How will they condense FFC and DWD into Season 5? (book spoilers)

[FreeParking]

They really kinda screwed up Brienne by making her a stone cold killer from the outset of her intro in S2. The fact that she waits so long to actually kill a man is a big part of her character, particularly in AFFC once she actually does it. Alas, that ship has sailed.

A Clash of Kings Catelyn (the one with the shadow baby)

"A shadow with a sword, I swear it, I saw. Are you blind, the girl loved him! Help her!" She glanced back (at Brienne fighting two guards who attacked her), saw the second guardsman fall, his blade dropping from limp fingers.

Lots of people seem to have missed this, but Brienne already killed someone in ACOK.

[Arkash]

having the "Watcher on the Wall" episode (which was awesome and heartbreaking) in the middle or maybe at beginning of the season's second half, and by this being able to finish the whole plot about Jon's decision against leaving the NW and him becoming the LC in Season 4. If they had done so, they would have it much easier now and would not have to cut so much.

I agree. The Watchers on the Wall should have been episode 6 or 7.

[alcasinoroyale]

Source Material Left Before Winds of Winter

Major Characters

Jon - 15 Chapters Left in ASOS + ADWD

Cersei - 12 Chapters in AFFC + ADWD

Tyrion - 12 Chapters in ADWD

Daenerys - 8 Chapters Left in ADWD

Jaime - 8 Chapters in AFFC + ADWD

Arya - 5 Chapters in AFFC + ADWD

Samwell - 5 Chapters in AFFC

Barristan - 4 Chapters in ADWD

Brienne - 4 Chapters Left in AFFC

Davos - 4 Chapters Left in ADWD

Theon - 4 Chapters Left in ADWD

Yara - 4 Chapters in AFFC + ADWD

Bran - 1 Chapter Left in ADWD

Melisandre - 1 Chapter in ADWD

Sansa - 1 Chapter Left in AFFC

New Characters Confirmed by HBO

Areo - 2 Chapters in AFFC + ADWD

New Characters that have not been confirmed by HBO

Quentyn - 4 Chapters in ADWD

Victarion - 4 Chapters in AFFC + ADWD

Aeron - 2 Chapters in AFFC

Arianne - 2 Chapters in AFFC

Connington - 2 Chapters in ADWD

Arys - 1 Chapter in AFFC

[RottenAppleFossoway]

A Clash of Kings Catelyn (the one with the shadow baby)

"A shadow with a sword, I swear it, I saw. Are you blind, the girl loved him! Help her!" She glanced back (at Brienne fighting two guards who attacked her), saw the second guardsman fall, his blade dropping from limp fingers.

Lots of people seem to have missed this, but Brienne already killed someone in ACOK.

Brienne herself confirms that she's killed no one until the incident at Crackclaw point where she kills the bloody mummers in the ruin the Whispers.

She disabled Renly's guard. It was actually Loras that killed them if I recall correctly.

[Christi84]

Newbie here!

I agree that Jon Snow's arc on the show shouldve ended with the election. It should be interesting how they will try to use two books that arent chronologically one after the other and try to condense them. I just hope they dont drown it with certain characters versus another.

Ive just started reading ADWD so Im not sure what role Dorne has in it, but in reading AFFC I didnt get as much as i thought i would other than the plot about Myrcella. At this point Im not fully understanding them playing a major part in the season if only to have a bit of contuation from what just happened and the Sand Snakes reactions...but they didnt go do anything so Im confused.

I feel like whats in this season may prepare us for what will come with the final book whenever GRRM gets it out.

[FalseKnight]

Brienne herself confirms that she's killed no one until the incident at Crackclaw point where she kills the bloody mummers in the ruin the Whispers.

She disabled Renly's guard. It was actually Loras that killed them if I recall correctly.

Brienne would be a rather unreliable narrator. She and Cat didn't stick around to confirm the kill. IIRC Loras killed the other living guardsmen.

