[Book Spoilers] Joffrey and the whores

[Jakester]

I get that HBO wants T&A, but this isn't the T&A that most people are looking forward to (most) - whores being tortured by a 13 year old. Wasn't him having Sansa stripped and beaten enough to show his cruelty this episode?

I agree, over the top, unnecessary and a turn off to me in deciding to continue to watch the show or not. I dont want to watch constant twisted behavior. Really depraved people must LOVE watching these kind of scenes, Im sure people into torture, rape and extreme sadism, etc can get their rocks off watching this, but I'd rather pass and have a show that takes me on a journey and away from real life, not one that emphasizes all the evils in this world constantly.

I think these types of scenes would be better left to the imagination, and less of them so they had more impact. We already saw him ordering babies being killed, it's enough. If they wanted to emphasize his vileness a few more smacks on Sansa would have been enough.

[Catastrophe]

For all the flak it's gotten, I actually didn't mind this scene, and I usually hate when the show adds in superfluous sex scenes. It was extremely disturbing, but that's the point, it shows just how much of a sadistic little shit Joffrey is. In the books we got to see Joffrey's horrific behavior on a day-to-day basis in Tyrion and Sansa's chapters, but since a TV show can't go into that level of detail, it works better to have a few truly horrifying scenes to showcase the depths of his depravity.

[Ser Sweets]

I actually rather approved of the scene's addition. The very fact that half the posters in this thread seem to be disgusted by the addition of the scene prove that it accomplished what it was trying to do; to me, it also offered another point of justification as to why Ros is around.

I don't think it needed to be so long, though. My imagination would have actually done far worse things with that sceptre if, perhaps without the hoo-hah of crossbow, belt and overall elongation of the scene, they could have simply had him lay his eyes on the sceptre and given a wicked smirk.

The scene was fine. It just didn't need to take up so much screen time.

Also, I never stop being impressed by Gleeson's acting. He does such a great job as Joffrey - one of the better actors in the show, imho.

[Wonder]

I agree that it is a bit over the top, but it underlines a valuable point. That Joffrey doesn't learn and instead grow increasingly bitter. In this case particularly linked to the battle of will he just lost to Tyrion in the throne room about Sansa

[TheEvilKing]

I agree that it is a bit over the top, but it underlines a valuable point. That Joffrey doesn't learn and instead grow increasingly bitter. In this case particularly linked to the battle of will he just lost to Tyrion in the throne room about Sansa

Yeah it's more of a petty rebellion against Tyrion than just for his own pleasure. Tyrion stopped him from doing it to Sansa, fine, he'll have this whore beaten instead. I'm King, I can do what I want.

ETA: I also think it was kind of there to "make up for" the throne room scene with Sansa. For obvious reasons they can't strip her like in the books, and the audience would probably come away from that scene admiring Tyrion and pitying Sansa more than hating Joff. Thus, added scene.

Also, the pent up frustration Tyrion talks about in Joffrey turns out not to be sexual, but from being restrained in his cruelty. So he takes that out on the whores rather than banging them.

The more I think on it, the more in-character this scene was. Did it go too far? Maybe, it was certainly very disturbing ("what is she going to with that mace...") but it was totally in context for Joff to do that.

[BurnedCrow]

People, Joffrey does shit like this all the time in the books. It was more convenient for him to do it to Roz and a whore, for budget reasons (having live animals on a film shoot, or robotic ones, is costly and time wasting, if they were to try to put his crossbow shots on screen), plus it ties in with his enmity towards Tyrion. In the books, there is mention of his frequent desire to watch men fight to the death, the frequent beatings of Sansa (if he will beat his betrothed in broad daylight, wtf do you think he is going to do when the door is closed with two whores?). He is an impulsive little monster, who happens to be King of the Seven Kingdoms.

[Mulled Wino]

People, Joffrey does shit like this all the time in the books. It was more convenient for him to do it to Roz and a whore, for budget reasons (having live animals on a film shoot, or robotic ones, is costly and time wasting, if they were to try to put his crossbow shots on screen), plus it ties in with his enmity towards Tyrion. In the books, there is mention of his frequent desire to watch men fight to the death, the frequent beatings of Sansa (if he will beat his betrothed in broad daylight, wtf do you think he is going to do when the door is closed with two whores?). He is an impulsive little monster, who happens to be King of the Seven Kingdoms.

except that there is absolutely no impression to the viewer that kings landing is under any sort of danger, there's zero setup for Blackwater, I mean, tyrion hasn't started the chain yet, not has he met with the pyromancers, renly and stannis are in some distant land that hasn't really been explained and robb stark is beating the lannisters in their back yard, but no one seems the least bit concerned.

kings landing is still a bunch of hookers and tricks, hanging out. doing what they do.

where is the starving city? where is the food supply being cut off? where's the people despising joff and tyrion?

