It's unclear. My understanding is that strictly speaking, the term wights refers to things controlled by The Others, often resurrected men and animals. and not The Others themselves. Consensus seems to be that The Others are actual physical entities rather than some amorphous spirits. Given the plot development up to A Dance With Dragons, it seems like a good bet that the exact nature of The Others will be fleshed out more in The Winds of Winter.
YES. The show has been ungodly faithful to the books. The show is also doing an interesting thing of tossing in things that weren't necessarily in the book but make sense anyway. The book will flesh some stuff out, a lot of the internal thoughts, and mostly make you like Tyrion 100 times more.
Episode 2 was WAY better than episode 1, which I found to be a complete bore. Stannis Baratheon officially now qualifies as the most uninteresting new character on this whole show. Hopefully he'll be more than a guy whi just bitches and scowls a lot. Nice to see Bronn back in the picture, I want to see him kick more ass soon. As for Cersei, Jesus..I cannot figure this chick out. One thing I do know: her hair isn't speaking to her eyebrows. Another: I would love to see her drawn and quartered. I'm surprised she hasn't put The Moves on Tyrion or her own dad yet, seeing what a sick fuck she is. Tyrion devours the scenery every second he's on screen.
I've been led to believe the White Walkers and The Others are one and the same, just two different names for them. He didn't strike me as very interesting in the books, just uncomprimising.
It's funny you say that Stannis is uninteresting because that's pretty much exactly how he's protrayed in the books: A dull, pedantic man whose sole notable feature is his near-absolute adherance to law and custom. His personality is why the Baratheon bannermen declared for Renly and not him. Cersei's pretty much a complete narcissist. Notice when she was speaking with Tyrion about the order to kill the bastards that she wangsts about the burdens of rulership that have fallen upon her as if she was just saddled with this new responsiblity and didn't conspire to get it in the first place.
This is one of the themes of his story, yes. Loras at one point says he has the personality of a lobster.
Yeah, the Baratheon brothers. Renly, all personality and no fight. Stannis all fight and no personality. Robert was the best of both worlds, and now he's dead. Watching this show knowing how some characters are supposed to be portrayed makes me go back and question how I feel about the acting of other characters and other shows. This show, like Mad Men, has characters that dance outside the cliche roles/tropes most people are used to seeing on television and causes you to actually wonder if the person is a bad actor or the character is supposed to be like that. To keep it simple, for the non-book readers, the casting and the characters have all been dead-on. Sansa is supposed to be a ditz, you're not supposed to have any idea what the fuck Cersei's end-game is, and Stannis is supposed to be exactly how you saw him, boring. That 2 minute letter writing session sums him up perfectly. The only complaint I have about the show is that the chick that plays Melisandre was actually the first choice for Cersei. I would have loved that because I'd want Lena Headley to play Cat. Other than that the casting + characters have been perfect. Sallahdor Saan had me laughing my ass off with his 3 minutes of screen time.
I don't think I am the only one here that feels like GoT should have 2 threads. One for everyone who has read the books, and another for the people that are just watching the show. I completely avoid this thread because even if I'm trying to have a discussion about the show, I still end up seeing spoilers (EVERY FUCKING TIME). There is obviously enough interest in both the show and books, so lets make 2 threads so I can discuss it without stumbling upon someone who forgot to use spoiler tags and sucks at the internet.
I also loved how they played off Theon getting played by Asha, although it was more graphic in the book.
It was more graphic because she was rubbing his cock. And the scene in the book was "longer" because there was kissing and what not. I don't know how to support this statement but I'm going to say it: You finger banging your sister is less creepy than your sister repeatedly grabbing your cock. I can't explain why, but it is.
Plus the best thing about a book is that you hear the inner dialogue related to "meeting" Asha. In his inner dialogue, Theon is more of a self involved douchebag as his outer monologue on the show would suggest (although they do a pretty good job of it)
It felt like it went on for a lot longer, and the whole fingerbanging was pretty much a split second on TV, there wasn't even any banging involved.
So should we infer from the show that the sister was into it? Cause that's almost as creepy as a twelve year old breastfeeding.
If I recall from the book it was more the amusement of fucking with him like that than actually getting turned on by it.
1. Wow, this guy has a fixation on incest. Season 2 and we've already got three subplots dealing with brothers and sisters fucking, or fathers and daughters. 2. Do the books say at any point why Cersi insists on Joffrey marrying Sensa, even though House Stark is undoubtedly on the shit list? If they want to paint Ned Stark as a traitor and Robb Stark as a usurper, why are they marrying into that family?