Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events review: Netflix's take finally does right by the books

There’s no real way to say this without sounding cloyingly twee, but adaptations can only really thrive by sticking to their literal meaning. Putting a novel to screen through direct translation is near impossible, since the very language of written storytelling versus visual storytelling is so wildly different.

Fans can decry every minor change until the cows come home but, at the end of the day, that’s an attitude that inevitably betrays the very nature of the form. The importance of adaptation isn’t to document every beat of the narrative, but to capture – in whatever manner necessary – it’s feel, mood, and themes.

There are exceptions, though. Netflix’s take on the modern children’s classic Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events is, indeed, the kind of rare beast which manages to buck the rules; functioning as a surprisingly literal adaptation of the series, while managing to triumph as its own creation.

Lemony Snicket’s 13 novels (penned in reality by Daniel Handler) are some of the most intensely literary children's books in existence, with the first four here – The Bad Beginning, The Reptile Room, The Wide Window, and The Miserable Mill - being adapted; they delight fully in an expansiveness of vocabulary, in pulling narrative tricks like a rabbit out of a hat. The written word is an essential part of Lemony Snicket’s DNA, so to put any of it to film is something of a Herculean task.

Yet, it's all rather wonderfully and inventively managed in Netflix’s adaptation; putting Handler’s language at the centre of the proceedings by having his fictional alter ego, Snicket, physically walk into the midst of the story to narrate this sad tale. It’s a simple trick, but astonishingly effective when it comes to preserving the wit and language which defined the books.

Played to dry perfection by Patrick Warburton, Snicket will elsewhere interject in the most delightfully clever ways; cutting away to his cluttered home to reflect on the nature of things, using a theatrical stage to explain the difference between “literally” and “figuratively”, or even introducing a new chapter in the story through the guise of a fake weather report.

The 2004 film failed many fans simply because it took little interest in what made Handler’s series such a unique experience to readers, failing that core need for an adaptation to capture the right mood; snatching up the wider characters and plot details to deliver the usual mass-appealing family adventure, albeit tinged with a just a little of Tim Burton's style keep things nicely quirky.

Truthfully, however, it wasn’t the aesthetic qualities of Lemony Snicket’s willingly morbid world of the three Baudelaire Orphans – tossed from guardian to guardian after the death of their parents in a mysterious fire, forever on the run from the villainous Count Olaf, hell-bent on acquiring their inherited fortune – that really connected with young readers, but its self-possessed intelligence and maturity.

A Series of Unfortunate Events treated its younger readers with a directness and respect that’s so rarely seen in children’s fiction of any medium. It never looked down or patronised them; but presented three children who relished in their own intellectual curiosity and their love of learning - from Klaus the voracious reader, to Violet the inventor, or even baby Sunny’s love of biting things.

Netflix’s version understands this in a way the 2004 film never did, managing to be as in love with words and learning as the books. Often, it’s by reflecting upon the great minds of the past that the Baudelaires find temporary solutions to their troubles, or at least some simple comfort, whether it be Ida B. Wells, or author Haruki Murakami.

Sure, those are references that will sail straight over the heads of most children watching; yet, the point here is that the Snicket world offers a genuine trust in children that they do have the capability to understand things far beyond what most adults assume of them. And that’s a strangely empowering thing for a child to experience.

A Series of Unfortunate Events routinely parodies the adult world presenting grown-ups who insist they know far better than the Baudelaires, yet quickly prove they know next to nothing; consistently fooled are they by the poor disguises of the villainous Count Olaf. It understands that, sometimes, the mind of a child untouched by society's befuddling structures is actually far more perceptive; it's they who are quick to point out the lunacy of a lumber mill paying employees entirely in coupons, but with no money to buy anything in the first place.

The series’ adult cast take particular delight in the naiveté of their roles, especially in the likes of Joan Cusack, K. Todd Freeman, Alfre Woodard, and Rhys Darby; their performances may have a broad, pantomime flavour to them, but they work as seen through the eyes of children befuddled by their strange, myopic behaviour.

Neil Patrick Harris’ Olaf doesn't quite possess the comedic infectiousness Jim Carrey brought to the role yet, in a way, his is the superior performance; tackling Olaf as the true villain of the piece as opposed to its comic relief. He’s selfish, sinister, and cruel in all the best/worst ways; in love with himself, the acting talent he believes himself to have, and his own powers to manipulate people who think “closest living relative” should be interpreted in terms of physical distance.

Furthermore, the show’s morbidity is never tacky, but entirely sincere in its manners. Though its unfortunate events come with dire warnings for its audience to – as the theme song proclaims – “look away, look away”, this isn’t some Hot Topic-style, light-Gothic yarn but genuine tragedy; with the show’s narrative allowing the children to fully and painfully experience their grief, before finding hope and comfort in each other.

Much of Handler’s original dialogue is preserved here, with him working as a credited writer on the series, so it’s particularly touching to see the inclusion of one of his most memorable pieces of writing; in which he describes grief as, “like walking up the stairs to your bedroom in the dark, and thinking there is one more stair than there is. Your foot falls down, through the air, and there is a sickly moment of dark surprise as you try and readjust the way you thought of things.”

It is worth noting, for all its loyalty to the source material, that even Netflix must eventually deviate just a little; establishing a parallel narrative that works to deepen the mystery surrounding the Baudelaire’s parents and widen the forces at work beyond their immediate perils. In truth, it adds little and the links back to the main narrative can sometimes seem a little clunky, but its presence is entirely understandable in TV’s current obsession with leaving viewers parched for more by hanging as many unanswered questions over their head as possible.

And there’s certainly no way they can’t do a second season now.

Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events hits Netflix on 13 January.