Don't humanize Jaime until the third season

[Commodore]

One of the pleasures of a SoS was reading the perspective of a character we had essentially come to despise as a reader. The way Martin turns Jaime into a sympathetic (or at least more sympathetic) character is a joy to read. It's also interesting how reading Cersei's perspective doesn't make her sympathetic at all, it has the exact opposite effect in fact.

The series should do the same. Make Jaime out to be an asshole pretty boy murderer, have the viewer hate him, then turn it on it's head in the third season (if the series ever gets that far lol).

[Faceless Man of Braavos]

Wholeheartedly agree. :thumbsup:

[superkick]

cerceis perspective makes you hate her more. Both of them are going to need really good actors to be cast. I dont mean famous i mean good. And wholeheatly agree as well Early jamie should come off as an evil prick bastard.

[Warg Arry]

This is purely speculation.
Having read the Jaime and Cersei POV's a few times and then listened to the audio.
In the beginning it's Cersei and Jaime, two halves of a whole. Tyrion even says that; nothing comes between them.
Well now, there are things and people who have.
The loss of Jaime's arm. And the parade of men Cersei "plays" with
Jaime has been faithful to Cersei. You can see even the suggestion of Cersei sleeping with others is eating him up. and opening his eyes.
it's seems Cersei can not abide imperfection. or how she perceives things to be perfect. All of a sudden Jaime repulses her, for the loss of his limb. no longer the perfect lover/brother+ her reflection.
they are no longer a mirror of each other.
Here comes the speculation.
I feel the day is coming when it's Jaime who puts Cersei down broken hearted and full of anger.

And I agree follow the book. We have to hate Jaime before we can love him. or slightly like him. whatever.
But the hate of Jaime is necessary to the hate of Cersei before we can separate the two. if we like Jaime in the beginning we have to assume that there is something in Cersei that is worthy of redemption.
So it would be a misuse of two characters. IMO

[feyrband]

[quote name='Saurian' post='1599501' date='Nov 24 2008, 21.22']This is purely speculation.
Having read the Jaime and Cersei POV's a few times and then listened to the audio.
In the beginning it's Cersei and Jaime, two halves of a whole. Tyrion even says that; nothing comes between them.
Well now, there are things and people who have.
The loss of Jaime's arm. And the parade of men Cersei "plays" with
Jaime has been faithful to Cersei. You can see even the suggestion of Cersei sleeping with others is eating him up. and opening his eyes.
it's seems Cersei can not abide imperfection. or how she perceives things to be perfect. All of a sudden Jaime repulses her, for the loss of his limb. no longer the perfect lover/brother+ her reflection.
they are no longer a mirror of each other.
Here comes the speculation.
I feel the day is coming when it's Jaime who puts Cersei down broken hearted and full of anger.

And I agree follow the book. We have to hate Jaime before we can love him. or slightly like him. whatever.
But the hate of Jaime is necessary to the hate of Cersei before we can separate the two. if we like Jaime in the beginning we have to assume that there is something in Cersei that is worthy of redemption.
So it would be a misuse of two characters. IMO[/quote]

well said sir, i agree completely including with your speculation for the two's relationship forthcoming.

that said, i really think the same holds true for Ned/Cat and Jon Snow. Arya to a lesser extent and then the rest of the Starks.

[Matarreyes]

Very recenty, I read a GOT review by a spanish literary critic I actually respect. This person read only the 1st book, so it was pretty eyes-opening when the review went like this: all is good, but WHY are the POV so one-sided? This person thought he would have enjoyed an evil Lannister party POV, since Tyrion is too likable and a queer Lannister as well, and went as far as to wonder about Jaime. Which were my thoughs exactly as I read GOT.

Making Jaime purely evil is difficult because:

1 - he is a pretty boy (better sold on screen than on paper)

2 - all his inicial scenes are pretty badass/cool/spectacular (a POW on his knees: "I would give you my sword but I mislaid it somewhere") - > I can see the females swooning.

3 - even the infamous window scene is very carefully worded. One thing is chase a kid, grab him then throw him overboard. Other is... you know. There have been years of speculation about the mitigating factors of unintentionality, spur-of-the-moment and weight of love. If filmed well, some viewers will sense that.

4 - Tyrion´s brotherly affection becomes suspicious as early as first 100 pages in GOT. Having a clearly sympathetic character go on and on about how his (supposedly evil) brother has always been kind to him and will save him from any kind of danger is suspicious, you know? Tyrion is clever and not blinded by Cercei, so why he hates one twin and loves another?

5 - and finally, Jaime is one of the main villains, and since some minor characters will be written off, he will become proportionally more visible.

This is NOT to say that I don´t agree with you. In fact, I am having a hard time deciding what I would prefer. A later glimpse of his motives rather than a sooner glimpse? My experience was that I got a sooner glimpse and pretty much expected everything that I got in book 3, and enjoyed the "I told you so" rutine with my friends very much. But I realise 99% people were surprised. It can also be enjoyable.

[Tywin's bastard]

[quote name='superkick' post='1599473' date='Nov 25 2008, 02.59']cerceis perspective makes you hate her more. Both of them are going to need really good actors to be cast. I dont mean famous i mean good. And wholeheatly agree as well Early jamie should come off as an evil prick bastard.[/quote]
I disagree. When we see her perspective she's just an insecure woman guided by her distaste for being discriminated for her sex and desperately striving to achive something despite of that, as well as she's a very protecting mother. She's not a very good person but I think her bad sides are humanized a bit more than Jaime's since his bad sides aren't explained as much, he instead changes and becomes a better person.

