This March, Daisy Jones & The Six came to life on the screen, based on the 2019 Taylor Jenkins Reid novel of the same name. Filled with original music and a star-studded cast, including Sam Claflin and Riley Keough, the 10 episode mini-series took on a life of its own. What follows is my review of the adaptation, including what it did β or didn’t β capture from the incredible novel. All opinions are solely my own. If you haven’t read the book or watched the show, please proceed with caution!! Major spoilers ahead.
Daisy Jones & The Six is one of my favorite books of all time, so when the show came out I was equal parts excited and terrified. Having your favorite novel come to life before you can be a blessing and a curse. Adaptations are fickle things to create, and I give major props to the cast and crew of this show for producing what they did. It took the Internet by storm and left lasting impressions on its viewers. Let’s get into some of my personal favorite things they did, as well as what I felt could’ve been handled better.
There have to be certain liberties taken in transforming a book into a TV series, but I feel that the drug abuse and addiction was sort of played down in the show. It was alluded to a lot, and we saw Daisy in the midst of her overdose, but it only skimmed the surface for me. In the book, addiction is explored and talked about a lot more, which is incredibly important for the plot and for understanding the characters and their motivations. I understand it is a little more delicate to be showing things explicitly on screen, but there was a missed opportunity for me. One of my favorite things about the book is how the characters are so quintessentially human β messy, selfish, vulnerable. Daisy and Billy both do incredibly selfish things, they hurt the people that they love, they choose the wrong things over and over again β and yet we still root for them because of their incredible characterization. The show skimmed over a lot of that for me in favor of making the characters seem more likeable. The fact is, a lot of the time they aren’t likable! But we love them anyway. That’s the beauty of the story.
Let’s detour to talk about Chuck for a second, one of the original members in The Dunne Brothers and… a dentist? This came way out of left field for me. In the novel, Chuck is drafted to the Vietnam War and is killed. This was really important in showing the political and social climate of the times, and part of the rise of rock music. It seems odd to just ignore that. A weird change, but didn’t ruin the show or anything.
One thing the books didn’t include that the show did is a bigger focus on Simone Jackson, disco pioneer and Daisy’s closest (and really, only) friend. She is featured in the book only in relation to Daisy, commenting and verifying on various aspects of Daisy’s rise to fame. But the show takes Simone and gives her her own life, telling the story of how she moved to New York to pursue her music career and helped propel the disco genre into popularity. It also brought to light the struggles of a Black, queer woman in the 1970s, and the importance they had in our culture that is so often overlooked. Simone deserves her own show, if I’m being honest! Nabiyah Be did such an incredible job bringing her to life.
Romance is something that is typically amplified in book to screen adaptations, and this is true for this series as well. It certainly emphasizes Daisy and Billy’s will-they-won’t-they relationship, and the implications and consequences this had on Billy’s marriage with Camilla. I think they did a great job with this, highlighting the messiness and complications of the relationship where nothing was black and white. I will say, though, I did not like the Camilla/Eddie relationship at all. Book Cami would never! This brought her down to Billy’s level, and Camilla was not the type who would do something like that. It is implied in the novel that she also cheats on Billy, but with an unnamed high school boyfriend, not with a member of Billy’s band β let alone one he already has a tumultuous relationship with! This doesn’t sit with Camilla’s character and didn’t sit with me either.
The original music, all performed by the cast, is incredible. Check it out on Spotify or other streaming services now if you haven’t listened already β for me it’s been on repeat since its release! It captures everything about the show β and in extension, the book β and is just downright catchy. If they go on tour, I will certainly be buying tickets!
Karen and Graham’s relationship was my favorite part of the book, and overall, I’m happy with the way it was portrayed in the series. Suki Waterhouse and Will Harrison did an incredible job and had great chemistry. Their love story breaks me in the best possible way. The elevator scene? Just rip my heart out and stomp on it, why don’t you. But seriously, it was wonderful getting to see their story play out, and if I have any critique it’s only that they didn’t get more screen time.
The show was honestly one of my favorite adaptations on a book done, and that’s saying a lot! It took on a life all it’s own, paying homage to the book while still adding its own twists and ideas. Add into that the fashion, 1970s aesthetics, and original soundtrack, and this easily became one of my favorite TV shows. The story, both in novel and screen form, is going to stick with me for a long, long time.