Rant & Rave Season 8 [Spoilers]: When you are cool like a cucumber, as evil as the mother of madness, but never as perfect as the pet!

[Le Cygne]

Thinking about how they threw away the magic of giants for yet more glorification of Ramsay, they threw away the magic of animal imagery in the books, too. Which would be very easy to add to the show.

I remember the scene with Jon learning about Orell, how he's a skinchanger, and if they had the time to do that for a minor character, why not Jon? The excuses of working with animals is just an excuse.

Ser Pounce just needed to act like a cat, and they said oh, that's too hard for us. Yet they spent all of that money on special effects for underwhelming battles that made no sense at all.

Imagine a battle with Jon warging Ghost. We don't have to imagine, we have all the scenes from the books with Arya warging Nymeria. Something else they left out, to make the direwolves fluffy pets instead.

GRRM wrote this scene for Sansa with Sandor, a la Beauty and the Beast. But then they took her own story away. In season 8, they had her tell the Hound that she killed Ramsay via hounds. Swing and a miss.

All the animal imagery in the books is about personal identity. The stories in the books with women and beastly men was about discovering the beast within themselves, via positive expressions of sexuality.

Sansa was inspired by her beast, the Hound, to find herself. Dany was inspired by her beast, Drogo, to find herself, too. These men were in tune with the women's own power, via sexual awakening. What a better story.

GRRM spent so much time developing the Beauty and the Beast story for Sansa and the Hound, there's so much there. He has Sansa enjoying the hell out of her own story, which she totally gets. It's classic gothic romance. Fly, little bird!

Ditto for Dany and Drogo. GRRM describes the scene with the horse that was his gift to her. The horse's hair is even like hers. Riding the horse sets her free! As does riding Drogo, and ultimately Drogon, named after him.

When people say the show was good at first, it really never was. It was better, but that's not good. They got it wrong from the get go. They didn't understand the material, and didn't respect it enough to listen.

(Just thought some more about Ser Pounce, how fitting to give a kitten to Tommen. Tommen is a little lion, but a gentle one. They could have used it to show his character, and to foreshadow his death. It was all there for them.)

[SeanF]

25 minutes ago, Le Cygne said:

Thinking about how they threw away the magic of giants for yet more glorification of Ramsay, they threw away the magic of animal imagery in the books, too. Which would be very easy to add to the show.

I remember the scene with Jon learning about Orell, how he's a skinchanger, and if they had the time to do that for a minor character, why not Jon? The excuses of working with animals is just an excuse.

Ser Pounce just needed to act like a cat, and they said oh, that's too hard for us. Yet they spent all of that money on special effects for underwhelming battles that made no sense at all.

Imagine a battle with Jon warging Ghost. We don't have to imagine, we have all the scenes from the books with Arya warging Nymeria. Something else they left out, to make the direwolves fluffy pets instead.

GRRM wrote this scene for Sansa with Sandor, a la Beauty and the Beast. But then they took her own story away. In season 8, they had her tell the Hound that she killed Ramsay via hounds. Swing and a miss.

All the animal imagery in the books is about personal identity. The stories in the books with women and beastly men was about discovering the beast within themselves, via positive expressions of sexuality.

Sansa was inspired by her beast, the Hound, to find herself. Dany was inspired by her beast, Drogo, to find herself, too. These men were in tune with the women's own power, via sexual awakening. What a better story.

GRRM spent so much time developing the Beauty and the Beast story for Sansa and the Hound, there's so much there. He has Sansa enjoying the hell out of her own story, which she totally gets. It's classic gothic romance.

Ditto for Dany and Drogo. GRRM describes the scene with the horse that was his gift to her. The horse's hair is even like hers. Riding the horse sets her free! As does riding Drogo, and ultimately Drogon, named after him.

When people say the show was good at first, it really never was. It was better, but that's not good. They got it wrong from the get go. They didn't understand the material, and didn't respect it enough to listen.

I think they saw it purely in terms of protagonist-centred morality.  If they liked a protagonist, what that protagonist does is right, and the more that protagonist acts like a shit, the better.

Someone recently gave me a small example of this - the forgettable character of Olly.  He's presented as a spiteful little shit, who can't get over what was done to his parents, despite the need to unite in the face of the common enemy.  Sansa on the other hand, despite the enemy being  at the gates, is presented as entirely justified in hating Daenerys for what her father did to her grandfather.

