Yes, it is. It took me years to realize this, but Game of Thrones is really fucking boring. It's one huge "nothing ever happens" show. Sure, some people die, there's a lot of travelling, but it never seems to change anything. After 5 seasons of Daenerys doing fuck all, I just don't care anymore.
He whose main character is an exotically toned, brooding, bereaved badass who is naturally brilliant at literally everything he tries his hand at, who wields the most special named sword of them all, who knows all of the magic and who was taught the ways of love by an angel?
You can argue that Kvothe shows signs of Mary Sue syndrome, but there's the question of unreliable narration that has yet to be answered, and even on his worst day Rothfuss is miles ahead of Sanderson at characterization.
But rating Rothfuss above Martin? You go too far, sir! Pistols at dawn.
Not trying to place Martin on a pedestal here, mind you. The dear old gnome has certainly left himself spinning quite a few too many plates, and his pacing suffers for it, but I am still left scratching my head at the suggestion that Rothfuss is even in the same league.
Good. Keep it that way. It's Terry Goodkind quality fantasy, only more tedious.
Zhukov said:
But rating Rothfuss above Martin? You go too far, sir! Pistols at dawn.
Not trying to place Martin on a pedestal here, mind you. The dear old gnome has certainly left himself spinning quite a few too many plates, and his pacing suffers for it, but I am still left scratching my head at the suggestion that Rothfuss is even in the same league.
Rothfuss writes beautiful prose, and has an engaging style. In some ways, he's similar to Martin in that he has a tendency to over-write things/get into too much detail and takes forever between books, but unlike Martin his pacing hasn't tanked and he's keeping the focus tight on a small handful of characters.
As with Abercrombie, it is POSSIBLE my affection goes up because of the extreme high quality of the audiobook narration elevating the material. It's quite the opposite for ASOIAF unfortunately, where the doddering Roy Dotrice...a friend of Martin's...provides a range of voices from "crazy old pirate lady" to "crazy old pirate leprechaun" for the various characters, slipping in and out of accents randomly and never shaking the impression that what he really needs is a good nap.
In relation to Martin I mean. He seemed to go through a phase around books 2-3 where he stopped to describe the wardrobe (and heraldry, where applicable) of every single named character whenever they made an appearance.
BloatedGuppy said:
As with Abercrombie, it is POSSIBLE my affection goes up because of the extreme high quality of the audiobook narration elevating the material. It's quite the opposite for ASOIAF unfortunately, where the doddering Roy Dotrice...a friend of Martin's...provides a range of voices from "crazy old pirate lady" to "crazy old pirate leprechaun" for the various characters, slipping in and out of accents randomly and never shaking the impression that what he really needs is a good nap.
Never really done the audiobook thing myself. My poor little gorilla brain doesn't have the multi-tasking capacity to pay attention to a story and do literally anything else at the same time. I either listen or I zone out and realize I haven't taken in a single word for the past 20 minutes.
Shit? No. Overrated? Holy bloody hell, yes, of course.
I quite like Game of Thrones, and it is on my weekly watch list, but for every episode in which something interesting does happen, there are about 2 or 3 where hardly anything does, and there are so many characters to follow, not many get that much screen time. Sure, it is a symptom of the length of the show, I mean, 10 hours to cover a whole book? Maybe half a book? It sounds like a lot of time, but it really isn't.
I will probably ride this train until the end, but I am certainly interested to see what the show will do when they eventually get past the material the GRRM has released.
Never really done the audiobook thing myself. My poor little gorilla brain doesn't have the multi-tasking capacity to pay attention to a story and do literally anything else at the same time. I either listen or I zone out and realize I haven't taken in a single word for the past 20 minutes.
I have a bit of an eye condition. I can read (obviously) but reading for long periods of time is a bit exhausting for my eyes, so I take the opportunity to rest them on my commute and listen to books instead. Actually came to quite like it...particularly nice when exercising or doing chores or other tedious things.
You do run into the issue where narration becomes an additional factor in the quality of a book, though. I've had well regarded books I couldn't "read" because the narration was pure shit. And if it's too droning it puts me to sleep. Can't "read" right before bed. Too sleepy.
