Creativity Through “Unoriginality”
At the start of season 5, Game of Thrones had officially surpassed George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, which had served as their source material for the first four seasons. Fans were both nervous and excited to see how the so-far wildly successful adaptation would overcome its newest obstacle – coming up with original ideas. After significant criticism for the show’s finale in 2019, it is safe to say that Game of Thrones did not live up to fans’ expectations when it came to leaving behind the source material and introducing brand new plot points. But can any part of the show truly ever be original? The plot beyond the season four finale might have split from the source material, but the show will always be rooted in someone else’s work. By definition, no part of Game of Thrones can every really be original, but it is far from alone within the entertainment industry.
From adaptations to reboots, remakes, sequels, and retellings, none of the films most people flocked to see in 2018 were new. However, originality is a tricky concept. A product may be grounded in someone else’s idea, but by adding a different flair or providing a different perspective, can’t one person’s concept be the basis of another person’s original story? In other words, through the act of transforming someone else’s original work, can creativity be introduced until the final product is not a derivative, but a brand new concept? People are drawn to novelty because it communicates a sense of ingenuity and innovation. In turn, they reject conventionality because it communicates the opposite. But that isn’t always the case - if we all automatically rejected unoriginality based on it being the antithesis of originality, then our culture would be at a loss. Without the books The Godfather, Jaws, and Forrest Gump, we wouldn’t have the movie adaptations that have made such a big impact on contemporary culture. Without E.T.A Hoffman’s fairytale The Nutcracker and the Mouse King, we would never have gotten the classical ballet by the same name, and the world would never have heard Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker Suite.
If our understanding of originality abides by the dictionary definition - an idea that is the first of its kind - than this mindset suffocates true innovation. By limiting novelty to only a characteristic of a new notion, we undermine a product’s potential to become fresh through a metamorphosis of a pre-existing concept – originality is the end as much as it is the beginning. An outcome isn’t conventional because it is derived, but rather when the approach by which conceptualization comes to life lacks ingenuity. In other words, an imitative concept can become a refreshing product if the process is inventive enough to give the end product a unique quality. While Game of Thrones was successful as an original book series, the TV series was just as successful, if not more so. Originality does not determine success as much as innovation - the TV series was a fresh take on the book series, not just a word for word re-telling, which was why it enjoyed the achievements that it did.
There may come a time when there are no more original thoughts. Still, there can always be a new aspect that requires further exploration - a way of reiterating through an unconventional approach, or a new, unconsidered perspective. Jack L Warner’s My Fair Lady, the classic Audrey Hepburn movie was an adaptation of a musical by the same name, and that musical was a re-telling of George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion. Yet despite being a perhaps overdone story, the movie was awarded Best Picture at the 1965 Oscars. Originality doesn't just have to be contingent on coming up with a completely new idea, something can also become original through taking an existing concept and transforming it uniquely. Refusing to believe that originality pertains to the process as much as the idea would be close-minded, and it’s hard to be original when you’re close-minded.
