GRR Martin's Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire)
 

Apparently we lost the thread about this. Or maybe we shamefully never had one?

Who has read these fantasy books? I've read the first 3 and I absolutely adored them. When A Feast For Crows was split up into 2 books, I decided to wait for the 2nd half. That was 4 or 5 years ago. Now A Dance With Dragons finally has a release date: July 12 2011. I'm looking forward to it and I'll probably reread book 1-3.

In 40 days (the pilot of?) the TV series airs. The preview I saw looked pretty good. If reviews are good, I'll definitely be watching this.

Re: GRR Martin's Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire)
 

Makes me sad I don't have HBO.

It'll be on Netflix eventually though.

I can't believe the next book is -finally- coming out.

Re: GRR Martin's Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire)
 

I think I'll start rereading the books in a few months. If it goes as fast as the first time, I'll finish them in a few weeks, maybe 2 months.

Then I'll read FfC and DwD simultaneously (if still possible/logical). Then when the series has completed, I'll start watching that.

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I've already started re-reading the series in anticipation of ADwD. Unfortunately, I don't have cable so I'll have to catch the show later on (or maybe online if HBO hosts new episodes on their website?).

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I've read all of the books.

Considered rereading them for the impending release of A Dance with Dragons but that's so much work...will probably have to read a synopsis.

The show looks pretty wicked.

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I know, the books are huge. But I do remember I loved them and finished them incredibly fast. Well, that was mostly because I spent so much time on them...

I calculated that I read almost 22 pages per hour. That's around 34 hours per book.

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I don't recommend reading AFFC and ADWD simultaneously as some characters (or maybe just Arya) have chapters in both books. And since the books are set in different parts of the world, they won't effect each other that much so it's fine to read them separately.

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Wait, that doesn't make sense. You say Arya has chapters in both books (I think you're right), AND they take place in different places?
Hm I want to know what GRR says about it. I've heard that AFFC was pretty boring, nothing really happened. Mixing it up with ADWD could really improve the experience.
I hope.

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GRRM said Arya had chapters in bother books because he was pretty sure fans would be upset about a book without Arya chapters. Arya's chapters in AFFC take place in the same part of the work as the chapters in ADWD. I think Samwell's do as well, actually.

Or thinking about it, maybe I'm confused about how he's splitting it up because I'm pretty sure Jon had no chapters in AFFC.

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I think AFFC missed the best characters... Jon and Tyrion. Hm I forgot who he all killed off.
Again, I haven't read AFFC yet, but I do know my brother was disappointed because it was boring. And I remember that it was supposed to be 1 book but it got split in half...

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From what I've read, ADwD is going past the split. So, we'll have chapters from all over including the continuing story lines of those in AFfC. I'm sure the majority of it will focus on the "not in King's Landing" characters, though.

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AFFC had a lot of good endings (Cersei, Jaime, and Sansa come to mind), but other than that was a bit of a slog.

It's pretty sweet that Cersei finally gets chapters because you think "maybe GRRM will humanize her" and then you learn that she really is just a crazy, crazy bitch.

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For me, Theon Greyjoy was a disappointment in A Storm of Swords. All this time you were wondering what the heck was making him grin all the time (I think it was described "as if he knew some huge secret that nobody else knew." And then you finally get him as a main character... and nothing. So boring.

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I just don't have confidence that he'll ever finish the series. But I've read what's out thusfar and plan to watch the show.

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I'm one of the few who couldn't make it through the first book. Too perverted and depressing for me. I felt awkward the whole time.

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Did anybody see the premier?

I thought it was quite good, all things considered. Relative to other fantasy to film adaptations, it was very true to the book. In fact, I picked up on subplots I'm not entirely sure were well presented in the books (which explained a few questions I've had).

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Oh the pilot is out? And it wasn't utter crap? :)

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I checked it out, seems like a fun show.

Though I hate having to remember so many characters. Though, I guess you could just break it up into families and be set.

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All I know is that chicks are going to LOVE this show...

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Titties and gore. For the ladies.

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And the forced anal sex

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Favourite part, summarized:

"Congratulations on the marriage, have this box of snakes."


But really, never read the books, know absolutely nothing of them - loved the first episode.

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Just watched the first episode a couple of hours ago. I've read the books, and I thought it was really good. :)

Watched it with my girlfriend and she enjoyed it as well.

