Animated adaption of ASOIAF almost happened

[aFeastForDragons]

I saw this on George's blog, very last comment:

http://grrm.livejournal.com/411570.html#comments

George, just out of curiosity: have you ever been approached by anyone about an animated adaption of ASOIAF? Like a cartoon, anime, etc?

Yes. Often. In fact, one of the proposed feature deals I turned down before HBO was from a major animator. Odd thing is, I might have accepted that offer... I was on the fence... until an exec I was supposed to meet failed to turn up for a lunch we had scheduled to discuss their approach. I did get an apology, later... but being stood up pushed me off the fence back into "No" land. And boy, am I glad of that. Maybe things do happen for a reason.

Crazy!!

[mrjakmanuk]

I actually think it would have been better as it means budget isn't as big as an issue. Like Lord of the Rings animated, they are able to do battles with a limited budget using different techniques

[Darryk]

Thank god that executive missed the lunch. The thought of an animated ASOIF makes me cringe.

[Kikajon]

Mee too. I would never look an animated rendition of the story.

[aFeastForDragons]

I would love to see animated versions of big fantasy stories like The Dark Tower or Wheel of Time but animated ASOIAF would have been a terrible move.

[Ab3nd]

As much as I would love to see it translated to animation now; I think it would have been a disaster. Cheaper to make; and maybe the places and characters would be more accurately depicted; but much less expresive and human. Animated faces have nowhere the same range of emotion,; even if you use anime trciks to enhace it is still nowhere as beliavable as acting. Plus, animation is generally disregarded as entertaiment for children, it wouldn't have gotten nearly the same amount of audience; and lots of people like me would have gotten around the book.

[Prince Lou of House Reed]

What? It could have been great and been able to give visuals to amazing things like the house of the undying. Shit just pictures of the books gets me hyped!

[JonCon's Red Beard]

I think an animated adaptation would have been quite groundbreaking, considering the subjects GoT deals with.

There is currently a project by a French/Japanese animation house, The Two Queens, which also deals with mature subjects like murder and sex.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wpop92BuDLY

http://www.the2queens.com/

[The Onion Sleight]

I think it would have been quite awesome, IF done right!

I think an animated adaptation would have been quite groundbreaking, considering the subjects GoT deals with.

There is currently a project by a French/Japanese animation house, The Two Queens, which also deals with mature subjects like murder and sex.

http://www.the2queens.com/

Wow! Now, that looks pretty awesome! Thanks for the links!

That's exactly the kind of style I'd love to see an ASOIAF series with.

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

I think an animated adaptation would have been quite groundbreaking, considering the subjects GoT deals with.

There is currently a project by a French/Japanese animation house, The Two Queens, which also deals with mature subjects like murder and sex.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wpop92BuDLY

http://www.the2queens.com/

Actually, animation has been dealing with mature subjects for some time now. I still remember the reaction of the audience after watching "Waltz with Bashir": everyone leaving the projection room in half-stunned silence. No murmur. No chatter. Not a word spoken for several seconds by anyone. And I also can't recall a single live action film inducing the same kind of reaction.

An animated GOT could help slay that unfortunate myth that "animation is for kids" (just like comic books are for kids, aren't they? "Maus", "Sandman", Alan Moore's works, etc.). But more through marketing the thing heavily in the North American market, than by doing something actually new.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Actually, animation has been dealing with mature subjects for some time now. I still remember the reaction of the audience after watching "Waltz with Bashir": everyone leaving the projection room in half-stunned silence. No murmur. No chatter. Not a word spoken for several seconds by anyone. And I also can't recall a single live action film inducing the same kind of reaction.

An animated GOT could help slay that unfortunate myth that "animation is for kids" (just like comic books are for kids, aren't they? "Maus", "Sandman", Alan Moore's works, etc.). But more through marketing the thing heavily in the North American market, than by doing something actually new.

But that's a movie. Also, many anime has also doing the same. Groundbreaking for western audiences and HBO, I mean.

[Rex999]

Had that happened I don't think game of thrones would have ever become as popular as it is today

and It would have had a much smaller audience ( since we know that lot of people will never take animation seriously)

plus an animated ASOIAF would probably be on a cable channel like adult swim and not HBO

[Rufus Lupus]

I think ASOIAF animated in the style of Takashi Okazaki (did the animated segment in Kill Bill 1) would be pretty awesome.

