GOT Finale
Jun. 16th, 2014 09:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shipperxValar Morghulis.
A couple of book things left out of the finale, and Bran way, way deep into the next books (isn't he? I'm afraid that I lose track of where one book ends and another begins. But that seemed to be somewhat A Dance with Dragons(?) ).
Death 1 -
Jojen didn't die in the book, did he? I remember his being near death, but I didn't remember his actually dying. Though I wasn't shocked by their making that choice. It felt like Jojen was GOING to die, so I don't anticipate that he had all that much left to do, so no criticism of that death. (I liked "Meera's'" background acting after it. She continued to look devastated by her brother's death -- which she should be -- even during the Three-Eyed Raven scene.)
"Death" 2+ ... kinda
I liked the addition of the Ygritte funeral. As well as the Pyp and Grenn ones.Still no mention of Mance's wife and baby. Wonder whether that's going to be left out? Tormund is still around (as he should be). And there's Melisendre, Shireen, and Stannis, so everything is set for next year at The Wall.
Death 3
The shepherd they cast did a good job, because by the time he exposed his daughter's bones to Dany I felt like crying. Guess what happens when you train your pets to attack people? They learn that it's okay to attack people. And when the pet in question is a fire breathing dragon, that can lead to terrible things. And still, Dragons crying for "Mom" was painful too.
Undeath 1 and "Death" 4
Well I see they are clarifying what happened to The Mountain Clegane. It was rather murky and thus a tad speculative in the book. So, yep, The Mountain is the Westerosi 'Frankenstein"... how could this not end well (because we all know that it won't).
And then Sandor Clegane. *sniff*
Book Change: It wasn't Brienne who 'done him in' in the book. She searched for him later. This is a change. I wonder whether it will be significant or not? (In the book, I was one who thought that he was not really, most sincerely dead. And I'll remain open to that argument for some time yet.) The Brienne/Sandor fight was epic, mainly because I didn't want either to die (though I knew what happened to Sandor in the book, so... yeah. I was wondering how they were going to separate Arya from Brienne here because it absolutely had to boil down to the same thing for Arya/The Hound where she refused to kill him. And I loved that it retained all of its ambiguity. Oh! And I also loved The Hound claiming he was looking out for Arya. I do think The Hound came to care (in his way) for the fierce little future assassin. May you find peace, Sandor(and hopefully the way a lot of people speculated you did in the book.)
And Arya is off to Braavos. I'm still sort of hoping Jaquen H'dar resurfaces rather than just new characters. I always wanted Jaquen back. Surprised Arya got the final scene though. But more on that later...
Deaths 5 and 6
I believe at one point I said aloud, "Yes, Tywin, Tyrion would totally kill you on the toilet." And I never felt a moment of pity for the controlling asshole. Tywin Lannister needed to die by the hand of one of his own children. Hoisted on his own petard of 'family legacy'. And isn't it weird to confess you wanted Tyrion dead his whole life and then promising you wouldn't have let him be executed? Methinks by that point, Tywin was talking out of his ass... which is rather ironic somethings considered.
Shae's death was always the more difficult one to take. Yes, she testified against Tyrion. And yes, she was in Tywin's bed. But... those are not executable offenses. The scene was subtlely changed from the books. Her grabbing the knife and fighting added some nuance. But it still boils down to a tragedy. The book!Shae never loved Tyrion, but I do believe that Show!Shae once did. And I believe that Tyrion loved her. And all of that is fatally besmirched. He murdered her. Tyrion, truly, is sucks to be you.
Now, about that other change. No fall-out between Jaime/Tyrion???!Jaime doesn't confess the truth that Tysha wasn't a prostitute, that she had loved Tyrion? That Jaime lied at Tywin's command? When Jaime didn't bring it up, I wondered whether Tywin would (because then it could be tied to Shae in Tywin's bed and Shae's murder as well. I could've understood that because it would've seemed very out of the blue to have Jaime/Tyrion speaking about Tysha.) Still, while this change doesn't do anything to the PLOT... it does seem strange to lose that moment where Tyrion lost Jaime too. That was powerful that Tyrion lost everyone. Jaime was the very last person he believed in and Jaime had 'rescued' him... and then Tyrion discovered that Jaime had betrayed him too. So now, Tyrion departs with no acrimony and only thankfullness to Jaime. Huh.
