The Maze Runner: Book vs. Movie
Wes Ball’s 2014 film The Maze Runner is adapted from James Dashner’s 2009 novel. The story follows a memoryless teenager trapped in the Glade, where a changing maze and its Grievers stand between the residents and escape.
From Books Adapted
What changed from the book
Thomas and Teresa lose their telepathic connection
The movie adapts the first novel through the escape from the Maze. The later trials belong to the next two books and movies.
One of the first book’s major differences is how Thomas and Teresa communicate. They can talk in each other’s minds in the novel. The movie removes that ability, while keeping their connection to a past neither fully remembers.
The change continues into The Scorch Trials. Dylan O’Brien explained that the second book uses the loss of mental contact to create distance between them. Without telepathy, the movies have to establish that separation through their behavior and circumstances instead.
Contains spoilersTap to show
The Maze is outside instead of beneath an artificial sky
Dashner’s Maze is underground, with an artificial sky overhead. The movie puts it outdoors.
Wes Ball said he removed the artificial environment because he wanted the place to feel physically real. That changes what lies beyond the walls: the movie’s Gladers emerge into the ruined outside world rather than discovering that the sky above them was part of the construction.
About the book and the movie
- Author
- James Dashner
- Year
- 2009
- Pages
- 375Buy book
- Audiobook length
- 10 hr 50 minGet audiobook
- Narrator
- Mark Deakins
- Series
- The Maze Runner, book 1
Thomas wakes inside a metal lift with no memory beyond his name and emerges into the Glade, a settlement run by boys who arrived the same way. Beyond its walls, Runners map a shifting maze inhabited by deadly Grievers, but the arrival of Teresa, the first girl and apparently the last newcomer, signals that the system around them is changing.
- Director
- Wes Ball
- Writer
- Noah Oppenheim, Grant Pierce Myers, T.S. Nowlin
- Year
- 2014
- Runtime
- 1 hr 53 minWatch on Amazon
- Cast
- Dylan O’Brien, Kaya Scodelario, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Will Poulter, Patricia Clarkson
- Genre
- action, dystopian, Fantasy, Mystery, post-apocalyptic, science fiction, Thriller
- IMDb
- View on IMDb
Thomas is delivered to the Glade, where a group of teenage boys has built a fragile community beside a vast mechanical maze. His refusal to accept the Gladers’ rules draws him into the maze and its Grievers, while Teresa’s unexpected arrival and fragments of Thomas’s returning memory point toward the organization controlling their captivity.
Other books in this series
- 1The Maze RunnerMovie · 2014You are here
- 2
The Scorch TrialsMaze Runner: The Scorch Trials · Movie · 2015Details
- Director
- Wes Ball
- Writer
- T.S. Nowlin
- Year
- 2015
- Runtime
- 2 hr 11 min
- Cast
- Dylan O’Brien, Kaya Scodelario, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Giancarlo Esposito, Aidan Gillen, Patricia Clarkson
Thomas discovers that the facility sheltering the Gladers is controlled by WCKD and is harvesting immune teenagers for its research. He escapes with his friends into the Scorch, a ruined landscape filled with infected Cranks, and searches for the resistance known as the Right Arm while WCKD forces pursue them.
- 3
The Death CureMaze Runner: The Death Cure · Movie · 2018Details
- Director
- Wes Ball
- Writer
- T.S. Nowlin
- Year
- 2018
- Runtime
- 2 hr 23 min
- Cast
- Dylan O’Brien, Kaya Scodelario, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Nathalie Emmanuel, Giancarlo Esposito, Aidan Gillen, Ki Hong Lee, Patricia Clarkson
Thomas and the surviving Gladers launch a rescue mission after WCKD captures Minho and takes him to the fortified Last City. With Newt’s condition worsening and WCKD still experimenting on immune children, Thomas must enter the organization’s stronghold and choose how far he will go to save his friends.
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