Game of Thrones

[Bam]

Anyone else here watch Game of Thrones? I'm getting ready to do a big marathon to prep myself for season 5. My favorite character is Tyrion, but my favorite house is Bolton. I'm looking forward to being emotionally devastated by future episodes.

No book spoilers please. I'm only on A Clash of Kings.

[pennydreadful]

I watch it as well; I'd have to say my fave character is Brienne, closely followed by Daeny.

I've got to be honest, I did find the format of the books very frustrating - by which I mean the constantly changing POVs, and the fact that no sooner do you get attached to a character than GRRM kills them off. It's something that I find easier to roll with in the tv series than the books; I'm able to keep a bit more emotional distance with the tv series.

[TheBlueTurtle1]

LOve it, one of my fav shows, can't wait for season 5. Yes Tyrion rules!

[ObiWanFan4life]

I adore the Show, I've wanted to read the books, but they're the size of phone books.

[Bam]

Originally Posted by pennydreadful

I've got to be honest, I did find the format of the books very frustrating - by which I mean the constantly changing POVs, and the fact that no sooner do you get attached to a character than GRRM kills them off. It's something that I find easier to roll with in the tv series than the books; I'm able to keep a bit more emotional distance with the tv series.

Yeah, after reading the first book, I'm honestly happy that I watched the show first. I feel more of an emotional impact from the show. But the books provide more information and help to understand the characters better. I just wish I had more time to read them.

Brienne is a really great character. I lover her. All the female characters are really fantastic.

[pennydreadful]

I'm actually very fond of Cersei as well.

It's going to be interesting to see whether GRRM ever actually finishes the book series - I know he's said he's going to but let's face it, he's 67 and not in the best of shape. Truthfully, I don't think it's going to happen. It's actually made me extremely reluctant to continue reading the novels (well, that and the fact that I find his books very hard work as I'm just not a fan of his particular writing style).

[Bam]

Originally Posted by pennydreadful

I'm actually very fond of Cersei as well.

It's going to be interesting to see whether GRRM ever actually finishes the book series - I know he's said he's going to but let's face it, he's 67 and not in the best of shape. Truthfully, I don't think it's going to happen. It's actually made me extremely reluctant to continue reading the novels (well, that and the fact that I find his books very hard work as I'm just not a fan of his particular writing style).

I actually really like Cersei too. She's a great character, but people seem to hate her.

Yeah, considering the books started when I was a child and there are only 5...I don't really have high hopes of seeing them end. I'm sure that he has some kind of notebook full of spoilers just in case. And the HBO show will do it own thing, so there's that.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

I think Peter Laird and GRRM get together in a pub somewhere and knock back ales as they laugh at their fans who desperately wait with bated breath for conclusions to their stories.

In all seriousness, though, I loved Daenerys and Tyrion... Jaime is also badass. The books seemed to get really tedious though around Book 4 "Feast of Crows" and I started skipping whole sections... too many new character introduced around that time. I still don't understand all of the Sand Viper girls and that whole family/clan...

[THGhost]

Love it. My favourite character is either Daeny or Arya - such strong female characters which is a rare thing.

[Bam]

Originally Posted by CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy

In all seriousness, though, I loved Daenerys and Tyrion... Jaime is also badass. The books seemed to get really tedious though around Book 4 "Feast of Crows" and I started skipping whole sections... too many new character introduced around that time. I still don't understand all of the Sand Viper girls and that whole family/clan...

That's not the first time I've heard someone say that about A Feast for Crows. Makes me worried. I really do want to read all the books. I love reading, but it's just taking me forever. I'm around page 600 on the second book and I've been reading for over half a year. Gah! I usually read really fast, but it's just hard to find the time. And sometimes I just get to a character I just don't want to read about and stop for a while. Like, Bran's parts really drag for me.

Has anyone else played the Telltale games?

[pennydreadful]

He's basically said that if he dies before he finishes the book series, whatever unfolds in the tv show will be the official wrap-up for the story.

I view the books and the show as two very different animals anyway, so it doesn't particularly bother me. They made a hell of a lot of changes in the show - bringing in new characters that weren't in the books, not killing off characters who died in the books, leaving out literally dozens of characters from the books and leaving out numerous sub-plots and storylines entirely, making characters more sympathetic in the tv series than they were in the books, characters who were unattractive in the books are more attractive in the tv series etc.

Ordinarily that kind of departure from the source material would drive me wild, as I'm a dyed-in-the-wool book snob, but I think that if the changes hadn't been made to both streamline the narrative and make the world appealing to the viewer, it wouldn't have nearly the success that it does. Let's be honest, there's a lot of people who had never heard of the books and would never have picked them up if it weren't for the tv series. IMO, the tv series is a rare instance of the adaptation being better than the original novel(s).

