StannisandDaeny

So when you say someone looks like someone else, you're not talking about their appearance... okay then. I think our ideas on who or what Asha is differ extremely. The current actress does a great job portraying her IMO, smugness, authority and threatening confidence all around. Not the pretty sultry out-of-place looking outlandish girl who is nevertheless a daughter of Balon Greyjoy Oona would have made if cast for Asha. Talking about similar appearances, I had Bronn confused with Roose there for a minute at the beginning of a scene where it was kinda dark, lol. Roose is another character they did really well. It makes no sense to me Jeyne would simply walk straight into the tent and interrupt Robb's council however (this is the second time!). It does make for great foreshadowing for what Roose is going to pull.

I think of her more as 'handsome' than 'pretty' if you get my drift: the way she's described Asha is more about charisma and the way she carries herself rather than 'blindingly pretty girl with big brown eyes-looks' like Jeyne is. I never think of her as ugly but not stunningly beautiful either and I think that's the way she's described. A girl like Jeyne would be a pushover and be turned into a salt wife if she was on the Iron Islands, not to mention looking terribly out of place. Yeah, it totally would have made more sense to simply have a previously unseen black whore dragged out of nowhere instead of the clever way they set up Ros for the job (in case you missed it, she was caught because she was still wearing the necklace Tyrion gave her in episode 1).

Probably. Asha is neither dark-skinned nor very pretty. She doesn't even have long hair. As for Tywin, giving Arya to the Mountain is probably his idea of making sure she stays where she is. Most girls would be too scared to run knowing Gregor would come after them. The Mountain will probably get a rap on the knuckles for letting her escape later and then is when it'll be revealed Tywin knew she was important.

Balon is blinded by his lust for vengeance over the sons he lost because he started his rebellion and completely unreasonable, even Damphair of all people admits it in one of his POVs, nuff said I think. The episode was awesome! Many great dialogues, jokes (Varys is just SOOO good, Dolorous Ed as well) and lots of backstory: Stephen Dillane just nailed it this time around with the tale of the siege of Storm's End and the dialogue was perfect (past portrayals of Stannis were sometimes somewhat lacking, because of the writing mind you, 'cos Dillane does a great job). Karstark was awesome as well, I just love how they really do their best to find the perfect actors for the minor characters as well. My only gripes are that the Halfhand is severely less cool being captured like that and the Starks seem like total idiots now whereas you would have had more sympathy for them if they acted on emotion 'knowing' Bran and Rickon were dead. Jeyne should've also made the move, not Robb, 'cos I still feel it was a Westerling ploy (how did she NOT get pregnant anyway?) rather than pure coincidence. Either way after Episode 7 gave me some worries they're back with force with this episode 8.

Do you see what's wrong with this quote? And yeah, they are, I laughed my ass off at the episode 3 commentary I think it was. Where the kids are singing the intro to the show along especially. I also like the little side-stories like how the elevator jammed and the technical information about how the scenes were shot and came to be and stuff, makes you appreciate the creators more.

Exactly. I often feel their respect for one another grew from there with the 'respect for each other as warriors' as a core basis which they established during that fight. It all boils down to (usually a combination of) 1. People coming to the internet and expecting a good time, then being unable to relieve the tension they wanted to relieve because everything is not completely as they want it to be 2. People taking themselves too seriously 3. People everywhere being too touchy in general. 4. It being more difficult to carry over intonation and irony over the internet. EvaMitchelle got more offended by me than she was supposed to be too most likely because of point 4. 5. No one being as awesomely cool-headed as I am (see what I did there? ^^) Btw, I'm watching Season 1 with commentaries now, and hope they do a commentary on this episode as well, preferably a writer who explains why all the changes were necessary... You do make a lot more sense of it when a guy explains it like that, weird as that may sound.

1. Unless you're a man. Which is why it is also common to compare women to men when insulting him, like people accusing them of having beards. I just don't think people who are mean by default should be used to judge the rest of society as a whole. 2. See above. 3. I don't take anyone's gender for granted over the internet. You're all ambiguous creatures made of walls of texts, screennames and avatars to me. 4. So you approve of people making stuff that offends you. Okay, each to their own. 5. I respect minorities when they address existing problems in society, not when they get offended at everything and anything. While we're discussing something Arya-the-fictional-tv-character said, some woman is being forced to wear a Burkha. 6. I'm actually amused by your existence, to be completely honest.

Hodor.

