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[Book Spoilers] EP510 Discussion


Ran
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I can't speak for whatever this show has become, but ASOIAF is certainly a character-driven story, even if the story is an epic tale. When GRRM originally pitched the series he even specified that five characters would not die - Jon Snow, Daenerys Targaryen, Tyrion Lannister, Bran Stark, and Arya Stark (presumably he meant that they will all survive until the endgame, not "they will all live until the series is complete"; and I would also assume that Sansa got promoted to this level at some point). That may very well have changed, but the structure of the series suggests that the survival of those characters is important.

Hi Pat, what's your source on this?

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Hi Pat, what's your source on this?

I'm not Pat, but it's Martin's original synopsis of the series.

http://winteriscoming.net/2015/02/05/george-rr-martin-original-game-of-thrones-pitch/

It also makes clear that Viserys was "the mummer's dragon," or the "Targaryen pretender," as he put it in the synopsis, and not this (f)Aegon nonsense that was tacked on later for no good reason.

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Hi Pat, what's your source on this?

Here's an article on the story. The relevant source is in the first paragraph on the second page of the letter.

Preach it brother. We've lost the middle.

We've gone from Gary Cooper/Tom Cruise never get killled to the way to get props is fucking kill people at random to generate buzz for the hell of it, whether it make sense or not.

Exactly. I generally like how Martin handles character deaths - with realism, but without gratuitously killing protagonists.

I'm not Pat, but it's Martin's original synopsis of the series.

http://winteriscoming.net/2015/02/05/george-rr-martin-original-game-of-thrones-pitch/

It also makes clear that Viserys was "the mummer's dragon," or the "Targaryen pretender," as he put it in the synopsis, and not this (f)Aegon nonsense that was tacked on later for no good reason.

That is not suggested in the slightest... I don't know where you got that from. His legitimacy is not called into question and he is still killed by Khal Drogo.

Aegon has been in play since he wrote A Clash of Kings, according to Elio (Ran). But there is plenty of foreshadowing even in AGoT. His role has always been extremely different from that of Viserys, in that he is supposed to complicate Dany's invasion.

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That is not suggested in the slightest... I don't know where you got that from. His legitimacy is not called into question and he is still killed by Khal Drogo.

Aegon has been in play since he wrote A Clash of Kings, according to Elio (Ran). But there is plenty of foreshadowing even in AGoT. His role has always been extremely different from that of Viserys, in that he is supposed to complicate Dany's invasion.

I'm trolling just a little bit. I believe that a false Targ was in the cards since ACOK, but I believe this false Targ morphed from "minor speedbump for Dany" to "V&I's Plan A all along" much later.

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I'm trolling just a little bit. I believe that a false Targ was in the cards since ACOK, but I believe this false Targ morphed from "minor speedbump for Dany" to "V&I's Plan A all along" much later.

Ah ok, sorry. I definitely disagree with that assessment, though. Varys and Illyrio seem like they were created because of Aegon rather than the other way around.

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Someone asked me today why I bother watching the show if I think it's so bad. Well, the show brought me to the books. I watched S1E1 at my girlfriend's insistence and fell in love with the thing. I watched the whole of season 1 that day and borrowed a copy of AGoT, to see what they were like. I read about a third of it during the night and the next day I went and bought books 1-5. So I'm eternally grateful to the show for bringing me to the books. And I genuinely thought that it was some of the best stuff on TV. I watched seasons 2 and 3, and although they had flaws, I thought that they were still pretty great. Season 4 was when I thought things started going wobbly. But I still enjoyed it and afterwards I looked to season 5 with anticipation. I was looking forward to some of the changes that they would make. But this season has been poor. It left in stuff that should have been cut, it removed stuff that should have been left in. The writing got sloppy and, at times, bad. The leaps of logic required to justify certain narratives became too much. The failures in continuity happened more and more often. Even the acting took a hit this year. But I've never been a hate watcher. I watch each episode hoping for it to be the great show that it once was. Every episode this year I hoped against the increasingly unlikely outcome that the episode would be great, or even good.

I want this show to be great. And that means criticising it when it makes mistakes. And this year there were plenty.

i feel pretty much the same
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I'm trolling just a little bit. I believe that a false Targ was in the cards since ACOK, but I believe this false Targ morphed from "minor speedbump for Dany" to "V&I's Plan A all along" much later.

, Doran's original "plan" [cough, cough] feels like a retcon, and not a very good one at that. The guy who Tywin Lannister considers a worthy foe, and his plan was sit around until Visery's grew up? Huh? So, I kind of feel something here with Dorne/Aegon is off track somehow.

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I just checked the GoT wiki, and it says that Lancel entered a sexual relationship with Cersei following Robert's death. Is this incorrect, or did the writers (once again) forget what has actually been established?

Its ambigious. I don't think we see Lancel and Cersei on screen together in a bedroom until after Robert's death. But some of the scenes between Lancel and Tyrion at least imply he was sleeping with her before Robert's death.

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Ah ok, sorry. I definitely disagree with that assessment, though. Varys and Illyrio seem like they were created because of Aegon rather than the other way around.

