HBO adaptation of Game of Thrones - will this be just for nerds? (NO SPOILERS PLEASE)

After reading the books this past summer, I appreciate how well the show captured the good parts as well as how bad the bad parts are.

like, that's your gritty addition to the milieu of howard, moorcock, tolkein, and lieber is... giggly shit about prostitution?

The show shows the subjugation of women and other groups, and even glorifies it at times. But the larger themes of the story are about rising up and taking the mantle of power imo.

the tv show doesn't engage any consistent themes beyond the power struggles that serve as the main drivers of the plot. which are also about as banal as anything in Dallas or Falcon Crest

agree to disagree

xpost Yeah, I agree. It's pretty soapy, but laced with portent and teeming with dragons and giants and magic and zombies.

it's all about power, but it's power divorced from any reality or context. why anyone wants to be king/queen is mostly rooted in revenge fantasies and/or because they simply take it for granted that they *should* be. there's one glaring exception to this, and her plotline gets p ridiculous p quick (and still involves a bunch of birthright nonsense). the show has no moral center or point of view, and when it *does* try to go there (via Danaerys freeing slaves, for ex.) it is very clumsy.

why anyone wants to be king/queen is mostly rooted in revenge fantasies and/or because they simply take it for granted that they *should* be.

The show is very clearly a critique of this!

also this ignores both Bran and Arya's plot lines which have nothing to do with power in the ruling sense, though Arya is definitely out for revenge

also falcon crest and dallas were cool imo

I generally want to defend this show but there's a trend I dislike that's been popular probably since the 90s that's in GoT and Boardwalk Empire (which I've been loving recently): characters going into monologues that are either supposed to be cool or disquieting/sobering or moving. It often feels quite mechanical, forced and a bit cringey.
You often get it in films/tv with criminals who start with "y'see it's like this..." and proceed to confidently rationalise their crimes as if they're justified or just an inescapable part of nature. Similar to Hannibal Lectures.

Glad I haven't read many new mainstream comics in a long time because they tend to be the absolute most excruciating for hip and "profound" dialogue.

The show is very clearly a critique of this!

it's not a critique, it's just plot mechanics. there's no pattern to which people are punished for their ambitions vs which people are rewarded for them. people and their misplaced ambitions are age-old dramatic devices that drive action, and that's what they do on the show.

but the show is not about how, for example, power corrupts (Tolkien), or a contest between order and chaos (Moorcock) etc. It just sets a bunch of windup toys in motion and lets them go, there is no lesson to be drawn from it, no moral, no worldview explored. It's just a parade of boobs murder and the occasional dragon, in endless succession. It's empty.

xp

and before anyone jumps on me accusing me for asking to have my hand held through a story with a lesson at the end that's not what I'm getting at. Ambiguity is fine, contradictions are fine, nuances are fine - but the show isn't interested in underlying themes of the nature of power or evil or good or human institutions or gender or race or economics or anything at all really, it's just a series of titillating setpieces

It just sets a bunch of windup toys in motion and lets them go, there is no lesson to be drawn from it, no moral, no worldview explored. It's just a parade of boobs murder and the occasional dragon, in endless succession. It's empty.

That's kind of the point I think. Nothing really matters since we're all gonna die anyway, either killed by ice zombies or some other way.

Yeah, I think having no moral is this show's worldview. A lot of fucked up shit happens in real life for no reason.

It will still probably have some kind of happy ending though.

I think the show is extremely moral. Goodness *is* good, even if good people often suffer.

I don't think GRRM is interested AT ALL in exploring the worn-out "good vs. evil" tropes of most fantasy stuff. He is definitely interested in human institutions, gender, race, economics, etc. How well he explores those themes is questionable, but they are there.

