This Sci-Fi Clasic Will Never Be Adapted Faithfully

Some classic sci-fi novels get the luxury of excellent big-screen adaptations (like Denis Villeneuve’s work on Dune); others are so complex that they are almost impossible to adapt. Sometimes, Hollywood knows a book won’t work on the big screen, but the powers that be try it anyway. Then try again. And, because the third time’s the charm, it tries once more. There are many great sci-fi novels that should be turned into live-action movies; conversely, there is one that Hollywood needs to learn won’t work on the big screen… at least, not the way they think it can.

I Am Legend by Richard Matheson is often hailed as one of the greatest sci-fi/fantasy novels of all time. Even if you’ve never read the book, then once you’ve finished reading this – go and read that book! You most likely know the title “I Am Legend” from the 2007 movie adaptation starring Will Smith; however, what you might not know is that the Will Smith film is far from the first (unfaithful) adaptation of Matheson’s novel.

Tales of the Many Failed I Am Legend Movies

2007’s I Am Legend wasn’t the first film adaptation of Richard Matheson’s novel, but it is by far the biggest. Directed by Francis Lawrence, the movie changed almost everything about the core story in the book aside from some character names. Dr. Robert Neville was a scientist in the novel, he was looking for a cure for the world-ending virus, and there was a dog. But that’s about where the similarities end. The film changed the sentient manipulative vampires to rampaging zombies. Additionally, it added other survivors which completely altering the course of the book.

Before Will Smith’s I Am Legend, Boris Sagal directed The Omega Man, which was released in 1971 starring Charlton Heston as Neville. Like the 2007 adaptation, The Omega Man also made some major changes to the book — although they at least had the decency to alter the title of the film, as well. Again, Neville was a scientist, but there were also many other survivors, with Neville tasked with trying to cure those who had become contaminated with a “plague.”

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The first I Am Legend adaptation came in 1964, a decade after the novel’s publication. The Last Man on Earth starred Vincent Price as, well… the last man on Earth. The film is considered to be the most faithful adaptation so far, but even it made some big detours from the original novel. For starters, the intelligent vampires were swapped out for some brainless undead. The movie captured many of the themes of the novel, including the effects of Neville’s isolation, but omitted one of the most important and intriguing aspects of the novel: the science.

What Is I Am Legend Actually About? (& Why It Will Never Be Adapted Properly)

Why does every adaptation of I Am Legend fall short of the original novel? It has to do with Hollywood’s insistence that the story would make a great action/post-apocalyptic movie, where one man hunts the undead and defies the odds at the end of the world. But, the novel couldn’t be further from that. I Am Legend is less about Neville’s physical battles against the vampires and more about his psychological and intellectual battle against the nature of the vampiric disease.

Over half of I Am Legend is Dr. Robert Neville attempting to create a cure for the “disease,” one which leads Matheson to essentially write a scientific thesis on how vampires could actually exist. Why do they hate garlic, is it a folktale or is there a chemical component? Do Hindu or Muslim vampires also fear the cross? And why can’t they handle sunlight? In between these thought-provoking questions, I Am Legend also depicts Robert Neville’s own mental struggle against the vampires who come to his house every night to lure him out. They aren’t mindless creatures. One is his old best friend, who tries to convince him to leave the house, while some of the female vampires attempt to provocatively lure him out.

The novel also has one of the greatest literary endings of all time, which is so often ruined when the core themes of the book are changed in the adaptation process. The alternative ending to 2007’s I Am Legend attempted to replicate this, but widely missed the mark.

As amazing as that story sounds, it is hard to translate it to the big screen. So much of it is introspective and internalized in Robert Neville’s inner monologue. A faithful I Am Legend movie would be less 28 Days Later and more The Seventh Seal. To say it would never work on the big screen is a slight exaggeration, but it will never work in the way that Hollywood seems set on trying.

I Am Legend with Will Smith can be purchased or rented on Apple TV or Amazon Prime Video.