If you think there's a way to insult someone that's not offensive or wrong in any way, please share it. Basically what you just said was 'cusswords are offensive'. Yes, they are. That's why they're cusswords. In my language the most common insult is actually a word referring to male, so that it's different in English is coincidence more than anything. But no, of course, it has to be sexist! At most, even following your messed up logic, you could say Arya's (who is a girl, no less) comment is 'sexist' (which it's not), which doesn't mean it was the screenwriters' intent to offend anyone, because they're simply writing a character, in which case, in the end you'd be getting offended by a fictional character's fictional opinion, lol ^__^ What exactly are you trying to accomplish by fighting over that? If you think all such stuff should be omitted from everything because you're 'offended' by it you'd be severely limiting character possibilities, characters couldn't even express 'offensive' opinions anymore as a method to show how messed up they are (like the show actually did for Joffry). Seems to me someone has to get a stick out of her- above all. This attitude (shown by many minorities) is little more than an attempt to gain more influence on all kinds of branches of society anyway, while what we should be really focusing on actual important things like unequal wages. Of course, the little unimportant 'offensive' things keep our attention away from those and keep us fighting each other, exactly the thing the people maintaining the actual inequality want.

I agree. At least you gave up on saying the screenwriters were sexist. Well, then again, maybe not. You take offense from Arya's line 'a lot of girls are dumb!' while earlier Asha said 'anything with a cock is easy to fool.' These are just the characters, not stuff screenwriters want to put in there to be mean. Hodor. And now for something completely different: I've managed to make sense of Shae's protection of Sansa. Helping her flip over the mattress and stuff isn't that extreme and reasonably someone who isn't Cersei's spy would help her mistress with something she could get away in, putting a knife to a handmaiden's neck then again of course is. But self-preservation may play a role in this: the handmaiden could also have told Shae was helping Sansa hide it and that wouldn't have been good for Shae. So possibly she's not just acting on Sansa's behalf. That doesn't mean I think it was a good idea all things considered, but it might make more sense to me now. That the Hound was suddenly in the room still doesn't make that much sense to me however.

That's basically what saying Cat is 'just a reminder woman should stay at home' and questioning their intentions comes down to. Then why complain about how you're worried about their intentions a bit earlier? You haven't managed to answer the other inconsistency I addressed in my previous post either. Followed by an entire paragraph of text... lol. Bringing what I said about Cat acting smarter on the show to that horrible line that implies I think she should shut up (while I was focusing on things she did say) is biased as hell and I'm just going to let you go back to reread those parts. This is the second time I literally have to say I don't think she's dumb (which doesn't mean she's perfect or flawless), I hope it'll be enough. Again you keep whining about badass stuff that hasn't been included most likely to shorten the scene. Your opinions on the adaption are your own, bringing it all down to sexism as you were doing at the start of your argument, at least, is not. Your continued repetitions of your gripes with the adaption are not helping to make clear you understand I don't mind what you think of it either, I just felt your comment was very biased in your perception and towards the screenwriters intentions. I literally said I'm not making that point because it would be nonsensical, it was a hypothetic example to illustrate how it didn't make sense for you to say Cat was a sexist stereotype in the show either. Simply finding her less interesting is a whole different thing. Please learn how to read comprehensively.

Bonus points for Maester Luwin's epic 'Noooooo!' though :D I nééd to see a parody of that. Servant: "Maester Luwin, Ros has moved to King's Landing." Luwin: "NOOOO!"

