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[Book Spoilers] The countinuing emasculation of Jon Snow


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Other than Simon Armitage's Halfhand, Jon's story is actually better than in the books, as is Dany's. This scenario makes his being taken in by Mance more believable than in the books. And as for the Halfhand, he was more the 'strong, silent type' in the books, which just doesn't work on TV when its the leader. And to be fair, for what he's been given, Simon Armitage is doing a solid job as Qhorin Halfhand.

Better is always subjective of course, but if the wildling's force them to fight to the death, then it really isn't much of a choice. Sure they could choose to both die by the wildling's hand instead, but killing Qhorin under wildling threat of death would make me less likely to believe the act meant anything regarding his loyalties if I was Mance. The way it was set up in the books where Qhorin set Jon up to look like a turn cloak to the wildlings was much more believeable to me.

Of course we don't know exactly how it is going to happen on the show yet, so we can't really judge what the show is going to do for good or bad with Jon and Qhorin's fight, but the changes they have made to this point don't leave me with a ton of confidence.

It will be interesting to see how they set up the fight, since the whole reason both of them were captured rather than killed was to take to Mance, who as far as I know has not been cast for the show yet. Qhorin may not have a ton of lines in the book, but he has more than enough to fill up the brief screen time he gets. When they make up dialogue where Qhorin calls the wildlings "goat fuckers", when book Qhorin clearly respects the wildlings as enemies then it is hard to say they did a good job writing the character. It's also hard to believe that book Qhorin would ever allow himself to be captured alive.

The show could have kept the majority of the stuff they have filmed and made it much more faithful just by switching the order around and adjusting abit of the dialogue.

1)Have Ygritte escape from Jon after he fails to execute her rather than be recaptured.

2) Qhorin finds Jon, and if they don't want to show the other ranger's being picked off one by one (which would have added some much needed action without having to make up scenes like Jaime chocking his cousin or Pyat killing 12 of the 13), then they could have Qhorin just tell Jon that the wildling's killed off the others and he barely escaped or something along those lines.

3) Wildlings corner Jon and Qhorin and they have their fight.

4) Ygritte and Jon have their walk in the snow and taunting/flirting in a more believeable circumstance where she thinks he has joined them rather than her being tied up.

Should take about the same amount of screen time as what they made up and it would hit most of the highlights of the book story line in a condensed fashion.

For Jon and Dany I think that while the actors may not be perfect, any actor would have a tough time with the writing that has been provided for them this season. Of course I generally enjoyed both Jon and Dany's book story lines, so it seems we just have different outlooks on what makes a good story.

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Better is always subjective of course, but if the wildling's force them to fight to the death, then it really isn't much of a choice. Sure they could choose to both die by the wildling's hand instead, but killing Qhorin under wildling threat of death would make me less likely to believe the act meant anything regarding his loyalties if I was Mance. The way it was set up in the books where Qhorin set Jon up to look like a turn cloak to the wildlings was much more believeable to me.

Of course we don't know exactly how it is going to happen on the show yet, so we can't really judge what the show is going to do for good or bad with Jon and Qhorin's fight, but the changes they have made to this point don't leave me with a ton of confidence.

It will be interesting to see how they set up the fight, since the whole reason both of them were captured rather than killed was to take to Mance, who as far as I know has not been cast for the show yet. Qhorin may not have a ton of lines in the book, but he has more than enough to fill up the brief screen time he gets. When they make up dialogue where Qhorin calls the wildlings "goat fuckers", when book Qhorin clearly respects the wildlings as enemies then it is hard to say they did a good job writing the character. It's also hard to believe that book Qhorin would ever allow himself to be captured alive.

The show could have kept the majority of the stuff they have filmed and made it much more faithful just by switching the order around and adjusting abit of the dialogue.

1)Have Ygritte escape from Jon after he fails to execute her rather than be recaptured.

2) Qhorin finds Jon, and if they don't want to show the other ranger's being picked off one by one (which would have added some much needed action without having to make up scenes like Jaime chocking his cousin or Pyat killing 12 of the 13), then they could have Qhorin just tell Jon that the wildling's killed off the others and he barely escaped or something along those lines.

3) Wildlings corner Jon and Qhorin and they have their fight.

4) Ygritte and Jon have their walk in the snow and taunting/flirting in a more believeable circumstance where she thinks he has joined them rather than her being tied up.

