Game of Thrones

[Eerie]

Since the thread Winter is coming... is way too spoilerish because we talked about the books a lot without any spoilers, we decided it would be the best to make a brand new thread for the upcoming series in HBO

Game of Thrones is a brand new serie based off George R. R. Martin's series A Song of Ice and Fire [up to 4 books published right now, soon 5 this summer, on a total of 7]. It's low medieval-fantastic setting, with a plethora of characters, fighting to win the 7 Kingdom's thrones.

Why would you follow it when you hate Lord of the Rings?

Magic is very low-key here. It's more intrigues and political stuff, where a lot of characters are in the grey area rather than just "good" or "bad". There are a lot of twists, and it's a very complicated story, with numerous POVs.

It's full of violence, sex, honour, grinding reality. There are some fantastic things happening - especially in the 15 minutes preview - but really, it's far from being the whole thing. Like, really FAR, FAR away from it.

Some official links:

Official website
Official twitter
Official making of website
Watch the 15 min preview trailer of ep01
Interactive map and comprehensive Houses guide of Westeros made by HBO

I tried making a very short guide to the main characters. Note: kids are shown by age order, except for Jon Snow.

Main characters

The Stark
Motto: Winter is Coming


Eddard [Ned] Stark
Sean Bean plays the lead role of Eddard Stark, head of the House Stark. Knightly and full of honour and loyalty, King Robert asks him to become his Hand at the beginning of the series. The Stark are the head of the "North".


Catelyn [Cat] Stark
Played by Michelle Fairley, Catelyn Stark is Eddard's wife. Born as a Tully, she became quite accustomated to being a rigorous Stark.


Robb Stark
Played by Richard Madden, Robb Stark is the first born between Ned and Cat. He inherited of the Stark's traits in his heart, but resembles more of a Tully in his looks. He was raised to succeed to the head of the family.


Sansa Stark
Sophie Turner plays Sansa Stark, the eldest daughter, pride of Catelyn Stark. Beautiful, she is very girly, and also Cat's own portrait when she was her age.


Arya Stark
The youngest daughter of the family, she is also the tomboy, more prompt to learn sword play than needle play.


Bran Stark
Aventurous and curious, he is played by Isaac Hempstead-Wright. Very young, his wish is to become a knight himself.

Note: there is an even younger brother, Rickon, whose role isn't truly important.

Benjen Stark
[no pic yet]: Eddard's brother, enroled in the Watch. Played by Joseph Mawle.


Jon Snow
Even though Eddard is righteous, Jon Snow is his bastard, actually the eldest of all. His mother is unknown. To Cat's great dismay, he is the only one who actually looks like a Stark. He has inherited of his father's righteous mind too.



The Baratheon
Motto: Ours is the Fury


King Robert Baratheon
Robert was the one who was the head of the rebellion against the mad King Aerys Targaryen. He became the King afterwards, and for now 15 years have ruled over the 7 Kingdoms. Maybe some of you will have recognized Mark Addy as Robert.


Cersei Lannister
Married to King Robert and a Queen, Cersei, played by Lena Headey, was born as a Lannister. Twin of Jaime Lannister, she is the eldest of the Lannister siblings. She is reputed for her great beauty.


Joffrey Baratheon
The crown prince, Joffrey Baratheon, is played by Jack Gleeson.

Note: there are two other kids, Myrcella and Tommen, but their role in this season is quite small.
Note bis: Robert has two brothers, Renly and Stannis.



The Lannister
Motto: Hear Me Roar!


Jaime Lannister
Twin of the Queen Cersei, he is a Kingsguard, and one of the most famous one. As good-looking as his sister, he is also very impulsive. Played by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.


Tyrion Lannister
The youngest of the siblings, he also compensates for his siblings good looks by being "the dwarf". Of course, most of you will have recognized Peter Dinklage in this role.

Tywin Lannister
[no pic yet]: played by Charles Dance, he possesses like all the Lannisters a certain arrogance. Head of the Lannister house, he's also the father of the three siblings.



The Targaryen
Motto: Fire and Blood


Viserys Targaryen
Viserys, played by Harry Lloyd, is the eldest and one of the two Targaryen left. In exil with his sister, his obsession is to take back the throne and be the rightful king.


Daenerys [Dany] Targaryen
Youngest sister, she never knew the 7 Kingdoms, unlike her brother. Played by Emilia Clarke, she is to be betrothed to Khal Drogo, in exchange for power to set up a war against the 7 Kingdoms, so that her brother can become the King.


Khal Drogo
Played by Jason Momoa, Khal Drogo is the leader of one of the most powerful troops. Interested in Dany, he marries her and promises her brother to help them to get back the throne of the 7 Kingdoms.

