Game of Thrones TV Show Discussion

OH fuck, I totally forgot about The Hound vs. Brienne...it is...AMAZING! Maybe the best 1 on 1 ffight of the whole show.

Did you guys check out the new trailer? Looks like they've mad a lot of (in my opinion) positive changes from the book including:

Spoiler:

And with Winds of Winter delayed again I imagine the writers of the show are more seriously taking their stance on when and how to finish the show which is also a great thing, in my opinion.

First of all trailer was pretty rad. Lot of cool stuff in there. Dorne looks awesome.

But this will be a big challenge for the showrunners. I don't think as highly of them as you do Twolf. The first three books lent themselves well for adapting to TV. The fourth and fifth definitely need a lot more work. D&D seem good at creating scenes for the show that we didn't see in the book due to the POV structure (like Robert and Cersei scenes in Season 1 for instance). But they don't seem good at creating new material just for the show (we get stuff like Yara's attack on the Dreadfort). I do think they are making some smart changes, but then I'm not sure why I'd have confidence in the stuff they are going way off script for because they haven't given me a lot of reason for confidence.

To go into this a bit more spoilery:

Trailer and Cast Speculation with Book Spoilers:

I don't know. Seems like a little good and a little bad to me. But I won't really know until I see it executed. I'm also guessing based on some casting and trailer info and could be making wrong assumptions for good or bad too.

Also while I understand and share many of people's problems with Books 4 and 5, I do think there is plenty of good material in the two of them, to make a very good season which seems to be the plan. The showrunners now have the challenge of fitting it all together in a way that works.

I totally agree on Arianne:

Spoiler:

I think at this point the books will be their own thing and the TV show will be its own thing which is cool. We won't know everything that happens having read the books which is only a good thing! I'm personally of the opinion that book 4 and 5 were overlong: could have easily been one book. So the showrunners trimming the fat and some of the other characters is only a good thing. Now, not every choice they make is the right one (we can ALL point to a certain scene in season 4 and very vigorously shake our heads) but hopefully they start doing some more forward thinking about ending the show now that George is DEFINITELY not going to finish ahead of it.

Yeah I can agree on most all of that.

I'm excited for Dorne. I really liked the Dorne chapters, personally. Anything you're most intrigued by?

I guess I'll put this all in spoilers:

Spoilers:

Bumping this up for premiere thoughts. Of course spoiler any book discussion.

I thought the premiere was very...set-upy. Necessarily so, there's a lot of changes and deaths from the last season that need to be addressed. But I couldn't help but leave the episode feeling nothing really happened.

Yeah I feel the same. There wasn't much new stuff for me to take away from that episode apart from the assassins and the first real taste of what Jon's relationship with Stannis and the others will be. But Tyrion's beard is nice and there were a lot of butts

Yeah definitely a slow premiere, but as Twolf said kind of expected. I know I've said this before, but I often think instead of trying to squeeze in non-essential scenes, just spend more time with an episode's main storylines. I suppose some of this is necessary to keep storylines ready for future interactions, but I can't imagine Loras screentime this week wouldn't have been better served given to someone else.

The Tyrion/Varys scenes were my favorite this week. Funny and gave us a good idea of where they are headed this season. I also really liked Jon and Stannis' scene on The Wall. I felt Mance was a bit underutilized on the show, but again it is tough to serve so many characters in the show.

Littlefinger/Sansa are headed West which could be anywhere really since that is the only way out of The Vale. I suspect they might end up involved in the plots up North in an effort to group more characters into storylines together which seems like something they might be trying to do this season.

The flashback was well-done and I thought the girl who played Cersei did a good job. She seemed just like a little Cersei. I'm still a little surprised that of all the flashback scenes they could have done over the years this was their first (they had previously had a sort of no flashback rule).

Also one book spoiler thing-y:

Book Spoiler:

And I write reviews on my site for these if anyone wants to check them out. Here is the first one of the season:

https://thetripleoption.wordpress.com/2015/04/13/game-of-thrones-the-wars-to-come-review/

Pretty much a more fleshed out version of what I said here, so not really essential, but I figured I'd post the first one anyway.

...SPOILERS:

Spoiler:

Hmmm...

Book Spoilers:

Well, yeah, I'd agree with all of that. I think I was just saying the changes they made with her story line were emblematic of what they are hopefully doing with ALL of the characters (speeding things up, hitting the arcs a bit faster without the faffing around).

You guys watch? I really liked the Jon stuff this week. The scene with him and Stannis was really great. And I liked Sam's speech before the election. I would have preferred a bit more time spent building to the election or even a little more time between those two scenes, but it was still really good.

So far I really like how cohesive this season feels. For once it feels like all the characters are coming back together.

I totally agree with the election though. A bit more ho-humming from Jon Snow about whether or not to take it would have been nice but still good.

I'm sure I'll have more thoughts about tonight's episode eventually...

I thought the first two episodes felt about as scattered as the series has ever been. I mean Tyrion moves away from the King's Landing plots with Varys and they add two more major locations in Dorne and Braavos with those characters separated from most others. We can see things will be coming together and this episode takes some good steps in that direction.

Some things I really liked from this latest episode:
-Moat Cailin and Volantis looked great. The inside of The House of Black and White looked just how I'd imagined it.
-Arya's scene where she is trying to shed her old life, but can't give up Needle. Great work by Maisie.
-Davos conversation with Jon and using the oath to try and convince him that maybe taking Winterfell is actually what is best for "guarding the realms of men."
-Stannis' nod to Jon after he kills Slynt.
-The idea of all the Northern plots seeming to converge at Winterfell.
-Not sure I have a standout moment with Cersei this week, but her storyline is still really good.

