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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 FireClick Here for the spoiler-free thread. |
On May 19 2015 22:47 karazax wrote:Show nested quote +On May 19 2015 19:57 -Archangel- wrote:On May 19 2015 19:23 Conti wrote:
All the show-hate aside, what do you guys think they will do with Arya becoming a faceless man? I mean, in the books it's not an issue at all for her to get a new face. She'll still be Arya, have her POV chapters, her thoughts, her emotions, everything. Nothing would change for the reader.
In the show, they would have to cast entirely new actors to play her, and that rarely goes over very well for all kinds of reasons. Are they really going to do that? Are we going to see entire episodes with Arya being portrayed by some totally different actress? Or are they going to work around that somehow? I'm really curious. My guess is that her scenes as a completely different character will not last long. If she is going to now get a new face , she is probably not going to live as a street urchin for 2-3 episodes like in the books but just go murder that merchant and come back and get blinded in ep9 or 10. I suspect she will have a new face long enough to kill someone, and then change back immediately. She will kill Meryn Trant at some point as he went to Bravos with Mace Tyrell to see the Iron Bank. Regarding the rape scene, rape is a sensitive subject for lots of people. Sure Jeyne's fate was even worse, but it was one tiny part of two huge books and she is destroyed after it happens. They really worked hard to make a ridiculous scenario where Sansa can be raped when they cut or changed over 50% of two huge books. And I suspect that in a few episodes Sansa will act like it never happened just like Cersei did with Jaime. It's a realistic outcome for Ramsay and Sansa in that scenario, it's just not one you can say is necessary. The book plot revolves highly on the northern lords who don't even exist in the show. The rape and torture of fake Arya is heard regularly by the lords of the north who are visiting and helps lower morale and loosen support for the Boltons. Without the lords even being mentioned on the show, there really isn't even anything to gain from marrying Ramsay to Sansa in the first place. Become enemies of the crown is a pretty poor trade off for having a figure head Stark bride. And even after going with the ill conceived Sansa in Winterfell plot, they had the option of having Sansa rescued before the bedding. Even if Sansa personally kills Ramsay the damage of having her family killed and then being raped by the son of the murderer makes it a pretty hollow "victory" at that point. It didn't offend me, but in the end this is a show meant to be entertaining, and lots of people don't find that subject matter entertaining at all. My fiancée was already bored most of the season. Sansa was one of the last Starks alive and she basically said " Why am I watching this any more? Everyone who is left is either evil or a victim. Who is the hero at this point? I'm not really getting any entertainment from seeing the characters I care about get murdered, tortured or raped" Couldn't really give her a good answer.
This is one of the biggest criticisms of Martin's writing as well. Fans will say, "Well it's more realistic! It's better because in most writing, the hero always wins!"
The problem is that story telling isn't about realism. If it was, it would be incredibly boring because 99% of life is quite boring from a story telling perspective. In reality, being different isn't making it better, it's just being hipster. Consistently eliminating POV/other interesting characters that can be seen as protagonists isn't engaging or interesting, but it's the opposite; by repeatedly having antagonists win in near comical fashion and engaging characters killed, all you do is drive the reader away.
Of course, the books seems to eventually get around to the protagonists actually being interesting or accomplishing things (and some sense of justice is eventually arriving), but it's just taking far too long. For the better part of three incredibly dense (and, for the most part, dull) books, we've had this happening, and when it goes on for so long, it gets boring.
The show, by virtue of being based on the books, seems to be having that problem as well.
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Everything said on Reddit seems like common sense to me.
I don't get the all the fuzz, why are people so upset? What did they expect to happen? There was the possibility, that Stannis already attacks and Ramsey would have been called off, but well, it didn't happen and events took their course.
I wasn't upset in the slightest, even though i am really sensitive in that matter. E.g. Watching "Irreversible" (HAD to turn it off) or the documentaries "Mea Maxima Culpa" and "Deliver Us from Evil" absolutely destroyed me. That GoT scene did nothing. Maybe i'm just not attached to the characters. It's fiction, reality is far worse.
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On May 19 2015 22:56 Stratos_speAr wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On May 19 2015 22:47 karazax wrote:Show nested quote +On May 19 2015 19:57 -Archangel- wrote:On May 19 2015 19:23 Conti wrote:
All the show-hate aside, what do you guys think they will do with Arya becoming a faceless man? I mean, in the books it's not an issue at all for her to get a new face. She'll still be Arya, have her POV chapters, her thoughts, her emotions, everything. Nothing would change for the reader.
