Well, I will be happy to be proven wrong.
If Book 5 turns into Riverdance with Dragons I’m giving up.
— Alan
That’s like saying you should skip the other main chracters because they don’t interact with Dany.
As as minimum you have to skip also Jon’s chapters, who is also separated in the Wall.
And Arya chapters, who is having adventures on her own.
And Bran chapters, who doesn’t interact with any other MC since ages ago.
Oh wait, more of half of the main characters plotlines are separated from the rest!
While I think skipping the Dany chapters is a profligate action undertaken by wastrels and depraved nighthawks, to be fair the Dany chapters of AGoT and ASoS have been collected into novellas and released separately*. In fact, the Dany chapters from AGoT, Blood of the Dragon, won the Hugo for Best Novella that year.
So they can certainly stand on their own, but I do think the books are lesser without them.
*Apparently they did the same thing with the Iron Islands stories from AFFC. I would not care to read that novella.
Hammet
1886
Exactly! Unless you understand English and the difference between telling what you do and telling others what they should do.
The whole argument that I “should” skip Jon Snow and others … I honestly can’t be bothered to discuss it. But I will, anyway. As Bahimiron points out, the entire story arch of Dany, from start to finish, is completely possible to be read on its own, while none of the others are. I would also add that I haven’t gotten far at all into Feast for Crows and should this change, as Bahimirion’s linked chapter suggests, all I have to do is open up Storm of Swords somewhere in the middle and skip over everything that isn’t about Dany.
You know, to amend my wastrel and depraved nighthawk ways. (I liked that, by the way.)
You can pretty much read Jon Snow’s story all by itself. I mean. He’s up at the Wall. Doing Wall stuff.
Hammet
1888
Honestly? Any chapter without The Hound in it is a waste of recycled paper. More or less. Or not.
Dany haters.
NSFW YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
http://qikr.co/rd8yy
I loved Martin’s books and eagerly await the next one. But I too felt the Dan adventure was pretty slow and took me out of things through most of the first book. When it picked up and started to tie in around the second book, I was glad for it. Her story fast became as or more intereting most of the other stories after that.
I felt rather creepy watching that scene knowing she’s only 13 in the books (the actress is quite lovely though).
On Dany’s sections in the books, hers are some of my favorites as the series has gone on. A view into a major power developing that the rest of Westeros has no idea is coming. Her development from manipulated little sister to a woman of power was fun to read.
So I’ve been talking about this show with people who’ve read the books and people who haven’t, and I think the reason the non-readers aren’t totally confused is that they don’t realize they’re supposed to be paying attention to all this stuff. They’re just paying attention to the main characters (so far), and have no idea that they should even be remembering the names of all these bit-part dudes that readers know are going to be incredibly crucial later.
So if you’ve read the books, you’re frantically trying to remember who Littlefinger is and what’s up with that spymaster dude (does he betray Ned? I forget, but assume the answer is yes, on general principles) and trying to remember if Tywin Lannister is alive and could possibly be that old dude with the king, &c. Whereas non-readers are just like “miscellaneous dudes, miscellaneous dudes, miscellaneous dude.”
The tipoff that he isn’t Tywin is that he’s wearing the same armor as Jaime I believe.
Wha, seriously? You really think people who’ve read the books can’t figure out who Littlefinger is?
— Alan
Oh, you mean the Lannister family armor? (I know it’s not, now, but there’s every reason to think it is.)
I absolutely guarantee it, both me and another person I talked to. Remember, a lot of people who’ve read the books haven’t touched them in the last 5-10 years. Plus, for all I remember, Littlefinger is really only in the first book, which I’ve read once, when it came out in 1996. No way do I remember that book 15 years later.
I could have sworn that Barristan was wearing a gold cloak for a while. He was, of course, wearing the white of the Kingsguard, but it was the lighting that threw me off.
Well, it’s also not white. White armor would look shit on film. So instead it appears to be a gold armor with a crown inscribed on the chest.
It looks like they’re both wearing cloaks and that Barristan’s is white, but the armor definitely isn’t.
(They’re not great pictures, but I love how much shinier Jaime’s armor is than Barristan’s.)
Littlefinger is quite possibly the single most important mover and shaker in Westeros and you remember him as a guy who was ‘really only in the first book’.
Yipes.