'First things first', there was no 'attack' in my post. Get that idea out of your head. Thanks. Now then, 'Throwing the word sexism around' is virtually the same thing as making the very extreme (and wrong) statement 'showcat is just a reminder that a woman should be at home with her babies'. The final picture is made by all those small changes, so me addressing them one by one (especially since you brought them up) is no more than logical. Then how she could possibly be 'just a reminder that a woman should remain at home with her babies.?' ^__^ I gave different options for it, since I, as opposed to you, don't think I can see inside the minds of the screenwriters. Even following your trail of thought, the logical conclusion would still be they did not find it necessary to repeat the fact Theon is a hostage, not 'they want to make Cat seem unimportant and dumb.' Given your faith in the intelligence of the audience, I'm sure you'll agree they'll be smart enough to put 2 and 2 together and realize Cat saying it is a bad idea entails both not trusting Balon and not trusting Theon. Or that she did not trust Theon, but thought it smarter to question Balon's loyalty to get her point across than doubt Robb's good friend. Or that they want the audience to think for themselves and maybe say 'hmm, maybe Cat wasn't too fond of Theon to begin with...?', look back and watch the episodes again for clues. You see, many possible theories. But no, out of all possible options, it has to be 'we want to make Cat seem dumb an irrelevant.' As for Jaime, some of the audience may be shocked, but I'm pretty sure a lot of them will find him badass because of that scene as well. Sympathy can be gained on different levels, and a lot of people have weird taste. Yes, Cersei and Shae are way nicer in the series (it wasn't very difficult to do however, both of them are still pretty iffy and in Shae's case it doesn't even make much sense). That's what I'm saying. As for unlikeable women, now that I think of it Melisandre is pretty unlikeable in the show compared to the book, and Margaery doesn't appear very nice either, especially not as innocent as she was in the book. Whory and vainglorious, more likely. Of course, you can hardly speak of this in absolutes because opinions will differ on that. Again though, rather than attribute it to 'hurr, woman cannot be unlikeable! They have to fit in a nice little frame!' you could also think positively and attribute this to the show wanting to stress the fact there are no 'wholly evil' or 'wholly good' characters (something GRRM really stresses on, even in interviews), something that is easier to get across in the books through their thoughts and the masses of information you get compared to a little bit of screentime. The character's popularity among fans is obsolete to the screenwriter's intentions which we're discussing. I don't see why you brought that up. From your huge defence of Cat and your assumption I was implying she was dumb I took it you thought I was a Cat-hater. It may not have been very relevant, but I thought I'd point it out I'm not a Cat-hater, on the contrary, while I was at it. Robb tells Cat not to go home in the show. I interpret that as Cat is competent, she doesn't have to go home because she is too freakin' important. That makes her appear much smarter than when she stays of her own will and then fucks up. As in being wrong, the 'Jaime would have died and had no more purpose anyway' argument you can make in the show quickly turns that around. It could be that I just don't remember it, but the scene where Catelyn stands up to Karstark is Show-only as I recall it. Why make up an extra scene like that when you're only trying to put Cat down? Catelyn was simplified, but then not one show character has been as complete as it was in the books, it simply seems to me you're paying more attention to her missing scenes than any others. The basis is still there: she's clearly a strong-willed woman who does give good advice even if she didn't say everything she said in the books and is counted upon, and I'm sure most people (especially those who haven't read the books) will see her that way. If you don't like her in the adaption, that's all up to you, but don't blame it on sexism, because that's just ridiculous. Asoiaf is like the worst series you could ever use to attempt to get a sexist message across, lol. A lot of what you say has nothing to do with the screenwriters anyway, but are simply things that happen in the story regardless and can be brought down to the fact that Westeros just isn't a very nice place for women, or people in general ^__^ I could be here complaining about how Jon Snow is a complete pussy in the show who gets repeatedly owned by Ygritte (as well as everyone else) and bring that down to sexism as well, but since it makes little sense to me I'd rather look for other less nonsensical reasons.

When she's obviously portraying Catelyn as a strong, intelligent woman and not 'the dumb woman stereotype who should be an example women should stay at home', yet it is claimed she's failing at her attempt, I find that to be rather demeaning. Saying her portrayal is a sexist stereotype, is completely ignoring her standing up to Karstark. You don't have to say so explicitly. How being given a great responsibility by her King while he could rely on countless men to do his bidding, yet he finds her the best person for the job is sexist, is beyond me. In the show, they make it seem inevitable that she would have to release Jaime because he was going to get killed and make her decision smart. They make it look like she is doing a good job while Robb is away, not sitting around like a sexist stereotype that would not be able to make a decision without a man by her side rather than make her decision completely emotional, rather than logical. Whether you like this twist or not is up to you, but it's not sexist at all. It shows Cat to be a strong, shrewd woman who is able to make the most of a very difficult situation. The exact wording is irrelevant, the show retains the basic value of the scene: Catelyn warned Robb against doing something she thought to be dumb, he didn't listen, Catelyn was right, Robb was wrong. How is this sexist? It's merely 1. shortening the scene 2. avoiding having to explain the whole Theon being a hostage thing again, something a lot of people who only watch the show might not have understood / remembered / even seen. I'm not talking about the books, I'm talking about that scene where Robb's flirting. She's polite when Jeyne is there and it only makes sense she's smart enough not to make a huge scene to Robb in front of his men, imagine how bad for morale it would be for soldiers to see their King berated by his mummy like a little kid? Cat handled this situation well and again her intelligence shows as opposed to Robb's (it seems to be a recurring theme), you'd be blind not to see it. I agree with you she is not dumb, which is why I didn't say she was dumb. See? It can be that easy. If you want my opinion on book Cat, it would be that while I may not agree with everything she's done, people often forget she just lost her friggin' husband and children and is bound not to be at her best, and often had very little time to make decisions. Capturing Tyrion as a counter-weight to the hostages the Lannisters (virtually) had still seems like a good decision to me. And again people forget how little time she had to react after Tyrion confronted her, and how it thus wasn't her initial plan. But that's for another thread. If I were a sexist screen writer, and I wanted scenes that showed the inferiority of women, I would not have a hulking badass like Brienne in the background who proves the opposite of what I'm trying to prove by her mere presence. So Brienne's presence does matter. She didn't partake in the action when the Hillmen attacked, that's true, but she did fight off the 'You're not supposed to be here' dude, a scene that no doubt created a lot of respect for her which I would have definitely taken out and given solely to the wolf if I were a sexist screenwriter. Making her less controversial is again, not sexist. It's happened to all the characters. Even freakin' Tywin shows moments of humanity. You think it's sexist Brienne takes decisive action rather than Catelyn, showing Brienne can keep a cool head after the horrible thing that happened to her? Err, yeah... well then. Brienne is a woman. How substituting one smart action by a woman by a brave and smart action by another woman is sexist is, again, beyond me. Your huge defense rant of Cat is meaningless, because I haven't said whether I liked or didn't like the character, you were saying 'hurr durr the show writers are sexist'. They should have perhaps chosen another tale than ASOIAF, a series with *a lot* of strong female characters, to write for then.

