Game of thrones: why is it so WRONG.?

[Eclectic Dreck]

Also, you complain that the scene for Arya in Harrenhal is less developed. Well, considering they are stuffing a 900 page book into a season, there are going to be some things that are going to be less elaborate.

I don't really buy that logic. While cramming a 900 page book into a single movie might be a stretch, Game of Thrones is seeking to the same with nine hours. Considering how much of the length of any book is given to description that can be presented at a glance to a viewer (e.g. what a dining hall looks like) assuming that nine hours is insufficient for the purpose is silly.

They have the run time to reflect what happened in the book and only make alterations they think necessary for the show (budget concerns, clarity, etc). I don't really think the OP's complaints are an issue resulting from the need to abridge so much as it is the common problem with such media crossovers when one person's vision for the story is different from someone else's.

 

[DjinnFor]

I agree with the above points, but some changes seem utterly unnecessary.

For instance, why invent a new wife for Robb? What's wrong with Jayne Westerling? it would not have taken any more time to explain who she was than it did to have Robb meet this other woman. I can't even remember her name. As far as I can see the change serves little purpose at all. I'd e happy to be corrected on this, if anyone can see a reason.

The two characterize Robb differently. The book's emphasize on begrudging and blaming him for his choice and are designed to add a bit of irony and conflict with his mother and the camp. The TV show is designed to inflate Robb's sense of worth in the eye's of the audience.

I hope Martin can get his shit together for his last 2 books. He probably shouldn't kill so many characters if he can't keep the story interesting.

Unfortunately that's the only reason why the stories are interesting. Let a character live too long and it starts to look like plot armor, which defeats the entire theme of all of the books.

 

[murdeoc]

towards the end of the last book (5th that is) i felt like martin didnt really know what he's doing anymore. im convinced the story wont end with the 7th book because martin just keeps adding characters and sub-plots without working towards anything in particular. i offcourse might be wrong, but i think that if he is going to end it in 2 more books it will feel like a rushed ending.
so i hope im wrong.

OT: i agree that the differences you mention could easily have been fixed although i do like the arya story in the show.

 

[Xeorm]

Honestly, the biggest changes I see to between the book and the movie tend to occur due to how they show the characters. The books rely a lot on inner thoughts to show how people think, and what they think of other people. None of which works in a more visual medium. Combine the limits on how much tie you have to show some things, and you'll see a bit more on why things are changed so much.

Take, for example, Arya's stay in Harrenhal. Very difficult to show off on TV, as we don't have access to her thoughts, combine that with her tasks being fairly monotonous and time consuming and it's no surprise to see much of that cut in the show. Instead, they add scenes with Tywin and Arya, showing off both characters in a time efficient manner, without resorting to simple telling.

Overall, it's interesting to watch and see how they handle the characters and really show off some of them. I do enjoy the shows, though I wish they had a bigger budget, just to see more. And I wouldn't mind a second Tyrion, he easily carries the show at times (and honestly, the books, at least in the beginning.)

 

[VoidWanderer]

Books series are always better than the TV versions, unless people know of a series where this isn't the case?

I know I couldn't even finish the first 15 mins of the TV series of the Sword of Truth series because of the differences between the books and the first few minutes of the pilot episode.

 

[Abomination]

I really enjoy the TV series and I don't care if it's different from the books.

I judge both as their own piece of entertainment.

 

[loc978]

...when I first heard that the TV series was going to be a thing, my first thought was "How the f... not even HBO is going to depict Daenerys' story." And I was right. They just added enough years to her to make it less horribly brutal (also, so they could sell her as T&A, which I'm still a bit creeped out by. In my head she was still an abused little girl forced into brutal adulthood, not a mostly sheltered young adult forced into a brutal reality).

After that, the rest of the changes were expected. Still fun to watch, but I'd rather have The Winds of Winter.

 

[Innocent Flower]

Honestly, the biggest changes I see to between the book and the movie tend to occur due to how they show the characters. The books rely a lot on inner thoughts to show how people think, and what they think of other people. None of which works in a more visual medium. Combine the limits on how much tie you have to show some things, and you'll see a bit more on why things are changed so much.

