**** you saberopus

Also, thank you Google.

Game of Thrones is the only story I've ever seen/read where I was actively happy when a character died. And not even because of any single incident, either. Joffrey was a great antagonist not only because he did evil ****, but because he was really enthusiastically despicable in every possible way. I'm pretty sure if Joffrey was a real person born in modern times, he would either be a Kardashian, or be diagnosed with some dangerous new variant of Asperger Syndrome.

asoiaf is the only story I've ever seen/read where I couldn't put it down but I also kept nodding off.

I haven't read past the first few chapters, but I have to admit that in the show at least the Red Wedding delighted me much more than I should probably admit. Up to that point I had been pretty unimpressed with Lord Frey. But that sequence made me so goddamn proud of the man.

I'm convinced there's no way the actor that played Joffrey (Jack Gleeson) is that good at being a little prick. He's just too despicable. He's either the best damn actor on the planet or he's just a douche in real life that happened to get the role of his life, and I'm thinking the latter.

Also this:

**** the Kingsguard, **** saberopus.

I'm going to eat every ****ing Michael MacFarlane in this room.

The rumor around King's Landing is that Cersei already did that with the Kingslayer.

I liked the last (and the only?) fight scene in the first episode of the new season; it was how I'd imagine such a fight would look; no fancy swordplay, just sharp steel and the will to survive ... very cool. Looking forward to the next episode. Just add BAELISH.



Source: http://daaria.deviantart.com/art/Petyr-Baelish-251184502

Oh, we should probably set up some rules about spoilers, since there are probably a lot of people here who either only watch the show or are at any number of different places in the books. Maybe spoiler anything from the books that's happened after the end of the most recent TV episode?

seems like a good idea.

I haven't read the books, but I've heard that the differences between them and the show are starting to accumulate.

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Well, yes and no. Generally the differences involve things like combining several minor book characters into one more important character for the sake of streamlining the show (see Tyrell familly) or substituting a brief (s)exposition scene for events that the book used dozens of pages to describe. The one revision I disliked the most involved changing a key character's background for non-obvious reasons, then killing her off even though her counterpart from the novels is still alive. That's the best example of a sort of reverse-spoiler effect for readers, where we discover through the show that a character is not going to matter because she's dead on the show, or because he doesn't exist on the show.

But, digression. My main point is, it's not like the show is getting onto a different trajectory or anything; the overall plotline is intact.



I like the books more than the show. A lot of what makes the books compelling is the sheer breadth and depth of the world Martin has created, and that's the sort of thing that will necessarily get trimmed down in any screen adaptation.

The book currently being written is supposed to be the sixth of a total of seven books. I have serious doubts whether the story can be concluded in two more books, but that's just me; I haven't seen anyone else express the same concern.



"Pornographic" is probably not an unfair word to use to describe that scene. It's also taken more or less word-for-word from the source material, so what can you do? Anyway, while there's a whole lot of sex and nudity on the show, I wouldn't say that scene is very representative. It's meant to lay the entire groundwork for those characters' story in as little space as possible, and I think it works well for that purpose.

Especially since that character you're supposed to despise.

Supposedly Martin's filled in the show's producers as to what's supposed to happen in the last books, just in case he has a stroke or something.

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......

Which is how within exactly 5 minutes you know that not only is he a psychopath, but nobody has ever even tried to reign him in.

Yes, but he's not?



I'm really surprised that what you got from that scene was "Viserys hates his sister." Maybe watch it again? Viserys would let thousands of men rape Daenerys if it served his goal of regaining the Iron Throne. He's telling her this because he wants her to believe that what he's doing now is, by comparison, the easy way.



I guess I don't really think of sex and nudity in film/television as inherently pornographic. I certainly don't think of any television show or film that depicts graphic nudity and sex as automatically no more worth watching than ordinary pornography.



Martin goes into quite a bit of detail on the history, traditions, religions, and customs of the world he's created. That's mainly what I had in mind.

