 |
I wonder what's going to happen in the 4th season. A lot of people complain about Feast for the Crows, but I think that mainly has to do with an absence of their favorite characters. No Tyrion! NO TYRION! But A Dance With Dragons won't have any Jaime Lannister!
Since both are supposed to happen simultaneously, I guess they'll find some way to combine the two books so people who're watching the show that have never read the books won't get bored.
This is usually the way HBO does it, if the premiere does good, they will do a second season. I liked the pilot I am looking forward to the season that is coming. Never reading any of the books, it makes it open to interpretation, but you can tell that HBO didn't stray to far from the book with all the characters that they introduced, hopefully the grow all of them through the series. Working nights at DISH means I will have one more thing to put on the DVR for Sunday, but on the bright side I can re-watch it again because if the next episodes are like this one I will get lost the first time I watch it. At least my HD package is free with any top package, I can get my use out of the great job HBO did on this show.
It was a pretty shitty first episode that relied on random (and creepy) nudity to keep people watching, rather than having a good story or interesting characters.
I'm a big fan of the series, but the pilot episode just felt meh...I was sort of ticking off the important stuff in my head: "Yep, there goes the wolves. Ok, they got the 'Tyron's a sex fiend' in. Oh good, they got that line right. Great, there's Robert pining after Ned's sister. Oh, gratuitous nude scene, glad they didn't miss THAT opportunity! Nice horse, check..." I haven't read this book for a few years (having read it at least eight or nine times) but I was quite bored. Everything seemed so generic and disjointed - if I'd never read the books, I don't think I'd care very much about the characters, except Bran, who they spent a good amount of time looking at from different angles, and Catelyn, whom I thought was really well presented. It irked me that they had opportunities to call a lot of the secondary characters by name, but didn't. Why should I care about someone whose name I don't know? I'd be sad if XXX got axed, I'd not be so sad if nameless "Extra" got axed.
Not saying there's unexpected deaths in this series or anything. :|
I have to disagree with part of your review here. As I stated above, I was underwhelmed by the pilot so we agree on that.
I thought they did a horrible portrayal of Catelyn though...which is where I must disagree. Her character in the pilot matches that of her character after many of the events unfold in the first book (ie that she becomes an overly worried mother rather than the strong woman she begins as). For instance, when Robert asks Ned to be the Hand she states that she can tell him that she forbids it and that Ned can't leave them in the pilot. It was quite the opposite in the book if I remember correctly - Ned wanted to stay but she said he must go.
I dunno...we'll see how it all pans out. Color me unimpressed thus far though.
I actually enjoyed the first episode more than I enjoyed the part of the book it's adapted from: then again, I had some problems with said book. Tyrion's introduction was VASTLY better than the book (a dwarf's first appearance should never, EVER be a circus display somersault, especially if you're trying to sell this dwarf as a nobleman as opposed to a sideshow freak), and I even found some of the characters more relateable. There were changes I didn't like, too, but not too many.
The ratings for the series aren't too bad, but they're not "insane". The 4.2 is a cumulative number. It could always build an audience, and it's certainly good enough to.
Why does everyone say they had tremendous set design? It was a bunch of furs and rocks... It was certainly pretty, and appropriate, but in terms of set design far less impressive than say, Boardwalk Empire, or of course, Rome.
I haven't read the books, so the pilot was a little difficult to follow- I didn't really get a read on any of the characters except "this guy is obviously supposed to be a bad guy", "this guy is obviously supposed to be a good guy", and I felt like I needed some sort of family tree and a map to keep track of whatever they were talking about. I will stick it out through the season though.
I beat Rob in watching Game of Thrones? YES! I'm a more savvy nerd than the guy that runs a website! Tralalalalala!!!
I kid of course. I am interested to hear what Mr. Bricken has to say. I'm not much of a sword & sorcery guy, and this was heavy on the sword and light on the sorcery so I liked it quite a bit.
I actually got hbo just to watch this show. And I hadn't even thought about reading the books yet. Totally worth it.
I think of all the episodes this season the first will be the weakest because they had to squeeze a lot into 1 hour. I'm sure the writers wanted to end the episode on a 'oh my god' moment, which they did, and to get to that point they had to rush the story along.
Now, only having read reviews online, it does sound like the show picks up an awful lot over the next few weeks, just like the books
I haven't read the books so from my viewpoint it was alright. I'm not a massive fantasy novel fan (LOTR and The Hobbit being notable exceptions) but it seemed a definite step up from most other fantasy literature I've seen. Here's hoping it gets more exciting and better in general soon.
I also dunno if it's really part of the books, but the nudity and sex also seemed gratuitously excessive at times... like it didn't REALLY drive the plot that much forward (except for the ending scene with poor Bran of course).
Watch that number drop for the next episode, because in order to get the huge amount of viewers, DirecTV and HBO had a free weekend so people could check it out.
One of them was me. And I enjoyed the show. I'll probably get it on a torrent or something later...
As someone whos 'marketing' job was trying to force people shopping in Safeway (huge grocery chain for those not arround these parts) to sign up for DirecTV, I can attest that satellite tv is alive and well. Dish Network and DirecTV love to brawl with each other for customers.
