An Inside Look: A Guest Post by Peter Brown
A wonderful journey that looks closely at the relationship between nature and technology, The Wild Robot is a survival tale about a young robot lost in the wilderness.
Paperback $9.99
The Wild Robot (Wild Robot Series #1) (Movie Tie-In)
The Wild Robot (Wild Robot Series #1) (Movie Tie-In)
By Peter Brown
In Stock Online
Paperback $9.99
This #1 New York Times bestselling illustrated middle grade novel from a Caldecott Honor winner tells an extraordinary story full of action and thought-provoking questions as a robot learns to survive—and live—in the wilderness.
This #1 New York Times bestselling illustrated middle grade novel from a Caldecott Honor winner tells an extraordinary story full of action and thought-provoking questions as a robot learns to survive—and live—in the wilderness.
Long before I became an author and illustrator, I dreamed of working in animation. I grew up watching tons of animated movies and TV shows, I poured through books about the making of Disney animated movies, and I filled sketchbooks with drawings of my favorite cartoon characters. At art college I ended up falling in love with writing and illustrating children’s books, but I never lost my love of animation. So, to have my novel, The Wild Robot, adapted into an animated film by DreamWorks has been a really amazing experience for me.
The director of The Wild Robot movie, Chris Sanders, has an incredible track record. Among other animated movies, he co-wrote and co-directed the How to Train Your Dragon movies (which are based on the delightful illustrated novels by Cressida Cowell), and he also co-wrote and co-directed the much beloved Lilo & Stitch. When Chris signed on to direct The Wild Robot, I knew Roz and Brightbill were in good hands. Chris and I and Jeff Hermann, the producer, had many meetings where they asked me a wide range of questions about my story, about why I made certain decisions, about the research that I did for The Wild Robot, and they asked for my reaction to their ideas. It was quite a privilege to have an inside look at Chris’s thought process and to see how Jeff managed all the complexities of producing an animated film.
As the filmmaking process unfolded Chris shared with me the character designs and storyboards and pieces of concept art that were being made by his team of artists. It was around this time that I realized The Wild Robot movie wasn’t going to be exactly like my book. The animated characters were going to look a little different from my illustrated characters. The story was going to be a little different from my version. These changes weren’t a surprise to me. The process of adapting a book into an animated movie involves making countless tough decisions with the goal of creating the best movie possible, and that inevitably means making changes from the original story. Movies like The Wizard of Oz, Winnie the Pooh, The Secret of N.I.M.H., and Howl’s Moving Castle are all based on books. In each of those cases, the movie version strays from the original source material in all kinds of ways, and yet those movies went on to become classics. I think The Wild Robot movie will follow that same trajectory. The DreamWorks team has made a remarkable animated film that captures the spirit and tone and the essential details of my story, and that’s all I could ever hope for. I have no doubt that the movie is going to be a massive success. And if some of those moviegoers go on to read my original book, even better. I think both versions of The Wild Robot have something pretty special to offer.
