"Treasure Island" by Robert Louis Stevenson and "Black Sails" by Starz Entertainment Group

This book was written in 1883, and has been reviewed many times by many people because it such a great story. My reasons for reviewing it however are somewhat different. This is because I just finished watching the fourth and last season of the Starz series "Black Sails", which was written as a prequel to Treasure Island and introduces you to many of the story's main characters. So, I suppose I am actually reviewing both Black Sails and Treasure Island but I figure I can try and get away with it just this once.

Typically - in my humble opinion - it is very rare for Hollywood to come even close to what an author actually has written. Most times they seem to take pride in the fact that when they buy the rights to a book or story they can totally change it and keep nothing but maybe the character names or the title. But that is simply a pet peeve that I have and luckily for you it won't be something I'll dwell upon, as you do not want me to start ranting about how Disney has ruined so many stories.

But because this show is a prequel (some 20 years previous) to the book the directors and writers had a great deal of latitude in what they could do. When actually comparing "Black Sails" to the book that inspired it there was very little that they actually did change. The few changes they made were in rather insignificant places. One of the few differences that I was able to note between the two was that in the book Long John Silver lost his leg from the hip down, during an accident at sea. In the series he loses it below the knee, during a fight / or you could possibly say as punishment.

In other areas, the show did make a few changes to the way history actually played out, but once again these were relatively minor, and these changes, do not detract from the story in any way.

All in all, I found Black Sails to be an excellent series, and I sincerely hope that the Starz people will consider making a version of Treasure Island to conclude the storyline. Rumour has it that there are spin-offs being considered dealing with other characters as well.

I should note that the series is quite graphic, and there is a fair bit of what some consider vulgar language, but anybody who has ever been around any real sailors (or construction workers for that matter), will know this really is how they talk.