“I am fascinated by last words,” Miles “Pudge” Halter opens in Hulu’s “Looking for Alaska” mini-series adaptation.
In the long-awaited screen adaptation of John Green’s 2005 debut novel, “Looking for Alaska,” Miles “Pudge” Halter, played by Charlie Plummer, is a 16-year-old high school junior transferring to Culver Creek Academy in Alabama. Miles is shown as an awkward loner from Florida who is obsessed with last words, specifically those of French poet Francois Rabelais: “I go to seek a great perhaps.”
The story revolves around how Miles and his friends navigate the Culver Creek social maze while balancing academics, teen angst, nicotine addiction and Miles’s search for “a great perhaps.”
As Miles moves into Culver Creek, he is quickly introduced to his roommate Chip “The Colonel” Martin, masterfully portrayed by Denny Love. The Colonel is a genius, hard-nosed and underprivileged student who has an aptitude for pranks. The Colonel ironically nicknames Miles “Pudge,” for his slight stature.
Throughout move-in day, The Colonel introduces Pudge to the remainder of the cigarette-loving friend group: fun-loving Takumi Hikohoto, played by Jay Lee, and the chaotic title character, Alaska Young, played by Kristine Froseth. Miles is also introduced to the school’s intimidating dean, Mr. Starns, played by Timothy Simons, who is aptly nicknamed “The Eagle.”
The trio of friends quickly becomes a quad after Pudge refuses to join the trio’s campus rivals, “the Weekday Warriors,” rich students who live close enough to the campus to go home on weekends. He is abruptly wrapped up in plastic wrap by the Warriors and thrown into the creek.
The quad hastily embarks into a prank war with The Weekday Warriors. The squads go back and forth with pranks involving hair dye, scissors, fireworks and fire alarm sprinklers.
As the four become close, Miles becomes keenly attracted to Alaska. He becomes obsessed with her mysterious wit and her obsession over the fictitious last words of Simon Bolivar: “Damn it, how will I ever get out of this labyrinth.”
Meanwhile, in the classroom, Miles is captivated by his world religion class, taught by Mr. Hyde, an elderly man, played by Ron Cephas Jones. Miles becomes engrossed in his class from Hyde’s introduction: “Our time together may be short, but we are engaged in the most important pursuit of all: the search for meaning. What is the nature of being human? How did we come to be?”
As the series unfolds, the four friends smoke and drink cheap wine while trying to figure out life before college. For Pudge, Culver Creek is everything that he could have wanted, until one night when Alaska drunkenly leaves campus and everything changes.
While the mini-series takes little out of the original novel, Plummer’s awkward adaptation of Miles is strikingly similar to Dustin Hoffman’s character of Benjamin Braddock in the 1967 film “The Graduate,” as an awkward loner searching for more.
While Lee’s and Froseth’s performances were also noteworthy, none were more impressive than Denny Love’s adaptation of The Colonel. His stocky prowess demanded attention on the screen and perfectly encapsulated Green’s original transcript.
Hulu’s “Looking for Alaska” is not only a nostalgic coming of age story about an adolescent’s search for meaning. It is a cornish and profound story about addiction, religion, longing and grief.
By Matt Villanueva, Opinion Editor
villanjm18@bonaventure.edu