Take, for example, Arya's stay in Harrenhal. Very difficult to show off on TV, as we don't have access to her thoughts, combine that with her tasks being fairly monotonous and time consuming and it's no surprise to see much of that cut in the show. Instead, they add scenes with Tywin and Arya, showing off both characters in a time efficient manner, without resorting to simple telling.

Overall, it's interesting to watch and see how they handle the characters and really show off some of them. I do enjoy the shows, though I wish they had a bigger budget, just to see more. And I wouldn't mind a second Tyrion, he easily carries the show at times (and honestly, the books, at least in the beginning.)

With good use of facial expressions you can hint at one someone's thinking (admittedly the actor for arya isn't rather bad, but anyhow) (and tywin is not supposed to smile. Plus, with tywin constantly in her pressense arya would be constantly reminded that he's a massive threat and should be a name given) The book version of harrenhall and the events before/after were far more interesting.

 

[ike42]

Ok.

Then you remember that TV is a visual medium that actually has budget constraints and thus is a lot of things need to be changed. Consider this: Martin's books aren't 100 % perfect, even as books. If you would traslate it word-to-word to the screen, well, it'd be extremely silly in a few places.

Game of Thrones is one of the most successfull critically acclaimed TV-Shows out there, beating other fantasy shows by a mile. I do actually trust that they're very competent and know what they're doing.

This always bothers me when print is translated into film. The screen writers and directors always seem to want to somehow interject their own influence into the product. I view the original work as a history and the changes made as a sort of revisionism. To me it would be like if the director of Lincoln decided that it would be better if AL was actually leading the charge at Gettysburg. It's okay to leave things out, but never okay to change them in my opinion. Also I agree that the most egregious offense was Dany in Qarth.

 

[ike42]

You sure you've replied to the right post? because I don't agree with you in the slightest.

whoops, you're right. Must have clicked the wrong one somehow. Meant to reply to main thread, sorry.

 

[Exterminas]

Because Writers are the little Princesses of Moviemaking, who fancy themselves more important than anybody else in the whole process.
In the case of game of thrones you can tell that pretty well by listening to the commentary tracks on the DvD: Often times you hear writers talking about how they didn't like something in the books, so they changed it for the script.

Some of them seem to have the attitude, that writing for this series is more about promoting their craft and demonstrating their skills, rather than adapting the books to the screen.

I guess, I can understand that, since Writing is probably a tough job. But listening to that commentary track I can't shake the feeling that a lot of people on the writing stuff see Game of Thrones as a stepping stone for a bigger career... and you can't do that, by simply putting what George wrote into Dialogue-Form with Screenplay instructions.

 

[El Danny]

All you guys complaining about the changes in the TV series do realise George RR Martin plays a major role in the shows plot development? Most changes are ran though George before they're written in, or are his ideas to begin with.

 

[DJjaffacake]

I disagree about Jon asking to go with Qhorin. In the books we were well aware by that point that Jon wanted to be a Ranger more than almost anything, but in the TV show we only got that one scene where he got pissed off because he was made a Steward instead. So the scene serves to remind the TV only audience that Jon wants to be a Ranger.

 

[Mutie]

I'll put it this way: As an awesome Christmas present a few years back, my dad bought me the first five books. Then the TV show came to England... And turned out to be soft-core porn with a 75% cast of sexy teenagers and badly rendered baby wyverns which people keep calling dragons. And the whole "thirteen year old girl repeatedly raped by a warlord" thing became some kind of... sordid... fantasy... romance...? Nope. Fuck it. I'm waiting till the whole thing is over and done with. Maybe THEN I can read the Heldamn books and maybe THEN entertain thoughts of watching the show. I just want real, old school, 1980s "we can do whatever the fuck we want with this world" fantasy back. Not the war of the roses re written as an elder scrolls game! And I'm from fucking Sheffield and think Sean Bean is the don!

 

[RedDeadFred]

I hope Martin can get his shit together for his last 2 books. He probably shouldn't kill so many characters if he can't keep the story interesting.

