The books and the show could never meld properly. The show's at its peak when its focused and can let its many talented actors flex their muscles. The books are at their peak with the rich history of the world and the expansive characters. But the problem with that is a TV show can't handle the weight of so many characters and sidetracking back stories without seeming aimless or wandering. Lost is about as close as I can think to a show with so many important characters, but that was mainly balanced well by having them in one location, not thrown all over the world, and with more episodes (GoT is far too expensive to have an extended season). So they have to cut a lot of fat from the books in order to streamline the show. I can agree with this. We lose Victarion and Euron and Strong Belwas and Maester Marwyn (so far) and so on and so on, but we get more time with the more important characters and the story moves faster.
OT: This season I was hugely disappointed with how slow the story moved. A good season requires resolution to feel like a complete chapter, with just enough open endings to keep the audience asking for more. But we got almost nothing but loose threads with very few resolutions because very little actually happened. The North is the only place where things are progressing reasonably. Stannis saw his character arc completed (maybe?), the Boltons have secured Winterfell, but now must find Sansa (the Manderlys cometh?), Davos finds himself without a king, Jon Snow needs help again, and Brienne remains bad at keeping promises.
The only other positives were the rise of the High Sparrow, and Varys and Tyrion set up to recreate Season 2 magic in Mereen. Dorne could still come out as a positive if my hope that Doran is actually more similar to his book counterpart proves true. After all, he didn't explicitly state what he was referring to when he said "I don't believe in third chances." But if not, he's about as interesting as his chair.
And, as with everything else I talk about in GoT, Dany remains the worst character in book and in show.
OT: This season I was hugely disappointed with how slow the story moved. A good season requires resolution to feel like a complete chapter, with just enough open endings to keep the audience asking for more. But we got almost nothing but loose threads with very few resolutions because very little actually happened. The North is the only place where things are progressing reasonably. Stannis saw his character arc completed (maybe?), the Boltons have secured Winterfell, but now must find Sansa (the Manderlys cometh?), Davos finds himself without a king, Jon Snow needs help again, and Brienne remains bad at keeping promises.
The only other positives were the rise of the High Sparrow, and Varys and Tyrion set up to recreate Season 2 magic in Mereen. Dorne could still come out as a positive if my hope that Doran is actually more similar to his book counterpart proves true. After all, he didn't explicitly state what he was referring to when he said "I don't believe in third chances." But if not, he's about as interesting as his chair.
And, as with everything else I talk about in GoT, Dany remains the worst character in book and in show.