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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to be getting increasingly annoyed with Game of Thrones (full book and TV spoilers)

85 replies

Thurlow · 16/05/2015 20:36

Is it just me? I used to love it but now it's just pissing me off. So many changes to the plotlines in the books. I know they're going to change quite a lot but some of it is just pissing me off now because it's changing storylines that haven't even finished in the books, so you don't feel as though they are worth reading anymore.

Like this whole adventure with Jaime and Bronn in Dorne. In the books Jaime is only halfway through an adventure around Westeros putting down the last rebellions. But if the TV show isn't doing that, then what's the point in finishing that story in the book? Confused

Ditto the whole Sansa storyline. And I'm guessing also that the guy from Dorne isn't going to turn up in the show and get eaten by dragons, so that's whole chapters of the book that's wasted. And Penny the dwarf - she should have turned up by now, shouldn't she?

It's not that I just don't like the changes, it's more that they have been saying Martin has been agreeing to the new storylines, so it's as if he's admitting that huge parts of his book are completely irrelevant, iyswim?

Plus I hate the Arya, Dany and Brienne storylines at the moment, so I'm really not feeling the love, when I adored this at the start...

OP posts:
Original poster
Thurlow · 16/05/2015 21:44

Sam and Jaime will be the heroes in the end, I reckon.

OP posts:
Gnome7000 · 16/05/2015 21:45

The thing that bothers me is that if HBO know the ending, then obviously stuff they've not bothered to include isn't important to the end of the books (it's been well publicised that GRRM told them the end). So right now the lack of "young griff" and the iron born means none of that matters in the end and I don't want to know that! He needs to write faster...

Although at least they haven't written off R+L=J I guess.

BoulevardOfBrokenSleep · 16/05/2015 21:48

I read somewhere (Empire magazine?) that the TV series will have a different ending from the books so you can watch it without spoilering? Or maybe that is a complicated double bluff... And it depends how 'different' they mean.

If forced to choose, I'd rather JS died in the books rather than TV so I can continue to watch Kit Harington do his thing in furs. Yes, I am actually that shallow.

GreatJoanUmber · 16/05/2015 21:48

Yes, it's pissing me off no end.
I also think GRRM is starting to regret his decision to licence this, if you see his more recent statements, and the poignant release of the Sansa/Alayne chapter before the start of the new season, you notice that he's trying to push the book content more and to 'defend' his characters.
I don't mind so much that the TV show is cutting out and streamlining thousands of characters and plot lines, because hey, their screen time is limited. What I do mind is how they change the characters until they are completely unrecognisable - and mostly for no good reason. Take Jaime, who in the books is one of the few male characters who is vehemently opposed to rape. And yet here he is in GoT, raping the woman he loves next to their dead son. Tyrion, in GoT super whitewashed to be a "viewer's favourite", and even his most pressing motive for almost everything he does, including killing his father, removed (the guilt about Tysha); what does that leave?
I could go on and on, but don't want to bore people. Just generally, they leave out important bits to get more titties and rape in, or kill off characters still alive to "shock the book readers" (Ser Barristan! jojen! Pyp! Grenn!), so it skewers the entire message the books are trying to convey.

Original poster
Thurlow · 16/05/2015 21:49

Yes, Gnome, that's it! That's so much better explained than I managed it Grin

I'm 50/50 on Young Griff anyway - could easily be a ringer - but it seemed like such a big new storyline with the potential, at least, so change things quite dramatically. And it was an interesting storyline.

So if the producers know how it all ends and don't feel the need to include Young Griff, that means that we now have a spoiler that he might not do anything particularly relevant to the big picture, because he doesn't feature in the final end story of the series. (I'm sure I read too that it will at least end the same way, even if they go different ways to get there).

OP posts:
DragonWithAGirlTattoo · 16/05/2015 21:52

I disagree GJU - Jaime is changing in line with the books - starts off as a total wanker, and through his 'journey' becomes a lot more likeable

I dont get what you are saying about Tyrion either? (dont understand what you are trying to say - probably my bad)

Ser Barristen is mostly like about to kick the bucket in the next book too.

And what is the message the book is trying to convey? I have sat there and said "well that didnt happen - yet - in the books"

Gnome7000 · 16/05/2015 21:55

Agree about young griff, it was too suspicious & with varys involved there'd have to be a web of lies somewhere!

I miss Penny.

Anyone else think they'll end up doing Arya's upcoming storyline in the style of quantum leap? If you get what I mean...

Original poster
Thurlow · 16/05/2015 22:00

What, that she'll become another character?

I was hoping that Young Griff would be a sort of double bluff - that it looked suspicious, but actually turned out to be real. In the same way that GRRM kills off characters, he might be the kind of person to bring in a really important character halfway through the series.