Yeah, it doesn't seem that way to me, at all, but that's cool. We know from the synopsis letter that Martin doesn't outline, and that while he knows in general where he wants the story to go, he gets bored if he tries to plan out all the details. And to be clear, I don't have any problem with this: His seat-of-the-pants plotting is in another league from most fantasy authors. I just think he stumbled with Aegon and it doesn't...quite...fit. If he can successfully use it to tie together Essos and Westeros and get the story back on track, no harm no foul.

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aGoT is already the story changed as we know it now. So, I'm sure, even if he's not very much included there, that Aegon was already created.

Didn't he had one of the books already planned to be name "Dance"? You need two for tango.

A Dance with Dragons was going to be the second book back when it was a trilogy, iirc. It was set to begin after the Red Wedding I think
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aGoT is already the story changed as we know it now. So, I'm sure, even if he's not very much included there, that Aegon was already created.

Didn't he had one of the books already planned to be name "Dance"? You need two for tango.

Read the synopsis. What you think of as the "Dance" is not what he was originally thinking. All that Blackfyre stuff was created later when he started writing the Dunk & Egg stories. Originally, A Dance with Dragons (the second book in the trilogy) was to cover the Dany/Dothraki invasion of Westeros.

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A Dance with Dragons was going to be the second book back when it was a trilogy, iirc. It was set to begin after the Red Wedding I think

See? Well, at some point, a Dragon was meant to appear. The "they all died but this one kid who might or might not be real" is probably the oldest trope of the bag. Anastasia comes to mind.

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Read the synopsis. What you think of as the "Dance" is not what he was originally thinking. All that Blackfyre stuff was created later when he started writing the Dunk & Egg stories. Originally, A Dance with Dragons (the second book in the trilogy) was to cover the Dany/Dothraki invasion of Westeros.

TBF, we don't know exactly what Martin had in mind, nor what was he meant to include or not. We don't know also what he planned to do of his "Dance".

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TBF, we don't know exactly what Martin had in mind, nor what was he meant to include or not. We don't know also what he planned to do of his "Dance".

Well, we know what he told his agent and prospective editors about what was on his mind. That's what the synopsis is.

"While the lion of Lannister and the direwolf of Stark snarl and scrap, a second and greater threat takes shape across the narrow sea, where the Dothraki horselords mass their barbarian hordes for a great invasion of the Seven Kingdoms, led by the fierce and beautiful Daenerys Stormborn, the last of the Targaryen dragonlords (ed: hmmm...). The Dothraki invasion will be the central story of my second volume, A Dance with Dragons."

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Well, we know what he told his agent and prospective editors about what was on his mind. That's what the synopsis is.

"While the lion of Lannister and the direwolf of Stark snarl and scrap, a second and greater threat takes shape across the narrow sea, where the Dothraki horselords mass their barbarian hordes for a great invasion of the Seven Kingdoms, led by the fierce and beautiful Daenerys Stormborn, the last of the Targaryen dragonlords (ed: hmmm...). The Dothraki invasion will be the central story of my second volume, A Dance with Dragons."

He deliberately keeps the events of ADwD and TWoW ambiguous, though, as demonstrated when he doesn't reveal who Jon's parents are.

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I'm not Pat, but it's Martin's original synopsis of the series.

http://winteriscoming.net/2015/02/05/george-rr-martin-original-game-of-thrones-pitch/

It also makes clear that Viserys was "the mummer's dragon," or the "Targaryen pretender," as he put it in the synopsis, and not this (f)Aegon nonsense that was tacked on later for no good reason.

That word, it doesn't mean what you think it means.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pretender

Aegon was going to happen right from book 1 where it's mentioned his head was smashed.

Edited by Facebookless Man
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He deliberately keeps the events of ADwD and TWoW ambiguous, though, as demonstrated when he doesn't reveal who Jon's parents are.

Oh, I definitely think he was planning R+L=J from the start. In the synopsis, he mentions that "the secret of Jon's true parentage is finally revealed in the last book." And I'm glad we've (apparently) avoided that Jon-Tyrion-Arya love triangle!

Edited by Greg B
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I'm not Pat, but it's Martin's original synopsis of the series.

http://winteriscoming.net/2015/02/05/george-rr-martin-original-game-of-thrones-pitch/

It also makes clear that Viserys was "the mummer's dragon," or the "Targaryen pretender," as he put it in the synopsis, and not this (f)Aegon nonsense that was tacked on later for no good reason.

Here's an article on the story. The relevant source is in the first paragraph on the second page of the letter.

Exactly. I generally like how Martin handles character deaths - with realism, but without gratuitously killing protagonists.

That is not suggested in the slightest... I don't know where you got that from. His legitimacy is not called into question and he is still killed by Khal Drogo.

Aegon has been in play since he wrote A Clash of Kings, according to Elio (Ran). But there is plenty of foreshadowing even in AGoT. His role has always been extremely different from that of Viserys, in that he is supposed to complicate Dany's invasion.

Oh, this, ok I wouldn't read that much into that, if I recall correctly Tyrion was a villain at that point and stuff...

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Oh, this, ok I wouldn't read that much into that, if I recall correctly Tyrion was a villain at that point and stuff...

I think the core story-arc is still intact (at least I hope so): the three conflicts (WoFK, Dany Invasion, Others Invasion), and I suspect it's still GRRM's plan that those five characters are still needed to resolve those three conflicts. It certainly could have changed, so much has, but it seems to me that the backbone of the original story is still there.

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