[Mad Queen]

That scene made me sick, but didn't Joffrey shoot some of the people who were begging for food at the Red Keep's gate in the book as well? Although there is no corresponding scene in ACoK, I can see book Joffrey doing the same. The killing of the bastards bothers me a lot more because it makes no sense to me.

[Sam with Hooters]

CrypticWeirdwood wrote:

Did you really expect even HBO to show a bare-butted Jackie Gleason doing a couple of whores? Sure, he’s 18 now and all, but I don’t know that that would have gone over very well. I guess they could have shown him with some sort of unexplained scarring on his backside to help explain his wickedness.

*shudder* Jackie "Honeymooners" Gleason has been dead for years, so, no, no one wants to see that.

As for the young Gleeson, however, if HBO wanted to show that he'd rather get laid than force one whore to beat the other up, it could've easily been implied rather than shown:

Whore(s): Happy nameday!

Joffrey (interested, embracing): Remind me to thank my uncle for his gifts later.

Fade out, next scene, no problem.

[Envie]

CrypticWeirdwood wrote:

*shudder* Jackie "Honeymooners" Gleason has been dead for years, so, no, no one wants to see that.

As for the young Gleeson, however, if HBO wanted to show that he'd rather get laid than force one whore to beat the other up, it could've easily been implied rather than shown:

Whore(s): Happy nameday!

Joffrey (interested, embracing): Remind me to thank my uncle for his gifts later.

Fade out, next scene, no problem.

I agree, seeing Joffrey having sex with whores would not have been nearly as effective as the scene they chose to do instead. Sure, lots of people have been annoyed with it in this thread, but more annoyed that it seemed unnecessary and redundant rather than disgusted or turned off. I think the running theme in many of the discussion debates which include the whore scenes or Ros seem to go that way, and if that's any majority poll indication, I think the producers should stop and listen to the fans a bit... seems most are getting a wee bit tired of all the whore scenes and would prefer to see more important storyline scenes. Yes, yes, I know - GRRM wrote lots of sex and violence too... so tell me again why exactly we need the HBO creators to add their own on top of what's already been written?

We all understand visual plot devices, we get it. Some feel they're being bashed with a scepter too because apparently audiences need lots of sexual depravity to 'get it' in this show.

[johnnysd]

I think people are missing the point of this scene. It was only partly about reinforcing that Joffrey is a monster and nothing at all to do with sexposition.

A them of this weeks episode was the effect that the game of thrones and the decisions that all the key characters have on the average citizen.

We say it in several ways:

1. Robb wins a "glorious" battle to defend his father's honor and to rescue his sisters, but makes almost no thought to the thousands of common people he is killing to achieve that goal, regular people like fisherman that are thrust into battle without out really knowing which side is which and why they are even fighting. Robb, at least in this episode does not really care. He is king in the north and this was just one part of his ongoing fight.

2. Roose Bolton casually talks about flaying people to get information not caring at all about the people

3, Dany's entire khalasar faces starvation and death by thirst because of their association with the mother of dragons, when the reality is that any one of them like the bloodrider could just approach and be let in

4. Then the Joffrey scene: Ros and her associate are amongst the lowest class of Westeros but they are people with feelings and dreams. This scene showed that they were playthings for a king to do with as he pleased and they had no recourse to stop it or face death. More than demonizing Joffrey that scene was very much about humanizing the victims. I doubt any viewer cared what their professions was, but they completely empathized with the victim.

Interestingly there was a very interesting counterpoint to all of this in the episode. Stannis and Renly are at a standstill. Their armies could fight and hundred maybe thousands would die before one of them was a victor. Stannis takes another route and uses Melisandre and dark magic to take out the only noble that matters in this case and save thousands of peoples lives, yet he will likely be branded an evil man and a coward with no honor, when what he did is easily less evil than the alternative.

Of course all this ties in with one of major themes of the story.

Jamie does the most honorable thing in the last was by killing he mad king, yet he is branded a traitor, a kingslayer and a man of no honor. While Robert leads an entire war killing thousands upon thousands of innocent people and is crowned king,

That is the purpose of this scene, and in that I think it is exrtremely successful and in line with one of the major themes of the book.

[voodooqueen126]

I think the whole Roz character is irrelevant and annoying.

Joffrey's sadism could easily be shown by having him beat Sansa frequently, this is not only in keeping with the books, but is also relevant: it doesn't matter if Joffrey sadistically tortures prostitutes, because nobody has any way of knowing that (except the Hound and Baelish), but the fact that Joffrey treated his betrothed, and the daughter of Lord Stark/a very important political hostage, in such a manner is the thing that definitively brings about his own downfall, since it is Sansa's testimony of Joffrey's evil that clinches the Tyrell desire to kill Joffrey before he has the oppurtunity to treat Margaery like that.

