5161

6 is supposed to be released in 2015, as far as speculation goes. But Martin said he won’t commit to anything. But he needs to get on it, or the show is going to catch up, as it is cutting out a lot of fluff. Unless next season has 3 episodes of Gout-prince adventures, the show will move at a faster clip than the books.

5162

I can promise you that, from the books, Tyrion’s storyline is not coming to an end. There are a few more significant events involving Tyrion (that I’m really looking forward to), but after those, Tyrion sort of devolves for awhile (in the books). However, about 3/4th of the way through Dance with Dragons, I felt like the old Tyrion had returned, and it made me look forward to the next book as it gave me hope that Tyrion still has a major role to play in world events.

5163

Glad to hear that. Honestly my fear was that he would just be killed off like a lot of other characters when he’s basically one of the only interesting parts of the show.

5164

I was speaking in pretty broad terms but basically I meant that the war has been settled in the classical sense for the time being and Sansa acts as a catalyst to swing Tyrion against his family. I don’t feel like he needs much of a nudge, but he’s the ultimate conniver and the thought of him finally turning his wits against his sister, her son, and the father seemed like it could be a fun way to shake things up for the story. Which goes back to what I thought was interesting about the Starks taking Casterly Rock. At least it would change something for me to at least attempt to move the conflict in another direction so it feels like narrative progress. Instead, the purple wedding makes it so the war really isn’t settled in the classical sense so we get to potentially recycle the progress from the last season or whatever.

To me it feels like they keep dropping the same exact pebble in the exact same part of the pool. I feel like while things like the red wedding may be shocking, I feel like they are also narratively much safer choices than letting some of these ideas go to see how they play out.

Like I said, the story may not be for me just because I find the path its taking to be one of the lesser interesting paths given some others hinted at.

5165

awdougherty, I think you have it backwards. These are the risky choices for both books and TV. The vengeful authority figure (Robb) is gone, which is an extra doubling down on the tension you don’t always see. And the infamous villain is gone, which you don’t see much in television.

There is definitely some boring shit. Bran dreaming of a three eyed crow ought to be a TVTropes meme for character arcs going nowhere. Speaking of which, that site has myriad examples of serial media trying to stay relevant and interesting. It’s hard.

5166

I guess I disagree that I have it backwards. To me the choices are safer because it allows for things to essentially stay exactly where they are. The characters become, at least on a structural level, interchangeable as long as you have a couple of groups on the lam, ownership of the throne up in the air, and the dragon milf looking for an army (again, when her brother died, she just stepped in to fill that role). To me, the story feels like it bends over backwards to tread water on these points. Young Stark gets an idea that could shake up the throne fight, he gets offed. By winning, the evil kid sort of shakes up that throne fight, but he gets offed. It’s interesting in a way, I guess, to so blatantly set up an antagonist and then just dump him, but I’m not necessarily going “OH SHIT! NOW WHAT?!?!?!” because my guess is it falls back into the patterns earlier in the series.

Jon Snow… north of the wall. Need to get back! And he does, so we swap in the paralyzed brother who NEEDS TO GOT BEYOND THE WALL!! It feels like swapping pieces instead of progressing a story. That’s what, to me, feels like safe choices.

5167

Keep watching.

I think that the homeostasis of the throne situation is just there to

A. Remind you that no matter how much you hope and pray, the same people fuck up the same shit over and over again. (New Monarch is the worst, same as the first)

B. Have a contrast to where the real threats/stories lie north of the wall and across the sea.

I think that the game of thrones phrase needs to be changed.

“When you play the game of thrones you either win (for a while), or you die (then you die)”

5168

On the subject of plot lines going nowhere in A Song of Ice and Fire, there are some of those, but not with the major characters in the tale.

I would answer that GRRM has a very complicated plot and that the import of things as they may impact the story going forward are not always clear. What was said or intimated in Books 1 or 2 may not come to fruition until Books 5, 6 or 7.

To say there is no payoff to dreaming about the Three-Eyed Raven would be very wrong. That’s the entire point of WHY Bran bothers with his trip north of the Wall in the first place. Without those dreams, he does not go there. We have seen by Book 5 what those dreams were aimed at getting Bran to do and why. We do not as yet have the entire payoff about what that will ultimately give to Bran, but there are several prominent theories which will, at the end of the day, make Bran the savior of the world such that without his help, the Others would prevail. That is CERTAINLY the stated objective and goal of the Reeds for their journey in helping Bran within the TV series. They are quite plain about that. Brans’ journey north of the wall is essentially a walk into Mordor - a journey from which Bran does not expect to return.