There are authors that have arguably surpassed Martin in his genre...I'd say Rothfuss and Abercrombie are two that leap to mind. Sanderson is not one of them. He's a hack. His characters are paper thin and he eschews world building in favor of fussy, tedious magic systems.
It's a pity, too, I like door-stopper novels and he's prolific, but I'm not thirteen anymore and his amateurish YA Fantasy-Lite approach to characterization makes him almost unreadable.
See, the thing about these types authors that follow Martin, subversion of fantasy tropes has become a trope itself. I suppose one could say it always has been, and existed in some form or another before Martin. But Martin's work popularized it. It's getting kind of stale now, to be honest.
The thing about characters being well executed... To me, that only matters if I like them. Or at the very least, appreciate them. That would be more accurate, I think. There are lot's of things in stories that I can appreciate without liking. With these character driven pieces, it's all well and good for people who care about the characters, but not so much when you only care about a few. It becomes a chore and you want to skip the parts without the characters you like.
I like Sanderson's fussy magic systems. I like how he presents his worlds. I think it's a left brain/right brain thing. I compartmentalize things in my entertainment. I don't care all that much about characters in a lot of the books I read. I'll probably dislike 2/3 of them or more. I don't read Sanderson for that. I can go to other authors to scratch that itch. Though, it's fair to say I'm not exactly a big fan of him. In that he writes a lot of stuff, and I've only read a choice few things. I've been to the forums (unfortunately) and seen how unpopular he is. It's kind of comical really. I read all of it and I see all these reasons why other people dislike his work. It just makes me shrug and wonder how I'm different.
I like Sanderson's fussy magic systems. I like how he presents his worlds. I think it's a left brain/right brain thing. I compartmentalize things in my entertainment. I don't care all that much about characters in a lot of the books I read. I'll probably dislike 2/3 of them or more. I don't read Sanderson for that. I can go to other authors to scratch that itch. Though, it's fair to say I'm not exactly a big fan of him. In that he writes a lot of stuff, and I've only read a choice few things. I've been to the forums (unfortunately) and seen how unpopular he is. It's kind of comical really. I read all of it and I see all these reasons why other people dislike his work. It just makes me shrug and wonder how I'm different.
Yeah Sanderson writes very codified/rulesy systems. He's a gamer, and his affection for systems translates into his writing. It's not something I particularly appreciate (or at the very least, I didn't appreciate it in Mistborn, where it made for extraordinarily tedious reading).
I hear what you're saying about "subversion of tropes" becoming a trope in and of itself, but I actually find it very difficult to find fantasy that is A) "low magic" and B) at least moderately "shades of grey". I blew through what was available pretty quickly, and now all that's left is this endless, foaming sea of Heroes and their Journeys, their dauntless companions and mystical MacGuffins, and a ridiculous shit-ton of names with 73 vowels and a preponderance of l's. Join Andellywn D'Lashnikoff as he strives to save Dar T'Lanrienlliel from the evil K'thock Dun Rippletides. It just makes me glaze the fuck over.
I like Sanderson's fussy magic systems. I like how he presents his worlds. I think it's a left brain/right brain thing. I compartmentalize things in my entertainment. I don't care all that much about characters in a lot of the books I read. I'll probably dislike 2/3 of them or more. I don't read Sanderson for that. I can go to other authors to scratch that itch. Though, it's fair to say I'm not exactly a big fan of him. In that he writes a lot of stuff, and I've only read a choice few things. I've been to the forums (unfortunately) and seen how unpopular he is. It's kind of comical really. I read all of it and I see all these reasons why other people dislike his work. It just makes me shrug and wonder how I'm different.
Yeah Sanderson writes very codified/rulesy systems. He's a gamer, and his affection for systems translates into his writing. It's not something I particularly appreciate (or at the very least, I didn't appreciate it in Mistborn, where it made for extraordinarily tedious reading).
I hear what you're saying about "subversion of tropes" becoming a trope in and of itself, but I actually find it very difficult to find fantasy that is A) "low magic" and B) at least moderately "shades of grey". I blew through what was available pretty quickly, and now all that's left is this endless, foaming sea of Heroes and their Journeys, their dauntless companions and mystical MacGuffins, and a ridiculous shit-ton of names with 73 vowels and a preponderance of l's. Join Andellywn D'Lashnikoff as he strives to save Dar T'Lanrienlliel from the evil K'thock Dun Rippletides. It just makes me glaze the fuck over.