Link to an article of GRRM discussion how all this went down in the book (which makes it seem as though leaving it out left out some important stuff).
Guess Tyrion was never supposed to exact revenge on Jaime (honestly, despite Tyrion's fuming... I never expected Tyrion to avenge himself against Jaime. Cersei? Yeah, that holds a distinct possibility. But I never thought that when push came to shove Tyrion and Jaime would do one another true harm.
Still, maybe this spares us the endless repetition of "Where do whores go?" from drunk Tyrion.
And, I see, in the show Varys got on the ship with Tyrion. Minor change, but who wants Varys to be MIA as long as he is MIA in the book? I can see how Varys could work in some of the early stages of A Dance with Dragons so, again, this makes an understandable change.
And finally, the ending. Odd choice to end it where they did. Um... where the hell was the epilogue?!Undeath 2 - Where's Stoneheart?!! Double spoiler-tagged so you can click on the others and still not be spoiled for the last one.
A couple of book things left out of the finale, and Bran way, way deep into the next books (isn't he? I'm afraid that I lose track of where one book ends and another begins. But that seemed to be somewhat A Dance with Dragons(?) ).
Death 1 -
Jojen didn't die in the book, did he? I remember his being near death, but I didn't remember his actually dying. Though I wasn't shocked by their making that choice. It felt like Jojen was GOING to die, so I don't anticipate that he had all that much left to do, so no criticism of that death. (I liked "Meera's'" background acting after it. She continued to look devastated by her brother's death -- which she should be -- even during the Three-Eyed Raven scene.)
"Death" 2+ ... kinda
I liked the addition of the Ygritte funeral. As well as the Pyp and Grenn ones.
Death 3
The shepherd they cast did a good job, because by the time he exposed his daughter's bones to Dany I felt like crying. Guess what happens when you train your pets to attack people? They learn that it's okay to attack people. And when the pet in question is a fire breathing dragon, that can lead to terrible things. And still, Dragons crying for "Mom" was painful too.
Undeath 1 and "Death" 4
Well I see they are clarifying what happened to The Mountain Clegane. It was rather murky and thus a tad speculative in the book. So, yep, The Mountain is the Westerosi 'Frankenstein"... how could this not end well (because we all know that it won't).
And then Sandor Clegane. *sniff*
Book Change: It wasn't Brienne who 'done him in' in the book. She searched for him later. This is a change. I wonder whether it will be significant or not? (In the book, I was one who thought that he was not really, most sincerely dead. And I'll remain open to that argument for some time yet.) The Brienne/Sandor fight was epic, mainly because I didn't want either to die (though I knew what happened to Sandor in the book, so... yeah. I was wondering how they were going to separate Arya from Brienne here because it absolutely had to boil down to the same thing for Arya/The Hound where she refused to kill him. And I loved that it retained all of its ambiguity. Oh! And I also loved The Hound claiming he was looking out for Arya. I do think The Hound came to care (in his way) for the fierce little future assassin. May you find peace, Sandor
And Arya is off to Braavos. I'm still sort of hoping Jaquen H'dar resurfaces rather than just new characters. I always wanted Jaquen back. Surprised Arya got the final scene though. But more on that later...
Deaths 5 and 6
I believe at one point I said aloud, "Yes, Tywin, Tyrion would totally kill you on the toilet." And I never felt a moment of pity for the controlling asshole. Tywin Lannister needed to die by the hand of one of his own children. Hoisted on his own petard of 'family legacy'. And isn't it weird to confess you wanted Tyrion dead his whole life and then promising you wouldn't have let him be executed? Methinks by that point, Tywin was talking out of his ass... which is rather ironic somethings considered.
Shae's death was always the more difficult one to take. Yes, she testified against Tyrion. And yes, she was in Tywin's bed. But... those are not executable offenses. The scene was subtlely changed from the books. Her grabbing the knife and fighting added some nuance. But it still boils down to a tragedy. The book!Shae never loved Tyrion, but I do believe that Show!Shae once did. And I believe that Tyrion loved her. And all of that is fatally besmirched. He murdered her. Tyrion, truly, is sucks to be you.