[FreeParking]

Brienne would be a rather unreliable narrator. She and Cat didn't stick around to confirm the kill. IIRC Loras killed the other living guardsmen.

Correct. Summary of what happened: Renly killed, Brienne attacked by knight and two guards, Brienne cuts off one guard's hand he retreats, Cat convinces other knight who hasn't joined in to not attack her, then we have the bit I quoted, watching knight agrees with Cat and says he will try to hold off anyone coming into the tent for a little while, Cat knocks something into the knight, Cat and Brienne escape, later on we here Loras went berserk and killed some guys.

Newbie here!

I agree that Jon Snow's arc on the show shouldve ended with the election. It should be interesting how they will try to use two books that arent chronologically one after the other and try to condense them. I just hope they dont drown it with certain characters versus another.

Ive just started reading ADWD so Im not sure what role Dorne has in it, but in reading AFFC I didnt get as much as i thought i would other than the plot about Myrcella. At this point Im not fully understanding them playing a major part in the season if only to have a bit of contuation from what just happened and the Sand Snakes reactions...but they didnt go do anything so Im confused.

I feel like whats in this season may prepare us for what will come with the final book whenever GRRM gets it out.

The Ironborn and Dorne plots in AFFC and ADWD are both just setup for the most part. Getting pieces into place.

[EddardsHead]

To condense the IB story arc I could see them replacing Euron with Balon, as he is still alive in the show, and having Balon send Victarion to Meereen. Unless they cut Victarion too but his character seems to be serving a purpose with the dragon horn. This would allow them to cut the kingsmoot, and most likely Damphair.

As for Aegon, there is absolutely no chance this character is cut, he is far too important for the story. Like somebody had previously mentioned it doesn't make a lick of sense to reveal your major plot twist months in advance.

Over to Dorne, cutting Arianne makes no sense at all. She is clearly going to serve a purpose in the future novels (Possible marriage to Aegon). Trystane can certainly accomplish Quentyn's arc, but then there is also the betrothal to Myrcella, so I am curious as to how D&D will play this one.

Bran's story is currently finished through aDwD so his character will be on hiatus in S5, which is really the only option.

I personally think they should make the next two novels into two seasons, not one. This will also stretch the show long enough for at least the next novel to come out.

[FreeParking]

To condense the IB story arc I could see them replacing Euron with Balon, as he is still alive in the show, and having Balon send Victarion to Meereen. Unless they cut Victarion too but his character seems to be serving a purpose with the dragon horn. This would allow them to cut the kingsmoot, and most likely Damphair.

As for Aegon, there is absolutely no chance this character is cut, he is far too important for the story. Like somebody had previously mentioned it doesn't make a lick of sense to reveal your major plot twist months in advance.

Over to Dorne, cutting Arianne makes no sense at all. She is clearly going to serve a purpose in the future novels (Possible marriage to Aegon). Trystane can certainly accomplish Quentyn's arc, but then there is also the betrothal to Myrcella, so I am curious as to how D&D will play this one.

Bran's story is currently finished through aDwD so his character will be on hiatus in S5, which is really the only option.

I personally think they should make the next two novels into two seasons, not one. This will also stretch the show long enough for at least the next novel to come out.

We had the leeches, so I imagine Balon will die (if he didn't already die off screen). I expect we will get Euron, though who knows if we will see him this season of next. Victorion is out. Dany has her ships, and the horn most likely came from the Warlock ship Euron took. If the horn is needed, the Warlocks (who are established in the show) can get it to her. Unless Aeron does something important later, he is likely cut. Basically what happened with the IB in AFFC/ADWD is Euron declares himself king after Balon died, a kingsmoot is called, Euron remains king, Yara goes to Deepwood Motte, IB attack the Reach's version of Crackclaw Point, Vic goes to Dany, Yara is captured by Stannis. It is a lot of wheel spinning that can be cut.

