SPOILER WARNING If you only watch the show, this thread will spoil you of future events in HBO's Game of Thrones. Thread contains discussion of all books of the series A Song of Ice and Fire Click Here for the spoiler-free thread.
On May 10 2015 04:35 karazax wrote: I wouldn't be surprised if they just delayed the Greyjoys until next season to keep the cast size down. Which is a reasonable reason, though having the Greyjoys do nothing of consequence since Theon took Winterfell and then trying to make them into a threat requires a huge suspension of disbelief. Balon is still alive on the show, when he should have died before Renly in the book time line, which caused Victarion and most of the rest of the Iron Born to return for the King's Moot. With him still alive the Greyjoys should have been much more active and aggressive the past few seasons instead of rowboating around Westeros to save Theon only to be chased away by some dogs.
Don't doubt D&D (dumb&dumber) logic. When we next see the Ironborn they are going to ride Ice Dragons.
Edit: I'm not sure what you mean, the way it worked was that Tyrion finds out he was betrayed by the witness' during the trial, then Oberyn makes the offer in his cell and Tyrion asks for the trial by combat.
So he became his champion during the span of the trial but not during the actual trial. I'm not sure how it went in the show, I only watch bits and pieces and missed a lot of episodes.
In the books Oberyn tells Tyrion he'll fight for him if he tells him who killed his sister and niece, though I seem to remember he already suspects it's the mountain.
On May 10 2015 06:21 SKC wrote: He makes the offer to Tyrion before the trial.
Edit: I'm not sure what you mean, the way it worked was that Tyrion finds out he was betrayed by the witness' during the trial, then Oberyn makes the offer in his cell and Tyrion asks for the trial by combat.
So he became his champion during the span of the trial but not during the actual trial. I'm not sure how it went in the show, I only watch bits and pieces and missed a lot of episodes.
In the show it is after Tyrion rage-quits his show trial and demanded trial by combat that Oberyn shows up to his cell and makes the offer. I hadn't thought of it as a very important change, but there is something to be said for demanding trial by combat without a champion lined up.
The bad thing that the show's version opened up is that in their version I'm not sure why Jaime didn't crush Tywin's sham by jumping at the chance to be Tyrion's champion. They even mention it, but it is treated it like a joke. It would have been a great idea. Let Tyrion go and Jaime gives up the white cloak to be heir to the rock, or let Jaime die...Tywin would have been thoroughly Tywined.
On May 09 2015 19:03 Lylat wrote: Sooo Barristan is dead, does that mean that he has no role to play in the books ? Or did the show diverge completely from the books ?
It means that they have diverged. He has already done important things in the books that the show won't have now.
There have been great show additions. The first promising taste of a show-invented scene was that conversation between Cersei and Robert back in s1. The show went on to do good things with s2 Arya-Tywin, s1-3 Varys-LF interactions, everything non-book about Oberyn, and everything Jaime-Bronn until the most recent bits for a few that stand out off the top of my head.
That said, I don't think the good additions have done much of a job making up for poorer changes since circa late s2. The negative impact of changes to plot piles up while new ones are becoming more frequent. The good additions/changes are becoming less frequent since s3 and do not enjoy a cumulative boosting effect. The only change that probably ever enjoyed any plot boosting impact was s2 Arya-Tywin. The rest is exposition or one scene flash-in-the-pan goodness.
Yes there are many great dramatic scenes that doesn't have parallel scenes in the books, but most of them are either things that were simply omitted from the books by not having a PoV present, or simply happens between great characters portrayed by great actors. The dialog in the show is very good for the most part, and drama tends to hit people more on screen than on page.
The thing most people are complaining about is that the plot deviations are sub par. They can have a ton of great scenes but if the story doesn't make sense and the characters don't act logical within their universe, it gets really hard to watch. most recently LF parting with Sansa for seemingly no gain, Jaime going to dorne to save his daughter
People will complain about the plot deviations no matter what happens. I remember angry posts about minor details like Jon's words before beheading Janos Slynt or the name of Theon's sister. It's impossible to please everyone.