Should take about the same amount of screen time as what they made up and it would hit most of the highlights of the book story line in a condensed fashion.

For Jon and Dany I think that while the actors may not be perfect, any actor would have a tough time with the writing that has been provided for them this season. Of course I generally enjoyed both Jon and Dany's book story lines, so it seems we just have different outlooks on what makes a good story.

Exactly, this so very much. Great post.

The show is in no way more believable for Mance accepting Jon.

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Better is always subjective of course, but if the wildling's force them to fight to the death, then it really isn't much of a choice. Sure they could choose to both die by the wildling's hand instead, but killing Qhorin under wildling threat of death would make me less likely to believe the act meant anything regarding his loyalties if I was Mance. The way it was set up in the books where Qhorin set Jon up to look like a turn cloak to the wildlings was much more believeable to me. Of course we don't know exactly how it is going to happen on the show yet, so we can't really judge what the show is going to do for good or bad with Jon and Qhorin's fight, but the changes they have made to this point don't leave me with a ton of confidence. It will be interesting to see how they set up the fight, since the whole reason both of them were captured rather than killed was to take to Mance, who as far as I know has not been cast for the show yet. Qhorin may not have a ton of lines in the book, but he has more than enough to fill up the brief screen time he gets. When they make up dialogue where Qhorin calls the wildlings "goat fuckers", when book Qhorin clearly respects the wildlings as enemies then it is hard to say they did a good job writing the character. It's also hard to believe that book Qhorin would ever allow himself to be captured alive. The show could have kept the majority of the stuff they have filmed and made it much more faithful just by switching the order around and adjusting abit of the dialogue. 1)Have Ygritte escape from Jon after he fails to execute her rather than be recaptured. 2) Qhorin finds Jon, and if they don't want to show the other ranger's being picked off one by one (which would have added some much needed action without having to make up scenes like Jaime chocking his cousin or Pyat killing 12 of the 13), then they could have Qhorin just tell Jon that the wildling's killed off the others and he barely escaped or something along those lines. 3) Wildlings corner Jon and Qhorin and they have their fight. 4) Ygritte and Jon have their walk in the snow and taunting/flirting in a more believeable circumstance where she thinks he has joined them rather than her being tied up. Should take about the same amount of screen time as what they made up and it would hit most of the highlights of the book story line in a condensed fashion. For Jon and Dany I think that while the actors may not be perfect, any actor would have a tough time with the writing that has been provided for them this season. Of course I generally enjoyed both Jon and Dany's book story lines, so it seems we just have different outlooks on what makes a good story.

This is exactly what I think they should've done. It's much more thrilling and dramatic. The reason why I think they didn't choose this path is that they wanted Jon's storyline to end with him killing Qhorin and if they followed this scenario, then this would appear somewhere around the 8th episode. Which is perfectly fine in my opinion. They could end his storyline with Orell attacking Jon or Ghost seeing Mance's army with the mammoths and giants. It'd work great as a cliffhanger. I really have no idea why they decided against it.

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I think the emasculation term is a poor one, because no one is saying Jon Show is gay, feminine, or a eunuch. Better to say he's dumbed down, slow, and stupid--like ShowTyrion is whitewashed and ShowCat is irrational. "Stupid" doesn't have a gender. If he's kept in a perpetual state of childhood, then the infantilization of Jon Snow might be a better descriptor.

Weakening is a better synonym than those 3. Its not a dig at his straightness.

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I have to agree, he is acting more like Waymer Royce, make that Ser Waymer Royce, he was knight no matter what else he was than than like the bastard son of Ned Stark who was well educated at Winterfell and liked because he usually understood his place, hence his joining the Watch voluntarily. He is acting more like a willful child than a young man who was castle bred and raised. He would know from Winterfell how a subordinate acts towards his Lord. In the book he gives his objections about Craster to Mormont privately, when they are leaving instead of almost getting himself killed doing something stupid and embarresing his superior who had just previously warned hom about his behaivior. It would have made more sense for Mormont to send him back to the Wall to muck stables after that rather than to keep him with the ranging much less send him with the Halfhand. Its not realistic in terms of a military organization like the Nights Watch.

So true.

"hope you make a better ranger than a steward", yet they are going to send him on arguably the most important nights watch ranging in history...

Um, not believing it.