Cutting Aegon depends on if they need to cut the second dance with dragons. Making it work would most likely be there biggest challenge yet. This ties into Arianne. If her purpose is to marry Aegon and Aegon is cut, then her use is gone. Quentyn's most important contribution in the story has been to open a door. Thankfully Meereen is filled with people who have hands. Unless Dany pulled a Locke on them all. As for potentially turning Dorne against Dany, I am not even sure why they seem pro-Targaryen anyway after what Aerys and Rhaeghar did. Nothing has come of the betrothal to Myrcella yet in the books and I doubt anything ever will. We will have a little Trystane and Myrcella romance subplot to look forward to. sigh

Bran has a chapter left from ADWD. I don't expect we will see him much though. We will see him in season five though. Probably not Hodor and Meera though.

They are doing this in seven seasons. They can't stretch it out. And the show will past the books. I suggest you come to terms with that.

[larastone]

I just hope a tyrell dies in season 5

[FreeParking]

I just hope a tyrell dies in season 5

Dayum! Not a fan of the Tyrells?

[Kyrion]

Really is aggravating that out of the AFFC and ADWD new POV's, the only one being in the show is Areo Hotah. By far the most useless of any of them.....but unfortunately that makes him perfect for the show which wants to focus on the POV's from the first 3 books only.

[zaphodbrx]

Really is aggravating that out of the AFFC and ADWD new POV's, the only one being in the show is Areo Hotah. By far the most useless of any of them.....but unfortunately that makes him perfect for the show which wants to focus on the POV's from the first 3 books only.

Don't keep your hopes up for Areo to be like the books either. He is probably going to be D & D's fanfiction character similar to show!Xaro in season 2 , and indeed the same goes for "Trystane" ( a weird combination of Arianne, Quentyn and Aegon according to popular theories ) , Myrcella and the rest of the Sand Snakes.

[EddardsHead]

Bran has a chapter left from ADWD. I don't expect we will see him much though. We will see him in season five though. Probably not Hodor and Meera though.

They are doing this in seven seasons. They can't stretch it out. And the show will past the books. I suggest you come to terms with that.

I wasn't aware they were only doing seven seasons, and yes sadly the show will pass the books which i find absolutely foolish but oh well. As for Bran it was already confirmed last week his character will have a hiatus http://guardianlv.com/2014/09/game-of-thrones-season-5-will-have-no-bran-and-hodor/

[Game of Thrones Reference]

Really is aggravating that out of the AFFC and ADWD new POV's, the only one being in the show is Areo Hotah. By far the most useless of any of them.....but unfortunately that makes him perfect for the show which wants to focus on the POV's from the first 3 books only.

Wasn't that the reason why AFFC and ADWD wasn't as well received as the first three books? Because GRRM chose to focus on new characters rather than previously established characters?

[Janicia]

To condense the IB story arc I could see them replacing Euron with Balon, as he is still alive in the show, and having Balon send Victarion to Meereen. Unless they cut Victarion too but his character seems to be serving a purpose with the dragon horn. This would allow them to cut the kingsmoot, and most likely Damphair.

As for Aegon, there is absolutely no chance this character is cut, he is far too important for the story. Like somebody had previously mentioned it doesn't make a lick of sense to reveal your major plot twist months in advance.

Over to Dorne, cutting Arianne makes no sense at all. She is clearly going to serve a purpose in the future novels (Possible marriage to Aegon). Trystane can certainly accomplish Quentyn's arc, but then there is also the betrothal to Myrcella, so I am curious as to how D&D will play this one.

Bran's story is currently finished through aDwD so his character will be on hiatus in S5, which is really the only option.

I personally think they should make the next two novels into two seasons, not one. This will also stretch the show long enough for at least the next novel to come out.

Bran has given several interviews in which he indicated that he would be in season 5.

The big problems with making two seasons out of the next two books is that there aren't good season end stopping points in the middle of their arcs and too many of the characters are basically in stasis isolated from the rest of the plot. Arya's story would be fine across two seasons with exciting training stuff, but she hasn't yet impacted the larger plot of the show. If Arya had died in season 1, the only characters impacted in the show would be Sandor (probably escaped to Essos), Gendry (dead), Hot Pie (dead), and Brienne (wandering around); and Melissandre would have had to find a different bastard. Eventually Arya needs to matter in the story.

