Game Of Thrones - Book/TV discussions - WITH SPOILERS

I started watching this show just a couple days ago. Truly the best decision I've made in months. I'm 4 episodes in, and I'm hooked. My thoughts so far:

- Peter Dinklage is The Shit. He's even better than I expected. His character has more swagger than the entire Fab Five.

- I hate Queen Cersei (and her brother/lover and faggy son, for that matter). I have a feeling that I'm going to end up disliking her more than Rick's wife in The Walking Dead.

- You can make a fantastic drinking game using only the words 'winter,' 'snow,' and 'cold.'

 

the bit that has me thrown in the series at the moment is Jon and Ygritte, it's been a while but didn't he tell her to piss off then rejoin the other Crows. It was with the others that he got surrounded and killed Half-Hand. Was an important bit in painting if he was a traitor to the watch or had no choice in the books.

 

We have wandered pretty far afield from the books, Bundy.

They are compressing characters to save time, among other changes, which might be troubling to a purist. I am just enjoying the series for what it is rather than over thinking it.

Cheers.

 

The compression is super odd given the fact most HBO shows are 13 episodes, but they're doing it in 10. But seriously, I'm watching the show and having fun with it because I'm seeing something different and fun on the screen with the same characters, landscape and scene that I love. If they did everything word for word, and exactly the way it was in the books, it'd be boring.

 

Yes, but also think about how expensive a show like GoT must be for HBO. CGI Dragons and direwolves, special effects, shooting all over the world, not to mention the budget for costumes and props, has to make the budget for this show be especially high. Keeping it to 10 episodes probably keeps their budget in check.

The Jon and Ygritte scenes, I thought, were good (and shit is Ygritte hot), although I thought the point in the book was the Halfhand told Jon to do everything possible to gain the complete trust of the Wildlings. If they remove that conversation, it will look much more like Jon just decided to turn on the Night's Watch instead of "going undercover" so to speak. That was kind of an important conversation, at least from Jon's perspective, even if no one else knew about it.

 

My guess is that in the season finale, Halfhand will be captured and Jon will kill him. It just seems like such an important plot point to completely leave out.

 

That was exactly the point I was making in my previous post. I'm loving the series and how it has divergances from the books but I thought that particular conversation was very important to Jon's arc and I'm not sure if it can happen now with him having been caught.

 

They also skipped Jon and Sam finding the dragon glass weapons. I'm guessing they give that to Sam for the season finale.

 

Easy, they capture Jon, use him track down QH, and say you have to kill him. During the close stab scene, QH can whisper it in his ear. Ygritte does her vouching thing and it goes from there.

 

I had last night off work, so I stayed up all night and watched the rest of season 1 in one sitting. That's 6 episodes, back-to-back. Goddamn, this show is addicting. I need to learn moderation.

Thanks again to all you guys who told me how much I was missing out.

 

I've put four or five friends onto the show and they've all cursed me numerous times for stealing away their study time.

 

There's a world of great books out there. For instance, just on my iPad I still need to read Faulkner's "The Sound and The Fury", McCarthy's "Sutree" and another fantasy series called "Acacia", which I'm told is quite good.

Yet, here I am reading Game of Thrones over again, and I never read books a second time. Goddamn I think it's even better the second time around.

 

Okay. I just finished A Storm of Swords and it was awesome. Too bad A Feast for Crows ( edited to add: so far, at least) blows harder than a wolf trying to eat little pigs in shoddily constructed homes.

Spoiler

But seriously, fuck the Freys. Fuck them so hard. And that lying cuntface Lysa Arryn. And the Boltons. How someone like Roose Bolton isn't murdered in his sleep is beyond me.

Questions/Discussion points:
-Who is actually the father of Lysa Arryn's son Robert?
-Why doesn't Brienne have a personality? Her chapters are so, so, so mindnumbingly boring.
-What was the implication of Shae being in Tywin's bed? Are we supposed to assume that Tyrion became enraged by the hypocrisy, or that Tywin also fucked Tysha before sending her off into the unknown?
-Out of all the places in Westeros and beyond, I think I would want to live in Dorne. Second choice is obviously Highgarden. Third choice is Braavos.
-Lord Commander Snow is boss. That is all.