To those who say animation doesn't portray emotion well, watch Barefoot Gen and youj might change your mind. In some ways animation can draw even more emotion from an audience.

[Masha]

Thank you HBO for making real-life version of Game of Thrones!

It would have been complete and utter disaster, if animated version happened.

Unless the company's is big company with strong animation background - ala Pixar, Disney, DreamWorks, Studio MIR, big Japanese anime creative companies, it can become a horror-show.

And producers/directors need to know what the heck they are doing

You want to see an example of long-awaited animated adaptation, see no further than Dragonlance. I used to love this book when I was in Junior High, so when the animated adaption came out in 2008, I grabbed it to watch it. By that time, we had high production Disney, Pixar, DreamWorks, Avatar releases, not counting tremendous amount of high-quality anime, heck even MArvel and DC animated movies were out. And I watched it.....

Lets just say, I regretted it deeply! the quality was so low, it wouldn't even be shown on television studio. It looked like an early 80s cartoon, it was bad, it was really really bad.... I couldn't even finish watching beyond first 10 min.

Lesson learned. DO NOT DO animated adaptions unless there is a well-known producer and a known quality studio involved. American adaptions, other than DC, are not good. Japanese only do good adaptions of comics/manga/young adults/children novels, the only one who could do it well was Hayao Miyazaki, and even he takes HUGE liberties with original material. Even his son, Godo, changed EarthSea so drastically that LeGuin still haven't forgiven Studio Ghibli in that bait and switch.

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

Thank you HBO for making real-life version of Game of Thrones!

It would have been complete and utter disaster, if animated version happened.

Unless the company's is big company with strong animation background - ala Pixar, Disney, DreamWorks, Studio MIR, big Japanese anime creative companies, it can become a horror-show.

And producers/directors need to know what the heck they are doing

You want to see an example of long-awaited animated adaptation, see no further than Dragonlance. I used to love this book when I was in Junior High, so when the animated adaption came out in 2008, I grabbed it to watch it. By that time, we had high production Disney, Pixar, DreamWorks, Avatar releases, not counting tremendous amount of high-quality anime, heck even MArvel and DC animated movies were out. And I watched it.....

Lets just say, I regretted it deeply! the quality was so low, it wouldn't even be shown on television studio. It looked like an early 80s cartoon, it was bad, it was really really bad.... I couldn't even finish watching beyond first 10 min.

On the other hand, from the look of things, you have never seen a crappy live action adaptation and or TV show. How I envy you is hard to express.

[CyanidePie]

I would only want to see it if it was video-game CGI STYLE.

[ServantOnIce]

Better as an animation. Ever watch, "Bleach" or "Fist of the North Star?" The things you can do in 2-D animation can accurately match the mind of GRRM.

[Darryk]

There are certain stories to which the medium of animation is better suited, just not ASOIF. The emphasis is on human drama, you need real actors to portray that.

Definitely not saying animation is only for kiddies; there are plenty of examples that show otherwise, such as Waltz of Bashir which someone mentioned. But it's just not suited to a story like this; the life that the real-life actors have given to the story could not have been emulated by animation.

[protar]

There are certain stories to which the medium of animation is better suited, just not ASOIF. The emphasis is on human drama, you need real actors to portray that.

Definitely not saying animation is only for kiddies; there are plenty of examples that show otherwise, such as Waltz of Bashir which someone mentioned. But it's just not suited to a story like this; the life that the real-life actors have given to the story could not have been emulated by animation.

Human drama can still be portrayed through animation. An animated ASOIAF would have been amazing, and it would have solved many of the budget/CGI related problems that the show suffers from. I'd still like to see that one day. But it wouldn't have had mainstream appeal. An animated series filled with sex and gore - that's just too hard of a sell for western audiences. We're getting to a place where that could actually be a viable possibility as stuff like Attack on Titan becomes more popular. But we're not there yet.

[tyrell19]

I'm not usually a cg fan but I'd love to see one with the animation of the Beowulf film, just brighter colours :P. Tbh I just want to see the Vale in all its glory. I enjoyed HBO's take on the Eyrie, but that region is just so spectacular in the books!!!