Now, about that other change. No fall-out between Jaime/Tyrion???!
Link to an article of GRRM discussion how all this went down in the book (which makes it seem as though leaving it out left out some important stuff).
Guess Tyrion was never supposed to exact revenge on Jaime (honestly, despite Tyrion's fuming... I never expected Tyrion to avenge himself against Jaime. Cersei? Yeah, that holds a distinct possibility. But I never thought that when push came to shove Tyrion and Jaime would do one another true harm.
Still, maybe this spares us the endless repetition of "Where do whores go?" from drunk Tyrion.
And, I see, in the show Varys got on the ship with Tyrion. Minor change, but who wants Varys to be MIA as long as he is MIA in the book? I can see how Varys could work in some of the early stages of A Dance with Dragons so, again, this makes an understandable change.
And finally, the ending. Odd choice to end it where they did. Um... where the hell was the epilogue?!
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no subject
Date: 2014-06-16 03:25 pm (UTC)And I was really wondering about the Tysha story. First off it always felt a little bit like there was a possibility that Tysha might at somepoint resurface somewhere.
But I also felt that it was a truly important distinction between Tysha and Shae. Tysha never actually deceived him, Shae did. But then show Shae did not do it to extend that book Shae did. It's all very off.
I was glad that Shae was at least awake and fighting though, even if it was still a horrible turning point for Tyrion.
Still they left the relationship between Tyrion and Jaime intact. I also felt that non of them would ever truly avenge himself on the other, but still. It is a massive difference. Jaime by the end of the book has come clean and he helps Tyrion despite Tyrion telling him that he poisoned Joffrey.
I liked the fight between Brienne and the Hound. Fewer henchmen, more action for the main cast is always a good thing.
no subject
Date: 2014-06-16 03:55 pm (UTC)And the Tysha thing...
On the one hand it really messes with the Tyrion/Jaime dynamic. Tyrion left King's Landing hating EVERYONE, having been disillusioned by EVERYONE. Here: Well, Tyrion should love Jaime more than ever. He was the one who remained true to him no matter what. That seems like a relationship change even though I suspect it has little if no impact on plot (although Cersei discovering Jaime freed Tyrion could do-in their relationship, which is a reversal of the dynamic on the show. Either tha, and if Jaime does go to Dorne, maybe the fall-out is over Myrcella?)
On the other hand, from a show-only perspective, bringing up Tysha would be really out in left field. Casual show fans would most likely not know what they were talking about.
And the change in Shae has always made the prospect of this episode more difficult to figure how it's going to work. Book!Shae never loved Tyrion. Show!Shae (I believe) did. It's just a very basic difference that makes things more difficult to figure out emotionally.
Brienne/Hound was a good adaptation. Better than random people doing in the Hound. And a great scene in that -- who do you root to "win"? As a viewer you're torn during the scene, because you really don't want either to die.
However, it is a change to have Brienne meet the Hound. On the other hand, if speculation about the Hound IS true, it changes that (potential) future scene because the debateability about it was that Brienne wouldn't have recognized the Hound anyway. Yet, on TV there's no way to pull off that ambiguity so I guess if that speculation IS true, it wouldn't matter whether or not Brienne recognized him because the audience would. So, it's a change (MAYBE) but one that I don't think changes things the way that the Jaime/Tyrion dynamic is changed.
Stoneheart remains an open question. But I still contend inclusion of Stoneheart is not optional. It's where Brienne and Jaimes plot WILL eventually go. It just may take a while.
no subject
Date: 2014-06-16 07:50 pm (UTC)Because even if Jaime believes that Tyrion poisoned Joff, he knew that Joff was another Mad King Aerys in the making. And Tyrion knows that the mastermind behind the Tysha horror was Tywin not Jaime.
no subject
Date: 2014-06-16 08:12 pm (UTC)For that matter, as much as Tyrion would like it and as much as Cersei fears it, I don't think Tyrion will ever get revenge on Cersei either.
I've always felt that it's Jaime who will be the valonquar... mainly because who is the ONLY person (well, other than Tommen, maybe) who would regret Cersei's death? Since Jaime is the only person who would not wish to be the valonquar, I suspect he must be it.