I was bothered with how they took the wildfire from him as well. Still I'm positive Tyrion will get the credit, I even think they'll make it a tide-changing effort later on in the battle rather than the start and not show the city was about to fall before the reinforcements arrived. The Tyrion's inventions caused would then replace the 'ghost of Renly' which would be somewhat hard to do or explain seeing as we haven't had a good or at least memorable shot of his armour. Although his banner would make for a nice enough substitute... They almost can't get around Tyrion taking over for the Hound, I think (the Hound *has* to leave and Tyrion pretty much *has* to get wounded by a King's Guard), which should establish enough heroism for him by itself. A short dialogue of "Who are these men?" as a motley group of guys run by to defend and Tyrion answering "I've been recruiting mercenaries! Someone has to defend this city!" or so and then the chain along with his sortie would be enough to establish him as the hero of the battle. The other side of me says the Blackwater will be extremely limited and a few short action scenes will be constantly interrupted with long dialogues as it usually goes, lol. Something else I don't like is that Davos is going to lead the ships and thus will likely be the one making the mistake, while actually he is the one guy who was smart enough to prevent that disaster.

That's sexism with a velvet glove right there. You're denying Cat is acting tough and holding her own in the face of Karstark and even making him back down (something 6 men with swords couldn't), managed to broker an agreement with Renly, is still at Robb's side playing an important role despite her losses, bravely telling Stannis and Renly off when they're bickering, taking initiative when she realizes Jaime is going to get killed and Robb isn't around to decide, making her choice smarter than it was in the books because it is a logical decision rather than an emotional one, telling Robb the whole Greyjoy idea was a bad plan rather than just sending Theon (again making her smarter than in the books, because, she was obviously right!) and reminding Robb of his duties when he's flirting with the medic and being irresponsible. She's not just some dumb woman in the show, far from it. To say otherwise is really an insult to the great actress who plays her so strongly. It's funny you should say that she's only there to point out a stereotype while she has Brienne the Badass at her side as the epitome of female badassery (who even bites back when called 'woman' demeaningly, something I don't recall her do in the book either) in almost every scene, lol.

So in the show Joffry is already ruling independently? If he's 16? I remember people made a rather big deal out of this in the book (like Tyrion thinking he'd better get the hell out of there before Joffry's 16), can't remember if it was mentioned in the show.

It'll probably be used as a surprise to viewers as well. Like, the wildfire's innefective, the chain raises and catches ships on it so they can't move, the wildfire becomes effective and Tyrion gets the credit (at least from the audience...).

Under pressure, yes, it makes less sense he would simply decide to admit it by himself to make an argument to defend his honour (I f- my sister, har har, look at me I so honorable) when Cat hasn't even posed the question. There was more trouble with the dialogue, for instance Theon: "After all, it's only just a game!" No, no it's not! In the next scene you're explaining to Luwin how important this whole thing is to you! Brienne: "Threatening my lady is an act of treason!" When did Karstark threaten her? It should've been 'insulting my King is an act of treason' since he was referring to Robb. No, they've done a good job so far but a large part of this episode bugs me, and mostly not for these little things I've mentioned.

Just saw the episode. So far I was happy with the way they were doing things but now it's getting out of hand. It feels like the plot barely moved. I cringed many times at changes and how the episode seemed a big Lannister-charm offensive at times. So far the changes had been okay with me but right now some of them just seem irreversible to me. How is Daeny going to meet Xaro Xoan Daxos again later when he already betrays her like this now? Not, I guess. Okay then. Wasn't the way Jon joined up with the wildlings pivotal to his story? How is he going to win their trust now? Jeez. Jaime admitted he f-d Cersei, what the hell is going on? Cersei is admitting Joffry is a monster, what the hell is going on? Kit Harington has destroyed the image of Jon I had, I'm sorry, I tried to like him but he's a disappointment, although I realize the writers are to blame for this rather than the actor. The Mountain looks ridiculous! Bonus points for a couple of good laughs involving Brienne though: the quote already listed above when Cat says her name, how sternly she took Jaime's remarks, and most of all her conversation with the announcement guy who burst into the tent. When she bit 'man' at him I really lost it. So eh, I won't give up hope 'cos this is only the first episode that made me cringe but I hope the next episode will ring a few more bells rather than fall into irrelevant dialogue that isn't based on anything.