Bran is a classic fantasy hero. A selfless, idealistic, and innocent prince of a great and noble house with an even greater prophesied destiny that requires the ultimate sacrifice. We buy that from Bran where we would not accept that arc from other characters in the story. That’s part of the genius of GRRM.

I hardly see that as a character arc going nowhere. So, shenanigans on that. Instead, it looks like we can reasonably expect from Bran while warging a Weirwood tree that:

[ul]
[li]Bran can see the past and the present better than anybody. The explanations as to what has happened in the past, not just during Robert’s Rebellion, but THOUSANDS of years ago are uniquely available to Bran (and Bran only);[/li][li]Bran has met Samwell Tarly, and as Sam will end up in OldTown with a glass candle nearby which he can use to communicate telepathically with anyone he knows – i.e., Bran and Jon – so that this information that Bran discovers will come out when required and get to those who need to know it; and[/li][li]Bran is the most powerful Warg there is, he can not only control a human mind, but will probably be able to warg into Drogon and thereby become the great black dragon when nobody else can control it at the critical moment to use the dragon to destroy the Others.[/li][/ul]

That’s not exactly a pointless character arc, from where I sit. YMMV.

5169

You have to admit that plugging different characters into the same situations is at least one level up from most serial media, where the same characters get plugged into the same situations. :)

5170

Anyone found some detailed stills from the episode last night depicting the poisoning going down? I need to rewatch the scene, as some are saying it’s largely visible if you know what to look for.

5171

5172

Just saw that it’s the same girl that played one of the prostitutes Bolton used to torture Theon before unmanning him. I’m not sure if that means she’s the same character however.

5173

I’ll stick with it as a back burner show, but like I said, I don’t know if the story is doing enough for me to ever really be a fan of it. I’m willing to stipulate that these plot lines will go somewhere at some point unless GRRM plans on doing the worst ending ever, but I personally believe the author’s uncertainty with the series led him to drag some shit out to buy some time. But again, that’s my personal reaction for long stretches of this series. But I’ll step back now from the conversation because I’m not sure I have much to add.

5174

100% visible. The books never spell out what happened, but there are clues, and those clues were present last night.

5175

I noticed the part in the gif, but not anything as far as placement in the goblet.

5176

Pretty sure both the girls were.

5177

Yeah that’s the kicker. It’s clear Olenna gets the jewel off Sansa’s necklace, but how the jewel gets into the cup is another matter. If you look closely, though, I think you can see Margaery palming the thing into Joffrey’s cup just as she takes the cup off Joffrey so he can go get his sword to cut the pie.

Prior to that, I think just after Olenna talks to Sansa, there’s a long shot where you can briefly see Olenna passing in front of the royal table, so that might be the point when Margaery gets the jewel. Although M. is sitting down at the time, maybe O. just slips the jewel onto the table (at that point it’s just a loose jewel after all, nothing to notice or make a fuss about if noticed), and maybe M. picks it up at some point in the ensuing Tyrion-tormenting shenanigans.

5178

It’s visable in both scenes who did the poisoning. The gif above shows Lady Olenna touching Sansa’s necklace (and possibly transferring something to her other hand), then in the scene where Joffrey commands Tyrion to serve him, look who just happens to be sitting next to the wine as Tyrion pours, you can see her in the edge of the frame.

Both Myranda and the blonde they were chasing were the girls that teased Theon just before Ramsey cut him. Ramsey said something about the blonde girl making Myranda jealous, but the whole thing was mainly just to prove to the viewers once again how cruel and sadistic Ramsey is, and how broken Theon has become.

5179

Yep, in the books I believe Theon and the girl “escape” together then Ramsay hunts him down. All part of Ramsay’s games!

5180

Dammit! I can’t believe that after Book 5 I didn’t see this. Makes perfect sense, too. I was probably still obsessing over the “who is Jon Snow’s real parents” for far too long. R+L=J At least I got THAT reference from several pages ago…