P.S. If anyone finds job listings for marketing or tech support and show up to find out you'll actually be a DirecTV/Home Depot/auto glass salesman instead, don't be tempted by the commissions, run away from there SCREAMING. The main company that runs that racket is vile to the core.
Here in the UK and Ireland satelite tv is far more prevalent than cable. Infact Sky Atlantic, which is showing Game of Thrones over here the day after HBO is currently only available to Sky satelite subscribers and not the cable resellers.
I, for one, was underwhelmed with the pilot and didn't like a several of the changes...but I'll also admit that I don't do well with separating my mediums.
Need to completely agree with this. For the life of me, I can't separate mediums from one another. It has to be the way I had it in my mind and if not---then it's wrong. Fail on my part.
I'm glad you will finally review it. None of the female bloggers that were upset about the New York Times article that discounted the existence of 'nerd-girls' seem to have reviewed it. I kind of wonder what that means.
The nudity is certainly excessive. I mean, I like seeing the female body, but the fact that it is only women that get naked makes me feel like I am watching porn. It has nothing to do with the story...
Yes, because dudes don't get naked in porn. They just pull down the zipper and pull their wieners through.
I have to say, I was pretty Meh on the thing too. My husband has never read the books, and his comment was that it was beautiful set design and great actors, but he couldn't see any plot to it. Unfortunately, I think he's right. I know what I'm supposed to be seeing because I read the book. But the show seems determined to give us all the best one-liners from the books without presenting the more boring, but also more necessary meat of the story.
::SPOILER::
****In the books, the Starks are hard folk, but they are also happily naive. Ned is glad to see Robert come, not suspicious. There is smiling and laughter. And the dire-wolves play a much more important roll in the books. The TV show seems to gloss right over them, except when they are found and Bran is climbing for the last time...
Those were my biggest picky-nits, anyway.
Tomorrow on toplessrobot.com.
Rob discusses how many times he masturbated while watch GoT last night.
I did a book review of A Game of Thrones the book over on Tao of Scoot.http://scooteratreides.blogspo...Go look at it.When the series is over I will do a full series review and compare/contrast of the book and show.
By the way one thing I forgot to mention in the book review.Why does every other chapter have to begin by saying "they broke their fast"? why can't he just fucking say they had breakfast? And why the fuck do we even need to know what any of the characters had for breakfast anyway? how does that add to the story?I don't know why that one little piece of diction from the book gets on my nerves but it does.
In regards to the first question: because it's a medieval world. They wouldn't speak in modern dialect.As to the second: he's a writer. It's not a short story. Or a blog. He's establishing it as he would a real world. It would be a really short book if he abridged everything instead of describing it.
Speaking only as someone halfway through the first book, you may not find yourself fawning all that much.
I thought it was okay. Set design was tremendous. The acting was great. And the level of hot ass was appreciated. But some of the choices they made to differentiate from the book were just strange.
Overall, I thought the only characters who came out the better for the tv adaptation were Tyrion, Ned, Robert, Arya and Jon Snow.
Also, I know she's supposed to be 13, but I felt pretty sick with myself as I stared at the girl who plays Dany naked. ...but I couldn't turn away.
I believe that Dany is 16-17 in the series seeing as they mentioned that it has been 17 years since Robert claimed the throne and not 13 like it is stated in the book. They have also aged Bran from being 7 to 10 at the start as well.
Yes, they've increased the age of most of the characters. Apparently GRRM has gone on record as saying he wished he had written the characters older to begin with the address many of the issues they're facing. I think there was the opportunity (and legality) to change this in the TV show, so they did.
Well that makes sense, I was a little confused why Rob and Jon in the pilot were such big muscle dudebros with beards at 15. I also think that's a cool decision overall, I know it's a big thing about being realistic and everybody does stuff really young, but it always seemed a little bit of a stretch to have a 15 year old be a skilled battle commander.
In the book she's 13. I believe in the series, she's supposed to be 15 or 16 (though I can't remember where I read that). And, not even counting the nude scene (and it counted...) I thought Daenerys was played *perfectly* by the actress.
I always get concerned when a 'beautiful person' is brought to life in film that they're going to focus too much on their beauty, but Daenerys played the 'frightened/helpless' part well, with enough nuance that you can see something more within her.
Tyrion was perfect. Better than written, to be honest. Arya was excellent as well. In fact, I didn't find a single issue the entire episode with characters, and that's pretty impressive, considering my long love for this book series.
I noted Rickon was almost completely absent... Never even got a line... which is strangely accurate to how he appears in the books :)
I LOVE the books...yet completely agree with you here. The series looks and feels exactly how I imagined it would, so in that regard I'm very relieved.
But, it was a slow start to the series (which the book kind of had), I expect once things get rolling through to the end of the book and onto the next shit will start hitting the fan.
I just wish it was on a different channel. I can't justify the cost of HBO for one show, sigh.
Download it...thats what us Australians have to do to see it. (Well until it hits tv in July here, but I'm not waiting)
That's probably true. The show has a lot of room to grow. And you can't always judge a series by the pilot.
Nerd news, humor and self-loathing. Edited by Luke Y. Thompson