I can deal with all that stuff as long as it's portrayed in such a way that makes sense. That I can understand the motives and machinations of certain things.
I am reminded of the Mr. Btongue video about Dragon Age II, The Witcher, and his thoughts going into Inquisition. He said basically what you're saying now. He was tired of the Hero's journey. He'd done it all before. So what he liked about DA II was that it at least attempted to be something different, even if it fell on it's face for a multitude of reasons.
I can empathize with this, but only to a point. My buddy is the same way about GoT. He skipped all of Jon Snow's stuff in the books and the show because it was boring heroes journey stuff. But to me, there's only so much you can bleed out of this stuff and still keep it in the genre. It kinda sounds like you're not into fantasy, and would rather read another genre where your tastes for characters and morally gray situations are better served. Which is totally fine by the way. I get it. It's just I'm looking at the big picture and seeing all the things people are disliking about fantasy. So, new authors come along and say "It's orcs! Except with twist!" and put a new spin on it to make it more interesting. There's only so much time left before we'll be feeling the same way about this that we feel about Hero's Journey.
I disagree; some of the deviations make absolute sense -- for instance I'm looking forward (in Season 5: haven't seen it, but have read the books that it "covers") to the absence of most of the Greyjoys, the shortening of Brienne's hair-pullingly pointless tangent across Westeros, and likewise the shortening of Tyrion's narrative (there's probably more superfluities that I've forgotten). Martin really lost his way after ASOS: whereas the first three books were tight, pacey affairs, they afterwards became bloated and meandering.
You've listed a lot of ways in which the books got rambling and overstuffed...I won't disagree. Martin loses grip on his pacing in the latter volumes, and seems to suffer from a surfeit of POV characters which dilutes his narrative unnecessarily. All bad things. The television does not improve on them in the slightest, unless you're prepared to make an argument that its slapdash, confusing muddle of a plot-line is somehow improved by forcing the audience to fill in the gaps with imagination.
It's hard for me to say, because, as I wrote, I've yet to see any of Season 5 (and won't till the DVD release next February ...). I can only base my opinion on the past four seasons, in which the writers really haven't dropped the ball regarding their source material, and, IMO, have in some ways surpassed it. I always thought Season 5 would turn out to be a challenge, since it's reached the point at which deviation from the books can actually be seen as a positive step ... but looking forward to seeing what they do with it, good and bad.
I think I have to admit that if someone wrote genre fantasy to appeal to what I want, I don't imagine anyone would have heard of them because people who are actually fans of fantasy actually seem to love all the things I despise about the genre.
George was writing to subvert a lot of classic fantasy tropes, which he more or less succeeded at. That subsequent authors such as Lynch or Abercrombie have taken this formula further and made Martin look positively conservative by comparison doesn't change the fact A Song of Ice and Fire was a serious game changer.
I'm curious, though, what it is that you find overly traditional about the books?
evilthecat said:
That's the thing though. Writing "interesting characters" for a book is incredibly easy, because you can explain to the audience what they're feeling and how they think and that kind of voyeuristic element is fundamentally easy to make interesting. With visual media, that can't happen (short of voice overs, which are generally disliked for a reason) so you need situations which will make characters reveal information. Ros herself is not an interesting character and I don't think she's meant to be. She's the straight woman, she's the basically likable, down to earth person whom the other, more interesting characters bounce off. Without her, for example, Theon for most of the early series would just be what he is in the first book, a smirky prick hanging around in the background about whom we know nothing and don't really care.
They could have as easily given Theon scenes with a Stark, or crafted a three dimensional character in Ros's place. They've proven time and time again that they can't. They're either grotesque anachronisms (Talissa), one note cartoons (Karl) or dull bits of scenery. Martin's issue as a writer is certainly NOT an inability to provide his novels with more shabby/disinteresting POV characters with which to give us additional insight into supporting players. Quite the opposite. If the show spent less time with its idiotic DIY projects and more time with the central cast, it might not feel so rushed and choppy.
evilthecat said:
Is it, really?
She fails in small ways due to things which are entirely not her fault and which, at absolute best, she merely failed to prevent. That isn't a disruption of the hero narrative, it's the "Road of Trials" from Joseph Campbell's monomyth.
