[Book Spoilers] An Analysis of Why the Sand Snakes' Introduction Fell Short

[Red Tiger]

One of a kind woot about the other 3? Maybe she was newly recruited into the same sister look alike brigade of the family of scorpions, children eaters, who haven't got any armies, because they foxfour girlpower it quite supernaturally considering where Oberyn liked to sleep.

My description is valid a general comparison into the final product shown not what she doesn't look like on the show.

Whatever making you disagree.

I wanted to see Dorne in exotic beauty which distinguished the Targaryens to intermingle outside of tradition within splendour. I had imagined Aladdin princesses diversely different from each other, corny I know. Not miss scary scarier scariest with the rest of her sisterhood looking like carbon copies of one another.

I take it English is not your first language?

[Weeping Sore]

Not only I have huge problem with TV sand snakes, I hate the TV sparrow too, do they have to portray them as a group of thugs? Is that because this is the only way TV showrunners nowadays knows to portray religious fanatics? The novel sparrows are much more complicated and much more convincing

The rise of the sparrows should have been a slow boil of escalating incidents over a few episodes, but the rush to advance the of Cersei v. Marg plot made it too sudden and clunky. I do really love Jonathan Pryce as the High Sparrow, though.

[TheHeirToDorne]

- We know Nym and Obara are supposed to go in KL in Winds, and I have an immense feeling that the Sand Snakes and not Arianne were introduced because they are going to become relevant to the chaos in King's Landing that is one of the show's central point since day one (opposite to whatever Arianne and Aegon end doing).

Trying to divine what happens in Winds based on GOT is useless. With such huge divergences already on display how can we assume that anything from the show is done with the future of the books in mind? I don't think GRRM has given them as much guidance on the endgame as we might think. They may get the broad strokes, but court intricacies of Nym in KL? I doubt somehow that D&D have really sought counsel on that.

Then why bother casting them if they do not become somehow relevant ?

To fill the badass quota. Their motivation for the show isn't about plot intrigue, it's about surface level badass characters, hamfisted motivations, and spectacle. As they have made the show less and less reliant on the books, it's become more clear. A perfect one to one example is Blackwater vs. The Watchers on the Wall.

I'm looking at it right now, and it is most definitely NOT an oblique/Dutch angle. The camera isn't tilted in the slightest. Maybe Nym is blocking Obara, but I don't think so.

Anyway, I just noticed how little the picnic blanket is. Like, what is this, a picnic for ANTS?

This is definitely a continuity error, probably they liked the nod from Nym from a different blocking and thought they could get away with it. But if it were an oblique angle that cut out Obara then it would cut Ellaria too, but she appears on the edge of frame. Also they would have to be cheated pretty significantly towards camera for both faces to show in such an oblique angle.

The other terrible thing about this scene are the costumes and styling. Tyene and Nym are wearing almost exactly the same thing and the muted color palette mixed with the weather gives the whole scene a pallor. It's visually uninteresting. Not to mention that dressing to characters the same gives them no character differentiation, and Obara's nipples (although accidental) is such a perfect middle finger to the books, you have to laugh.

[Bronn Urgandy]

When I was a boy, my father took me to see the over-hyped Sand Snake scene. I did not know thees man, yet he inseested I learn how to do a horreeble "Latin" accent while making a drama school speech in Aladdin curly-toe shoes.

My mother cried and said, "Fast forward! Fast forward!" I looked at my mother's tears and at the remote...

I fast forwarded that sheet because God eet was awful.

I made my decision long ago. Only good scenes with good actors.

Okay, at least this post came out of that scene

[Red Tiger]

When I was a boy, my father took me to see the over-hyped Sand Snake scene. I did not know thees man, yet he inseested I learn how to do a horreeble "Latin" accent while making a drama school speech in Aladdin curly-toe shoes.

My mother cried and said, "Fast forward! Fast forward!" I looked at my mother's tears and at the remote...

I fast forwarded that sheet because God eet was awful.

I made my decision long ago. Only good scenes with good actors.

Thank you for giving me my new sig, brother.

[Weeping Sore]

I just realized: the curly shoes are, in fact, Dorne-shaped.

[Primalsplit]

These dornish aree creaaaaaazzzy

[Good Guy Garlan]

I just realized: the curly shoes are, in fact, Dorne-shaped.

Don't you mean Loras' birthmark-shaped?

[robasp2]

One question..

Did GRRM ever comment about how he does or does not like the deviations the show is taking?

Especially about sand snakes or Dorne?

