The Reptile Room, The Wide Window, and The Fine Film by Lemony Snicket

My personal thoughts on the series as a whole (besides the fact that this series is incredibly wretched and full of unfortunate events is posted in my post prior. If you want to see my opinions on all the books as a whole, please (please do not, though, as the post is as wretched and full of unfortunate events as the actual series) go the one prior by scrolling down, a phrase which here means, 'putting your finger on the little bumpy area between the left and right button and pushing in downward'.

THE REPTILE ROOM

The Baudelaire orphans are taken to another relative, Doctor Montgomery Montgomery, who asks to be called Uncle Monty. Uncle Monty proves to be a wonderful man with a great interest in reptiles, particularly snakes, which is why he is a herpetologist, a word which here means, 'a person who studies snakes'. Here we also meet the Incredibly Deadly Viper, which is not deadly at all and it's name is a misnomer. For a short, happy while, the children go to the reptile room, where Uncle Monty keeps all his precious reptiles, work there and prepare for their trip to Peru. However, when Uncle Monty'd new assistant, who goes by the name Stephano, but is actually Count Olaf. The children try, again and again, to warn Uncle Monty of his Stephano's true identity, but fails to. On the day of the trip, they find Uncle Monty dead in the reptile room. It is revealed that Stephano's (Count Olaf's) plan is to take the children away to Peru and try to steal their fortune there. Luckily, the children manage the prove to Mr. Poe the truth, and escape their deaths, which, unfortunately, was not the only thing that escaped. Count Olaf and the hook-handed- man, (who also turns out to be a more prominent character than we though), who helped him in this scheme get away as well. The story end with the children saying good bye to all the reptiles including the Incredibly Deadly Viper.

NOTES ON THE REPTILE ROOM
There isn't really much to talk about in this book, except for the first appearance of the Incredibly Deadly Viper, which turns out to be a more important animal later on, and Bruce whom we will meet again later. There is also this:

No comment. 

THE WIDE WINDOW

The Baudelaire children are taken to their new guardian, Aunt Josephine, who is absolutely terrified of almost everything and loves grammar. For several days, the orphans go through, mediocre at best lives, certainly not satisfying ones, but safe ones. That is until Count Olaf comes yet again with another evil plan. He disguises himself as a sailor called Captain Sham (an accurate name, because Sham means fraud or hoax) and charms Aunt Josephine and tricks her into believing that he was only the best intentions for them. When Captain Sham reveals his true colors, he makes Aunt Josephine go into hiding after leaving a will that puts the children in Captain Sham's hands. While the children temporarily believe this is a forgery, they quickly realize, after a quick handwriting comparison, that this is not the case. When it seems like Captain Sham has the orphans in his clutches, Violet comes up with the idea to have for her and her siblings to have a peppermint, which they are allergic to, and buys them some time. Klaus deciphers the incorrect grammar mistakes to discover that they decode to 'Curdled Cave'. The three youngsters attempt to get to the cave, and they succeed by stealing a boat from Captain Sham. The person who looked like neither a man or a woman attempts to stop them, but the three manage to get away to Curdled Cave. They take Aunt Josephine from her hiding spot and attempt to return to the mainland, only to have the famous Lachryrmose leeches attack them. Violet uses to inventing skills to light a flare, which gets the attention of none other than Captain Sham. Captain Sham pushes Aunt Josephine into the lake to be devoured by the leeches and takes the Baudelaires to shore, only to have quick thinking Sunny bite off his peg leg to reveal the tattoo on his left ankle. Unfortunately, Count Olaf gets away yet again, leaving the Baudelaires to another undecided fate. 

NOTES ON THE WIDE WINDOW

I first want to talk about the scenes where they light a flare. This symbolizes all the extreme measures the Baudelaires will go through later on in their lives, where they will do even more impossible things and beyond. I also want to talk about how insensible Mr. Poe is. Not only is he incredibly ignorant, underestimates children that are ten times smarter than him, he is incredibly illogical, proven by the fact that he doesn't allow the orphans to be taken by a kind, just woman who has proven herself fit for the Baudelaire children and the Baudelaire like, but lets some random stranger who could VERY WELL BE Count Olaf he has just met that the orphans hate take them, no questions asked. *slow clap* Good job, Mr. Poe, good job. 

MOVIE COMPARISONS

I do this in this blog post because the movie consists of 4 parts: The beginning of the first book, the second book, the third book, and the ending of the first book. If it were any other movie, I would rant about the disloyalty this movie has to the books to no end, but here, for some reason, it wasn't really bothering me. In fact, I was actually enjoying myself, Albeit, the second part and the third part was actually pretty book loyal, aside from the entire spyglass mysterious subplot. The first and the last sections? Not so much. However, I think the reason I was not screaming out the details of the book while watching this is because there were only two pieces that were not following the book. Despite the fact that they were MAJOR that drove the plot, I will give credit to the director that it was an interesting way to drive the story and I liked it despite not being in the book. (Don't abandon the books because I said that, this will be the last time I will ever say that). But honestly, how much will it pay you to make Emily Browning write two words with her left hand? Probably less than the CGI solar beam you used, 

I think the biggest reason I liked this is because the atmosphere of the series was portrayed wonderfully in this movie. With the melancholy voice over of Jude Law, the cunning music, and the brilliant warning at the beginning, this movie had me enjoying it despite every single detail I could nitpick. 

Well, that's it for today. I hope you come for more boom reviews, except not the reviews reviewing this series. 

With all due respect, Sooyoung Jo