GRRM is that interesting animal that I refer to as The Good Bad Writer. He has some very interesting ideas, and a great skill for constructing a unique and detailed world which makes the reader want to know more. Conversely, he does have a tendency to get bogged down in those same details (which results in chapters upon chapters of dragging exposition and set-up), and he falls prey to a great number of tropes which, to be fair, are fairly endemic across the fantasy genre (and are also present in the show). I think that the scope of what he has created has grown to the point that it now works against him and he's lost his way and doesn't know where he's going or what he's doing. The tv show has been able to trim things down and tighten the pacing of the storytelling, which most people would agree does drag significantly in the last two books.

I'm also going to flat-out say that GRRM's sex scenes are just butt-clenchingly ghastly. I think a lot of people glom onto his novels because they're excited that he breaks a lot of the fantasy novel traditions - in particular, his fondness for exploring the horizontal mambo in lurid, sweaty (and often rape-tastic) detail while at the same time using odd, awkward, flowery prose*. Unfortunately, when you get to one of those scenes in a GRRM book (or when he feels the need to throw in a description of how a character's breasts are moving under their clothes in the middle of a paragraph), it throws me right out of the scene and I just feel like I'm reading something written by a dirty old man (and trust me, I've read everything Richard Laymon has ever published, and that guy redefines "shoe-horning squicky personal fantasies into his work"). Ultimately, I'm never 100% sure whether he's writing these scenes in because they're part of his world, or if he's just trying to titillate himself and his readers.

* The author has not yet been spawned who can get away with referring to a character's male member as "The Gift" without resulting in me immediately heaving a jaded sigh, rolling my eyes skyward and reaching for the nearest bottle of absinthe.

[Bam]

I find it really odd that he's okay with the show wrapping up the canon story when he's so against fanfiction.

I can't really give in my full two cents until I catch up on the books, but this has me slightly apprehensive. Not that I'm not going to stop reading or enjoying them. I'm just going to have higher hopes for the show than the books. Most of what I've read so far has not strayed too far from the show.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Originally Posted by Bam

That's not the first time I've heard someone say that about A Feast for Crows. Makes me worried. I really do want to read all the books. I love reading, but it's just taking me forever. I'm around page 600 on the second book and I've been reading for over half a year. Gah! I usually read really fast, but it's just hard to find the time. And sometimes I just get to a character I just don't want to read about and stop for a while. Like, Bran's parts really drag for me.

Has anyone else played the Telltale games?

Identify your favorite characters and plot lines, then skip everything else. That's the only way I made it through Books Four and Five. And I am a fanatical reader who has been reading since I first read a +400 page chapter novel in preschool. Yeah, I'm an addict to good storytelling.

[Bam]

Originally Posted by CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy

Identify your favorite characters and plot lines, then skip everything else. That's the only way I made it through Books Four and Five. And I am a fanatical reader who has been reading since I first read a +400 page chapter novel in preschool. Yeah, I'm an addict to good storytelling.

Oh, man, I don't know if I could do that. Skipping parts in a book just feels so wrong to me. But I guess it depends on how frustrated I get.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Originally Posted by Bam

Oh, man, I don't know if I could do that. Skipping parts in a book just feels so wrong to me. But I guess it depends on how frustrated I get.

Believe me, I was not thrilled about doing it and I still feel a little guilty. But my brain was trying to escape out one of my ears from sheer frustration, so I did what was necessary.

[pennydreadful]

Originally Posted by Bam

I find it really odd that he's okay with the show wrapping up the canon story when he's so against fanfiction.

Ah yes, the old "I don't agree with fanfiction morally (because I'm scared someone will do a better job of writing my characters than me)" line. It worked out so well for Anne Rice!

The thing with the books is that GRRM originally only intended for it to be a trilogy. And by the time you hit book 4, it shows. My suggestion is to just stick with the first 3 books, otherwise you will inevitably feel that you're reading the others out of a sense of begrudging obligation. I know I did.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Originally Posted by pennydreadful

Ah yes, the old "I don't agree with fanfiction morally (because I'm scared someone will do a better job of writing my characters than me)" line. It worked out so well for Anne Rice!

The thing with the books is that GRRM originally only intended for it to be a trilogy. And by the time you hit book 4, it shows. My suggestion is to just stick with the first 3 books, otherwise you will inevitably feel that you're reading the others out of a sense of begrudging obligation. I know I did.

But Book 3 does not at all end all--any--of the plot lines. How would sticking with the first three books be a more palatable reading experience?

[pennydreadful]

I think that the first three books have a higher quality of writing, so I'm talking about it in that context. You've said yourself, by the time you hit book 4 you were skipping entire chapters. *shrugs* Just IMO.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Originally Posted by pennydreadful

I think that the first three books have a higher quality of writing, so I'm talking about it in that context. You've said yourself, by the time you hit book 4 you were skipping entire chapters. *shrugs* Just IMO.

Ah, for a quality reading experience. Gotcha. Definitely agree.

Well, for the moment, GoT is more or less a bunch of different stories collected together... there isn't a whole lot to tie some of the different character arcs together yet until certain characters join somebody out in Westoros (avoiding spoilers)...

[Bam]

Started my episode-a-day run to prepare myself for Season 5. The hardest part will be watching only one episode at a time.