[granville1]

Most of us here are aware of the vast differences between the Legion novel and the Legion film. I would love to see Blatty write a book called: “Legion: from Novel to Film” but that probably won't happen. Anyway, I have some questions about the novel, if anyone would care to discuss them.

This will, of course, contain *SPOILERS*:

1. I don't understand Kinderman confronting Temple with Temple's previous involvement in the Gemini case. Blatty links this with Kinderman's suspicion that Temple is interracting with Vennamun about the Gemini case, and thus possibly planting information in Vennamun that – if he's not really the soul of James Vennamun – Patient X could not possibly have known. If that was the case, then the chances that the Gemini was really present in Karras' body are severely lessened, because it makes him look dependent on Gemini data from an outside source. However, I'm not sure that Blatty wants the reader to think this. So his involving Temple with the Gemini case is baffling to me.

2. Amfortas is definitely one of the murderers. His double assures him of this and partially forgives, and partially condemns Amfortas for his involvement. Why, after building Amfortas up as a Karras-like sufferer, does Blatty need to implicate him in the murders? Just to introduce the Doppelganger? Especially since Amfortas was committing the crimes in a tumor-induced blank state and was not morally responsible.

3. The Doppelganger, who Blatty depicts as Amfortas' “good” Self and total truth-teller, says that Amfortas' great love cheated on him with Temple. Why is this element even in the story? Up until then, Amfortas' inner ruminations never hint that she had been unfaithful to him. How does this help complete the Amfortas story? If Blatty is trying to use “the cheating girlfriend” as a basis for Amfortas' (unconscious) rage, it doesn't work, primarily because Amfortas is not enraged – he's crushingly depressed and grieving. It seems to be – like his involvement in the murders – an arbitrary and nasty swipe at the tormented neurologist.

4. What purpose is served by the large section concerning Dyer's agreement to not blow the whistle on Amfortas' EVP research? Granted, it's a very creepy story, but how does it interract with the theme of the Gemini twins and Karras' reanimated corpse – the essential themes which form the novel's basic structure? The “dead people talking” theme does not occupy a significant or crucial place in the basic narrative, except, of course, that the “dead” Gemini is talking. It strikes me that Blatty's own personal EVP research prompted him to write this section, but there is very little linking material between it and the rest of the novel.

[granville1]

** bump ** … ?

Anyone? Surely many of us have read the book and have questions … ? Maybe even related to the questions I'm asking in this thread … ?

[Rye]

I think the point of this was just to give Kinderman some kind of “rational” way of how Patient X knew things.

 

Other points, I think adding the Amfortas character to the film would have given Kinderman/viewers a better insight but it may have been too much for the audience who don't need info overkill. Amfortas comes across in the novel as a “good” character but has demons. Perhaps mentioning his wife cheating on him despite him holding onto his love for her makes you sympathize with his character more. I liked the role of Amfortas but wished a better ending for him or somehow he was more helpful towards the resolution.

 

I felt the book was getting away from the exorcism/demon aspect- the nurse Keating had her organs taken out and replaced by electrical outlets however in the film, its rosary beads.

 

Not too sure why the Gemini killer's body was not found in the book was electrocuted in the film. Why change that detail?

[granville1]

Thanks for your reply 🙂

My only thought as to why the Gemini's death was changed to the electric chair is that, in retrospect, Blatty may have have thought the image of Vennamun climbing a bridge only to be shot down by cops was way over the top (I thought so when I read Legion), and “The Chair” would be a less dramatic image for audiences…

[Rye]

The change from shot down by cops compared to the chair… seemed weird. I thought the novel was trying to make a point that the Gemini's body was never found (creating some kind of possibility that he survived perhaps? Creating doubt?  Even though being riddled with bullets and and falling off a bridge seems pretty obvious therefore still baffled why the change. Would the Gemini killer ever let the police capture him alive?

 

Do you think leaving Amfortas character out of the film was a good idea?

[granville1]

Putting Amfortas in the movie would have changed it considerably – he would be the film's Karras-like figure, and his EVP work would have added some extra weirdness to the story. I don't know why Blatty thought Amfortas was expendable for the film version. Maybe the character was too internal – he doesn't do much and we only know about him from text, not from his own words and actions – so his story would not be easy to film…?

I don't think the novel's “the Gemini's body was never found” ever really created room for doubt that the Gemini had survived. Such a scenario would cast too much doubt on the story's central motif that the Gemini was physically dead but spritually alive. If the Gemini was alive, then who was possessing Karras's body? Karras had no knowledge of Vennamun, and even if he had, how to explain his imitating Vennamun, and to explain his false belief that he has become Vennamun, and how to explain his miraculous resuscitation? No, the story requires a dead Gemini in order to keep the supernatural elements viable.

[Author]

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