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March 29, 2024, 08:32:48 AM

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The Blade Artist (Begbie Trainspotting Series)

Started by Malcy, October 06, 2021, 01:32:44 PM

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Malcy

Begbie is getting a series based on the book.

QuoteWho's ready for more stories from the world of Trainspotting? Begbie star Robert Carlyle seems to be! A new TV series based on Trainspotting has been announced and rather than a reboot, this will continue the story of Begbie and we will, at least at first, see him as a changed man.

The series, which will be called The Blade Artist, is taken from the sequel book of the same name that was penned by Irvine Welsh. The news was revealed by Deadline.

Carlyle first played Begbie in the original Trainspotting movie in 1996. He reprised the role previously for the sequel that came out in 2017 but most of us thought that would be it for the character.

As for what this sequel series will be about, well, as mentioned, Begbie has got his life together and is in a much better place – he now uses the name, Jim Francis. But that all looks set to change when he returns to Edinburgh for his son's funeral. Begbie barely knew his son and his return to his home city will put his new life to the test.

https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/robert-carlyle-reprise-begbie-trainspotting-sequel-newsupdate/

I think this could be good. A different Begbie but no doubt he'll go full on at some point and glass someone!

jfjnpxmy

The book was fucking shite and Welsh hasn't written anything worth reading in 20 years. This will be a vanload of turds and I will watch it religiously.

An tSaoi

He'll have to break out of prison again.

I haven't read the book, but I read a synopsis.
Spoiler alert
Apparently, he moves to America, and has a wife and kids. He seems reformed, but then goes back to Edinburgh and murders everyone.
[close]
I don't think enough time has passed since the end of T2 to justify that much of a change in circumstances.

They should scrap the book and make a series about Begbie in prison, like Bronson. Or not bother and just leave well enough alone.

Brundle-Fly

They should have him start a male stripper troupe during a zombie outbreak in London.


Magnum Valentino

Quote from: Malcy on October 06, 2021, 01:32:44 PM
Begbie is getting a series based on the book.

https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/robert-carlyle-reprise-begbie-trainspotting-sequel-newsupdate/

I think this could be good. A different Begbie but no doubt he'll go full on at some point and glass someone!

If it's based on the book he'll end up doing worse than that.

jamiefairlie

Quote from: An tSaoi on October 06, 2021, 03:25:00 PM


They should scrap the book and make a series about Begbie in prison, like Bronson.

Still serving time for murdering Danny Kendall, good.

dissolute ocelot


Mister Six

Quote from: An tSaoi on October 06, 2021, 03:25:00 PM
He'll have to break out of prison again.

I haven't read the book, but I read a synopsis.
Spoiler alert
Apparently, he moves to America, and has a wife and kids. He seems reformed, but then goes back to Edinburgh and murders everyone.
[close]
I don't think enough time has passed since the end of T2 to justify that much of a change in circumstances.

Well it's coming up on five years since T2[nb]I love that this has supplanted Terminator 2 as the holder of the abbreviation.[/nb], and it'll be another two or three before this airs, most likely. If they fudge the date of T2 they could say ten or twelve years have elapsed, which seems like an all right passage of time for him to get his shit together a bit, make a sudden splash on the US art world and quickly become a cause celebre there.

What was the Begbie book before Blade Artist? Porno? What's the gap there?

Waking Life

I haven't read the Blade Artist book, but I'm curious about the notion of Begbie changing. He was probably the character in Trainspotting least likely to change in any way, although perhaps that's precisely the point. I remember reading the synopsis for Blade Artist and thinking it felt like fan fiction. Although same could be said for Porno.

Lisa Jesusandmarychain

Quote from: Waking Life on October 07, 2021, 06:12:58 AM
I haven't read the Blade Artist book, but I'm curious about the notion of Begbie changing. He was probably the character in Trainspotting least likely to change in any way, although perhaps that's precisely the point. I remember reading the synopsis for Blade Artist and thinking it felt like fan fiction. Although same could be said for Porno.

This. It's just so massively unlikely that Begbie would turn out to be a talented artist. In the Original " Trainspotting" , he was portrayed as a massively thick cunt while at school, and was doubtless destined to be one of those old jakies with all burst blood vessels in their nose and that, propping up the bar in some Edinburgh dive bar, just like his dad ( also featured briefly in the original book), not living in a nice, plush house, with a nice fit wife, being a celebrity in the art world, and rubbing shoulders with
Spoiler alert
and killing
[close]
film stars in fucking America ( is it Los Angeles where he lives? Cannae remember).

AllisonSays

Loads of artists who were 'massively thick cunts at school', though, I bet Caravaggio didn't get many A-levels.

I think this will be shite like everything Welsh has been involved with for the last twenty-odd years.

imitationleather

Sounds like Irvine Welsh nicked the idea from what happened to Adrian Mole's nemesis bully.