Jaime definitely should be portrayed as a despicable person in the beginning so the character change comes across. As for Cersei it's not as clear since things will be shown differently in a TV series but I think it's best to humanize her later as well.

[The Anti-Targ]

[quote name='Matarreyes' post='1600056' date='Nov 26 2008, 06.00']This is NOT to say that I don´t agree with you. In fact, I am having a hard time deciding what I would prefer. A later glimpse of his motives rather than a sooner glimpse? My experience was that I got a sooner glimpse and pretty much expected everything that I got in book 3, and enjoyed the "I told you so" rutine with my friends very much. But I realise 99% people were surprised. It can also be enjoyable.[/quote]

[quote name='Triskele' post='1600417' date='Nov 26 2008, 12.55']I think Jaime looks quite the villain after the window scene no matter what kind of nuance is injected into it. I also think the "Kill his men" part with Jory adds to Jaime the villain. He is going to be a son-of-a-bitch from the get-go.[/quote]

I had the disadvantaqge of reading CoK and SoS before reading GoT. So I didn't particularly hate Jaime. Though I had a healthy dislike for the Lannisters in general, and thereby a generally negative disposition towards Jaime. Funny how things are turning out with this family though. Now a majority of the Lannisters are sympathetic characters as only Cersei is left for everyone to dislike, though she is still a powerful reason for people wanting to see the family taken down a peg or two.

[quote name='Tywin's bastard' post='1600477' date='Nov 26 2008, 13.46']I disagree. When we see her perspective she's just an insecure woman guided by her distaste for being discriminated for her sex and desperately striving to achive something despite of that, as well as she's a very protecting mother. She's not a very good person but I think her bad sides are humanized a bit more than Jaime's since his bad sides aren't explained as much, he instead changes and becomes a better person.

Jaime definitely should be portrayed as a despicable person in the beginning so the character change comes across. As for Cersei it's not as clear since things will be shown differently in a TV series but I think it's best to humanize her later as well.[/quote]

Cersei in AFfC is better understood as a person (why she is who she is), but she is no more sympathetic or likeable than when we first meet her in GoT. Certainly as the series moves forward her character needs to be developed as with all the other key characters (this series will fail if the "villains" remain one dimensional. But that does not mean making her more sympathetic, unlike what needs to happen with Jaime.

[Smoldering Hound]

Jaime's character arc reminds me of that of the owner of the Gem Saloon in Deadwood. Still a bastard by season 2, but you are routing for him.

[Matarreyes]

OK, so imagine the series are made in full 7 seasons (cross fingers). Personal preferences apart, I simply find it difficult for the scriptwriters to get through two seasons without betraying one single human emotion from the guy. If you read the book and you assume Jaime is an asshole, you picture him being an asshole until you are slapped across the face by hard evidence. If you see a movie, you don´t get to picture anything, you get it all digested for you. If the actor acts even slightly horrified in the window scene, if the music is tender when they are together with Cercei, the viewer will pick all those little things. And having the guy go around like nothing is wrong (hey, Tyrion, guess what? I just kicked a kid out of the window) would not be very canon, IMO. Also, think of the enormous Stark POV bias in AGOT. It wasn´t just Bran. How many people assumed Jaime was greatly enjoying himself on that Iron Throne, all smug after having just gutted his kind, because that´s what Ned assumed? Now we know he wasn´t. So, if that scene gets filmed in season 1 (not completely unreasonable to hope for), whose POV do you expect it´ll reflect? Again, it would not be very canon to have it reflect Ned´s.

Hmmm. Guess I lean toward having at least some hints for the future plot twist, after all. The books had them! They just got totally squashed, because it seemed that nobody could antagonise Ned the Big Hero and Stark Kids with Cute Direwolfs. After it was established that half Westeros was set to do exactly that, perceptions shifted.

[red snow]

Portray him as evil and then have him become good. I don't know what the concern is, as this is staple character arc for genre tv shows where the villain gradually becomes more sympathetic and eventually a good guy. Off the top of my head, there's Spike from Buffy/Angel, Scorpious (and Krais) from Farscape, the aformentioned Al Swearangen, 01 boxer from Charlie Jade and a shed load of characters from Lost. I'm sure there are loads more. The best thing about these characters in tv is that everyone loves them - it's great to see people do what the hell they want, get the best lines and even better eventually come to understand why they did it.
It should also be easier for Jaime becasue people tend to be more sympathetic to good looking people doing bad things (so shallow) as far as tv is concerned.

[psim]

The thread title in itself is pretty much a spoiler, maybe you should consider changing that...

[DomDayne]

Since first reading GoT i'd always thought of Jamie not as a bloodthirsty murderer and pure evil guy, rather cersei always took that role. The window scene, Jamie doesn't actually want to throw Bran, but was persuaded by cersei.

[Lady Blackfish]

^ Cersei didn't persuade Jaime though, Jaime thought that it was what she would want but later we learn that Cersei was angry at him for doing it.

[Frank Stark]

Yeah, there wasn't really much dialogue between Jaime and Cersei about what to do. Jaime just did it. In the books, we read that he said his line with "loathing" (IIRC) which I think suggests some humanity about him, but that doesn't necessarily have to come across in the acting. Pretty much everything else he does in Game is rather dick-ish. And he's barely in Clash until Cat's last chapter (really his first lengthy dialogue).