I know that the movie adaptation of a book is hard to perform - seldom succeeds - and this one proves it. Most of the actual humor (dark, subtle, dry, crazy) and the subtle message from the book comes from the extremely clever narrative and situations and dialogues arising from them, not the other way around. This series depicts only the circumstances (and even that in general), taking (randomly?) the pieces from the book and trying to connect them using ... I don't know what (so called "fillers"?) but it's not functioning. It is simply not coherent. The novel Catch 22 itself is "sacred" and crazy as it gets (as well as every character in it). Extremely funny also (as much as war can be, that is). Read it several times, once a year at least (never gets "out of fashion" or becomes "obsolete"). However, the cinematography and casting are excellent. Choice of locations also. But I think Mr. Heller did not have a movie/series in mind writing it (quite the opposite of MASH). Let me make a comparison: the original Blade Runner has almost nothing to do with the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (which is all about artificial vs. natural life). P.K. Dick also did not write the script for a future movie. However, both are masterpieces in their own category. Lord of the Rings suffers from almost the same problem. In all mentioned cases literary templates are simply not suitable for anything but reader's "visualization". In that sense Catch 22 series is a miss, but one has to appreciate the guts for attempting. Just read the book, and you'll remember it the rest of your life (and come back to it). Watch this series and you'll soon forget it. 6 stars for bravery (although futile).
Review of Catch-22