I dunno, I like books 4 and 5 quite a bit (I'm assuming those are the ones you have a problem with). Jamie is now one of my favourite characters because of the PoV chapters we got of him in those books. Cersei is so much more interesting now and reading about her thought process was extremely entertaining for me. Danny was frustrating but having Barristan around sort of made up for that to me. The Greyjoy PoV started off fairly uninteresting but I think they grew to be much better as the books went on.
As for killing off characters:

Spoiler

I highly doubt Jon is going to stay dead if the books have been foreshadowing to what I think have.

The things that bothered me about the show have mostly already been said. I should point out that I do still like the show very much but some of the alterations are really unnecessary. I wish they could have shown some kind of flash back to the Tower of Joy with Ned reminiscing about it like he does in the books. That may prove to be one of the most important scenes in the entire story.
I wish they had done more with the House of the Undying. It foreshadows so many things in the books and much of that is absent in the show.
Lastly, as much as I liked Tywin and Arya's interactions, I think removing Bolton from that role was a mistake. We gained a lot of insight into his character that way and I think that's pretty important.

 

[irishda]

I'm leaning more in favor of the character developments on the show. Daenerys' arrogance and naivete seem to mesh well with her background and her experiences. She's spent most of her time with her brother, a self-absorbed idiot who filled her head with lies of how the people were awaiting the return of the Targaryens, and then with her husband, a brutal warrior from a society who rules by strength. She realizes she's the only person in the world who has birthed and raised dragons in a millenium (or whatever), and all of this before she's turned 25 or so (I'm guessing that's what her age in the show, maybe even younger). Does that sound like a likely source for wisdom and prudence? What are other teenagers like when they're given every advantage in life and believe they're super special?

Jon Snow? He's completely out of his element at the wall dealing with things he doesn't understand. Much like his father, he's been raised with a strict moral code, so the "whatever-it-takes-to-survive" attitude of the Night Watch puts him behind the curve. His moral code makes him seem naive and stupid to the necessity of the wilds.

Arya? I'm not sure why you believe she's a "weakling". She's easily the strongest of the Stark children (in a metaphorical sense). She's naive at times, as all the young characters are, but she's easily proven to be the most adaptable and the most cunning.

 

[Innocent Flower]

I'm leaning more in favor of the character developments on the show. Daenerys' arrogance and naivete seem to mesh well with her background and her experiences. She's spent most of her time with her brother, a self-absorbed idiot who filled her head with lies of how the people were awaiting the return of the Targaryens, and then with her husband, a brutal warrior from a society who rules by strength. She realizes she's the only person in the world who has birthed and raised dragons in a millenium (or whatever), and all of this before she's turned 25 or so (I'm guessing that's what her age in the show, maybe even younger). Does that sound like a likely source for wisdom and prudence? What are other teenagers like when they're given every advantage in life and believe they're super special?

Jon Snow? He's completely out of his element at the wall dealing with things he doesn't understand. Much like his father, he's been raised with a strict moral code, so the "whatever-it-takes-to-survive" attitude of the Night Watch puts him behind the curve. His moral code makes him seem naive and stupid to the necessity of the wilds.

Arya? I'm not sure why you believe she's a "weakling". She's easily the strongest of the Stark children (in a metaphorical sense). She's naive at times, as all the young characters are, but she's easily proven to be the most adaptable and the most cunning.

But those characters are smarter in the books and do less stupid shit. But above all the books feel less 'cheesy'

Jon is far more loyal and honourable in the books. He's also rather solem, a bit like ned stark. he's the outcast. Yet the tv show portrays him as the happy social butterfly with the first few episodes and an idiot for every other.

Arya is harder (and colder). Granted she's stabed a stable boy and might have attacked a few soldiers in the tv show. But in the tv show it also appears that she's forgotten everything that syrio has taught her. Shit like challenging one of the leaders of an outlaw group and getting disarmed in a small stroke make her look stupid and pathetic. She's younger in the books yet a stronger character. She's actualy my favourite in the books, yet i loath here every scene in the tv series.

I can understand daenerys being 20 or so rather than 13. But at the same time there's scenes were she's pretty much a female viserys. She's supposed to be the prince that was promised and an amazing mother to her people. We're supposed to think that she'd make a better leader than joff//rob/balon/renly/stanis/drogo/tommen/tommen's cats yet she's fucking not. I think most people agree with me on quarth.