There are changes that are easy to defend like cutting battles because of the budget, or cutting characters to keep the cast size reasonable, and there are changes that make no sense or could have easily been avoided. You are right that people will complain about even minor details, and even if it was 99% accurate someone would complain about the 1% that is not. It doesn't mean some of the complaints aren't valid though. What's the point of changing the dialogue when it easily would have fit in the same scene in the same context? They bring criticism that could easily have been avoided and didn't gain them anything. Those changes don't ruin the show, they are just annoying generally. They aren't really plot deviations, they are script deviations. The story still stays 90%+ the same despite these pointless changes.
The original scenes they add often completely contradict the book, and some times the show too. Like Jaime still being completely in love with Cersei at this point, Littlefinger being a moron, Brienne coming into contact with both Arya and Sansa, Tyrion still being in love with Shae even after he murdered her, Yara row boating for over 1,700 miles from the Iron Isles to the Dreadfort to save Theon and then get chased away by dogs. The high sparrow having an anti-gay agenda and Cersei being the one to suggest arming the faith with no prompting and with no gain other than imprisoning Loras. At least book Cersei wiped out a huge debt to the crown in the process and it wasn't her idea. Most of their completely original story lines are bad, even the ones that are really well acted like Tywin and Arya. Tywin treated a believed commoner servant girl better than book_Tywin treated his own kids. And Littlefinger saw Arya and did nothing with the information. People speculated that he knew who she was but was holding the info for his own use, but there is nothing since then to suggest that is the case. It's a shame because most of the scenes they adapt directly from the book are really good. Unfortunately those are becoming rarer and rarer. On the plus side many of their changes are so extreme that it will be hard to say anything is a spoiler for sure except for the end of the series.
On May 10 2015 12:06 karazax wrote: The original scenes they add often completely contradict the book, and some times the show too. Like Jaime still being completely in love with Cersei at this point, Littlefinger being a moron, Brienne coming into contact with both Arya and Sansa, Tyrion still being in love with Shae even after he murdered her, Yara row boating for over 1,700 miles from the Iron Isles to the Dreadfort to save Theon and then get chased away by dogs. The high sparrow having an anti-gay agenda and Cersei being the one to suggest arming the faith with no prompting and with no gain other than imprisoning Loras. At least book Cersei wiped out a huge debt to the crown in the process and it wasn't her idea. Most of their completely original story lines are bad, even the ones that are really well acted like Tywin and Arya. Tywin treated a believed commoner servant girl better than book_Tywin treated his own kids. And Littlefinger saw Arya and did nothing with the information. People speculated that he knew who she was but was holding the info for his own use, but there is nothing since then to suggest that is the case. It's a shame because most of the scenes they adapt directly from the book are really good. Unfortunately those are becoming rarer and rarer. On the plus side many of their changes are so extreme that it will be hard to say anything is a spoiler for sure except for the end of the series.
I think that's the issue here. You seem to say that changing plots/characters from the books for no "good" reason is an inherently bad thing that has to be avoided at all costs. I'm sorry to say, but we, the book readers, are not the target audience here. Sure, we're a useful tool to get all our friends to watch the show, but that's about it. Ultimately, there are (or were, rather) far too few book readers to make the show (or any show/film) a success. The show needs unsullied people to survive, and a ton of it.
And so it becomes less and less important that things stay true to the books. So what if Jaime is still in love with Cersei? So what if he and Tyrion parted on good terms? So what if Brienne's storyline is completely different at this point? None of these things matter one bit in terms of whether the show is good or bad. It only matters whether these things make sense from the show's point of view, not whether the books did it differently. And from the show's PoV, there's really nothing wrong with Brienne or Jaime's characters (Though Jaime going to Dorne should raise a few eyebrows, admittedly). Yes, they're very clearly different from the books, but that is not inherently bad.
On May 10 2015 12:06 karazax wrote: The original scenes they add often completely contradict the book, and some times the show too. Like Jaime still being completely in love with Cersei at this point, Littlefinger being a moron, Brienne coming into contact with both Arya and Sansa, Tyrion still being in love with Shae even after he murdered her, Yara row boating for over 1,700 miles from the Iron Isles to the Dreadfort to save Theon and then get chased away by dogs. The high sparrow having an anti-gay agenda and Cersei being the one to suggest arming the faith with no prompting and with no gain other than imprisoning Loras. At least book Cersei wiped out a huge debt to the crown in the process and it wasn't her idea. Most of their completely original story lines are bad, even the ones that are really well acted like Tywin and Arya. Tywin treated a believed commoner servant girl better than book_Tywin treated his own kids. And Littlefinger saw Arya and did nothing with the information. People speculated that he knew who she was but was holding the info for his own use, but there is nothing since then to suggest that is the case. It's a shame because most of the scenes they adapt directly from the book are really good. Unfortunately those are becoming rarer and rarer. On the plus side many of their changes are so extreme that it will be hard to say anything is a spoiler for sure except for the end of the series.