In the show, they would have to cast entirely new actors to play her, and that rarely goes over very well for all kinds of reasons. Are they really going to do that? Are we going to see entire episodes with Arya being portrayed by some totally different actress? Or are they going to work around that somehow? I'm really curious. My guess is that her scenes as a completely different character will not last long. If she is going to now get a new face , she is probably not going to live as a street urchin for 2-3 episodes like in the books but just go murder that merchant and come back and get blinded in ep9 or 10. I suspect she will have a new face long enough to kill someone, and then change back immediately. She will kill Meryn Trant at some point as he went to Bravos with Mace Tyrell to see the Iron Bank. Regarding the rape scene, rape is a sensitive subject for lots of people. Sure Jeyne's fate was even worse, but it was one tiny part of two huge books and she is destroyed after it happens. They really worked hard to make a ridiculous scenario where Sansa can be raped when they cut or changed over 50% of two huge books. And I suspect that in a few episodes Sansa will act like it never happened just like Cersei did with Jaime. It's a realistic outcome for Ramsay and Sansa in that scenario, it's just not one you can say is necessary. The book plot revolves highly on the northern lords who don't even exist in the show. The rape and torture of fake Arya is heard regularly by the lords of the north who are visiting and helps lower morale and loosen support for the Boltons. Without the lords even being mentioned on the show, there really isn't even anything to gain from marrying Ramsay to Sansa in the first place. Become enemies of the crown is a pretty poor trade off for having a figure head Stark bride. And even after going with the ill conceived Sansa in Winterfell plot, they had the option of having Sansa rescued before the bedding. Even if Sansa personally kills Ramsay the damage of having her family killed and then being raped by the son of the murderer makes it a pretty hollow "victory" at that point. It didn't offend me, but in the end this is a show meant to be entertaining, and lots of people don't find that subject matter entertaining at all. My fiancée was already bored most of the season. Sansa was one of the last Starks alive and she basically said " Why am I watching this any more? Everyone who is left is either evil or a victim. Who is the hero at this point? I'm not really getting any entertainment from seeing the characters I care about get murdered, tortured or raped" Couldn't really give her a good answer. This is one of the biggest criticisms of Martin's writing as well. Fans will say, "Well it's more realistic! It's better because in most writing, the hero always wins!" The problem is that story telling isn't about realism. If it was, it would be incredibly boring because 99% of life is quite boring from a story telling perspective. In reality, being different isn't making it better, it's just being hipster. Consistently eliminating POV/other interesting characters that can be seen as protagonists isn't engaging or interesting, but it's the opposite; by repeatedly having antagonists win in near comical fashion and engaging characters killed, all you do is drive the reader away. Of course, the books seems to eventually get around to the protagonists actually being interesting or accomplishing things (and some sense of justice is eventually arriving), but it's just taking far too long. For the better part of three incredibly dense (and, for the most part, dull) books, we've had this happening, and when it goes on for so long, it gets boring. The show, by virtue of being based on the books, seems to be having that problem as well.
I'm fine with it. This isn't a knight in shining armor saves the world story, this should be really clear to everybody by now. The kind of people, who are desperately in need of a hollywood ending are in for a ride!
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GRRM said his ending will be bittersweet, i am excited to see how he defines it :D
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On May 19 2015 23:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:
GRRM said his ending will be bittersweet, i am excited to see how he defines it :D
Kinda. He made some statements before the whole thing rose to the popularity it has now. I didn't want to mention it, because it goes even beyond the books, but in the end it's all speculation. There wasn't much sweetness to the stuff i read a couple of years ago but it was very cryptical... His ideas might have changed, but i trust in him to stay true to his original masterplan.
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On May 19 2015 23:41 r00ty wrote:Show nested quote +On May 19 2015 23:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:
GRRM said his ending will be bittersweet, i am excited to see how he defines it :D
Kinda. He made some statements before the whole thing rose to the popularity it has now. I didn't want to mention it, because it goes even beyond the books, but in the end it's all speculation. There wasn't much sweetness to the stuff i read a couple of years ago but it was very cryptical... His ideas might have changed, but i trust in him to stay true to his original masterplan.
I would be interested in what this means
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On May 20 2015 00:00 Cricketer12 wrote:Show nested quote +On May 19 2015 23:41 r00ty wrote:On May 19 2015 23:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:
GRRM said his ending will be bittersweet, i am excited to see how he defines it :D
Kinda. He made some statements before the whole thing rose to the popularity it has now. I didn't want to mention it, because it goes even beyond the books, but in the end it's all speculation. There wasn't much sweetness to the stuff i read a couple of years ago but it was very cryptical... His ideas might have changed, but i trust in him to stay true to his original masterplan. I would be interested in what this means
me too
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On May 19 2015 23:41 r00ty wrote:Show nested quote +On May 19 2015 23:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:
GRRM said his ending will be bittersweet, i am excited to see how he defines it :D
Kinda. He made some statements before the whole thing rose to the popularity it has now. I didn't want to mention it, because it goes even beyond the books, but in the end it's all speculation. There wasn't much sweetness to the stuff i read a couple of years ago but it was very cryptical... His ideas might have changed, but i trust in him to stay true to his original masterplan.