I don't think nudity and gore is going to be a turn off for women. If you think that's the aspect of some media that offends women, I don't think you know women that well. It's when a women's role in something is only defined by her body.

There are several strong willed and cunning female characters in the book, even though they have to work within a patriarchal society. There are also plenty of misogynistic male characters in the books, but they're never painted in a good light either, so it's not like the story approves of them. Hopefully that will play out in the show as well.

I also don't get the people who are saying that the scene with Daenerys and Drogo is rape - it wasn't that way in the book and I don't think it was portrayed that way in the show either. It didn't really go far enough to make an assumption either way - but I think since the rest of the show was pretty true to the book, we can assume that that part would have been too.

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My fiance is pumped for this show. I'm not actually worried about the ladies.

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She was very young and she was coerced into a marriage she didn't want by her brother. It's rape, even if it's not textbook. But that's not to say she doesn't grow into the relationship and learn to love him. Regardless, rape isn't exactly rare in ASoIaF.

If people are bothered by the tame depiction of a fictitious rape then they should avoid the show. It's only going to get more brutal.

On the other hand, if people just complained that it was misrepresented in the show as being more like rape, I would simply disagree. I thought it was borderline rape by our cultures standards in both.

But the fact is it isn't our universe, culture, or time. And imposing our moral expectations on the characters is unrealistic and burdensome.

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Keep in mind, my opinions are based solely on the first episode. In the first episode the women are portrayed as jewelry, victims, and/or whores. Reading up on it, I know the tides change eventually, but just from that first episode I don't think you would expect NOW to lead the fan club...

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Goddammit that was awesome.

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Yes, yes it was.

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So how many episodes have there been yet? I thought it was only the pilot last month...

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It was a 10 episode season and we saw the finale last night. Season 2 is already gearing up. This one was really well done, I can't wait for it.

My biggest concern at this point is that there's no way he'll have more than 5 or 6 books finished even if they were to do a season each year. Either we won't finish it or we'll have a gap and have to decide whether to recast everybody.

If anybody has interest in reading the books, Amazon has a decent deal going for the first 4: http://www.amazon.com/George-Martins...dp/0345529057/

The 5th is out in a month.

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Well 5th is already done, so he has about 4 years to finish book six. He might make it, and for all we know he has some work done on six and seven already. So...there's a chance he could finish the series before the show catches up.

If not it will either have to go on hiatus or maybe he'll work with them to finish the show first. :\

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The third book might be two seasons because it's effing massive. That's what I heard, anyways.

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I love this show, for one, because it is so well thought out. Example: In the first episode Ned takes the head of an innocent man, only to have his head taken as an innocent man in the 9th episode

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Any old Hero won't do
 

My biggest problem with the Fantasy genre is that many authors seem to develop their stories and their characters separately. Just because you've conceptualized a provoking character, it doesn't mean they fit into the world you've imagined. Often times you end up with conflicts between what needs to happen and what the character should do. In the end the character bends to make the story work and you get a book that's a shadow of what it could have been.

Martin is different.

While it's easy to romanticize the characters, they're all distinct individuals with identifiable goals and ultimately things make sense even if you didn't see them coming. If you have an established character and something doesn't make sense or sticks out, it's usually for a reason that has either already been hinted at or will be revealed later.

There's just a lot less maneuvering to get things where they need to be. People do the things they would do and as a result the story progresses as it should.

Re: GRR Martin's Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire)
 

I'm currently in the middle of Storm of Swords. Great stuff.

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Storm of Swords is the best book.

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I'm 40% into Storm of Swords as well. I've been trying to reread the series ever since the show premiered on HBO.

Yeah, Storm of Swords was epic. The bigger issue is that Feast for Crows was missing some fairly key characters. After Storm of Swords, though, I imagine he was loathe to write another book that big.

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Since some of the books are missing major characters, I wonder if they'll just take the next 4 available and turn them into 5 - 6 seasons worth of episodes, and move things that were happening concurrently with the missing characters up into episodes alongside stuff that was actually happening in the book?

I don't see any other way they could do it that would make sense.

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Before anyone starts planning out 5 or 6 seasons of Game of Thrones, keep in mind very few HBO series make it that long. Even Deadwood, one of the most beloved HBO series, was cancelled unceremoniously due to cost concerns. I imagine Game of Thrones would be almost as expensive to film due to the setting (same for Boardwalk Empire).

I hope to get 4 seasons out of them, followed by a movie or two to finish the story.