Is There Anything On The Show That You Think Is Better Than The Books?

[Woman of War]

The fight of Sandor and Brienne was one of the highlights among the show-only scenes. Two so very dedicated and charismatic actors. And the outcome was a litmus test for me: I may like Sandor as interesting fictional invention - but I like Brienne as character much more. 

And there is a long forgotten scene, the talk about their marriage between Cersei and Robert from the first series, not very present anymore  among fandom. It was great.

[Meera of Tarth]

12 hours ago, dsug said:

bringing back the mountain is far different than catelyn. the mountain was a big deal in season four, and bringing him back into the plot was simple because the plot was already full of existing characters. he was simply being added to an already in-progress plot. 

catelyn coming back would be its own completely removed storyline that the show didn't have time for. in the books she hasn't done anything. i wish the show could have done her, but i understand her exclusion. 

the mountain was crucial to cersei's storyline in S4, S6, and to a lesser extent, S5. Cat wouldn't have anything to do with another story. 

But they could have done LSH with Jaime and Brienne, instead of Jaime being with Cersei.

Until last season finale I thought she would appear because they hinted at her a lot last season. I was sad. It would have been a good opportunity even if the plot was short. The finale would have been more shocking too.

[Cron]

On 11/16/2016 at 6:18 AM, Woman of War said:

The fight of Sandor and Brienne was one of the highlights among the show-only scenes. Two so very dedicated and charismatic actors. And the outcome was a litmus test for me: I may like Sandor as interesting fictional invention - but I like Brienne as character much more. 

And there is a long forgotten scene, the talk about their marriage between Cersei and Robert from the first series, not very present anymore  among fandom. It was great.

Absolutely great stuff.

I might be in a small minority here, but I actually liked the scene of Robert's stag hunt in Season One, too.  It was consistent with the books, and also gave us a deeper look into the characters of Renly and Robert (the two of whom did most of the talking).

Also, the scene where Robert, Barristan Selmy, and then Jaime were talking about the first people theykilled in battle.  Loved that scene.

it's interesting that Robert is in three of these scenes (counting the one that you mentioned with Cersei, which I agree is great).  

Season One seems to have added scenes like this very well, but later seasons...not so much (although, as I said above and you discussed, the Brienne/Sandor fight was tremendous)

[Cron]

On 11/16/2016 at 11:50 AM, Meera of Tarth said:

But they could have done LSH with Jaime and Brienne, instead of Jaime being with Cersei.

Until last season finale I thought she would appear because they hinted at her a lot last season. I was sad. It would have been a good opportunity even if the plot was short. The finale would have been more shocking too.

Yeah, that would have been a fantastic season finale scene, Lady Stoneheart!

I've got a feeling that ship has sailed, though, and we are never going to see her in the show.

I think the showrunners decided a long time ago it's just not happening, and they are even more unlikely to change their minds now that only 13 episodes with very limited and precious screen time remain.

[Meera of Tarth]

3 hours ago, Cron said:

Yeah, that would have been a fantastic season finale scene, Lady Stoneheart!

I've got a feeling that ship has sailed, though, and we are never going to see her in the show.

I think the showrunners decided a long time ago it's just not happening, and they are even more unlikely to change their minds now that only 13 episodes with very limited and precious screen time remain.

unfortunately, yeah

[Nevets]

On 11/16/2016 at 2:58 AM, Cron said:

Yeah, great stuff there.

Oberyn was fine in the books, but even better in the show.

How did you like show-Bronn?  (Better than the books, in my opinion)

And show-Pod? (Better than the books, in my opinion)

And Brienne's fight with the Hound in the show? (Better than how Arya and the Hound parted ways in the books, in my opinion)

Oberyn and Bronn are improvements, as is Olenna Tyrell.  I also like the show's versions of Shae and Osha.  I think they are more interesting than their book counterparts.  I disagree about Pod, though.  I liked him much better as a shy, undersized 12 year-old than as Pod the Rod, who I find boring and irritating.

16 hours ago, Cron said:

Absolutely great stuff.

I might be in a small minority here, but I actually liked the scene of Robert's stag hunt in Season One, too.  It was consistent with the books, and also gave us a deeper look into the characters of Renly and Robert (the two of whom did most of the talking).

Also, the scene where Robert, Barristan Selmy, and then Jaime were talking about the first people theykilled in battle.  Loved that scene.

it's interesting that Robert is in three of these scenes (counting the one that you mentioned with Cersei, which I agree is great).  

Season One seems to have added scenes like this very well, but later seasons...not so much (although, as I said above and you discussed, the Brienne/Sandor fight was tremendous)

I too liked the Brienne/Arya/Hound scene.  I felt like Brienne's story in AFFC was more or less pointless.  (Fun to read, but still pointless).

A couple of early scenes with Arya that I really liked as well:

The scene with Syrio after Ned's injury "There is no god but Death.  And we say to death: Not today!."

