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!

[Cas Stark]

13 hours ago, Ser Gareth said:

Or the mess GRRM left the story in after ASOS.  So you have two poor writers who, to be fair, assumed that the entire story would be as great as the first three books, left with trying to finish off a story that even the author had fucked up so badly that he can't even reach a conclusion despite being a competent writer and great story teller.  I can only imagine D&D's face after they'd read the pile of shit that was ADWD.  Bet they regretted taking the series on after that!!  I think one of the most frustrating thing about the series is that it really could have fixed some of the glaring flaws from the books, but not only did they not fix them but they simply added a whole bunch of new ones to the mix too.....

Yes, as time has gone on, and no Winds, and it begins to look like the author has held back some details on purpose to preserve his books that he doesn't write, it begins to look like not all the decline in quality is due to D&D being hacks, but is in part due to the lack of source material, lack of detail from the author and the story itself, whatever it is, having gone out of control and becoming less grounded in realism, bogged down in excesses, which when combined with D&D's proclivities, led to the mess of the later seasons.  A long winded to say that not everything is going to turn out to have been the fault of Dan and Dave, GRRM will bear some responsibility for how off kilter things have gone. 

[Lady Fevre Dream]

3 hours ago, SeanF said:

ASOS is the high point of the series, but I still enjoyed AFFC and ADWD a lot.

For all the complaining about AFFC and ADWD, they do have some of the best material, Arya's Needle being Jon Snow's smile, Jaime and The Blackfish, Edd, fetch me a block, Davos's tour of the dungeons of Westeros.  That's just off the top of my head.  Yes, there are some differences in the last two, but they also contain some of the best writing. 

[alienarea]

2 hours ago, Cas Stark said:

Yes, as time has gone on, and no Winds, and it begins to look like the author has held back some details on purpose to preserve his books that he doesn't write, it begins to look like not all the decline in quality is due to D&D being hacks, but is in part due to the lack of source material, lack of detail from the author and the story itself, whatever it is, having gone out of control and becoming less grounded in realism, bogged down in excesses, which when combined with D&D's proclivities, led to the mess of the later seasons.  A long winded to say that not everything is going to turn out to have been the fault of Dan and Dave, GRRM will bear some responsibility for how off kilter things have gone. 

In hindsight, the show should have deviated more from the books and have streamlined things more.

- skip Dorne

- skip Euron

- don't kill off Stannis that rushed 

[Cas Stark]

7 minutes ago, alienarea said:

In hindsight, the show should have deviated more from the books and have streamlined things more.

- skip Dorne

- skip Euron

- don't kill off Stannis that rushed 

I mostly agree with this, but some of it is also personal preference.  I hate the Dorne story in the books and hated it worse in the show.  It definitely looks like the show has proved that Dorne is superfluous to the main story and ending.  I also hate Euron in the books and think he's one of the worst, most flat, trite characters in the novels...he's actually slightly better on the show, but I assume he does something important for the end game and this why he's on the show.  I was disappointed there was no Aegon because I wanted the late introduction of Aegon to be meaningful and important, and his absence from the show strongly implies that he, like so many others, is a dead end tangent with no major impact that can't be shown via some other character.  

[Suzanna Stormborn]

1 hour ago, Lady Fevre Dream said:

For all the complaining about AFFC and ADWD, they do have some of the best material, Arya's Needle being Jon Snow's smile, Jaime and The Blackfish, Edd, fetch me a block, Davos's tour of the dungeons of Westeros.  That's just off the top of my head.  Yes, there are some differences in the last two, but they also contain some of the best writing. 

Yeah, I actually love these books from start to finish, every page, and I have 100% faith the GRRM will finish them. I don't much see the point of spending all this time on website discussing something ad nauseum that I don't even enjoy.....

[Cas Stark]

1 hour ago, Suzanna Stormborn said:

Yeah, I actually love these books from start to finish, every page, and I have 100% faith the GRRM will finish them. I don't much see the point of spending all this time on website discussing something ad nauseum that I don't even enjoy.....

Really?  I'm surprised you have 100% faith, LOL.  I think some people, like myself, were hooked by the first three books, and have thought things went awry after that, same with the show, the first 1-4 seasons were mostly good, sometimes great, and then, again, also went awry.  But, mileage on this varies widely I realize.

[Suzanna Stormborn]

13 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

Really?  I'm surprised you have 100% faith, LOL.  I think some people, like myself, were hooked by the first three books, and have thought things went awry after that, same with the show, the first 1-4 seasons were mostly good, sometimes great, and then, again, also went awry.  But, mileage on this varies widely I realize.