[Tadco26]

Some replies here have mentioned that they need to add more of Joffrey's evil actions because some of his have been cut from the book, but that ignores the fact that LOTS of stuff has been cut from the book for all the characters. So why is this act necessary when so many other things that have been cut are not? They already added Joffrey's unexplained murdering of his, what he believes to be, bastard step-brothers and sisters. He has already threatened to kill his mother. If people don't get the fact that he is evil by the time the Sansa scene is over, then they aren't really watching.

As for getting back at Tyrion for showing him up in court, that warrants asking ourselves why Tyrion was able to stop him in the court in the first place? In the books it's by threatening to tell his mother what he is doing which cows him, but TV Joffrey has already made it plain that he does whatever he likes and has threated to kill Cersei... So why does TV Joffrey "allow" Tyrion to stop the beating? Just because he has Bronn? This is a plot hole that opens up from the changes of previous writer created scenes. In fact I find it practically impossible to believe that TV Joffrey who appears to have the powers of a full king and no respect or curtailing from his mother, would let TV Tyrion live thru the events of Clash and Storm of Swords. All because of simple writing changes that would have taken no longer to play out if they followed the book. Some how on the show we are supposed to believe that Joffrey has no regards for what Cersei says, but will be curtailed by Tyrion...

[Honey Badger]

I wish HBO never went through the Rome/Deadwood debacle where they overspent and had to go around canceling stuff not named The Wire. We see the consequences of a weakened HBO with 10 episode seasons with only a 50 minute episode. Might as well add commercial breaks at this rate.

The whore beating scene wouldn't be so bad with 13 episodes and a 110 minute run time each. But with the condensed budget, it's getting grating with Ros. End her life already, because I didn't like the shortened Sansa scene, and the rushed parley sucked. It wasn't even a peach; Renly picked up an apple and bit before ever meeting Stannis.

[Eggplant Wizard]

I think people are missing the point of this scene. It was only partly about reinforcing that Joffrey is a monster and nothing at all to do with sexposition.

A them of this weeks episode was the effect that the game of thrones and the decisions that all the key characters have on the average citizen.

We say it in several ways:

1. Robb wins a "glorious" battle to defend his father's honor and to rescue his sisters, but makes almost no thought to the thousands of common people he is killing to achieve that goal, regular people like fisherman that are thrust into battle without out really knowing which side is which and why they are even fighting. Robb, at least in this episode does not really care. He is king in the north and this was just one part of his ongoing fight.

2. Roose Bolton casually talks about flaying people to get information not caring at all about the people

3, Dany's entire khalasar faces starvation and death by thirst because of their association with the mother of dragons, when the reality is that any one of them like the bloodrider could just approach and be let in

4. Then the Joffrey scene: Ros and her associate are amongst the lowest class of Westeros but they are people with feelings and dreams. This scene showed that they were playthings for a king to do with as he pleased and they had no recourse to stop it or face death. More than demonizing Joffrey that scene was very much about humanizing the victims. I doubt any viewer cared what their professions was, but they completely empathized with the victim.

Interestingly there was a very interesting counterpoint to all of this in the episode. Stannis and Renly are at a standstill. Their armies could fight and hundred maybe thousands would die before one of them was a victor. Stannis takes another route and uses Melisandre and dark magic to take out the only noble that matters in this case and save thousands of peoples lives, yet he will likely be branded an evil man and a coward with no honor, when what he did is easily less evil than the alternative.

Of course all this ties in with one of major themes of the story.

Jamie does the most honorable thing in the last was by killing he mad king, yet he is branded a traitor, a kingslayer and a man of no honor. While Robert leads an entire war killing thousands upon thousands of innocent people and is crowned king,

That is the purpose of this scene, and in that I think it is exrtremely successful and in line with one of the major themes of the book.

Very subtle read of the episode, good post.

[Envie]

As for getting back at Tyrion for showing him up in court, that warrants asking ourselves why Tyrion was able to stop him in the court in the first place? In the books it's by threatening to tell his mother what he is doing which cows him, but TV Joffrey has already made it plain that he does whatever he likes and has threated to kill Cersei... So why does TV Joffrey "allow" Tyrion to stop the beating? Just because he has Bronn? This is a plot hole that opens up from the changes of previous writer created scenes. In fact I find it practically impossible to believe that TV Joffrey who appears to have the powers of a full king and no respect or curtailing from his mother, would let TV Tyrion live thru the events of Clash and Storm of Swords. All because of simple writing changes that would have taken no longer to play out if they followed the book. Some how on the show we are supposed to believe that Joffrey has no regards for what Cersei says, but will be curtailed by Tyrion...

This is a really good point - especially the part I put in bold font. Since they changed how Joffrey and Cersei behave. they've created a domino effect of other necessary changes in order to convey the same thing the book did in a much more subtle way and now they're contradicting some of those changes.

