Interview: ‘Wildwood’ Author Colin Meloy and Illustrator Carson Ellis Chat About Seeing Their Book Become an Animated Movie

For anyone to see their work adapted, it’s a mix of dread and honor. Imagine the pride of having a book you’ve written turned into a movie? Now, also imagine the fear that those who are taking it to a new medium will ruin it. Conflicting emotions, right? For author Colin Meloy (also the frontman for the rock band The Decemberists) and illustrator Carson Ellis (they’re also married), they lucked out in having Travis Knight and Laika adapted Wildwood. The final product thrilled them, as you’ll find out next. I recently spoke to Knight here, as well as voice actors Peyton Elizabeth Lee and Jacob Tremblay here. Now, it’s Meloy and Ellis’ turn.

As a reminder, I spoke highly of the film here in my review like so:

It is absolutely mind-boggling to me that Laika is able to do what they do. Stop-motion animation is so difficult, so expensive, and so time consuming, anyone who is able to complete a project deserves my deepest respect. At the same time, as impressive as Laika’s visuals always are, I don’t always fully connect with their stories. Truly, only ParaNorman is the only time I was completely locked in from start to finish. So, it’s probably not a surprise that Wildwood is far more stunning to me as a visual treat than as a fantasy epic. That being said, as someone who doesn’t tend to dig fantasy films, having this movie work for me is an achievement all its own.

Wildwood is a true animated epic, which would be impressive enough, even before you consider what goes into doing this all with stop-motion animation. The size and scale help to create a full world, one unlike we’ve seen before in the form, especially during a stunning third act battle sequence. Now, there’s a flip side to this, as the flick runs well over two hours, with a notable hump in the middle. It starts and ends well, but the middle, while interestingly dense, struggles to keep up the momentum.

Below, you can see my conversation with Ellis and Meloy. Our couple of minutes together was focused on seeing the flick sprout out of their illustrations and text, as well as what letting go of the source material means. The trust they had in Knight and Laika is evident, not just in what they tell me, but in how good the film turned out. Wildwood is in theaters now and if you haven’t seen the stop motion animated movie yet, you owe it to yourself to check it out.

Here now is my interview with Wildwood author Colin Meloy and illustrator Carson Ellis. Enjoy:

Wildwood is in theaters now!