I think that's the issue here. You seem to say that changing plots/characters from the books for no "good" reason is an inherently bad thing that has to be avoided at all costs. I'm sorry to say, but we, the book readers, are not the target audience here. Sure, we're a useful tool to get all our friends to watch the show, but that's about it. Ultimately, there are (or were, rather) far too few book readers to make the show (or any show/film) a success. The show needs unsullied people to survive, and a ton of it.
And so it becomes less and less important that things stay true to the books. So what if Jaime is still in love with Cersei? So what if he and Tyrion parted on good terms? So what if Brienne's storyline is completely different at this point? None of these things matter one bit in terms of whether the show is good or bad. It only matters whether these things make sense from the show's point of view, not whether the books did it differently. And from the show's PoV, there's really nothing wrong with Brienne or Jaime's characters (Though Jaime going to Dorne should raise a few eyebrows, admittedly). Yes, they're very clearly different from the books, but that is not inherently bad.
Isnt it actually better if the show is different from the book? After all you alread read the books and know what happens. so this is another version to enjoy.
On May 10 2015 06:21 SKC wrote: He makes the offer to Tyrion before the trial.
Edit: I'm not sure what you mean, the way it worked was that Tyrion finds out he was betrayed by the witness' during the trial, then Oberyn makes the offer in his cell and Tyrion asks for the trial by combat.
So he became his champion during the span of the trial but not during the actual trial. I'm not sure how it went in the show, I only watch bits and pieces and missed a lot of episodes.
In the show it is after Tyrion rage-quits his show trial and demanded trial by combat that Oberyn shows up to his cell and makes the offer. I hadn't thought of it as a very important change, but there is something to be said for demanding trial by combat without a champion lined up.
The bad thing that the show's version opened up is that in their version I'm not sure why Jaime didn't crush Tywin's sham by jumping at the chance to be Tyrion's champion. They even mention it, but it is treated it like a joke. It would have been a great idea. Let Tyrion go and Jaime gives up the white cloak to be heir to the rock, or let Jaime die...Tywin would have been thoroughly Tywined.
I think it is implied that the kids believe Tywin would let Jaime fight and die in that situation to preserve his pride. It's also implied through the show that Jaime loves his brother but has no intention of dying for him.
Tyrion himself does not seem to realize the execution order is a sham, since Tywin told Jaime he intended to allow Tyrion to take the black and go to the wall and was not planning to actually kill him. To be fair, for Tyrion that might have been a fate worse than death. They don't acknowledge the intensely desperate plea for help from the wall that Davos shows to Stannis, but presumably they know the situation there is dire. And to be even more fair, it could be a head fake (literally!) like Joffrey did to Ned Stark.
Seems my thoughts on it were correct. He was a book reader and made the argument why D&D were fucking up.
I wonder if Jorah gets back with (or more likely without) Tyrion ahead of book schedule and takes Selmy's place killing that Mereen dude in the chambers. At this point I'd not be surprised.
What? He basically said that he wanted to stay on the show because he enjoyed being a part of it, not because he disagreed with the plot. He did not like it because he would be out of a job and because he felt safe and expected to last a few more seasons at the very least, simple as that.
On May 11 2015 04:28 Conti wrote: What? He basically said that he wanted to stay on the show because he enjoyed being a part of it, not because he disagreed with the plot. He did not like it because he would be out of a job and because he felt safe and expected to last a few more seasons at the very least, simple as that.
And how does that, even if it was true (you don't know how much factual logical book supported arguments he conjured up in trying to make his case), contradict what I said?
If Euron = Daario is true, it would explain why they aren't including scenes with the Greyjoys, since showing the actor in both places would give away the game (esp. without Daario's hair dye). Strange coincidence that Victarion's fleet and Mereen's captured fleet both have exactly 93 ships. My guess; Show Daario = Book Euron + Book Victarion. Although it'd mean that both Silence and Moqorro are left out.
EPT