I know it's impossible to make the show exactly like the book. Most of the subtle character portrayals just do not translate well to screen and actors without tons and tons of additional scenes to explain it. There's no 'narrator' and they've got to limit the amount of info crammed into each episode. That being said, I have to kind of agree that they're cutting the episode short while adding these scenes that may not have been necessary.

[Thunderfist]

My main objection to this scene is that it took time away from what I feel are much more interesting and important issues. If the point of the scene was to show that Joffrey is cruel, sadistic and mad as a hatter, there are other ways that this could have been done. They could have extended the Sansa beating scene a little bit, giving the Hound a chance to get some lines in. They could also have shown Joffrey shooting the hungry beggars with his crossbow which would really make the riots in KL (when they see Myrcella off) alot more understandable, at this stage in the show we haven´t really seen much that indicates that the citizens of KL are hungry, frightened and angry.

[ChromeWeasel]

I think the whole Roz character is irrelevant and annoying.

Joffrey's sadism could easily be shown by having him beat Sansa frequently, this is not only in keeping with the books, but is also relevant: it doesn't matter if Joffrey sadistically tortures prostitutes, because nobody has any way of knowing that (except the Hound and Baelish), but the fact that Joffrey treated his betrothed, and the daughter of Lord Stark/a very important political hostage, in such a manner is the thing that definitively brings about his own downfall, since it is Sansa's testimony of Joffrey's evil that clinches the Tyrell desire to kill Joffrey before he has the oppurtunity to treat Margaery like that.

My immediate thought from that scene was that Ros is a pretty lousy whore. By that I mean that she's not very good at the 'acting' part of the job. Sizing men up and making them feel special, and making men feel like there's a connection between them and her. Instilling empathy is pretty important in the long run, keeps you from getting tossed around, makes you more money, and lets you spend less time on your back overall. It's more than half the job for an expensive whore.

Ros did put in a token effort at getting Joffrey to get into the sex more than the torture, but that was a pretty weak effort. She just dropped one comment, and it wasn't at all seductive or convincing. It was more 'that's not how you do this,' which is going to fall on deaf ears when you're talking to a spoiled young king.

Now Joffrey is clearly one sick puppy, and a decent person wouldnt beat whores or Sansa. But my point isnt that Joffrey was justified. My point is that Ros is NOT an effective high-end whore. Ros upset another customer in a recent episode with her crying over the assassinated infant. That's understandable, but its also bad whoring. She also didnt seem to get it when Baelish was teaching her how to 'act' last season, in a fairly painful scene that was well discussed here.

It all makes me wonder if there's any consistency with this, or if the show just isnt paying attention to Ros as a character. Did Baelish offer Ros up to Tyrion knowing that she's not well suited for Joffrey? We never saw whether Ros came back the day after her crying episode, and didnt upset any more customers. If Baelish suspected that Joffrey would beat on whoever was sent to him by Tyrion, then the whole thing could be a punishment for Ros. It would be EXACTLY the kind of repercussion that Baelish told Ros she should expect if she didnt get her act together.

On the other hand, if neither Tyrion nor Baelish expected any issues with Joffrey, it diminishes both those characters a bit. Baelish should know at this point how much of a lunatic Joffrey is. Sending Ros, who Baelish should know to be a fairly inneffective whore (outside of her looks), would suggest that Baelish is not that clever.

I don't know if the show accounted for any of this at all though. For all we know, they may just like putting Ros on camera because one of the producers has something going on with the actress.

[Neffaria]

The scene made me feel physically ill, but it was important to the plot. It shows just how much danger Sansa, and later Margaery, are actually in.

couldnt agree with you more. I have a few friends that watched the show and I asked them if they thought it was over the top and unnecessary or gratuitous. One said he always figured joff was a jerk but thought that was more of a power hungry ruler "Im the king and a bad one at that" kind of jerk.. the fact that he did it behind closed doors made them really afraid for Sansa...they're all pretty afraid for her. which i think is good, because up till this episode they werent really getting the fact that she is pretending to still be in love. Now, especially after the beating scene and small conversation with tyrion, they got it, and then they became scared for her.

I didnt like the scene, thought it was too much, and I do think that if they could have extended the Sansa beating scene and it would have had the same effect, but it is possible that b/c sophie doesnt do nudity they went about it a different way

[Neffaria]

Completely agree. I'd like to think that they are saving everything for Blackwater, but watch... just watch... Blackwater will amount to barely anything while we'll spend all of our time in church with Cersie and Sansa.

Wow. I need sleep. I'm so grumpy. It's more my passion for Martin, though. My passion, can't you see?

I will bet that they did save a bulk of the budget for this one, Thank god george himself is writing this episode. I for one CANNOT wait. I think it will be fantastic.