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How is this going to work long term?


Aegnor

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So lets say the the series lasts the duration? Bran is 10 years old in the show, and in 5 years (6 if they split season 3 as rumored) the actor that plays Bran will be 15 or 16, while the character will be what? Eleven? Arya...the actor is a 13 year-old playing an 11 year-old. In 5-6 years she'll be an 18 or 19 year old playing a 12 year old.

That just isn't workable, or at least I can't see how it can be. I'm wondering if they are planning on recasting the child roles? I'd think they'd have to be, and it makes me wonder how that will be handled.

Sorry if this has already been discussed and I missed it.

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I imagine they'll pad out the length of time between events in some fashion, but mostly, I think they will ignore it and ask viewers to ignore it as well as a conceit of the story. I mean, really, I can't imagine their even conceiving of recasting Maisie, for example. They struck gold with their casting for the young actors.

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Bran is probably already pushing eleven. The first season covered a good portion of a year (6-10 months?). The show didn't do a great job of convering the sense that time was passing, but Daenerys went through the bulk of a pregnancy. Tyrion travelled from Winterfell to the Wall to the Riverlands to the Eyrie, back to the Riverlands and is en route to Kings Landing in the end. He's spent months on the road.

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I imagine they'll pad out the length of time between events in some fashion, but mostly, I think they will ignore it and ask viewers to ignore it as well as a conceit of the story. I mean, really, I can't imagine their even conceiving of recasting Maisie, for example. They struck gold with their casting for the young actors.

GRRM's original conception of the series was that the children would grow up. Remember the proposed six-year gap? My prediction is that they'll find a way to stretch events out (or they'll pretend that events stretch out) so that each season takes roughly one year. The only problem I might foresee is if Bran gets too big for Hodor to carry.

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Very off topic, but is there any reason why GRRM wouldn't put in a 5 year gap in a later book of the series? Wrap up the necessary plot elements in ADWD and then make the jump in the next book? Or in the book after that?

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GRRM's original conception of the series was that the children would grow up. Remember the proposed six-year gap? My prediction is that they'll find a way to stretch events out (or they'll pretend that events stretch out) so that each season takes roughly one year. The only problem I might foresee is if Bran gets too big for Hodor to carry.

Maybe at that time, Hodor can instead wheel him around in a wheelchair/barrow like the geriatric child he would be then. ;)

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So lets say the the series lasts the duration? Bran is 10 years old in the show, and in 5 years (6 if they split season 3 as rumored) the actor that plays Bran will be 15 or 16, while the character will be what? Eleven? Arya...the actor is a 13 year-old playing an 11 year-old. In 5-6 years she'll be an 18 or 19 year old playing a 12 year old.

That just isn't workable, or at least I can't see how it can be. I'm wondering if they are planning on recasting the child roles? I'd think they'd have to be, and it makes me wonder how that will be handled.

Sorry if this has already been discussed and I missed it.

Each season lasts 1 year, just as each book does. What could make them older is if season 3 is split in two. But then, Martin has said that maybe books 4 and 5 (AFFC and ADWD) could be made into just one season.

Anyway, by the end of The Winds of Winter (supposedly book 7), Bran will be 13 in the books, Arya will be 14, Sansa will be 16, Jon will be 19. By the end of the 7th season (if there's one), each actor will be three years older than the character, if they use the same chronology as the series. They could make book 3 happen in the span of two years, and not one maybe, or make season 4 happen in the span of two years.

Since the TV show characters are all older than the book characters, I don't see a problem. Also, there's my theory that Arya will somehow magically age in the Temple of Black and White. That could be worked in the TV show very well.

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The only real issue with the children aging is Arya continuing to pass as a boy, but I think baggy clothes will be enough to work there. And if I recall, that's only necessary for one more season.

Yes, toward the end of book 2 she's revealed as a girl and poses as "Nymeria" aka Nan. So that shouldn't be an issue.

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The only real issue with the children aging is Arya continuing to pass as a boy, but I think baggy clothes will be enough to work there. And if I recall, that's only necessary for one more season.

Arya is only a 'boy' in disguise for a very short time in book two if you'll remember. While traveling with Yoren she's Arry, but once they're captured and taken to Harenhal, she's a girl from then onward. She's "Weasel" and then "Nan" as the cupbearer to Roose Bolton when he takes over there before escaping again with Gendry and Hotpie.

I suspect they won't keep her as a 'boy' but maybe one scene in the second season of the series - as they're taken to Harenhal, and then her time there will be maybe one more scene, maybe two, so they can show her and Jaqen interacting, the men he kills as repayment to her, and the "weasel soup" scene of freeing the captured northmen. Honestly, that's all Arya is in second season, a 'mouse' as she calls herself in a castle. They won't need to focus on her much until she goes across the narrow sea and by then she'll have aged as much as GRRM wanted originally anyways.

