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I love Leroux's original. It made me cry. But it was really tough reading. I kept having urges to skip chapters, but then I'd miss something important and reluctantly go back and force myself to digest word after word after word in spots. Sort of like with Wicked. I have yet to read that book without skipping around... D: But you have to love the original.

Night Magic was pretty awful of a book. D: I don't care WHAT the author said. I didn't see no stinkin' Beauty and the Beast. I just saw a lustful old man with a quilt attached to his face molesting little girls. @_@ Which is different from ALW. As much as it sounds like it doesn't. D: Work with me here, okay? And The Phantom of Manhattan- oh gods, don't even get me going on that. The only thing I liked about that stupid book was the ******** cover. D:< The Angel of the Opera was odd. And rather difficult to digest. Erik seemed like he had a motivational problem. "She is singing to bring down the chandelier. Wooo. *unenthusiastically waves flags/banners*" XDD They could have at LEAST given him an exclamation point!

The ALW version I fell in love with. The music's amazing... I've pretty much memorized the script... I just don't like that he wasn't given a name. And I think Butler could have been a bit more... deformed in the movie. And... the Persian magically dissapeared D: But over-all, I love it.

Susan Kay's novel is probably my favourite. It instilled so many emotions in one little book.. I cried, I laughed, I smiled, I clutched my heart in symphathy, etc, etc. It was absolutely amazing. Although I don't see why Ayesha was added in. O_o I really don't. Coulda done without the cat. Definitely. But now every time someone in Health says "narcotic" as we're going a drug unit... I laugh hysterically. And they stare. D:

And I was SUPPOSED to see the Lon Chaney movie over the weekend, but my friend forgot to bring it with her. D: Bah. When I see it, I'll let you know.


...and this was a really long review. XD

I unfortunatley havent been able to read GL's book. Its not that I can't get a hold of it. Its the fact that it reads like a newspaper documentary and it puts me to sleep. Anything, no matter how exciting, when writen like that. It just becomes boreing.

But I did like Kay's version very much. The perspective shifts were wonderful and it seemed that she was able to understand Erik and how the suffering of having a deformed visage would affect and complicate his life. The drugs I think did make sense. If you had to live his life and for a small moment you could forget and not care about the horror in someones eyes when they look at you or the revultion that one would give you at just the thought of your touch for just a small moment, I think that anyone would do it. The Opium, the Morphine. Both were ways for him to forget. To numb his overly sensitive alertness of the world around him and how they react to his presence. Because when he was high he could beleive, even for a little while, that he was like everyone else.
And that's all he has ever wanted in his life. God granted him an extraordinary mind but he didnt give him the looks to be accepted for who he was. I bet that Erik would give all that up just to look "normal". Not necessarily handsome per sey. But at least not horribly disfigured. Because if he looked "normal" than he would be able to have a wife, be a father grow old next to a woman who loves him and die happy in his bed an old man.

Oh, on a different note. Have any of you ever read Sherlock Holmes meets tha Angel of the Opera? Sam Sciclliano is a great writer. He's no Conan Doyle but he is able to capture the genius of Sherlock none the less. And in the book Sherlock gives Erik Kudos on his booby traps that have been set through the catacombs. And he even comments that whoever designed the mechanisms and springs for the traps had a brilliant if slightly twisted mind. Its a great book. See if you can check it out some time. Its out of print now so I dont know if you can buy it anywhere but if you can. More power to you.

I still have yet to read Kay, but I will! I will once I find it! There are two Erik's I like/obsess over. Merik and Leroux's Erik. I prefer the full black mask however, it's more *coughsexycough*. (@purplebecca) And isn't it spelled 'Gerard', not 'Gerald'? And honestly, I love Leroux! I adore the books written like that, for whatever reason, it just is easier for me to read than current day stuff.