 

Spoiler

-Who is actually the father of Lysa Arryn's son Robert? I never got the impression it wasn't Jon Arryn. A quite google search implies some people think he might be the son of Littlefinger, but the thing about the ASOIAF fanbase is there are some adherants for almost any theory you can imagine.
-Why doesn't Brienne have a personality? Her chapters are so, so, so mindnumbingly boring. Agreed.
-What was the implication of Shae being in Tywin's bed? Are we supposed to assume that Tyrion became enraged by the hypocrisy, or that Tywin also fucked Tysha before sending her off into the unknown? Yes, I think it was meant to call to mind Tyrion's wife. From Tywin's perspective: "You fool, she's a whore and worthless like the other one; I'll prove it." From Tyrion's: another instance of everyone around him betraying him, and the removal of his last reason to stay in the kingdom.

 

I will give you some advice that is nigh impossible to heed: Once you're done with AFFC, stop. Don't read more. Not until Winds of Winter comes out. It would have been better to stop after Storm of Swords, but that ship has sailed. Dance With Dragons is really not worth it on its own and will only potentially be redeemed when book 6 comes out so I try and convince people to ignore it until then.

Meanwhile, in AFFC, the Brienne chapters do suck, but Jaime and Cersei is creepy, compelling, and interesting. I think people have mostly covered your questions, but if you have more, feel free to keep 'em coming.

 

Spoiler

I'm pretty sure Robert is a true Arryn and not a Littlebastard. Littlefinger did knock Lysa up, but Hoster Tully forced her to get an abortion. There doesn't strike me as being much opportunity nor motive for her to get pregnant by Littlefinger again after being married to Arryn.

 

You guys are either hardcore cynics or I'm easy as shit to entertain. The latter probably being a majority of it but I'm 310 pages into a Dance With Dragons and I'm loving it. There was only a month or so break between A Feast For Crows and this ADWD but I have no complaints so far. I'm thinking some of you didn't realize the books were concurrant for 80% of ADWD, because otherwise I think its pretty cool to see the other side of the cyvasse board line up and how everything is slowly falling into place. I've read people say "Nothing has happened."

But I'm right at the point where I know for sure that

Spoiler

Tyrion just got kidnapped by Jorah Mormont, and we know Aegon is still alive.

To me after having 4 books saying the opposite, that's kinda a huge WTF moment.

 

Haven't read other people's answers, but here's how I read it:

Spoiler

Jon Arryn is actually the father of Robert Arryn. Old sperm = weak kid.

Brienne becomes one of the best characters, but she never gets a personality. Her interactions with Jaime make it...

Shae in Tywin's bed means she was always a Whore looking to be associated with power. As soon as the Imp was out and his father was in, she switched. Also compounds the "You made me marry a (false) whore, that Tyrion has been living with all his life. Little does he know, that first wife was true (however whorry Tywin portrayed her) and Shae was just a money grubbing bitch (that Tyrion loved)

Having read the books, yes, Braavos or anywhere in those isles seems pretty good compared to Westeros...

Lord Commander Snow, if he can consolidate his power, in my opinion, will be a major player in the End Game


WHICH I MAINTAIN IS GOING TO BE THE FUCKING WIGHTS FROM THE NORTH

Why does every-god-damned-body ignore that? The fucking Impetus of the story is "WINTER IS COMING"...

Everybody is going to be so consumed by the throne struggle that they will ignore the THREAT FROM THE NORTH.

I don't give a fuck about Cersei, Stannis, etc...

Spoiler

Aegon, Danaerys, these are the people that have a chance to stop the white walkers, because they have blood ties to (already huge) dragons)

I just hope the Imp is in there with them...

 

Spoiler

To be honest I always thought that after Shae joined with Tyrion, and then the way it all went was that she was always sent by Tywin to spy on the Imp. Think about where Bron found her. Pretty vague if I recall. I think the betrayal was enough for the Imp to kill them both as he was playing the game for his family, and his family still did nothing but shit on him after he saved the city.