This reminds me of that time when I gave up on Breaking Bad after everyone had told me how much of a hardass Walter White is, and I watched the first half of the first episode and he's really just a mild mannered chemistry teacher who lets everyone walk all over him. Would not watch again 0/10

It also helps to know that schizophrenia runs in their family, that he used to molest his sister, and that he intended to marry her to keep the Targaryen bloodline strong before bartering her away out of desperation. So there's a little bit going on there. Certainly enough for a character who only lasts the first tenth of the first book.

Heh, yep. A definite additional strength of the books vs. the show. I don't remember how much screentime was given to explaining the Targaryen family's history of incest and mental illness, but it can't have been much.

It's discussed periodically throughout the first two seasons if I remember correctly. I don't think they specifically mention those things about Viserys, but an astute viewer could surely put two and two together when they tell stories about how the rest of the family pretty much has a 50/50 mix between people who are utterly insane and those who are likeable and insane to a far lesser degree.

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They're realistic, but not clearly derivative. I'm not sure exactly what sorts of ideologies you're expecting from a book called A Game of Thrones other than feudalism. If it were high-minded and seriously political I doubt HBO would have made a TV show about it.

Yes.

Viserys was not antisocial. I haven't seen the show so I honestly don't know how they treat it, but he was paranoid and delusional. The lust for power and siblings is actually the norm for people in his social stratum.

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He seems relatively normal to me in this interview & quite dissimilar from his character. If he's a prick, he's a good enough actor to hide it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PUefiJBJQQ

Avoid watching Spartacus. Also, I've read all but the most recent book & seen all of the series so far, & the "pornographic" stuff is barely memorable (I literally don't remember the details of any of these scenes). However, with shows like Spartacus, that's nearly all that I remember. If you can turn off your need to analyze everything to the point of ruin, & give the show a go from the beginning, you'll likely be quite entertained. LotR isn't 'Ulysses' & Martin is no Hemingway, but you're really missing out on an enjoyable experience, by obsessing over the intricacies of a ****ing story about dragons & ****.

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Spartacus is the Starz treatment of the story. Spartacus gets captured, becomes a badass gladiator, leads a revolt, they go on a rampage, etc, etc. I watched the first three seasons (the prequel season ((which I think I liked the most)) was made while the main actor underwent cancer treatment, but he ultimately died before season two started) but skipped the last one (enough established characters died, story wandered away from the gladiator stuff, etc). There's a certain amount of "300" in the combat, and in the first couple seasons the sex is one of the focal points.

All I know is Jaime Lannister enjoys his morning coffee:

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Doesn't know if Game of Thrones is high-brow enough; loves 300.

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Pretty sure George R. R. Martin is just trying to tell a story about a low fantasy cold war against liches, dude.

I'm not criticizing you for wanting more from a book, but most people don't. At all. And even if it didn't destroy the market appeal, there are so few authors equipped to deal with deep philosophical concepts that it's not even really a question worth asking of the fans of a book.


One of the reasons I love The Elder Scrolls series so much is because of how much they play around with metaphysics in the lore. The Elder Scrolls can get away with this because it's a video game; novels and TV shows can't, because it makes the entire work front-loaded. Most of the people who read TES lore won't get it and will just skip past the "weird" books. And most of the people who play the game don't read the lore, so none of this gets in their way at all. The people with a background in philosophy get a very different reading of those games compared to people who just want stabby stabby, which is pretty much how it has to be.

I, for one, made a librarian character in Morrowind and played through with my primary motivation being stealing and reading every book I encountered. The way that series incorporated all the possible endings of Daggerfall into a deeply conflicted and/or unreliable mythos is a work of art in itself. And Vivec.

My fav part is the reification of logic and the identity of indiscernibles. e.g. Vivec hints that the Dwemer (most likely) poofed the instant they collectively realized the logical contradiction of their existence, and characters metamorphose into other characters simply by acting like them for long enough.

Nothing to do with asoiaf though.