There are others who will age too, but I think the audience will expect it over the season's growth in years. It won't be true to the books that way, but honestly its ok with me and probably most people watching, since we have to wait a whole season to watch it again, it makes sense to see them 'growing up' over time.

Possibly the only place I can think it might be a problem is when Bran and Rickon are spirited away from Winterfell after the Greyjoy invasion and taken beyond the wall. By then, they won't be little boys anymore.

Sansa gets her 'flowering' towards the end of book two, and already looks mature for her age, so she'll be a full woman by the end of season two on the series. Arya won't be seen as much, and Daenerys is already a full grown woman by the end of season one, no more scared little girl (though she never did look 14 or so to me anyways). Jon and all the rest are adults too. It works.

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I guess I haven't seen a time-line for the books, but I didn't think each book covered a year each. Its hard to say for sure, since you can't tell by the changing seasons, but I would have put it at two years.

I'm not too worried about Sansa, as an 18 year-old girl, for instance, shouldn't have much problem playing a 15 year old girl. But by the 5th book, the actor playing Bran will be 5 to 6 years older (depending on whether they split book 3). It is just hard for me to think of Bran, at his point in the story, being 16.

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The only real issue with the children aging is Arya continuing to pass as a boy, but I think baggy clothes will be enough to work there. And if I recall, that's only necessary for one more season.

They can chest bind her anyway. This is a fairly nonissue in my opinion. And unless Maisie's really grown off screen, they are shooting season 2 soon and hopefully she hasn't grown too much.

Personally I think some of the child actors will be replaced, or their characters will be written out of the show. Good candidate would be Robin Arryn.

I'm more concerned about some of the older actors dying before their characters do. We've already had one death (the actress who played Old Nan).

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On the timeframe the show will surely take, they're going to run into some serious problems. I don't think they'll recast though: unless some kind of five-year gap occurs or something which will allow them to cast someone obviously older than the earlier incarnation, I think they'll just do what they can in terms of makeup, costuming, angles, and so forth to have the actor/actress play younger than they are.

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GRRM will just have to write faster. :D

They always intended to recast the children in the Harry Potter books as things progressed, but it was virtually impossible to imagine doing that after their personal fanbases grew so huge.

I think imagine it depends if each child is featured heavily in each season. If Bran and Rickon vanish for a while in the storyline, they could presumably come back as new actors and people would accept it.

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The only issue would be if they go with 2 seasons for Feast and Dance. I've never done the math, but 4 books into the series it seems like at least 3 years have passed. Game of Thrones seems to have taken about a year, if not more. Dany is married, rides around for awhile scared, gets pregnant and last about 9 months of time.

Considering how much traveling the characters are doing and how long that travel is said to take, I think each book is taking up more time than you might think.

The kids are each a couple years older to start with in the show. And each book doesn't take significantly less time than a year, if at all. Its a non issue, at least for the first 4 seasons. If it becomes an issue it will be an issue by only 1 year.

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I was thinking about that as well.

Sansa is OK, since she's already grown to her full height.

Bran and Arya are the ones who will get affected the most. A recast after season 3 is inevitable, maybe even after season 2. Sad, but that's the way it is.

You can't have Hodor still carrying a 13-year old Isaac Hempstead Wright, and you can't expect IHW to retain an air of innocence (which is crucial for Bran's character).

And Maisie will be a woman soon, and much too big to play the scrawny weasel that Arya is.

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So lets say the the series lasts the duration? Bran is 10 years old in the show, and in 5 years (6 if they split season 3 as rumored) the actor that plays Bran will be 15 or 16, while the character will be what? Eleven? Arya...the actor is a 13 year-old playing an 11 year-old. In 5-6 years she'll be an 18 or 19 year old playing a 12 year old.

That just isn't workable, or at least I can't see how it can be. I'm wondering if they are planning on recasting the child roles? I'd think they'd have to be, and it makes me wonder how that will be handled.

Sorry if this has already been discussed and I missed it.

Cryonic storage.

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Bran and Arya are the ones who will get affected the most. A recast after season 3 is inevitable, maybe even after season 2. Sad, but that's the way it is.

You can't have Hodor still carrying a 13-year old Isaac Hempstead Wright, and you can't expect IHW to retain an air of innocence (which is crucial for Bran's character).

And Maisie will be a woman soon, and much too big to play the scrawny weasel that Arya is.

Nah. Its more likely that they'll just adapt the story to deal with the cast been older than they were in the books. Remember, GRRM wanted the characters to be older after aSoS before realising it was too complicated to pull off. In this situation, the characters will already be at the right age.

For example, Arya only needs to be a scrawny weasel in S2. After that, its not important anymore. In fact, there are major advantages to her been older.

But then, Martin has said that maybe books 4 and 5 (AFFC and ADWD) could be made into just one season.

I'm pretty sure he hasn't said this.

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