I hope I didn't spoil too much - some of the settings explained are told in the very first episode I think, so it should be alright.

If anyone reading the books sees a problem or a major spoiler, please tell me so so I can correct

[Dana Scully]

First episode was excellent, got the ball rolling on all the many plot threads very nicely.

Also, awesome intro post Eerie

[The Man]

So apparently I don't have HBO and thus I couldn't watch it yet. I'm sure it'll be on the tubes shortly so I'll just pirate it.

[Eerie]

Ah, too bad, apparently HBO was free yesterday on a lot of cables.

I don't know when I'll be able to watch it but I'm sure will be watching this. I also can't wait for DVDs/BR versions, heard they had French subs on the original, so I'll be buying them on the UK xD (screw you Orange).

[Minato]

I just bought the book, though i dunno if I can get ahead of the tv series so i can nitpick on the differences here by Sunday. FFIV: CC will probably suck up all my time starting Friday and I gotta work until then.

[Cthulhu]

Just saw it yesterday (I totally pirate it, fuck you), and it was a very good interpretation of the books, almost all scenes and characters were instantly recognizable, .

* Jon looks fatter and darker-haired than i had imagined.
* Sansa's fucking tall for a 13-year old, .
* Fucking tits
* Dany's also supposed to be, what, 12? But 12 year olds and (SPOILER) nudity / sex scenes is a bridge too far, even for HBO .
* I always pictured Ned to be the skinny, black-haired kinda guy. More an Aragorn than a Boromir, so to speak, .
* Jaime, actor looks older than I pictured the guy, but the acting / character is excellent.

I'm (sorta) glad they haven't toned down on everything. Of course, the trailers and other publically accessible stuff were toned down, but that's understandable.

tits

This show combines all the good things in life - tits, sex scenes, dwarves, drinking, puppies, tits, and puppies.

[Splintered]

Dany's older than Sansa, but not by much. She's probably 14, 15 at most. It's definitely not toned down at all, and a good interpretation of the book.

Although there was more emphasis on the sex and tits hurr, which in of itself doesn't matter but I wish they pushed the kids=dire wolves a little more. I was raving about the book for years trying to get my brother to read it, he saw the tv show and was like, "WTF are you reading porno?"

[The Man]

Dany and a few other characters are definitely intended to be older in the TV adaptation, although I don't think they applied it across the board. Pretty sure she's supposed to be at least 16 in the adaptation. Bran is a few years older as well. On the other hand Arya looks about the same age.

Incidentally I still haven't watched it. Time to do so. Will give thoughts after seeing it

[The Man]

So yeah, was good. I can see how people who hadn't read the books might be slightly confused about some of the characters but it's nothing that a few re-watches probably wouldn't fix. This is definitely going to be one of those series that's best viewed on DVD/TiVo/whatever. My biggest complaint was that there were a few lines that couldn't be heard easily. Not a particularly big deal, though; none of them seemed particularly important.

[Cthulhu]

Funny, I could hear and understand as good as all of them, . Might be I'm primed for the lines, though, them stuck in my subconcious memory etc.

And yeah, on the puppies thing, you only see them at the start and not much else. Except for Bran's. But maybe they'll do more with 'em in later episodes.

We should complain, though. I'll set up a 'More Puppies In GoT' petition on the internets.

[Minato]

Cthulhu wrote:

* Jon looks fatter and darker-haired than i had imagined.

Really? I thought he looked way too skinny and pretty. I think they could've done well switching him and Robb's actors around .

[The Man]

Cthulhu wrote:

Funny, I could hear and understand as good as all of them, . Might be I'm primed for the lines, though, them stuck in my subconcious memory etc.

I haven't read the books in like six years. So that probably has something to do with it.

And yeah, on the puppies thing, you only see them at the start and not much else. Except for Bran's. But maybe they'll do more with 'em in later episodes.

We should complain, though. I'll set up a 'More Puppies In GoT' petition on the internets.

I approve of this idea.

[The Man]

Second episode was probably even better than the first. Pretty much any scene involving Tyrion was a highlight, especially the opening.

[Minato]

Can never have enough Tyrion. I thought the ending was kind weak. I fear for how they intend to handle Bran's story.

[The Man]

I thought it worked well. It's pretty clear from textual clues within the novels that the wolves have some connection to the Stark children, and since GRRM is involved in production of the TV series I'm sure they wouldn't juxtapose the images if they didn't have some connection that needed to be emphasized for later in the story. My only big concern with the way the ending was handled is that they haven't shown any of Bran's dreams yet, but I'm presuming those will be handled in a future episode. Much as Jaime's slaying of Mad King Aerys wasn't mentioned in the first episode but came out in this one, I'm presuming they know what they're doing with important bits of character development, and they can only fit so much into a single hour of television.