THE GAME OF THRONES/ASOIAF SPOILER THREAD (WARNING: SPOILERS)

Has this ever happened before in pop culture, where a series or story is adapted into a TV show before the story is done, and the TV show overtakes the narrative of the original material and has to make it up as it goes along? I guess "Walking Dead" is like this, to an extent, but that was never devised with an end in mind, so it doesn't really matter. This is different. Must be frustrating to Martin, unless he is really good at focusing, because the popularity of the show will make many people approach his (in theory) forthcoming novels like *they're* the adaptation, or they're the ones that are different. Not to mention that the show, at least in some places, will start to spoil his narrative (vs. the opposite). I mean, does he watch the show? Wouldn't it be tough to write a book with the show and its changes in mind, knowing (apparently) that both show and novels are ultimately (probably) ending up at more or less the same place?

he writes for the show, so he probably watches it yeah

and he's already admitted that the TV version of Osha made him change his plans for the character

I have to say I'm pretty impressed that the tv guys have managed to abandon the shitty plotlines of the last two books and come up with something worse though

I wonder how show watchers who aren't readers are gonna respond to cersei's "walk," lena headey has confirmed that that's gonna happen

well, once they brought in the zealots, i figured that was definitely gonna happen

they gave themselves a fig leaf by making the high septon do it first but I assume it will be very hard to watch and people will lose their minds

first casting leak for season six lists what is clearly euron greyjoy and randyl tarly as the first major parts they're looking for.

i feel like the show has slowly killed my enthusiasm for the series, i was super excited back during season 1 to see everything translated to the screen so well and now i don't know if i'm even going to bother reading the last couple books when they come out

Really though it's probably more that I've had 10 years to find and read better fantasy series while grrm mostly sat on his thumbs

Would love recommendations!

Robin hobb imo

really surprised that they're bothering to bring in euron (and what the hell even is the point of samwell's dad) but will obv be interested to see who they cast

super weird to see the guy who plays tormund giantsbane in travel commercials, btw

Samwell's backstory should translate well imo.

Anything Greyjoy gives me narcolepsy.

super weird to see the guy who plays tormund giantsbane in travel commercials, btw

if u haven't seen the film force majeure i'd recommend it. a lot of fun watching tormund as a yuppy euro ski tourist. (also it is an incredible film.)

it's on my netflix list, plan to check it out soon

man that's an even weirder thought than the commercial almost, does he have the giant beard in majeure as well???

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-izbWSV-xiIw/VE6x32ZoHqI/AAAAAAAAY4I/zCIVP-qwxdA/s1600/force%2Bmajeure-turist-kristofer%2Bhivju-johannes%2Bkuhnke.jpeg

sorry for the huge image but couldn't find a smaller version

Robin hobb imo

DO NOT read the second book of the Soldier's Son trilogy

I woke up and wrote this note yesterday at 3:48 AM. LOL

(Game of Thrones) theory:

- Jon Snow’s a Targaryen
- Jon Snow is murdered
- Melisandre (or Thoros of Myr) resurrects Jon Snow
- King’s blood

Xpost yeah for hobb I basically meant to recommend the group of trilogies that take place in the same world (farseer, live ship, fool, the other one) but soldier son is outside of that iirc

It is. It's also on the very short list of books I found physically repulsive and unpleasant to read (although it's in pretty good company with V and The Jungle, if for a completely different reason)

jon snow dies

― diamonddave85,

Will he I wonder?

i would be really surprised if they didn't go there in some fashion, although perhaps he'll just be attacked/stabbed by ollie (or some alliser thorne goon, or thorne himself) - in this hypothetical the point would be not a "will he or wont he die" cliffhanger as in dance w/ dragons but to show how vulnerable he is

they could also obvs actually kill him and have melisandre bring him back, which i think is the most likely course

they are being v heavy handed about setting up that kid to kill him so it would be v cool if that was a bluff to psyche the book readers out and jon stays alive, maybe show the kid changing his mind at the last minute or something. however, most likely the kid is just going to kill him.

but as has been discussed previously, the story at the wall requires him to come back somehow, there is nothing there without him. if he wargs into a perma wolf that would be too weird i think, so presumably the red god brings him back to life, which then makes him a watchman, wildling and zombie, and maybe he can bring everyone together and settle things amicably.

don't the thorne goons do a julius caesar on him? like, why would the show forgo the option of a mass stabbing?

they do indeed

i can see them forgoing it despite the undoubted shock potential mostly bc they don't spend /that/ much time dealing with crow vs. wildling suspicion compared to what's in the books, like in ADWD it's discussed in every single jon chapter p much, whereas in the show they've had a few ollie scenes, some dumb shit ser alliser says and some grumbling here and there

the kid is this season's chekhov's gun, he's getting screen time for a reason

just as he is about to shoot Jon, Bran worgs him from afar

I wonder if everybody thinks they're the first person to come up with the Ides of Marsh

am i right in remembering that for hardhome we never really get a description of the massacre, just like a letter back

and it talks about like 'white walkers in the waters' and possibly white walker fish and whales?

Just a letter.

At hardhome with six ships. Wild seas. Blackbird lost with all hands, two Lyseni ships driven aground on Skane, Talon taking water. Very bad here. Wildlings eating their own dead. Dead things in the woods. Braavosi captains will only take women, children on their ships. Witch women call us slavers. Attempt to take Storm Crow defeated, six crew dead, many wildlings. Eight ravens left. Dead things in the water. Send help by land, seas wracked by storms. From Talon, by hand of Maester Harmune

"Dead things in the water." is great

sooooooo in the "inside the episode" thing that plays after you watch the episodes on hbo go/now, david benioff said that GRRM told them the shireen death was coming, or at least had been an idea of his - presumably making that the second major instance of the show lapping the books after tyrion being by dany's side

Revealing that is a bit of a cop out. Kinda feels like he's saying, "I don't like this idea and couldn't think of a better alternative but at the same time I don't want to take the rap for it."

benioff said (paraphrasing) that he thought it worked for the story - that it was the logical hideous end result of stannis falling in thrall to the most extreme version of his religion - but that he hated filming it

could be at least a partial deflection though

"Well I can't completely throw GRRM under the bus having potentially spoiled a plot point from his unreleased book but I still have to give some indication that this development is anathema to my being."

hahaha, fair

really enjoyed how the meereen scene was done on a much larger/more interesting scale visually than it is in the books while it's also way less busy in terms of plot - eliminating the tedious "did hizdahr mean to give her poison locusts or didn't he etc. etc." thing, it was much more effective that way.

that said also reminds me of how there's no strong belwas!

strong belwas was a pretty good bit player

Feel like his presence would have tipped a lot of the Meereen scenes into absurdity but at the same time without him and especially now without Selmy, Dany feels ridiculously exposed.

true and shortly to have only tyrion and big homie daario protecting her what w jorah's incipient death

Grey Worm was probably supposed to make up the difference but having no stand in with everybody besides fake heartthrob dude gone seems like an easily fixable oversight.

I'm thinking that as they get closer to the end of the books staging scenes and introducing new characters in ways that don't cause confusion or mess with future continuity becomes painfully difficult. It's clear that GRRM puts a lot of thought into the little things so not having a chunky text there as a blueprint for how the details pan out has really shown in how loose the plotting has felt at times.

Boring season, all that I'm looking forward to now is to see if Dany gets the runs.

treason to talk about a khaleesi like that.

so next episode is Cersei walk of shame, Sansa/Theon escape into Camp Stannis, and Jon gets stabbed ?

that's what i've been assuming, although they haven't really done much to build towards the sansa/theon escape.