[Le Cygne]

34 minutes ago, SeanF said:

I think they saw it purely in terms of protagonist-centred morality.  If they liked a protagonist, what that protagonist does is right, and the more that protagonist acts like a shit, the better.

Someone recently gave me a small example of this - the forgettable character of Olly.  He's presented as a spiteful little shit, who can't get over what was done to his parents, despite the need to unite in the face of the common enemy.  Sansa on the other hand, despite the enemy being  at the gates, is presented as entirely justified in hating Daenerys for what her father did to her grandfather.

I would also say that it's situational, as in, whatever way the wind blows at present. They didn't actually develop the characters as people.

The show isn't a real story. It's just a series of disconnected skits.

In other words, they didn't write a story about the things they made them do, they just momentarily made use of them to justify their plot whims.

Benioff: "Creatively it made sense to us, because we wanted it to happen."

[Le Cygne]

Also thinking some more about how they blew the animal imagery that runs throughout the entire series... they like to use excuses that the magic and symbolism of the books is too hard for audiences to get.

But there's the classic example of sports teams. Many of them have animals as their mascot. That's something kids grow up with, and have fun with. It would have added something special to the show.

I remember that one scene that GRRM wrote for Arya, and he slipped in Sandor calling her "wolf girl" and I thought, YES! He got one in! But it stood out because it was so rarely done in the show.

Instantly, you get a picture of the character, it's shorthand for who they are. To not use it is bizarre.

[SeanF]

15 minutes ago, Le Cygne said:

Also thinking some more about how they blew the animal imagery that runs throughout the entire series... they like to use excuses that the magic and symbolism of the books is too hard for audiences to get.

But there's the classic example of sports teams. Many of them have animals as their mascot. That's something kids grow up with, and have fun with. It would have added something special to the show.

I remember that one scene that GRRM wrote for Arya, and he slipped in Sandor calling her "wolf girl" and I thought, YES! He got one in! But it stood out because it was so rarely done in the show.

Instantly, you get a picture of the character, it's shorthand for who they are. To not use it is bizarre.

Yes, humans identify with animals.  Bears, wolves, dragons, boar, lions, tigers, horses, or birds like eagles, hawks, symbolise strength and power.  So, we adopt them in symbols.

[Le Cygne]

1 hour ago, SeanF said:

Yes, humans identify with animals.  Bears, wolves, dragons, boar, lions, tigers, horses, or birds like eagles, hawks, symbolise strength and power.  So, we adopt them in symbols.

Yep, and they didn't even need to use live animals, or special effects, although they could have done it simply by focusing on the characters, and they had a huge special effects budget they wasted it on bad plots and in darkness.

There aren't actually animals at baseball and football games. It's something even children understand and is very easy to show. Case in point, GRRM having Sandor call Arya "wolf girl" in the script he wrote. He knows it's effective.

Cost: 2 words. Instant and colorful characterization and world building. Every movie about American Indians gets into this, their names are often descriptive animal names. GRRM knows screenwriting; they don't.

Also they showed skinchanging with Bran lots of times, they certainly could have used it with Jon and Arya. They did scenes on it with ORELL. The characters talked about it, and then they showed footage of an eagle. So hard!

Jon: What's wrong with him?

Mance: He's a warg. He can enter the mind of animals, see through their eyes. He's scouting for us.

Ygritte: You've never met a warg?

Mance: Orell, where were you this time?

Orell: The Fist of the First Men.

Mance: What did you see?

Orell: Dead crows.

[Angel Eyes]

Season 8 question: why did the living put all their civilians, with no soldiers or even trained civilians around to defend them, in the crypts where the dead could be raised? Jon would have known about that due to the undead kids at Hardome, meaning that the Night King can raise any dead body in the vicinity. And, if there’s anything Tolkien taught us, it’s never, ever, ever put your entire fighting force onto a battlefield. The House of Hador did that, they were slaughtered except for one man who was subsequently tortured for 28 years by watching his children destroy themselves (by causing the downfall of a kingdom and unknowingly committing incest). As a result, the House of Hador’s lands were left wide open to be taken by the Easterlings.