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GreatJoanUmber · 16/05/2015 22:02

Dragon - yes, Jaime changes in the books and becomes more likeable, but in a very different way. Don't you think it's odd to have a character who has one of his own men executed for raping a servant commit rape himself?
As for Tyrion, he is a lot more ambiguous in the books, I find. Not as likeable. All the bad things he's done seem to be glossed over in the show. One example, Shae attacks him first so he has to kill her; not he sees her in his father's bed and in blind rage kills her.

The general message I suppose I mean is that the iron throne is not important, yet in the show that is what everything revolves around. I do believe that by the end of the books, the iron throne doesn't exist anymore, it's just a symbol for the narrow mindedness of those in power and scheming to get power, when the battle of ice and fire is what really matters.

Trills · 16/05/2015 22:06

Young Griff could easily turn up in another way - the raised under another name in another land could show up much later, when we're closer to him becoming relevant to anyone else's storyline.

Gnome7000 · 16/05/2015 22:09

That they'll want to keep Maisie so it will be her playing the different characters until she looks in a mirror (or something similar).

I was counting young griff as one of the 3 heads of the dragon until hbo made me realise it was unlikely. In fairness I wanted someone else to have a better claim all along though.

Original poster
Thurlow · 16/05/2015 22:10

I agree that Tyrion is a little more clear cut in the TV show than the books, but so much of Tyrion in the book is internalised and that's always hard to put across on screen.

He could turn up again, Trills. Hopefully he will. But it's still pissing me off this week because he's not appeared at the correct time Grin

DP and have agreed that if they do kill Jon off at the end of this series, GRRM will have his next book out before April 2016 so that he gets there first.

OP posts:
Gnome7000 · 16/05/2015 22:11

Ahh true, he could turn up yet I guess.

Trills · 16/05/2015 22:13

They had to leave out Arya and Jaime and all of King's Landing this last episode - I think they'll not inclue any extra characters until they can merge or kill one of the existing threads.

AnImperialAffliction · 18/05/2015 22:53

What was that I just watched Hmm

UsedtobeFeckless · 18/05/2015 23:14

At least we'll get some sort of closure with the TV series ... Any ending's better than none! I don't think GRR will ever finish the books Sad

I actually love some of the changes - Bronn And Jaime Go Mad In Dorne is way more entertaining than Ser Dullsville Kingsguard Bloke and the total lack of charmless Ironborn beardy weirdies is a joy to me as I hate them all.

JS had better not be really, truely dead, though ... Angry

Sansarya · 18/05/2015 23:16

Ugh, that was pretty horrific.

nocoolnamesleft · 18/05/2015 23:26

Yeah. Mind you, I think she'll ultimately bury the bastard.

Alisvolatpropiis · 18/05/2015 23:26

I think the end result will be same for the books and show, but the characters used will be different.

I'm not overly bothered at the lack of Jeyne Poole, Penny and so on. Waste of time.

Ramsay's on show mistress isn't in the books is she? I don't remember her. Where's that storyline going?

CoupDetat · 18/05/2015 23:26

Ah yes, I was incredibly pissed when I found out that the TV show would be different from the books and to top it off George R Martin agreed with the changes! Leaving out characters that I loved, Cold Hands, Lady Stone Heart, Jaime going to Dorn, changing deaths and fights eg Brienne and the Hound really ruined the feel of the TV show for me.

Sansa's storyline with Ramsay was rubbish for the simple fact that it was meant to be Arya, though I think they had to use her because of their mistake with Robb's wife's casting.

Am I the only one who's excited about the reveal of Jon's parentage though! Grin

CoupDetat · 18/05/2015 23:28

Ali, in the books Ramsay has no female Bastard Boys. I think the only reason they put her in was to create drama with the Sansa marriage storyline.

YouTheCat · 18/05/2015 23:32

I just don't get what he's doing with the Sansa storyline.

In one of the chapters from the next book that he's released, she is still at the Eerie and still a virgin. No idea how that's going to come about.

Alisvolatpropiis · 18/05/2015 23:33

Didn't think she was a book character, thanks Coup.

CoupDetat · 18/05/2015 23:38

Anytime, Ali. Smile

You, I don't think he knows just what to do with her story either. Sansa was a character I would have loved to have seen progress more like others in the book. Arya tom boy -- assassin, Jon bastard child - Lord commander, Robb the heir - King of the North. Sansa really hasn't changed that much.

YouTheCat · 18/05/2015 23:44

I think Sansa has changed a lot. She's done what she was brought up to do in being adaptable and putting on a face. Somewhere along the line, I'm expecting she's going to get angry and get even.

I was really hopeful that Theon was going to step in and thump Ramsey.