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Topic : Re: What can a novel do that film and TV cannot? I have enjoyed writing prose for years and have a few short stories penned. I would like to build up to a novel but believe I have identified - selfpublishingguru.com

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I think in recent years the gap between what is "possible" in a prose vs. film (both cinema and TV) has narrowed significantly - historically the limitations and expense of things like CGI and practical effects made some of the more exotic genres such as Sci-Fi and Fantasy difficult to translate onto film. This is realistically no longer the case in 2019 - assuming budget can be found of course!

That doesn't mean there aren't still potential advantages to prose though - and you're probably already taking advantage of them without even realizing it!

Length

While audiences are more accepting of longer films then they used to be (remember all the fuss over Titanic at 195 mins? Avengers: Endgame is only 15 minutes shorter!) getting a reasonable-length novel into even three hours screen time is difficult without making cuts. TV used to be even more affected - the need to make relatively self-contained stories in ~45 mins of run time severely hampered the complexity and length of stories you could tell, binge-watching and the streaming services have changed that significantly now. But even so the episodic splits need taking account of and mean the story can suffer.

Inner thoughts and feelings

Being in a character's POV (either first or third person limited) can give you a great deal more scope for showing their internal state. On screen you are limited to how the character presents, unless you do narration devices whereas in prose you can show what they are thinking/feeling and how they are acting essentially simultaneously. You can be much more engaging with physical sensations as well in much the same way. Which leads me to..

POV options

First person, Third person, Third person-limited, Multiple POVS - these give you multiple ways to tell the story and engage with character(s).

Passage of time

While CGI and practical effects have again reduced this in a book you can naturally show the entire life cycle of a character. Complete with growing up, aging etc far easier. You can reverse this as well or even halt it. David Boreanez played a "never-aging" immortal for ~7 years on TV. And one who was supposed to be visually young in age. They pulled it off - pretty well actually. But how long could you do that for before the suspension of disbelief gets absurd? Sure you can digitally de-age people reasonably well these days (see Samuel L. Jackson in Captain Marvel) but at a certain point it's going to start becoming an issue.

Anyone can die

Want to shock-kill your biggest character? No problem - no worries about contracts or anything like that. Game of Thrones was notable in TV in that people in the main cast were almost as vulnerable to the plot as a redshirt. In most TV series you know that the majority of the time the main cast is going to make it out of peril because, well they are the main cast - they are in the opening credits and everything.

Much less "censorship"

Censorship feels like too strong a word - but movies and TV have a much tougher time getting more "adult" content such as violence and swearing in then books do. They have regulatory bodies and age ratings to worry about. Game of Thrones was considered extremely edgy for TV (even for HBO) - and it's not even that full-on by book standards (can you imagine anyone trying to get an uncut version of Scott Lynch's Gentleman Bastards series on to TV?)


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