It’s kind of like storytelling s & m – sort of an alternate world in which Martin’s punches land, and they land hard enough that we feel them, but not so hard that we have to use our safe word. Once we heal, we might want to come back for another session.
Game of Thrones spoiler, so proceed with caution if you care about spoilers and haven’t seen the last episode – but this video made me laugh out loud.
(I guess this contains GoT spoilers, but I do not talk about any plot points that haven’t happened in the HBO series yet, and only about a few plot points from the series.)
I recently got megaspoiled about the plot development of George R.R. Martin’s books by a good friend. The series is not spoiled because I know what’s going to happen, but because I now know how boringly simplified the plot and character development is in the series. The series is tremendously well produced and especially acted, but the books sound so much more interesting. And every single thing that sucked in the series is of the series writer’s creation. Take the Jaime – Cersei-beside-their-child’s-corpse-scene. The book version is shocking and terrible, but fits with plot and character arcs. The series version is gratuitously extra terrible and obviously shocking without any subtlety in a way that does not fit into the general narrative, especially of Jaime. Jaime is a horrible person, but for different reasons. I cannot stand the sight of him any longer.
I just stumbled upon another way in which the series is, well, needlessly less complex and interesting. It’s dumbed down for TV. At least from my point of view:
By ofhouseadama:
Here’s the thing about why Sansa slapping Sweetrobin on the show is so gross:
In the books, Sansa deliberately avoids continuing the cycle of abuse, because she realizes the dangerous situation Sweetrobin is in, and why he has become the child he is, how his illness and Lysa’s mothering has affected him, and is able to relate his circumstance to her own. In the show, D&D have blithely had a victim of physical abuse continue it by slapping someone with much less power — due to illness and familial power structure — than she does. I’m 99% certain they have no idea what they did by writing that, but there it is. And we shouldn’t be using that moment to point out Sansa as a “badass,” because on top of it being a sign of continuing the cycle of abuse, there are dozens of other things about Sansa to celebrate.
English Literature, University of Edinburgh
“’Those were the stories that stayed with you, that meant something, even if you were too small to understand why…’ How and why are mythopoeic ideas presented in The Lord of the Rings and A Song of Ice and Fire?”
I’d actually like to read that paper once it’s published.
It seems Dolce e Gabbana decided to create grand clothes for King Joffrey Baratheon.
I like tumblr, it keeps me updated on all the shows I don’t watch.