I hear he is angry and disabled show discussion on his blog.

[Red Tiger]

He didn't like them eliminating Willas and Garlan, other than that *shrugs*.

[robasp2]

Anyone looked at the GOT Facebook page? There are a LOT of angry comments about this scene.

No one in HBO cares actually. I have noted on several occasions that the content they put there is horrible.

"What is the secret of the feather sansa found the crypts" the title would read.

You ll expect to find some reveal from the books or some detail. Instead you will find a one liner not even related to the title.

The posts are made by some crackhead. So I do not expect D&D, producers, directors or anyone of importance to read the comments or take any feedback.

[marsyao]

One question..

Did GRRM ever comment about how he does or does not like the deviations the show is taking?

One hint, GRRM on longer writing any episodes for the show

[ummester]

Nice OP, with a good breakdown of why this scene is substandard for GoTs.

I re-watched the scene from the provided link and there is some weird ass nipple area digital smudging at play, like someone decided they didn't like Obara's armor in post.

I agree that if some of the cut material was included, the whole thing may have played a lot less B grade.

I think that the show (producers/D&D ?) are expecting the audience to immediately sympathize with the Ellaria and Sand Snakes position because Obyren was a popular character who died. I wonder if it would be easy to sympathize with show Ellaria having never read book Ellaria?

Perhaps this whole thing would have played better closer to the books - with the Sand Snakes being introduced and telling Doran that revenge is needed in Episode 502, whilst Ellaria was opposed and, in episode 504, Ellaria was the one who 'came around' to the Sand Snakes way of thinking.

I'm sure with this season it's not that the overall story telling is bad (Sand Snake introduction aside), it's just that the narrative flow is kind of haphazard and jumping around way too much. But then the narrative flow of Feast and Dragons was inferior to the other books, so one must wonder where the real issues with the final story telling problems begin. This season could break the show and we may never see the ending in either TV or written format - this is a real possibility.

[ServantOnIce]

Tertiary characters that Dave and Dan are trying to make interesting for a TV audience. We shall see if it works this season.

[Mindwalker]

I think that the show (producers/D&D ?) are expecting the audience to immediately sympathize with the Ellaria and Sand Snakes position because Obyren was a popular character who died. I wonder if it would be easy to sympathize with show Ellaria having never read book Ellaria?

In my case, no.

[ValrianSunni]

This isn't really personality...it's superficial appearance based stuff. As with all the Sandsnakes in the books. Lady Nym's the hot one, Tyene the innocent-looking one, and Obara the manly ugly one. That's really the extent of their characterization/personality.

Not to be totally sexist, but In the books it's clear to me that they're ALL hot. but yes, Lady Nym is Maxim hot, Tyene is innocent hot and Obara is cross dressing hot.

[ValrianSunni]

]One question..

Did GRRM ever comment about how he does or does not like the deviations the show is taking?

Especially about sand snakes or Dorne?

I hear he is angry and disabled show discussion on his blog.

[Pashernate Reader]

I guess I missed this the first time around, but I just re-watched the episode and did they digitally blur the nipples on Obara's armor???? In the pre-season production stills we saw of her armor, there were two hard pointy nips gracing her breast plate. Did Kraznys mo Nakloz cut them off? :drunk:

From what I understand, the costume designer claims the pointy nips were some sort of 'molding accident,' and somewhere along the line (apparently after these pictures were circulated and fans flipped out) they were filed down. I don't know. They look pretty intentional to me, but whatever.

[Pashernate Reader]

By the way, I just wanted to add that these gifs are more awesome than that entire episode.

[DemiNymph]

In general, we all like the assasin warrior maiden character types and they seldom get a lot of hate throughout genres or different stories. Nobody hates the female warrior characters, right? It's mostly the helpless whiny girls that get the hate. So the sand snakes have already got half the battle won before anyone's seen anything.

What a disappointment thou. The scene made them so uncool. The acting, the dialogue, how the scene played reminds me so much of all the low budget rubbish fantasy movies in the late 80s to 90s. Conan the barbarian, Red Sonja, anyone?

They are not even half as good as Xena the warrior princess and that show came 20 years ago! In case anyone thinks it's an unfair comparison in regards to the screentime, Xena did not have the privillege of being a main character. She started from being a villian character in one of the Hercules episodes and she was so good that they created a series out of it. But whether they have just 1 min or 5 mins to play with, just some talent can make the character shine. If the show can't do that then it's absolutely the producers' and directors' fault.