I think that it would be foolish to think he will end with some kind of happy/triumphant ending, but I think it's also foolish to believe that he will end it exactly as he initially planned, or even with what he was thinking when he made those comments. When a piece of art takes so long to create, ideas/opinions will inevitably be influenced by a lot of factors, and the end product will change accordingly.
I'm fine with it. This isn't a knight in shining armor saves the world story, this should be really clear to everybody by now. The kind of people, who are desperately in need of a hollywood ending are in for a ride!
I'm fine with it, it's just been kind of...boring. The last three books have lost a lot of what made the first two so intriguing. Too many new characters that we don't care anything about, too much of nothing happening/bad guy just keeps on truckin', too much Brienne and Dany POV's...
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By Book 4, I decided that ASOIAF is more of an exercise in nihilism than anything else. I'm not expecting a particularly good payoff by the end of Book 7. I expect a lot to be left unresolved.
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I bet for now people think Jon and Dany are heroes. Not for long BUAHAHAH :D
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On May 20 2015 01:05 xDaunt wrote:
By Book 4, I decided that ASOIAF is more of an exercise in nihilism than anything else. I'm not expecting a particularly good payoff by the end of Book 7. I expect a lot to be left unresolved.
It's more likely that we will get more than 7 books, actually. There's just no way he can wrap up all open plots in 2 books. Which, of course, would mean that it would take even longer for the book series to finish.
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On May 20 2015 01:45 Conti wrote:Show nested quote +On May 20 2015 01:05 xDaunt wrote:
By Book 4, I decided that ASOIAF is more of an exercise in nihilism than anything else. I'm not expecting a particularly good payoff by the end of Book 7. I expect a lot to be left unresolved. It's more likely that we will get more than 7 books, actually. There's just no way he can wrap up all open plots in 2 books. Which, of course, would mean that it would take even longer for the book series to finish.
I would be very surprised if we actually got more than 7. Not that it will be easy to finish everything in the two (as of yet) remaining books, but I just don't think it will happen.
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On May 20 2015 01:50 Sholip wrote:Show nested quote +On May 20 2015 01:45 Conti wrote:On May 20 2015 01:05 xDaunt wrote:
By Book 4, I decided that ASOIAF is more of an exercise in nihilism than anything else. I'm not expecting a particularly good payoff by the end of Book 7. I expect a lot to be left unresolved. It's more likely that we will get more than 7 books, actually. There's just no way he can wrap up all open plots in 2 books. Which, of course, would mean that it would take even longer for the book series to finish. I would be very surprised if we actually got more than 7. Not that it will be easy to finish everything in the two (as of yet) remaining books, but I just don't think it will happen.
It'd be easy to tie up all the loose ends if you just kill almost everyone off. All the potential rulers die, dragons and white walkers kill each other and the people of westeros join together form a democracy and vote in a leader amongst their own. xD
Obviously not what is going to happen but if he wants to end everything in two books I expect a few story lines to be cut short with quick deaths to make it possible.
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Can someone remind me why Boltons accepted the risk of taking Sansa into a family, when knowing Lannisters accuse her of killing the King?
I mean, they were official Wardens of the north and could probably keep the north in check, even without legitimate connection to Starks.
Surely lord Bolton knew that he would lose alliance with lannisters if his son marries sansa, and will gain nothing from it basically.
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On May 20 2015 02:27 Odoakar wrote:
Can someone remind me why Boltons accepted the risk of taking Sansa into a family, when knowing Lannisters accuse her of killing the King?
I mean, they were official Wardens of the north and could probably keep the north in check, even without legitimate connection to Starks.
Surely lord Bolton knew that he would lose alliance with lannisters if his son marries sansa, and will gain nothing from it basically.
My guess would be that they wanted to secure the support of the north, and were quite happy to risk losing the support of the Lannisters in the process. The Boltons are backstabbing bastards, after all, and probably would not mind starting the war all over again if they saw a chance of winning, or at least at becoming independent.
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On May 20 2015 02:27 Odoakar wrote:
Can someone remind me why Boltons accepted the risk of taking Sansa into a family, when knowing Lannisters accuse her of killing the King?
I mean, they were official Wardens of the north and could probably keep the north in check, even without legitimate connection to Starks.