[SeanF]

3 hours ago, Angel Eyes said:

Season 8 question: why did the living put all their civilians, with no soldiers or even trained civilians around to defend them, in the crypts where the dead could be raised? Jon would have known about that due to the undead kids at Hardome, meaning that the Night King can raise any dead body in the vicinity. And, if there’s anything Tolkien taught us, it’s never, ever, ever put your entire fighting force onto a battlefield. The House of Hador did that, they were slaughtered except for one man who was subsequently tortured for 28 years by watching his children destroy themselves (by causing the downfall of a kingdom and commit incest). As a result, the House of Hador’s lands were left wide open to be taken by the Easterlings.

Creatively, it made sense to them.

[Angel Eyes]

6 hours ago, SeanF said:

Creatively, it made sense to them.

Nah, doesn’t even make sense for them. If Tyrion’s their favorite character, why not have him do badass stuff like killing wights? It isn’t like he can’t, just watch the early seasons or even the battle at the fighting pits in Season 5 where he takes out a Son of the Harpy.

[Count Balerion]

dinklage commented on this. "he put them in the CRYPT, where the DEAD people are! so BLEAH!"

[Count Balerion]

tomorrow instead of doing hibberd tomorrow, we're doing commentary on a debate between shadiversity and remarkable republican on whether season 8, ep. 3 is rubbish or not. that should be entertaining.

[Lady Fevre Dream]

 

So, I had this strange desire to see some of the dragons, minus some D&D dialogue, found myself on youtube, AND......found some dragon action with it's own new dialogue.  This vid is only about a week old, so I thought I'd share it.  It made me.........glad that at least Drogon lived, mad at what was done to both Jon and Dany, but sorta satisfied my need to see the dragons.  It is also a reminder that it really is such a shame that the Ds littered up such beautiful potential with such.......dreck. 

 

[Lady Fevre Dream]

LOL  I think my favorite part might have been:  Bow ya shits!! 

[Le Cygne]

14 hours ago, Lady Fevre Dream said:

 

So, I had this strange desire to see some of the dragons, minus some D&D dialogue, found myself on youtube, AND......found some dragon action with it's own new dialogue.  This vid is only about a week old, so I thought I'd share it.  It made me.........glad that at least Drogon lived, mad at what was done to both Jon and Dany, but sorta satisfied my need to see the dragons.  It is also a reminder that it really is such a shame that the Ds littered up such beautiful potential with such.......dreck. 

 

Oh that's cute! Too bad Drogon didn't burn Jon in the end, which he totally would have done.

They could have had fun with the show, instead of the misery slog interspersed with boobs.

[Count Balerion]

cute. see, dragons ARE loveable

[Count Balerion]

 

[Dracul's Daughter]

On 3/1/2021 at 12:28 AM, Lady Fevre Dream said:

 

So, I had this strange desire to see some of the dragons, minus some D&D dialogue, found myself on youtube, AND......found some dragon action with it's own new dialogue.  This vid is only about a week old, so I thought I'd share it.  It made me.........glad that at least Drogon lived, mad at what was done to both Jon and Dany, but sorta satisfied my need to see the dragons.  It is also a reminder that it really is such a shame that the Ds littered up such beautiful potential with such.......dreck. 

 

This morning I found myself reading when she frees Yunkai (which scene we see here in the video is not correctly adapted from the books).I started to cry when I got reading this :

 

Quote

On the morning of the third day, the city gates swung open and a line of slaves began to emerge. Dany mounted her silver to greet them. As they passed, little Missandei told them that they owed their freedom to Daenerys Stormborn, the Unburnt, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros and Mother of Dragons.

"Mhysa!" a brown-skinned man shouted out at her. He had a child on his shoulder, a little girl, and she screamed the same word in her thin voice. "Mhysa! Mhysa!"

Dany looked at Missandei. "What are they shouting?"

"It is Ghiscari, the old pure tongue. It means 'Mother.' "

Dany felt a lightness in her chest. I will never bear a living child, she remembered. Her hand trembled as she raised it. Perhaps she smiled. She must have, because the man grinned and shouted again, and others took up the cry. "Mhysa!" they called. "Mhysa! MHYSA!" They were all smiling at her, reaching for her, kneeling before her. "Maela," some called her while others cried "Aelalla" or "Qathei" or "Tato," but whatever the tongue it all meant the same thing. Mother. They are calling me Mother.