An tSaoi

Quote from: Mister Six on October 06, 2021, 11:12:36 PM
If they fudge the date of T2 they could say ten or twelve years have elapsed, which seems like an all right passage of time for him to get his shit together a bit, make a sudden splash on the US art world and quickly become a cause celebre there.

I suppose. Surely they'd be watching him like a hawk after his T2 break-out. Maybe he just serves his time.

Quote from: Mister Six on October 06, 2021, 11:12:36 PM
What was the Begbie book before Blade Artist? Porno? What's the gap there?

10 years between Trainspotting and Porno, made into 20 by the films, so it depends.

Quote from: Lisa Jesusandmarychain on October 07, 2021, 06:53:31 AM
It's just so massively unlikely that Begbie would turn out to be a talented artist.

Maybe not a talented artist, but a sort of outsider artist curio, like Bronson.



Maybe it could work if they make it clear his art isn't actually very good, but that his story of reformation is the selling point.

jfjnpxmy

The thing is, Begbie wasn't even that scary or remarkable in his first few appearances. He was a ten a penny thug, really only seeming hard because he was much more aggressive than those around him, and usually armed. A terrifying figure in the tiny circles he inhabits, but basically a nobody outside them.

And then by the Blade Artist he's the scariest man in the world, whose early years booting fuck out of wide-os on Leith Walk had somehow enabled him to become some kind of savant of murder, and still the world's strongest and deadliest man despite being a middle aged American art fart with a younger wife.

Coincidentally, at the time of writing, Welsh was a middle aged American art fart with a younger wife. The whole book read very much like Jeremy Usbourne convincing himself he could still duff up younger guys if he had to.

Magnum Valentino

We talked about it some over in the books forum but Welsh can't write Americans at all. It's so bad you convince yourself that he's doing it out of spite.

For anyone curious, Begbie's art is sculptures of people that he then defaces quite gruesomely.

He's also appeared since the Blade Artist in Dead Men's Trousers, a book I remember nothing about.

Perhaps his most memorable characteristic in these novels is his continued championing of Guns N Roses's widely-despised album Chinese Democracy. Aye, that'n killin'.

Waking Life

I don't think Begbie being a good (or bad) artist is particularly unbelievable - of course he could have had hidden talents - but reading the back cover of The Blade Artist (so I'm well informed), the concept of him becoming a properly changed man (even temporarily), exercising the necessary self-discipline to be successful, and socially adjusting to a very different element of society feels very far fetched. His first person chapters in Trainspotting - particularly the one on the train - show someone who has no social or self awareness, as well as significant mental health issues. He was spiralling the other way.

Maybe I should actually read the book instead of speculating. Robert Carlyle is a massive fan of playing Begbie though, so I'm not surprised he's on board with this.

Blinder Data

Begbie's transformation from criminal into artist could definitely happen because it has in real life - see Jimmy Boyle: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Boyle_(artist)

(Plus Irvine Welsh's own journey, of course.)

An tSaoi

According to that link, Boyle got into art in prison, did 14 years, then continued his art on the outside. There's no indication that Begbie has so much as picked up a pencil to date. He wrote a letter to the queen mind you.

It was enough of a stretch turning Spud into a talented writer.

Rizla

He retconned Begbie in the laughably godawful yet addictive prequel Skagboys[nb]Renton, in the aftermath of the Battle of Orgreave, wonders ""What am ah goannie dae wi' ma fuckin life???", later, Sickboy bitterly opines "it's no as if some cunt's goannie come along and make a film oot ay oor lives, is it?"[/nb], giving him an incredible singing voice that brings Spud to tears. He makes the whole gang have a band in fact, Matty on guitar, Renton on bass and a never-again mentioned BFF the drummer.

Waking Life

Quote from: An tSaoi on October 08, 2021, 03:07:23 PM
According to that link, Boyle got into art in prison, did 14 years, then continued his art on the outside. There's no indication that Begbie has so much as picked up a pencil to date. He wrote a letter to the queen mind you.

It was enough of a stretch turning Spud into a talented writer.

Yeah, I came on to say something similar. The only thing Boyle has in common with Begbie is that they are both violent criminals - Begbie is not at all written like Boyle. And Renton is Welsh's cipher, with Welsh's actual life nowhere near as dramatic

I wasn't even disputing he could discover chops as an artist, but a massive character change needs to be believable in a work of fiction. He's seemingly become a whole new person, not just discovering he has a hidden talent. A real life criminal's rehabilitation is not really a precedent (who, incidentally, initially became famous by writing a gangster autobiography).

mr. logic

For what's it worth, Renton spells out that begbie's art is objectively shit and a con In DMT

mr. logic

And I agree about spud, but he didn't become a talented writer in the book. His manuscript was rejected and mocked

An tSaoi

Yes, but I assume the Begbie TV show will follow the film continuity, so it's going to look weird that Spud became a published author, and Begbie became a famous artist. In the books doesn't Sickboy becomes a pornstar? I think Renton became a successful DJ. Can't they just end up working in Lidl? They can't all be famous.