Yeah, I think (I dont know) that he got fed up with D&D ruining everything and just decided he wasn't going to publish WoW until after Season 8 aired.  My guess is that this season will coincide with the announcement on the release date of WoW. That would be smart marketing anyway.

[Ser Gareth]

20 minutes ago, Suzanna Stormborn said:

Yeah, I think (I dont know) that he got fed up with D&D ruining everything and just decided he wasn't going to publish WoW until after Season 8 aired.  My guess is that this season will coincide with the announcement on the release date of WoW. That would be smart marketing anyway.

I think your wrong on him waiting and smart marketing.  The time to make money is before the series ends as people are hungry for it.  As soon as the show ends the books become niche again.  The vast majority of people won't bother with them.

My personal opinion is that he is waiting until the final season is done so he can work out how to change the ending he originally conceived.  This will at least give him some clarity.  The downside is I think that could well means a massive rewrite and we won't see TWOW for another three to five years.

[Lady Fevre Dream]

I think we have a good chance at Winds, eventually, LOL  Maybe the if and when on that would tell us something about the chances of ever getting Dream.  I've always thought he needed to separate himself a bit emotionally from the show, well, I've thought that was one of the issues.  Look at all the different ways fans have to come to a place of dividing the show and the books, or not, etc., and the varying feelings many of us have had on the way.  I cannot imagine being the author, whether involved or not in many changes over the years to the original story or ideas for it. 

I've  made peace with the idea of never getting more from George.  If I do get more from him, great, I might even like it, LOL  I might not.  I might be happier to only get Winds and fanwank an ending out of that and the show's ideas, maybe.  I've also made peace with the fact of the show finishing it's story now.  I've enjoyed visuals the show has given me, peeks at the characters I fell in love with on the pages, but I've seen the show's story as something that has taken a huge detour from the original material.  That didn't have to be a bad thing, but for me it's been a mess.  I'm not even mad about in anymore, well, not often, it's mostly quite funny. 

 

 

[Lady Fevre Dream]

59 minutes ago, Suzanna Stormborn said:

Yeah, I think (I dont know) that he got fed up with D&D ruining everything and just decided he wasn't going to publish WoW until after Season 8 aired.  My guess is that this season will coincide with the announcement on the release date of WoW. That would be smart marketing anyway.

I'm not sure it's all that deliberate, but your idea would give us a book soon, LOL

 

[Lady Fevre Dream]

Did everyone see the update on extra time on the third episode?

http://watchersonthewall.com/battle-winterfell-episode-will-record-breaking-running-time/

[Meera of Tarth]

Random question...

does anyone have the links of the script in which they actually wrote "cool like a cucumber". Was it 7x07?

 

[Cas Stark]

40 minutes ago, Ser Gareth said:

I think your wrong on him waiting and smart marketing.  The time to make money is before the series ends as people are hungry for it.  As soon as the show ends the books become niche again.  The vast majority of people won't bother with them.

My personal opinion is that he is waiting until the final season is done so he can work out how to change the ending he originally conceived.  This will at least give him some clarity.  The downside is I think that could well means a massive rewrite and we won't see TWOW for another three to five years.

I agree. 

[Suzanna Stormborn]

48 minutes ago, Ser Gareth said:

I think your wrong on him waiting and smart marketing.  The time to make money is before the series ends as people are hungry for it.  As soon as the show ends the books become niche again.  The vast majority of people won't bother with them.

My personal opinion is that he is waiting until the final season is done so he can work out how to change the ending he originally conceived.  This will at least give him some clarity.  The downside is I think that could well means a massive rewrite and we won't see TWOW for another three to five years.

the vast majority of what people? Unsullied show watchers? I never expected them to read anyway.

90 million ppl worldwide have read/bought asoiaf, when WoW gets published that number will surpass LOTR as the number 1 Adult Fantasy series of all time. (HP is not 'Adult Fantasy') Not exactly what you would call 'niche'.

 

Millions more people will buy WoW than even bought DwD, as the numbers keep increasing from book to book.

[Lollygag]

5 hours ago, Cas Stark said:

Yes, as time has gone on, and no Winds, and it begins to look like the author has held back some details on purpose to preserve his books that he doesn't write, it begins to look like not all the decline in quality is due to D&D being hacks, but is in part due to the lack of source material, lack of detail from the author and the story itself, whatever it is, having gone out of control and becoming less grounded in realism, bogged down in excesses, which when combined with D&D's proclivities, led to the mess of the later seasons.  A long winded to say that not everything is going to turn out to have been the fault of Dan and Dave, GRRM will bear some responsibility for how off kilter things have gone. 