The chant grew, spread, swelled. It swelled so loud that it frightened her horse, and the mare backed and shook her head and lashed her silver-grey tail. It swelled until it seemed to shake the yellow walls of Yunkai. More slaves were streaming from the gates every moment, and as they came they took up the call. They were running toward her now, pushing, stumbling, wanting to touch her hand, to stroke her horse's mane, to kiss her feet. Her poor bloodriders could not keep them all away, and even Strong Belwas grunted and growled in dismay.

Ser Jorah urged her to go, but Dany remembered a dream she had dreamed in the House of the Undying. "They will not hurt me," she told him. "They are my children, Jorah." She laughed, put her heels into her horse, and rode to them, the bells in her hair ringing sweet victory. She trotted, then cantered, then broke into a gallop, her braid streaming behind. The freed slaves parted before her. "Mother," they called from a hundred throats, a thousand, ten thousand. "Mother," they sang, their fingers brushing her legs as she flew by. "Mother, Mother, Mother!"
 

How could they have portrayed her freeing slaves as a downfall in tyranny?How could this be evil?How could a person that does such a selfless act be evil or tyrannical?I'm kinda heartbroken now.

[SeanF]

7 minutes ago, Dracul's Daughter said:

This morning I found myself reading when she frees Yunkai (which scene we see here is not correctly adapted from the books).I started to cry when I got reading this :

 

How could they have portrayed her freeing slaves as a downfall in tyranny?How could this be evil?How could a person that does such a selfless act be evil or tyrannical?I'm kinda heartbroken now.

I'm not American,  but I believe there are parts of the US where there is quite a common view that slavery was essentially a benign institution.  And the two D's wanted to produce an alt.history series in which the Confederacy won.  I might regard that as a dystopia, like The Man in the High Castle, but I don't think that is how they see it.

In reality, I would say that liberators can be quite brutal in practice, like Bolivar, San Martin, Dessalines, and L'Ouverture, but that does not make them wrong.

[Dracul's Daughter]

28 minutes ago, SeanF said:

I'm not American,  but I believe there are parts of the US where there is quite a common view that slavery was essentially a benign institution.  And the two D's wanted to produce an alt.history series in which the Confederacy won.  I might regard that as a dystopia, like The Man in the High Castle, but I don't think that is how they see it.

But even the meeting in the tent is depcting her as treacherous.Meanwhile,in the books:

 

Quote

"I have a gift for you as well." She slammed the chest shut. "Three days. On the morning of the third day, send out your slaves. All of them. Every man, woman, and child shall be given a weapon, and as much food, clothing, coin, and goods as he or she can carry. These they shall be allowed to choose freely from among their masters' possessions, as payment for their years of servitude. When all the slaves have departed, you will open your gates and allow my Unsullied to enter and search your city, to make certain none remain in bondage. If you do this, Yunkai will not be burned or plundered, and none of your people shall be molested. The Wise Masters will have the peace they desire, and will have proved themselves wise indeed. What say you?"

"I say, you are mad."

"Am I?" Dany shrugged, and said, "Dracarys."

The dragons answered. Rhaegal hissed and smoked, Viserion snapped, and Drogon spat swirling red-black flame. It touched the drape of Grazdan's tokar, and the silk caught in half a heartbeat. Golden marks spilled across the carpets as the envoy stumbled over the chest, shouting curses and beating at his arm until Whitebeard flung a flagon of water over him to douse the flames . "You swore I should have safe conduct! " the Yunkish envoy wailed.

"Do all the Yunkai'i whine so over a singed tokar? I shall buy you a new one . . . if you deliver up your slaves within three days. Elsewise, Drogon shall give you a warmer kiss." She wrinkled her nose. "You've soiled yourself. Take your gold and go, and see that the Wise Masters hear my message."

Grazdan mo Eraz pointed a finger. "You shall rue this arrogance, whore. These little lizards will not keep you safe, I promise you. We will fill the air with arrows if they come within a league of Yunkai. Do you think it is so hard to kill a dragon?"

"Harder than to kill a slaver. Three days, Grazdan. Tell them. By the end of the third day, I will be in Yunkai, whether you open your gates for me or no."
 

 

[SeanF]

3 minutes ago, Dracul's Daughter said:

But even the meeting in the tent is depcting her as tracherous.Meanwhile,in the books:
 

I think a lot of people have picked up that the two D's were making an ideological point.  You may remember the bit where Tyrion intended to reinstate slavery for seven years and compensate the slave owners, and Benioff suggested in an interview that Lincoln should have gone down that route.