She completely destabilizes the region, resulting in the collapse of its economy, its worker class, and its primary food sources. She creates enemies everywhere she goes (and completely loses control of every city once she leaves it), creates a massive army of refugees she can neither protect nor feed, gets her field-army bogged down doing patrol work where they are whittled away by an army of insurgents, consistently fails to identify who the dissidents are, loses control of her principal asset (her dragons), and due to the overcrowding and unhygienic conditions a lethal plague is triggered that could absolutely decimate the population of the region.
Her reign is utterly catastrophic, there is literally nothing positive to say about it. Even the freed slaves are requesting to be returned to bondage so they can eat and provide for their families. Book 4 and 5 are entirely about characters attempting and failing to rule due to their bone deep character flaws. Daenerys is a conqueror, not a ruler, and it shows. Jon's insistence on being a "noble man" instead of a responsible Lord Commander/brother of the Night's Watch gets him murdered. Cersei's belief that she is "Tywin Lannister with teats" sees her overestimate her political acumen time and time again until she's completely lost control. The Boltons' inability to engender loyalty save through fear has their army self-destructing from the inside out.
You might also consider that it is far from fait d'accompli that Dany is the hero that prevents the Long Night. Or even Jon, Targaryen blood or not. It would be atypical for Martin, who spends his entire series stubbornly subverting tropes, to suddenly revert to one of the oldest and hoariest right at the end. What role does Bran play? Arya? Sansa? The wolves? What of the potential Greyscale plague Connington brings to Westeros (book 5 is riddled with Greyscale foreshadowing)? What's the end game? I think it's still far from clear. And at the rate that bearded molasses golem writes, we might never find out.
This is one of the best, most tight and precise explanations of Daenerys' faults, and D&D don't seem to twig it at all.
I love the books, I like the show, but it always annoys me when they change something that doesn't need changing. There were some good added in scenes in Season 1, mostly focusing on important characters that weren't POV at that point in the books, or Robert Baratheon. The scene where Robert, Barristan, and Jaime discuss their first kills is an excellent method of telling the backstory of some of the characters, as is the scene where Robert explains to Cersei why a Dothraki invasion would be so much trouble. They are engaging scenes, and they tell us something about the backstory of the characters involved.
Those sort of scenes no longer exist, in part due to deviations from the source material so it's no longer as clear for a scriptwriter where you could put such a scene in, and there's clear dislike for some of the characters from the showrunners. Being honest, I'm a fan of Stannis for the Iron Throne. He is the rightful king, and is a well-rounded character that would admittedly be difficult to translate into TV. Book Stannis is not some robot set on "sour grump" all the time, when he sees Davos after the Battle of the Blackwater, he smiles because his friend is still alive, he's haunted by what he did to Renly.
He's a complicated character struggling to assert his claim as the rightful king when everyone wants a popular figurehead that would be less competent. He's done the right thing all his life, and never been recognised for it, being ignored in favour of more charismatic rivals. He sided with his brother in the rebellion, knowing it could cost him his life and meant betraying his King. He held Storm's End against a siege for months, then after the war was forced to give it up to Renly and was instead given Dragonstone. He should have been Lord Paramount of the Stormlands, and was instead given a tiny island. He destroyed the Greyjoy fleet during their rebellion and received hardly any credit. Robert brought shame on his wedding by getting with one of the brides sisters in the wedding bed. When the War of Five Kings started, Renly refused to back him despite being the youngest of Robert's brothers, and the Lords of the Stormlands followed Renly.
In the TV shows, he's portrayed like a villain, under the thrall of Melisandre and a complete dick to Davos despite them meant to be friends. The showrunners themselves think he would be a bad ruler, but think Renly would be a good one, must have missed the comparisons of the brothers to metal, "Renly was copper, nice to look at but not much use for anything". I think the showrunners don't know how to make him interesting, and miss the point of the character entirely, despite him being similar in personality and upbringing to Ned Stark and Jon Snow. All second sons in the shadow of their more charismatic older siblings, having duty thrust upon them and having a strong moral code.