I do hope Littlefinger has some mustache-twirling plan running underneath this marriage setup though because otherwise it seems not very Littlefinger-esque. And I hope this doesn't turn Sansa into a victim again. That would be bad and go against her current trajectory. Though I'd assume there is something more tricky going on here, because otherwise... it seems dumb. Also it feels like they are really pushing the Brienne versus Stannis angle with her wanting revenge. I wonder if maybe it will come down to either saving Sansa or getting revenge and she chooses the former? I don't know I'm just spitballing here. Or maybe everything just goes to shit like it often does on this show. Who knows.

The maid's little "The North Remembers" gave me shivers. I have a feeling there'll be a rise up/insurrection but it'd be nice to see Sansa plot it instead of Littlefinger.

I agree with you guys and hope that Sansa plays a real part in what happens to her from here on. She's just getting interesting and she's in the perfect position to learn some of littlefinger's tricks. The converging plots in the north along with Tyrion's kidnapping should hopefully make up for most of the action being moved out of king's landing. Arya's plot is looking good, too, but I think they've made it clear not to expect a huge payoff quite yet. Also, maybe it's been revealed before, but what I gathered was that Melissandre(?) probably cured Stannis' daughter. Interesting bit of history that explains a lot about those people.

I caught the previous episode pretty late. Jaime going down to Dorne seemed really sudden, but with him and Bronn they've definitely got the characters for some good material. Loved how Danaerys' storyline is turning out with her continuing to realize that ruling is a lot more complicated than she'd hoped

Also worth noting that we've seen nothing from north of the wall so far this season. Last season's finale left me wondering if they'd keep Bran up their sleeves for a while... If they do, it works for me. The less realistic stuff in this show is often my least favourite

I don't know if this is spoiler or not but casting-alone revealed

Spoiler:

I kind of feel like things are moving a bit too fast this season. They could afford to stretch out the season for a few more episodes at the rate it's going.

Not sure how I feel about this episode. I loved the Stannis/Shireen scene and the one in the crypts with Littlefinger and Sansa. Stories about Rhaegar are always a plus, so I enjoyed both of them. The end fight was kind of a mess and Barristan dying kind of stinks. I'd guess they are making room for Tyrion? The Sand Snakes are meh. The whole plan for Jaime's trip seems kind of ham-fisted as a way to get him near other characters without a ton of logic behind it, but the fight scene with him and Bronn was fun at least. I don't know I will have to think on this one some more.

Yeah, I think the writer's logic for Jaime being in Dorne is good, but the way they are presenting it is...shit. I think Cersei sending Jaime to Dorne just for spite would have worked better.

I also, and you know I don't say this all that often, think that the introduction of the sand snakes was done way better in the books. Cutting then numbers made sense but having the 1 by 1 intros would have been better. But Thrones combining characters is still welcome in my book and getting Ellia to take over for Arienne works in the context of the show I think.

I do feel like this season could be building to some BIG scenes though, and I hope all this building up of plot lines/exposition pays off.

But the Harpies killing and/or wounding Gray Worm and Selmy definitely upped the stakes of that rebellion. Really happy with how that side of the world is being handled because it feels dangerous as hell in Meereen.

Having not read the books, Barristan and (maybe) Grey Worm dying seemed like it came really quick and it lacked a lot of the impact of other deaths. I hope that the latter is at least alive still.

I hope the sand snakes get more air time. They seem like they could be pretty cool. The monologue + spear through the face was kind of silly, though. I also really like the costume design for Dorne with the fancy yellow flowing robes and whatnot.

When is the show expected to meet up with the books? The end of this season? The end of next season?

It should meet up with the books by the end of this season and will be past them in some cases.

I really like Barristan, so I guess that is why him dying (assuming he did) is a bummer. Which I can deal with. It happens, especially in this series, but they didn't really do anything with his character in the show and he is much much better in the book (even Twolf must agree with this!). It also felt a little like shock for shock's sake though I figure they must be getting him out of the way for Tyrion to join the posse. The TV show can't service as many characters which I understand. Of course leaving it in limbo at the end of the episode also robs us of properly reacting to the death, but I'm not sure if show-only watchers would care much anyway, since they never really developed him.

I don't really like the Unsullied losing discipline as quickly as they did in the final fight either. Maybe they were trying to foreshadow this with them going to brothels and seeming more laxed? Either way it didn't feel right. I think perhaps a more clever trap getting the better of them would have made me feel better.

The end result is fine I suppose, but I don't really love the way it all happened I guess if that makes sense.

I really love the kingdom of Dorne. The look of the locations and as you pointed out ajapam, the way they dress. I also like how they stand out from the other kingdoms since they a gender-blind when it comes to succession and stuff like that (this is the only reason Ellaria doesn't feel like a proper replacement for Arianne). I just don't know if they are doing anything really interesting here so far, but we will have to see as the season continues.

Even I agree with you on that one, buddy.

I don't know what it is about this season, but I'm not really into it as much as previous seasons. Not to say its bad... but its just not hooking me like previous seasons. I'm hoping it'll ramp up soon!

To be honest I felt that too, but on the other hand I also feel genuinely tense as they are off the books enough now that I don't know what's going to happen really.

I liked how focused this episode was. The show is better when it doesn't spread itself too thin. But there was a little too much time spent on the Boltons for me. And Dany's move from the first scene to her last one seemed too quick. And the marriage thing seemed out of nowhere.

On the good side of things, I continue to love the stuff at the Wall. Both Jon and Stannis have been great this season. And I liked the final sequence with Jorah and Tyrion from the dragon flying over to the Stone men attack. Good stuff.

Also Stannis' "Fewer" line was gold.