The scene where Yoren tells her how he wound up on the Wall.  "I put an ax so deep into his skull they had to bury him with it."

[Cron]

7 hours ago, Nevets said:

Oberyn and Bronn are improvements, as is Olenna Tyrell.  I also like the show's versions of Shae and Osha.  I think they are more interesting than their book counterparts.  I disagree about Pod, though.  I liked him much better as a shy, undersized 12 year-old than as Pod the Rod, who I find boring and irritating.

Don't like show-Pod, huh? Interesting.  I guess the reason I like him is cuz he's a good comic relief foil for other characters (Tyrion, Bronn and Brienne), plus of course he's fundamentallygood and earnest. Very loyal and true.

7 hours ago, Nevets said:

I too liked the Brienne/Arya/Hound scene.  I felt like Brienne's story in AFFC was more or less pointless.  (Fun to read, but still pointless).

You're probably right about it being pointless in the picture, but sometimes the journey IS the story, and to me this is definitely true when we are talkig about a classic, wandering, questing knight.  Many times while reading these scenes with Brienne I thought of King Arthur stories with questing knights searching for the Holy Grail, and that resonated well with me, as I love the Arhturian legend stories, including the wandering and questing (indeed, as you may know, in Arthurian legend the Knights of the Round Table wandered and quested FOR YEARS)

7 hours ago, Nevets said:

A couple of early scenes with Arya that I really liked as well:

The scene with Syrio after Ned's injury "There is no god but Death.  And we say to death: Not today!."

Oh, was that scene not in the books?  Been so long since I've read them, I forgot if it was in the books. But yeah great scene.

7 hours ago, Nevets said:

The scene where Yoren tells her how he wound up on the Wall.  "I put an ax so deep into his skull they had to bury him with it."

Oh yes, good one here.  Coincidentally, I was just thinking about this scene the other day.  Great, great stuff, and a fantastic addition to the show, I agree completely

[Cron]

On 11/18/2016 at 6:59 AM, Meera of Tarth said:

unfortunately, yeah

I wonder how Cat will impact Jaime and Brienne in the books, though.

I've got to brush up on this, but if I recall correctly from the books UnCat thinks Jaime broke his oath, and wants Brienne to cross him off.

The show departs from this pretty radically...yet the show seems to be VERY clearly headed towards a Jaime/Brienne relationship.

I wonder if it's possible Jaime/Brienne will occur in the show but not the books...

[Meera of Tarth]

16 minutes ago, Cron said:

I wonder how Cat will impact Jaime and Brienne in the books, though.

I've got to brush up on this, but if I recall correctly from the books UnCat thinks Jaime broke his oath, and wants Brienne to cross him off.

The show departs from this pretty radically...yet the show seems to be VERY clearly headed towards a Jaime/Brienne relationship.

I wonder if it's possible Jaime/Brienne will occur in the show but not the books...

I think that this means they will both survive to LSH's attacks. Maybe I am wrong, but unless JB happens before LSH kills Jaime I can't see why they would hint at JB in the show.

I wonder what will happen un the books after the cliffhanger of LSH with them.

[Cron]

On 11/26/2016 at 9:48 AM, Meera of Tarth said:

I think that this means they will both survive to LSH's attacks. Maybe I am wrong, but unless JB happens before LSH kills Jaime I can't see why they would hint at JB in the show.

I wonder what will happen un the books after the cliffhanger of LSH with them.

Yeah, where was Brienne at the end of her story in the books?  Hanging in a tree? Or was she down from there?

Gonna be so hard to continue to keep track of these differences between books and show as both continue to unfold  GRRM himself talked about the "butterfly effect," and part of what that means is that things are likely to be diverging more and more cuz of the compound effect of changes in the past.  Yeah, I know we've been told the main characters in books and show are going to end up the same, but it's looking like a real twisty road between here and there.

Indeed, I remain amazed that Young Griff and Arianne Martell have been left out of the show, but here we are.  I can't imagine that GRRM wrote so much about them just for them to end up being totally insignificant in the books, yet the show left them out.  In fact, now that I think about it, I'm really looking forward to reading in Winds of Winter what GRRM has in store for some of those types of characters who were left out of the show.  Once we see that, we'll be in a better position to judge the show's decisions to leave them out.

[Dragon in the North]

6 hours ago, Cron said:

Yeah, where was Brienne at the end of her story in the books?  Hanging in a tree? Or was she down from there?

We left Brienne in AFFC hanging in a tree, but in ADWD, we see her in Jaime's camp. What occurred between the two scenes is unknown.

[Cron]

15 hours ago, Dragon in the North said:

We left Brienne in AFFC hanging in a tree, but in ADWD, we see her in Jaime's camp. What occurred between the two scenes is unknown.

Good stuff, thanks.