How well he explores those themes is questionable, but they are there.

yes

imo the books are better at this than the show for what that's worth

seconded

agree that the second and third seasons are the best, if only relatively. the show over all has settled into a rhythm of turgid exposition for 8 or so episodes, leavened with bits of casual violence and nudity, and then 2 episodes of genuine dramatic development. outside of tyrion all the characters have little complexity, just some bare-bones notion of "conflict" which mechanically propels them forward in the narrative. it sucks.

the most interesting thing by far is the mythological world building, particularly the mysteries surrounding the events before the first novel and the deeper history of westeros, but the show has no idea how to present that materia.

material

I'd agree with that. The most interesting aspect is the world building, which is the show is probably incapable of adequately conveying. Right now it is certainly coasting far below the level of the LotR movies in that regard, and obviously they left tons out.

Eh most interesting to me is watching the Lannister house tear itself apart from the inside. Also there is your moral compass in action. Good guys die a lot here but the bad guys inevitably get what's coming.

winter?

I've been reading lots of early medieval history lately and its like GoT happening over and over again, minus the dragons. But people back then believed in even crazier stuff than that. I'm sure the Vikings seemed like White Walkers at the time too.

Also lol only 2 dead lannisters so far. Meanwhile literally everyone from house stark is dead except arya and bran.

Xxp

And Rickon, and probably Sansa and Jon.

Jon looks p dead, rickon kinda belongs to another house. I forgot sansa tho yeah. She probably wishes she were dead at this pt.

Tywin, Joeffrey, Myrcella, Martyn, and Willem = 5 dead Lannisters

I dont even know who those last 3 are. Were they on the show?

I think the last two were murdered while prisoners of Rob Stark

Anyway my pt is its weird to argue that lannisters suffering is proportionate to their crimes. At best they suffer slightly less than more sympathetic characters.

do we know that Myrcella is dead? Is that a book spoiler?

Show hasn't made a terribly compelling argument, imo, for why anyone would want the iron throne, given the frequency of murders, executions and assassinations. Especially since the show has made a compelling argument that there are a dozen other better places to live than King's Landing. But that could be because the show hasn't clarified the elaborate history of the book. All the "how did we get here" background, which my nerd(ier) friends have explained to me Like, the importance of Valyrian Steel, etc.

But yeah, the story (as such) would be more effective minus the deus ex dragon and unbeatable threats of zombie hordes. Vikings might as well have been zombies, but really ... they weren't. And in terms of this show, half the cast is essentially Viking-esque anyway.

do we know that Myrcella is dead? Is that a book spoiler?

afaik yes, that is a book spoiler

like I don't think there's any evidence Martin or the showrunners intend the Lannisters as a cautionary tale. Suffering is meted out arbitrarily on this show, if anything it's POV seems to be "you're fucked no matter what you do" ie garden variety nihilism.

xp

Same nerd(ier) friends agrees that is the point, too. That a la history, good intentions are not enough, and bad stuff happens to good or well meaning people all the time, for capricious and greedy and stupid reasons. Doesn't do the narrative any favors, and yeah, nuclear option dragons and hordes of shambling metaphors complicate the nihilistic simplicity a little.

I'm holding out hope for something along the lines of:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvKIWjnEPNY

afaik yes, that is a book spoiler

Y'all didn't see last season?

or read the books

a bloody nose in a season finale doesn't inevitably mean death jeez

i thought she just got hit by a basketball

I mean I am assuming that she's dead based on context clues. I haven't read the book. I suppose she could have just had a very chill nosebleed?

I guess Reek and Sansa must be dead too. Last time we saw them they jumped off a high wall RIP

Buncha jokesters around here

if jon's dead i'm rhaegar targaryen

It would be silly to assume that after cutting away from the nosebleed scene, Jaime fetches her a tissue and she politely thanks him. But seriously, even her being in a coma or something as a result wouldn't be exactly likely after it was established that the sand snakes intended to kill her. Especially since she wasn't a very important character.

not a book spoiler, show is both somewhat divergent and ahead on that. seemed p fatal on the show.