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[BOOK SPOILERS] EP105 Discussion


Ran

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The shaving scene wasn't quite the way I'd have shown the Loras/Renly relationship. Also, how the hell are they going to show him about to battle Stannis with an army behind him when he cant even stand the sight of blood.

Renly had every intention of watching the battle from the rear. He gave the commands out, who was to lead from where. Renly was no warrior. He may have made a good king but the Reach lords would have fought his battles for him.

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Also, now I know what Ran meant on his original reviews when he said that the 5th episode is where the show feels like it finally lets itself breathe.

I think cutting down on the number of setting changes really helped this episode. It felt more fleshed out than some of the other ones.

I agree. The break-neck pacing trailed off a bit and we got to settle in with the characters. It was a nice break. :)

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out of curiosity, did they ever tell us why Arya is chasing after cats on the show???

that was a cool scene, even though I don't like the cat the cast as Balerion, not nearly big, mean or battered enough :P

It was in last weeks episode. Arya told Ned that her next assignment from Syrio was to catch cats.

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out of curiosity, did they ever tell us why Arya is chasing after cats on the show???

that was a cool scene, even though I don't like the cat the cast as Balerion, not nearly big, mean or battered enough :P

I'm pretty sure Arya mentions that Syrio wants her to catch cats during the scene where she's balancing on one leg on the stairwell, and then she and Ned sit down to talk about wolves sticking together in winter.

beaten to the punch. :)

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Things I liked about the episode:

- The running theme/joke about Arya being a boy, which will become important later

- The fight scene outside the brothel was awesome.

- The view from Tyrion's cell was stunning, cant tell if it sloped. In fact, the whole Vale part rocked

- And of course, Theon's dick. I can't claim to have actually seen it, but others do and who am I to doubt them.

Things I was meh about:

- The tourney crowd scenes continue to underwhelm.

- Loras looked more than a bit ridiculous.

Things I didnt like:

- The shaving scene wasn't quite the way I'd have shown the Loras/Renly relationship. Also, how the hell are they going to show him about to battle Stannis with an army behind him when he cant even stand the sight of blood.

I've seen a couple different people talking about Renly's apparent lack of courage. I was thinking that since we never saw him as a POV character, it was entirely possible that he acted naturally with his lover and put on a "tough guy" image when he was out and about (which is where we really "saw" him).

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Cold Hands,

They did. She said Syrio told her you can learn a lot from watching and chasing cats.

Good, I'm glad or there would be a lot of people going wtf is Arya doing.

One thing that's too bad is that the frantic pace of the show isn't giving us any time to see Arya progress in her training. She still looked pretty clueless when going after the cat in tonite's episode--whereas in the book she has progressed to the point where she can catch any cat in the castle complex and even get Balerion the baddest feline out there.

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I agree. The break-neck pacing trailed off a bit and we got to settle in with the characters. It was a nice break. :)

Indeed. It wasn't until the end of the episode that I noted there had been no Jon or Dany.

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I don't think you can seriously expect a network like HBO to tippy-toe around the homosexuality like GRRM did. Obviously GRRM was capable of writing some very explicit sex scenes, but he averred from showing us male-on-male bedsport because it didn’t happen between viewpoint characters, and in all probability, writing such intimacy well was beyond GRRM’s comfort zone. That makes perfect sense to me, and he can hardly be accused of homophobia with several interesting gay characters in the series – cf. The Wheel of Time series.

Given the accumulative references about Renly and Ser Loras do provide us with a relatively unassailable picture of their homosexual relationship, this is really just a case of the tv show taking something canon off-screen and putting it into the foreground. You don’t have to enjoy the aesthetics of the scene, but it’s hard to see how you can gainsay such a decision. Being a visual medium, TV isn’t limited solely to the experiences of viewpoint characters, and I see no real dramatic purpose to be all coy about it through ambiguity or some dramatic revelation in season 2. Indeed, in this day and age, such coyness strikes me as more than a little odd. Obviously that doesn't mean the characters themselves shouldn't be acting cognisant of the taboo of the act, but at best this was always a very poorly kept secret amongst Westerosi nobles. Accordingly, there's no need for the show to go beyond that and try to insert extras layers of opaqueness at a meta level in how it communicates the existence of the relationship. The fact that many, many people know the score and make open references to it in the books is more than sufficient licence to make it on-screen scene.

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In the novels, Renly is a knight. He rode in the tourney. He's an average knight, apparently, Stannis mocks him for taking part to let better men defeat him, but still.

He did not actually intend to lead from the rear. Renly gives himself command of the right battle, not the rear; in medieval warfare, the right (along with the vanguard) was often the primary offensive arm. We see this at the Green Fork, where the bulk of the Lannister cavalry are placed on the right.

He's perfectly capable and willing to fight, but he knows he's no great warrior like Robert, to go off and lead the vanguard.

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I thought it was a good episode. But I feel like Barristan's being jobbed. Even if he doesn't talk, why can't they show him sitting on the Small Council?

Re: Renly and Loras, in AFFC Cersei also wonders if Margaery shares Loras's tastes and looks at her ladies for a partner.

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blah waah blah meh

Your list is full of so many pointless things that don't matter one bit. I can't even respond to each comment individually because I find your nitpicking so irrelevant.

You might have noted my list included dislikes, likes and simple general comments. It was no hate filled diatribe or praise filled masturbation piece, but all is forgotten since one can simply quote the others post and snip all content and declare it irrelevant. If you cared so much why bother responding at all? There are 190 plus posts also in this thread any one of which you could have responded to.

So that begs the question why respond to the only post you don't care about in the slightest? Why not simply ignore it like you ignore the other 190 posts?

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