Surely lord Bolton knew that he would lose alliance with lannisters if his son marries sansa, and will gain nothing from it basically.
I think it was mentioned in the show, maybe in a conversation between Roose and Littlefinger, that although the Boltons rose to power thanks to the Lannister alliance, it no longer means much after they returned to the North. The crown is unlikely to send troops to the North, neither to help, nor to invade, so at this point what the Boltons do does not really matter regarding the alliance.
I think they hope that with Sansa, the North will actually rally behind them, since she is a Stark? I don't know.
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On May 20 2015 01:05 xDaunt wrote:
By Book 4, I decided that ASOIAF is more of an exercise in nihilism than anything else. I'm not expecting a particularly good payoff by the end of Book 7. I expect a lot to be left unresolved.
Nihilism? Euh no actually not.
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It wasn't underlined strong enough in the show but in the books it was pretty clear that the Northmen will follow Starks and Starks only. Everybody hates Boltons but if one of them marries the last Stark then there is a small chance that people will accept their rule. There is no risk in marrying Sansa, Lannisters are too far away to do anything about it.
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On May 20 2015 02:27 Odoakar wrote:
Can someone remind me why Boltons accepted the risk of taking Sansa into a family, when knowing Lannisters accuse her of killing the King?
I mean, they were official Wardens of the north and could probably keep the north in check, even without legitimate connection to Starks.
Surely lord Bolton knew that he would lose alliance with lannisters if his son marries sansa, and will gain nothing from it basically.
They partially followed the book plot lines but did a sloppy job at best.
From the books, there are multiple northern lords that both the Boltons and Stannis are trying to court and control. The Boltons call upon the northern bannerman to assemble in Barrowton to pledge loyalty to the Iron Throne and attend the wedding of "Arya" to Ramsay Bolton. After hearing that Stannis Baratheon has taken Deepwood Motte, Roose decides to move the wedding to Winterfell to strengthen Ramsay's claim and to goad Stannis into fighting. Jeyne's sobbing is heard throughout Winterfell. According to Lady Dustin, the crying of "Arya Stark" is more a danger than the army of Stannis Baratheon. The Freys may not care, but the other northern houses who had served House Stark for generations do, and morale is being damaged from hearing the cries of Eddard Stark's "daughter". The Boltons also have captives of many of the northern lords to keep them in check.
On the show there is no mention of any threat from northern lords. Roose doesn't mention it when planning to battle Stannis with Ramsay. He doesn't mention it when discussing the marriage in the first place. The most they give is Stannis wanting a Stark in Winterfell when trying to get Jon to take the title. When Jon refuses the plot line is quickly brushed aside and he doesn't bother sending Davos out to recruit any of the Northern lords, nor does he mention them as a threat.
The show assumes people should know that there are northern lords who still are a significant threat to Bolton rule, but doesn't explain or show that in any meaningful way. Beyond that it's completely stupid to betray the Throne for the absolute minimal gain that marrying Sansa would give them. They gave up their biggest reward for betraying the Starks in being named wardens of the north so they could placate a group that hasn't even been made out to be a threat on the show, and who would be unlikely to be significantly swayed any way. The marriage of Fake Arya has minimal effect on northern loyalties to the Boltons and it was done with the blessing of the Iron Throne. Now the Boltons have an enemy from the south to go with the Stannis threat from the north and a Stark bride, but no one on the show who cares. The action also would likely result in reversing the royal decree that Ramsay is no longer a bastard. They aren't just betraying the Lannisters, who ever is in control is unlikely to be happy with a rebellion in the north. With no fighting in the Riverlands and no Greyjoy threat, what are the armies of the Lannisters and Tyrells doing that is a bigger priority than coming to help defeat Stannis any way? Stannis is a threat to all of them, not just the Lannisters.
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On May 20 2015 00:48 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I'm fine with it, it's just been kind of...boring. The last three books have lost a lot of what made the first two so intriguing. Too many new characters that we don't care anything about, too much of nothing happening/bad guy just keeps on truckin', too much Brienne and Dany POV's...
I never really got the opinion that "the bad guys keep on truckin'" in ASOFAI. They seem to be killed off/have horrible things happen to them at a reasonably similar rate relative to the "good" guys.
Balon greyjoy -> dead
Theon greyjoy -> Reeked
Tywin Lannister -> dead
Gregor Clegane -> dunno wtf is going on
Cersei -> fucking insane and clearly going to die
Joffrey -> dead
Ramsay + Roose -> Possibly gonna get an ass-whoopin' from Stannis
That's the general theme of the story, which I appreciate: in long, protracted civil wars, pretty much everyone gets fucked.
Which seems to be true.
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EPT