They could have drawn out Sansa's adventures in the Vale, but that stuff is pretty slow moving and low stakes. Sansa is growing up, but she's really in stasis. Spreading Sansa and Littlefinger' awkward co-parenting of Robin across three seasons (4-6) would be boring.

Bran could have had a longer journey to get to the cave, but hungry people trudging through snow is hard to make into good TV. And then once he's in the cave, Bran would have training / flashback sequences for two seasons during which he did nothing about the white walkers and his whole impact on current events was to whisper "Theon"? This sounds .... not awesome...

Arcs like Cersei's, Dany's and Jon's have enough material for two seasons, but it would ruin the arc to pause in the middle for a season break. They're all getting a chance to govern and we see them struggle for a while and then they have their downfall. The whole thing builds up narrative tension and then things fall apart for them. Splitting those stories across two seasons would mean that season 5 had a lot of frustrating plots that don't get anywhere.

And Stannis would just be marching around in the snow for most of season 5 without accomplishing much. And Brienne wandering without meeting anybody of note. And Tyrion would just be traveling without getting anywhere we care about.

Season 6 could be pretty awesome if books 4-5 were split across seasons 5-6, but season 5 would feel frustrating, boring, and poorly paced as none of the characters manage to achieve anything, nothing gets resolved, and most of the characters seem to just wander/sit around in isolation. And season 6 would suffer from character isolation fatigue - people would wonder "why should I care about Dany - she's just in Mereen again this season" and "I already saw Arya in assassin training for a whole season, why am I seeing this again?".

GRRM didn't write two arcs for each of the characters in those two books. He wrote one arc. So while there is a ton of material, the arcs themselves don't lend themselves to two seasons. It is far better for the show to cut what it has to in order to largely preserve the most important character arcs. Trying to get two seasons out of one character arc led to some of the frustrations of season 4 - weird pacing at the Wall; spending so much of the Season 4 Kings Landing arc in Tyrion's cell; invented material to give characters something to do that didn't fully work.

[larastone]

Dayum! Not a fan of the Tyrells?

easily my least favorite family

[Seneti]

Season 6 could be pretty awesome if books 4-5 were split across seasons 5-6, but season 5 would feel frustrating, boring, and poorly paced as none of the characters manage to achieve anything, nothing gets resolved, and most of the characters seem to just wander/sit around in isolation. And season 6 would suffer from character isolation fatigue - people would wonder "why should I care about Dany - she's just in Mereen again this season" and "I already saw Arya in assassin training for a whole season, why am I seeing this again?".

GRRM didn't write two arcs for each of the characters in those two books. He wrote one arc. So while there is a ton of material, the arcs themselves don't lend themselves to two seasons. It is far better for the show to cut what it has to in order to largely preserve the most important character arcs. Trying to get two seasons out of one character arc led to some of the frustrations of season 4 - weird pacing at the Wall; spending so much of the Season 4 Kings Landing arc in Tyrion's cell; invented material to give characters something to do that didn't fully work.

This is the most well-worded, to-the-point, easy-to-understand explanation as to why two seasons for AFFC and ADWD would be a disaster. Thank you. Couldn't have put it better myself.

For my part, I'm looking forward to a fat-free season 5 and a very packed and exciting season 6 and 7.

[The Sand Snakes]

They could cut 75% of Daenerys, 90% of the Greyjoys. They need to have Arianna Martell, Victerion Greyjoy, Aegon and Jon Connington. Even if they play a significantly less role they still need to be there. Cut Quentin he sucks. Brans and Sansa don't have many scenes left. Arya can be easily condensed as well.

[JonSnowed]

While Bran and Sansa may not have many scenes left from the books I can only see that meaning we will see some of their early Winds story lines next season.