Another thing the TV runners do is adore Daenerys, and are basically ignoring the massive mess she's making of ruling, as outlined by Bloated Guppy. She's a terrible negotiator, only muddling through because the plot accommodates her. No sane person would have let her into Qarth, she made ultimatums in the negotiations with Yunkai despite not properly knowing about the situation, and I did love how the Spice King basically put her in her place.
I find the show really enjoyable.The interactions and dynamics between the characters are really well done, and is what makes me keep invested in the story. Now I do feel they have killed off too many characters last season, and replaced them with less interesting ones. Sometimes the writers of the show are trying too hard, espescially in regard to defying the expectations of the viewer. Also the incongruency between the books and the show is sometimes too obvious. I haven't read the books but I can sometimes see where the show is going its own way(espescially in terms of character development) and where its following critical plot points in the book, making characters do or say things that make no sense in the context of their previous actions or are completely out of character in the first place.
Again though, this can also be seen as a compliment b/c there are few shows that have such finely written characters where I would actually notice these things. Also I'm not the biggest fan of fantasy(I absolutely can't stand Lord of the Rings or any of that Tolkien crap) but really enjoy Game of Thrones. I think mostly b/c in this show they use fantasy elements to heighten the atmosphere and general intrigue, rathing than existing in and for itself. And also b/c there is a lot of 'grey' instead of just the simple black and white of goody-2-shoes versus 'evil'.
In regards to morality GoT usually comes off to me as Grey versus Black. Honestly, most of the villains are completely irredeemable, and the good guys are only good guys by virtue of not being as evil as the villains.
It is an adaption. Appreciate each thing for what it is. You'll learn to be a lot happier in life. The TV show being what it is won't ever take the books away from you and there are a lot of people that can't stand the books that prefer the TV show.(Myself included, I can't stand George RR Martins writing style.)
If I was going to levy a complaint at GoT, it'd mostly be that it becomes more of a highlight reel than an actual show. Spending 5 minutes with each character every episode.
In the vein of a grand epic, the 2010 Three Kingdoms series in China did a far better job. It had lower production values and looked cheap as hell, sure, but it was a far better show in my opinion.
I think it's a good show. I just don't think it's a good show by usual HBO standards. World building leaves a lot to be desired. Which is probably a direct consequence of not having a large enough budget to make the world feel really authentic. It's still good, it just feels smaller than it should be. It's like a video game with hubs instead of a large open world. I don't know how else to explain it. Other HBO shows didn't have a problem with that because they focused on a smaller or more contemporary area that you can believe in more easily (New Jersey, New York/Atlantic City, Baltimore, Deadwood). Rome was canceled because it was too expensive to make and not enough people wanted to watch it. But they tried and mostly succeeded in making the world feel really big and authentic. And Deadwood was canceled for the same reason. It had the best and most authentic world of them all.
Since this has inevitably descended into discussion on the books, I suppose I'll shout my opinion as if anyone cares.
Personally, my main issue with the last two books is the fact that the main story seems to have wandered off somewhere. While the slow change of season from autumn to winter was a nice touch, it feels like all this political backstabbing will turn out to be largely superfluous compared to the business with the Others (White Walkers) and the dragons. Politics and character moments are nice, but I prefer it to be to the backdrop of something. Aside from the aforementioned change of seasons there seemed to be rather poor indication that anything was really happening.
It just feels like the story is spinning its wheels and lining up all the pieces for the plot to proceed. Even the ending of ADWD with Daenerys felt like it was getting slightly meta when she started feeling guilty about wasting so much time in Essos.
I know "where are the dragons and white walkers" has become such a meme that even south park had to address it, but all I have to say is ...
On another note, am I the only one who is a little unclear on what kind of threat the Others actually pose? They seem rather slow moving and unable to build siege engines or formulate complex political tactics, so unless they are simply going to go around the wall I'm not sure how they are going to get south. I know the shit will hit the fan when winter ravages the land and they will provide additional hardship in that situation, but they don't really feel like an immediate threat.
What's more, how does winter work in Essos? While I'm aware it will still get cold down there, it seems like it would still be significantly more mild, especially since no one in Essos ever seems to make mention of winter like the Westerosi do. It seems like Essos is the place to be.
More Bron is definitely welcome, but their mission to Dorne - unless some major plot twist comes along to explain it - is pretty stupid. It makes so little sense that they've tried weakly to lampshade how absurd it is.
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