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Sanette, I think the writers are primarily responsible for the atrocity that is Jon Show but I'm not convinced some of Kit's acting decisions haven't played a role and perhaps influenced the way D & D decided to develop the character. Let me just say right off that I would hate to think this comes across as being disrespectful or hostile to Kit, who I agree is a good actor and I'm sure he is doing his best with the role. He has as much right to interpret Jon Snow as the rest of us. Nevertheless I find it hard to believe Jon Show's almost comical gormlessness in season 1, when the script did not require it in most places, isn't due in part to how Kit interpreted the part. I doubt the director was asking him to have his mouth hanging open all the time whenever he was receiving a dressing down, as well as on lots of other occasions. I just found his expressions really unfortunate as they didn't convey that he was thinking much about anything that was said to him. They just made him look stupefied and shocked. It looked like it was hard for him to adsorb a lot of what was said to him. I think book Jon can think on his feet, at least to a fair degree and that he is an intense, earnest thinker. Kit's expressions definitely conveyed the opposite, imo. His expression when he was given Ghost was just horrible, kind of an 'urgh, is this a white wolf, maybe, need to think hard?' When Mormont talked to him about his attempted desertion his mouth just never closed the whole way through! It made me such a sad panda. He came across as by far the most dopey and slow witted of the main characters and I think this was at least in part due to Kit's decisions. It seems at least plausible that this influenced D & D as the script in season 2 does require Kit to look mighty stupid, especially when Qhorin talks to him. He has to look very dumb for Qhorin's 'you are even dumber than you look,' line to work and boy did Kit deliver! Again, no hostility or disrespect to KH is intended by this post.

I guess this is a bit subjective.

I first watched season one before reading the books and TV Jon (guess also KH) is the reason Jon became my favourite character.

Then in the books, I liked him even more. My perceptions of book-Jon and TV-Jon were very mixed-up just until I started watching season two. And then I realised something was wrong with my favourite.

So in mind I have already built up the image of Jon Snow looking like KH, because I read the books after the show. It would have been really hard to build up a complete different character image in my mind, based only on the books.

It is interesting though how the non-book readers perceive Jon's character. I asked one non-book reader if he also thought Jon seemed stupid in the second season. He told me: "No, but olny because he didn't seem very bright in the first season either."

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Why do Ghost? Jon's already going there...... It would make the Jon Show/Ghost storyline more laughable. So you are suggesting that Ghost finally shows up after Jon Show's been captured out of the blue? I just want to be clear. Where has Ghost been? What was he doing all this time, why is he playing voyeur? Summer was with Bran so it makes sense that he's there looking at Bran's face.

Yeah, I also thought it would be cool to show the warging scene this way, but than the exactly same thing crossed my mind.

So if they show Ghost just out of nowhere, looking upon the gathered wildlings I will be: "Huh, where has he been all the time?!"

Don't get me wrong, I understand that the direwolves and the dragons are expensive extras and we aren't going to see a lot of them. But I need some plausible explanation why we are not seeing a lot of them. Sorry, but "Ghost is a wild creature and wild creatures do what they like" doesn't work for me... and it's not true in the context of the books. So I'm fine with not seeing Ghost very often, just I need a good reason for that. And it is also a pity, that the non-book readers are not aware of the importance of the direwolves.

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Yeah, I also thought it would be cool to show the warging scene this way, but than the exactly same thing crossed my mind. So if they show Ghost just out of nowhere, looking upon the gathered wildlings I will be: "Huh, where has he been all the time?!" Don't get me wrong, I understand that the direwolves and the dragons are expensive extras and we aren't going to see a lot of them. But I need some plausible explanation why we are not seeing a lot of them. Sorry, but "Ghost is a wild creature and wild creatures do what they like" doesn't work for me... and it's not true in the context of the books. So I'm fine with not seeing Ghost very often, just I need a good reason for that. And it is also a pity, that the non-book readers are not aware of the importance of the direwolves.

couldnt they have just done it like they did brans dream with camera work, seeing the wilding horde and then Jon waking up? no CGI required

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couldnt they have just done it like they did brans dream with camera work, seeing the wilding horde and then Jon waking up? no CGI required

I think that could work. I'm curious if they are going to show the Jon-warging part at all. If they do, it would be clear to the TV audience that the warging into direwolves is not just a Bran-thing, but a Stark-thing.

