Anyone else here watching Game of Thrones and/or reading/has read the books? I've read all the books and am up to date on the show as well. The changes they've made thus are are (mostly) ok, and I'm interested in seeing the direction they take with those changes. However, there are a few aspects of the story I would have liked to see more of, most recently the hilarious, awkward, and really interesting interaction between Brienne and Jaime. Also (only see below if you've read book 3, A Storm of Swords) Spoiler you may remember that Tarly's encounter with a white walker ends with him killing it practically by accident, by shoving an obsidian ("dragonglass") dagger into its chest, thereby allowing them to discover an effective way of fighting The Others. The show's take on the scene was a little underwhelming, by contrast.
I have read all books "before it was cool" *g*, but honestly they loose a bit their touch in the last two books. The show I watched Season 1, I found it well made but could not last more, especially when you know how it goes on. But honestly its great to see "Fantasy" back on the screen, was nothing good in the last years, expect Tudors.
I don't like the portrayal of Lady Stark or Jon Snow in the series. They are missing out on important story aspects that justify their actions. In the series they act like they're childlish or even worse, stupid. Spoiler The show hasn't showed us that part yet. If I recall correctly, that happens after the remnants of the Night Watch return to Craster's Hold.
I think Jon Snow is fine so far, Lady Stark is good and bad, mostly because its effin' hard to fit that much context into a TV show. Overall they're doing a better job than I'd have expected with the translation, even if they are playing up Robb's romance on the TV show where it wasn't mentioned at all in the books.
Have to remember as a side not that Georgy porgy martin helped to write the scripts for the show as well and approved the changes that they have made in order to keep the series more TV friendly. Spoiler with the latest ep, its been a while since I read the books but didnt Jamie get caught by Vargo Hoat not the flayed men? I dont really see the flayed men cutting off Jamies hand since they become supporters of the Lannisters Rule and all... :/
Yea, you've got a good point there. It is damn difficult to do the cropping, you know? It's the same issue game devs often face- you have 100 epic and awesome features, but you can only pick 5 of them for your final product. Which ones are going to get the axe? "You have to kill your darlings" - hear hear. An episode of 50 minutes can only contain so much. Sure, in some utopia we could have 30 episodes per season, each episode would be 3 hours long - and we probably wouldn't be missing a whole lot of important story aspects. But as things are as they are, in order to get a series that is popular enough to be extended beyond Season 1 (and cosmos forbid it be cancelled mid-season!) you have to do things differently than when you're writing a book. Books and TV-series are different formats with different expectations.
I think we all realize you can't have everything in the book, but what I don't like is when they're changing the story. Sure, I can accept small changes but some really piss me off. Read the below if you have watched/read up to this season. Spoiler I don't like that fact that in the TV series Lady Cat frees the Kingslayer before she finds out that Bran and Rickon are dead. In the books she freed the Kingslayer because she believed they were dead. Also, Jaime is a lot of things, but a KINSLAYER he isn't. He might have said he would have done so, but in the books he NEVER does it. So I'm pretty disappoint with the fact that he killed his cousin in the show just to try and escape. Oh, and don't get me started on Jon Snow trying to capture that Wildling woman. That made him look incompetent which Jon isn't.
The TV-series is excellent compared to most crap they are showing these days. In that light I don't mind at all them taking "shortcuts" or changing the story from the books. Plus if you haven't red the books already, you'll get double entertainment when reading how it "really" went.
Read all of the books and am also up to date with the show. Spoiler IIRC Sam has two encounters with the white walkers in the books, the first is when he actually kills one of the "Others" white a piece of dragonglass, later is when he and Gilly is taking refuge in a cabin and they are surrounded by white walkers. That is when Coldhands makes his first appearance. I really hope they don't cut the first encounter from the show, because it is vital to the lore of the Others. While I agree that Cat is poorly portrayed in the show, Michelle Fairly is still an awesome actress and does a realistic interpretation of a mother with so much against her. There are numerous portrayals which are similiar to hers but are compensated by the actors/actresses. Most notably are Littlefinger, Jon Snow, Tywin Lannister, Jora Mormont and many more. That being said, some of the characters are spot on portrayals from the book and at least one does it better according to GRRM (Osha). Jaime, Arya, Sansa and Joffrey are all perfect choices to fill the roles of their characters.
Not only playing it up more but completely changing his wife which makes no sense whatsoever because his wife in the books has significant impact on the story.
I actually like what they're doing with Robb's romance because they've made a compelling character and a decent reason for why he broke his promise to marry one of the Freys. In the books I seem to recall the girl he married instead of the Frey one wasn't really developed at all, and it came off as just a "dumb kid" thing I think.
Spoiler I was thinking that too! Vargo Hoat kidnapping Jaime would have made for a much more intense scene I think, too. Course, they didn't really capture them yet, who knows what could happen at the start of the next episode.
Spoiler With regard to Jaime, I sort of think there's a feeling that the more despicable Jaime is, the more he'll make for some compelling drama which is understandable to an extent from the standpoint of a tv show. As for Jon Snow, I think that while they don't make him look truly incompetent in the book he does look naive, and in a lot of ways the show is doing the same thing but slightly differently. I do agree about Catelyn though, but I also agree that actress (I suck with names....) is doing a phenomenal job.
To be frank, who he ends up marrying in the book is a lot less of a "dumb kid" thing than who he ends up marrying in the TV show.
Huh, it's been a couple years since I read A Storm of Swords. May need to go back and reread some bits in preparation for what's coming, then, since I don't remember it being that way at all.
If you'd like to know sooner: Spoiler Robb marries Jeyne Westerling, of the Crag. He besieges and captures the castle, obtaining an arrow wound (if I recall) and is nursed back to health by the daughter of the Westerlings, they fall for each other, have sex, and Robb decides to marry her rather than leave her there incase she is pregnant, because he doesn't want to do what his father did and create a bastard, and also because he believes it the most honourable course of action. There is some "dumb kid" decision-making there, to be sure, but he also took responsibility for his actions, and he still married a noblewoman. It would have been unheard of for him to marry a commoner, even if he did fancy her, because that would have been akin to committing political suicide. The whole red wedding came about because Walder Frey was an old snake who could not accept Robb's decision, and was influenced by Tywin, rather than because Robb committed political suicide. He made a mistake, but not THAT big of one in the grand scheme of things, and most Lords would have been upset, but reasonable about his decision, especially if they swore fealty to him.
warning heavy spoiling on s03e03 inside. Don't look, I mean it. Spoiler the img didn't work so here's a link in stead: http://mashable.com/2013/04/10/game-of-thrones-facebook-edition/
