Fans of Edith Wharton's Buccaneers Already Disappointed in Apple TV+ Version

Apple TV+'s new period drama The Buccaneers hasn't even premiered yet, but it's already garnering disgruntled comments from viewers. While the series is set to land on the platform on November 8, the official trailer has just hit the official Apple TV accounts.

The trailer left viewers with mixed feelings. While the ensemble cast, including fan favorite Christina Hendricks, looks gorgeous and it is exciting to see another high-budget romantic tale, what bothers fans the most is that Apple seems to be trying to ride the Bridgerton wave.

Ever since Netflix hit the jackpot with Shondaland's show, every streaming service wants their Bridgerton. And that's normal, until they start distorting the perfectly great source material for this trend.

Edith Wharton's writing is a treasure

The Buccaneers is based on the novel by Edith Wharton, who lived during the Gilded Age and had first-hand knowledge of the upper-class New York aristocracy, which she successfully reflected in her books.

Wharton's insider descriptions of the lives and morals of members of the Gilded Age families are riveting and keep readers hooked to the books, which are so much more than just another period romance, let alone a historical fantasy romance with modern tropes and characters.

The witty social commentary, gentle judgment, and cynicism are tempered with compassion and enlivened with humor in Wharton's novels. And fans of her work have come to expect the same from the series based on them.

The show looks nothing like the book

However, the new trailer became a huge disappointment for all Wharton fans and showed that the creators were not interested in serving something different on the table and making a faithful adaptation of her novel, but just wanted to create a new Bridgerton.

While the creators took the main premise of the novel, which is about new-money American girls going to London to marry nobility, they also modernized it beyond recognition. The protagonists have eradicated the girl-boss sensibility, the costumes and hairstyles are pleasing to the eyes of 21st century viewers, the storylines are reminiscent of something we might see in a modern romance series.

'Hollywood does a "follow the leader" thing,' a fan commented on the trailer on Reddit. 'They should've bought one of the many historical romance novels that are set in the era and adapted it as the Bridgerton knock-off they clearly wanted instead of doing this to Edith Wharton's Buccaneers.'

The copy is never as good as the original, and Apple should know that better than anyone.

Source: Reddit.