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I think that could work. I'm curious if they are going to show the Jon-warging part at all. If they do, it would be clear to the TV audience that the warging into direwolves is not just a Bran-thing, but a Stark-thing.

They better show it soon otherwise the twist at the end of ADwD will look pretty contrived since most of us presume that Jon wargs into Ghost at that moment. And not just because of that. Isn't Jon the most powerful warg of all the Starks? And I don't think they managed to explain what the hell happens to Bran when he has his dreams anyway. This is why they need the Reeds. The whole warging thing has been really overlooked so far.

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I guess this is a bit subjective. I first watched season one before reading the books and TV Jon (guess also KH) is the reason Jon became my favourite character. Then in the books, I liked him even more. My perceptions of book-Jon and TV-Jon were very mixed-up just until I started watching season two. And then I realised something was wrong with my favourite. So in mind I have already built up the image of Jon Snow looking like KH, because I read the books after the show. It would have been really hard to build up a complete different character image in my mind, based only on the books. It is interesting though how the non-book readers perceive Jon's character. I asked one non-book reader if he also thought Jon seemed stupid in the second season. He told me: "No, but olny because he didn't seem very bright in the first season either."

Interesting. I think it is quite telling that non-readers aren't screaming blue murder over Jon's behavior this season.

Kit's Jon is the only major character in the series who captures nothing of my image of his book character. Sure, a lot of the others have been badly out of character in book terms almost from the start (I'm looking at you Cat) but I do feel some of their scenes, even now, still get somewhere near the essence of the people they are in the books. Kit's Jon though I totally disliked from the start. He just came across as a dopey wimp.

This is fine though, I love how close Alfie and Emilia are to their book characters so I can't reasonably expect more from an adaptation.

Jenny's Dolfen's fan art perfectly captures my image of Jon Snow.

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No. That would be Bran, followed by Arya.

You're right. I got it mixed up. Varamyr said that Jon was more powerful than him and not the rest of the Starks. Still, Bran is so powerful that I take him for more of a greenseer than a warg. I know that he's both though. And we don't know if Arya is better at warging than Jon since she isn't in Westeros (fell free to correct me if I'm wrong).

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No. That would be Bran, followed by Arya.

Bran is the only one of the 6 children that have received guidance about his ability too. I think Bran's warging ability was hastened by his desperation to be able to move- via Hodor. I'm guessing that the other 4 kids could be equally as strong if someone counseled them.

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D&D must really hate Jon, otherwise I have no idea why would they butcher his storyline and his character like this. It's just sad.

Agree :crying:

Robb's portrayal has been AMAZING until this episode. Now he's the doofus that will lose the North due to a woody ( and his life and the banner-men's lives). And Jaime is being made into a psychopath:(

Those writers must love Cersei and Caitlyn though. They are showing them as kinder and gentler women than they are in the books.

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Agree :crying:

Robb's portrayal has been AMAZING until this episode. Now he's the doofus that will lose the North due to a woody ( and his life and the banner-men's lives). And Jaime is being made into a psychopath:(

Those writers must love Cersei and Caitlyn though. They are showing them as kinder and gentler women than they are in the books.

Yes I fucking hate how you can tell who their favorites are, and who they could give a shit less about. I have said it before, and I will say it again, you should not be able to tell who the writers personally like and who they don't like. They basically force the audience how to view a character, and it's bullshit. They should let the audience deside who they do, and don't like.

We get it, you guys love Ros and you think your so clever for creating her. We get it, you love Tyrion, Littlefinger, Theon, Arya, and Margaery, and you hate Stannis and Jon.

Their own take on characters should not reflect on how they write the characters... It makes me so angry, let the audience think for themselves!

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maybe we should understand that stannis is a goner and john is not tPtWP or AAR as they know the end of the story

That's not the case, I am sure of it. They just aren't that big into that part of the story, with the prophecys and Jon's parentage etc, the show would rather dwell on the political intrigue and stuff, because that is what D&D like best about the story. Instead of making a true adaptation like they should be doing, they are just playing up the things they personally like best(like everybody must like everything they do), and they are downplaying what they like the least about the story. It's bullshit really, and I hate it. Of course some people will agree with them, because a lot of people like best the same parts of the story as they like. At the same time though, there are people who love the other elements of the story best, or there are people like me who love all of it best. They should be showing the bests of both sides of the story, instead of neglecting what they don't really like.

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