FWIW my wife has no time with the books and from her reaction I think the tv show may have actually tipped its hand a bit early with respect to just how important Littlefinger is, in the way that if you trimmed a bunch of detail and less essential characters out of an Agatha Christie story you might end up with a pretty linear idea of cause and effect.
Why would Tywin wear armor in that scene? We didn’t see Ned wear a coat and arms when he greeted or feasted with the king (at least that I recall). If you hadn’t read the books, it’s pretty easy to think that Jaime and Barristan might both be Lannisters. If you have read the books, the armor was probably supposed to be the tipoff that it wasn’t Tywin.
That’s what it was supposed to be, obviously, it didn’t work because there was some confusion. I’m not judging you, just stating what I thought the intent was.
I don’t think it’s confusing. Odds of Tywin Lannister hanging out with Robert and shooting the shit about the olden days are pretty slim, right up with the odds of him being in any scene that he isn’t the focus of attention.
I was confused for a minute. First, I didn’t know who was cast to play Tywin and Robert’s “surrounded by Lannisters” rant was a bit oddly timed.
That’s a great point. However there is a lot of cross cutting, with very little transition, and a lot of characters introduced at once in these first few episodes. For those of us not as quick (or quick with the meta construction of the show), I think some confusion as to who he is (especially non-readers) is understandable.
For me, I didn’t think he was Tywin, but I couldn’t put a name to him during the scene until I remembered someone’s (Bahimiron?) comment about the casting of Barristan and it was so spot on, that I thought that must be Barristan.
Fair enough, and I could definitely see not knowing who Barristan was, I just couldn’t imagine thinking he was Mr T. In the books Tywin was like my most eagerly anticipated character meeting early on, so his relatively rare appearances stand out to me as do all of the details of his behavior.
So I’ll leave it at that.
bloo
1907
I just prefer to ignore most of Martin’s ages in the books, especially for the young, and just go with the ages from the tv show.
In the books, Dany is now 16 going on Alexander the Great.
Ned was 36 in GoT (played by 52 yo Bean), and hadn’t seen King Robert since he was 27 or so.
Arya starts at 9 (played by a 13 yo) and is now 11-12.
It’s been a long time since I read the books, and I’m don’t plan to reread them until the last one comes out. Who the hell was Barristan, and why do we care?
Barristan the Bold has been the chief badass of the Kingsguard for like a billion years. He shows up with a skull-crackin’ quarterstaff to bodyguard Dany quite a bit later, after Joffrey dismisses him from the Kingsguard for being too old or not nailing his mom or something.
The answer to every dumb question like the one above. And then there’s always this.
Bahimiron’s unleashed the sass!
I did check out one of the wikis before asking, but most of the stuff described there didn’t seem particularly noteworthy. I figured he had some great scenes or quotes that I had forgotten about, and weren’t listed in the wikis. By the way, the wikis read like police reports, and are terrible for this sort of question. I just wanted to know why everyone’s so excited about Barristan, when I didn’t remember who he was.
He also unseated Duncan the Tall (Dunk) during a tourney I believe. His name carries weight in Westeros, and his dismissal thoroughly angered Tywin who saw him very much as a symbol to the “smallfolk” as much as anything else. To have retained him would have meant a great deal.
— Alan
WINNER! said in Charlie Sheen’s voice
Tony_M
1915
Yeah I always mentally added a few years to Aryas age when i was reading the books. I know people grew up faster in Medieval times but I just couldn’t suspend my disbelief without ageing them.
Its fairly typical. I think most books, especially fantasy and sci-fi, are half what the writer has written and half whats going on in the imagination of the reader.
Tony
If your point is to agree and say “see, it looks like the armor is made of plastic!” it is a point well executed.
Jag
1917
This is exactly why i’m rereading them now.
I love the little touches, like Tyrion pissing off the wall then immediately turning around and shaking hands with Jon Snow. It fit the character perfectly.
Blips
1920
I haven’t seen this mentioned anywhere yet, but apparently Season 2 is going to just another 10 episodes. I was really hoping for 12. I’m not sure how they’re going to compress an even larger book into 10 episodes.