I do have sympathy for D&D being left in the lurch by GRRM, but they knew about this possibility going in. HBO signed up for the same situation with Charlaine Harris and True Blood which went just as bad (don't get me started), yet HBO signed up for this again despite GRRM's issues with AFFC and ADWD already being known. D&D were just adapters with the involvement of the author with experience in TV and they were pretty solid in this respect. 

But after the source material ended and GRRM stepped back, D&D and HBO could have hired assistant writers and editors to keep the characters from being nonsense, contradicting themselves, doing inexplicable things (Sansa not telling Jon about the Vale army among so, so, so many others), not shoring up the plot (Arya's stabbing scene anyone?), editing issues, all of those incredibly obvious face-palm things, etc., but they didn't even when it was pointed out and that's completely on D&D. These are things a basic writer could help with and we see how easy these thing are to spot on the forums. But D&D still do nothing.

The lack of imagination of the later seasons is on GRRM, but the lack of basic quality which one expects from even low-level network TV shows, that's not on GRRM in the least. D&D could have continued creating a solid though less imaginative show if they had sourced additional help.

[Cas Stark]

5 minutes ago, Suzanna Stormborn said:

the vast majority of what people? Unsullied show watchers? I never expected them to read anyway.

90 million ppl worldwide have read/bought asoiaf, when WoW gets published that number will surpass LOTR as the number 1 Adult Fantasy series of all time. (HP is not 'Adult Fantasy') Not exactly what you would call 'niche'.

 

Millions more people will buy WoW than even bought DwD, as the numbers keep increasing from book to book.

Maybe.  I don't know.  If the ending of the show is spectacularly disappointing, Winds may not exceed or even meet the sales of Dance.  I don't intend to buy it or read at this point, but I may be part of a small, disgruntled minority.  It's also worth noting that at the time of Dance's publication no one really legitimately believed he wouldn't finish.  Now, I think the majority does not expect to see him finish the series...so why buy another book in a series where you know the ending and where there is little chance that the final book or books will come out?

[Lady Fevre Dream]

37 minutes ago, Meera of Tarth said:

Random question...

does anyone have the links of the script in which they actually wrote "cool like a cucumber". Was it 7x07?

 

There are some links on page 2 of this thread.  I tried to copy and paste them for you, it didn't go well.  There are a few links in posts of mine on that page, and links to links.  I'm not sure which one the 'cool as a cucumber' comes from because I will confess, I haven't read all of them.  I've sampled some, read posts of others containing some, and that is quite enough for me, if you get my meaning, LOL 

[Suzanna Stormborn]

14 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

Maybe.  I don't know.  If the ending of the show is spectacularly disappointing, Winds may not exceed or even meet the sales of Dance.  I don't intend to buy it or read at this point, but I may be part of a small, disgruntled minority.  It's also worth noting that at the time of Dance's publication no one really legitimately believed he wouldn't finish.  Now, I think the majority does not expect to see him finish the series...so why buy another book in a series where you know the ending and where there is little chance that the final book or books will come out?

Where are you getting that fact about 'the majority dont expect him to finish'?

You really don't intend to read WoW even if it came out this Christmas? forgive me but then why would you even care enough to comment on this website? idk that makes no sense to me.

[SeanF]

4 hours ago, Lady Fevre Dream said:

For all the complaining about AFFC and ADWD, they do have some of the best material, Arya's Needle being Jon Snow's smile, Jaime and The Blackfish, Edd, fetch me a block, Davos's tour of the dungeons of Westeros.  That's just off the top of my head.  Yes, there are some differences in the last two, but they also contain some of the best writing. 

I would add the Reek and Cersei storylines, Bran & Co. North of the Wall, the Vale, and Meereen, from the return of Drogon onwards, as parts that stood out for me.  Some parts were less gripping, it's true.

[SeanF]

1 hour ago, Ser Gareth said:

I think your wrong on him waiting and smart marketing.  The time to make money is before the series ends as people are hungry for it.  As soon as the show ends the books become niche again.  The vast majority of people won't bother with them.

My personal opinion is that he is waiting until the final season is done so he can work out how to change the ending he originally conceived.  This will at least give him some clarity.  The downside is I think that could well means a massive rewrite and we won't see TWOW for another three to five years.

Even before the Show, sales had reached 11 million. That's many more than niche.