[BrienneofFart]

First, i have to admit i have only ever read the first book so far, but i know about what happens in the other books and the book characters bc of curiosity and internet acess. What i think was better was:

- Aging the characters up (I think many agree on this). For a while i thought it was actually more interesting for some POV characters to be children and GRRM writes them great, but i feel like he overestimates the physical and intellectual capabilites of under aged persons. Sure, it's fantasy and these characters stand out because of their abilites and accomplishments, but i couldn't take Robb, Jon and Arya's actions seriously after realizing how old they were supposed to be.

- Bran being the only to one to warg. Because i find all the stark children having wolf dreams and similar things a bit over the top. I like Bran having something special.

- Pyp and Grenn dying. In my opinion, Sam could have had too. Considering none of them are particulary powerful fighters, their chances of surving the wildling attack were actually quite low.

 

[Neds Secret]

I sort of enjoyed Aryas interactions with Tywin at Harrenhall. Although it was quite a diversion from the books it was one change that made some sense to me. Daario Naharis leading the Second Sons rather than the Stormcrows also was a change that simplified things without losing any real important scenes or plots just IMO.

[RenlyIsNotRight]

The big one for me was the Ned/Jaime fight. Perhaps the show upped Neds swordsmanship abilities compared to the books in a way that may seem a bit pander-y to some, but it was a much more memorable scene in my opinion, not to mention more emotionally impactful with Jorys death being more of a highlight.

Also pretty much any Robert Baratheon related add on scene in Season 1. Maybe Arya/Tywin to a lesser extent too but after that I have a really hard time thinking of anything I preferred on the show. Even the things I thought I did (the Stannis/Shireen scenes in particular) ultimately got ruined when they were revealed to simply be setting up something stupid.

[storm.131]

I think the battle of Blackwater Bay was better in the show.  I also liked the Missandei/Grey Worm storyline in the show.

[Cron]

On 12/22/2016 at 7:24 PM, RenlyIsNotRight said:

The big one for me was the Ned/Jaime fight. Perhaps the show upped Neds swordsmanship abilities compared to the books in a way that may seem a bit pander-y to some, but it was a much more memorable scene in my opinion, not to mention more emotionally impactful with Jorys death being more of a highlight.

Also pretty much any Robert Baratheon related add on scene in Season 1. Maybe Arya/Tywin to a lesser extent too but after that I have a really hard time thinking of anything I preferred on the show. Even the things I thought I did (the Stannis/Shireen scenes in particular) ultimately got ruined when they were revealed to simply be setting up something stupid.

Good stuff.

How about the scenes where Yoren tells the story of how he came to be in the Night's Watch, and the scene with Jaime and Tyrion discussing Cousin Orson crushing the beetles?

[Cron]

On 1/2/2017 at 1:34 AM, storm.131 said:

I think the battle of Blackwater Bay was better in the show.  I also liked the Missandei/Grey Worm storyline in the show.

Yeah, Blackwater was awesome.

Also, I agree about Grey Worm and Missandei (even though I think most people disagree with us).  In the books, those two characters were fine, but also kind of "just there," but in the show they are a lot more than that, and I like them a lot (both are very serious, responsbile and highly capable people, and both have really similarly messed up personal histories.  I think it would be good to see two people who were both slaves for so long finally be able to lead more normal, happy lives, but I wonder if one of them will get crossed off instead...)

[A Bong of Ice and Fire]

I liked the show's red wedding better than the book's.  The gut punch of Talisa getting stabbed added extra tragedy.  I also liked the catatonic ending for Cat.  

I like Talisa better than plain Jeyne, too.  Robb breaking his vow for love in the show was more convincing to me than his "doing the right thing" in the book.  I'd fall in love with Talisa, too.

[Cron]

On 1/15/2017 at 8:04 AM, A Bong of Ice and Fire said:

I liked the show's red wedding better than the book's.  The gut punch of Talisa getting stabbed added extra tragedy.  I also liked the catatonic ending for Cat.  

I like Talisa better than plain Jeyne, too.  Robb breaking his vow for love in the show was more convincing to me than his "doing the right thing" in the book.  I'd fall in love with Talisa, too.

Well, I think that Jeyne Westerling is at something of a disadvantage in this discussion, cuz Robb's romance with her happened completely "off stage" in the books, so we never saw or were told exactly how and why he fell in love with her (unlike Talisa)

One thing I was really hoping for in the show was that they would take the opportunity to show and tell the story of how Robb and Jeyne met and fell in love in detail (it could have been a real storybook romance), but...nope.  Instead, they chopped Jeyne and the details of that storyline out altogether, and gave us Talisa.

But I'm pretty sure Robb didn't marry Jeyne in the books just to "do the right thing," my understanding is that they truly loved each other.

But hey, if you liked the Talisa storyline better, that's cool, that's what this thread is here for, and I think it's great to hear other views.