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Game of Thrones: the last series [SPOILERS]

Started by sheridan, 15 April, 2019, 11:09:22 AM

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sheridan

The first episode was aired at 9 EST (which I think was 20:00 EDT and definitely was 02:00 this morning).  For more daylight-minded people in GMT/BST I believe UK broadcasters are showing it again at a 21:00 this evening.


Let the speculation commence!


p.s. the producers put together a playlist of music which (they say) holds some secrets about how the series is going to go - I'll try to dig out a link later.

sheridan

p.p.s. I would suggest spoiler tags are used for a day or two after an episode airs in the UK to reflect modern viewing habits, particularly on major revelations and plots developments.

radiator

Saw it last night. Unfortunately we had agreed to watch it at a friends house so they could show off their new 65" TV, and the factory settings - massively overclocked contrast and sharpening and that abysmal motion smoothing/interpolation feature - spoiled the experience somewhat. I can't stand that motion smoothing thing, it makes everything look like it's running at 1.5x speed and like it was shot on a cheap camcorder, and for some reason makes the special effects look really jarring - the scenes of Jon and Dany and the dragons looked like outtakes from the 90s movie Dragonheart. We had to rewatch most of the episode when we got home.

As for the episode, it was as expected - thoroughly entertaining nonsense.

The show's days as a genuinely excellent drama series are so far behind it at this point I think the best outcome is that they deliver some spectacle and don't completely screw up the landing.

sheridan

Quote from: radiator on 15 April, 2019, 06:31:04 PM
As for the episode, it was as expected - thoroughly entertaining nonsense.

The show's days as a genuinely excellent drama series are so far behind it at this point I think the best outcome is that they deliver some spectacle and don't completely screw up the landing.

It's certainly lost something since they had to diverge from GRRM's writing.  Having said that, it's also gained something with the increase in budget and scope since those far-off days when each episode had to make do with a budget of just $5,000,000...  Seriously though - it's a classic three-act structure, with set-up/exposition, conflict/rising action and climax/resolution.

radiator

Quote from: sheridan on 16 April, 2019, 01:38:14 AM
Quote from: radiator on 15 April, 2019, 06:31:04 PM
As for the episode, it was as expected - thoroughly entertaining nonsense.

The show's days as a genuinely excellent drama series are so far behind it at this point I think the best outcome is that they deliver some spectacle and don't completely screw up the landing.

It's certainly lost something since they had to diverge from GRRM's writing.  Having said that, it's also gained something with the increase in budget and scope since those far-off days when each episode had to make do with a budget of just $5,000,000...  Seriously though - it's a classic three-act structure, with set-up/exposition, conflict/rising action and climax/resolution.

I'm really not a fan of how a lot of the nuance and moral ambiguity has been stripped away to (pretty much) leave us with a cast of clear cut 'good guys' and 'bad guys', and how those good guys are essentially now superheroes who are impervious to the laws of physics. A lot of the gritty realism* that defined the early seasons has been jettisoned entirely in favour of shallow spectacle.

It's odd, for example, that the showrunners are evidently so afraid of their pet favourite characters doing anything too dark vs the books, and always tweak the narrative so they can present characters like Tyrion as totally virtuous, when the most enduring and iconic TV characters of the last 10-15 years have all been various degrees of monster (Tony Soprano, Walter White, Don Draper) whom we (somewhat) love and root for regardless. I feel like the Tyrion of seasons 1-3 could have been one of those kinds of characters if they had stayed the course instead of neutering and sanitising him from season 4 on.

Another example is Jon Snow, whose murder in the books is pretty much justified and is the direct and inevitable result of his own actions (ie compromising the Nights Watch's neutrality for personal reasons), making for a far more interesting plot development, whereas the show presented it as a far less interesting cut and dry - Jon was 100% right, his killers were evil and wrong. As a result, Jon is quite a bland, Harry Potter like figure in the TV show.

*Before anyone says it, yes, it has dragons in it, but seasons 1-4 feel infinitely more realistic, where a simple mistake could cost a character their head, a moral misjudgement had severe and far reaching consequences, and a brutal plot twist always felt totally earned in retrospect. The show in its current form doesn't seem to really adhere to any kind of logic or plausibility - the amount of miraculous last minute saves and improbable rescues ([spoiler]the latest being Theon and Yara in this ep[/spoiler]) just defy plausibility to the point where you just kind of have to roll your eyes and move on. It used to be a show that turned genre conventions on their heads, whereas now it wallows in tired action/adventure cliche.

Funt Solo

++SEASON 7 SPOILERS HERE++

My least favorite part of season #7 was where Aria single-handedly removes the Freys from the plot by poisoning an entire clan.  Prior to this she's also managed to secretly bake Frey's sons into pies.

I thought the whole point of the faceless assassins was that they secretly offed people - secretly.  So's as you might think it was an accident.  What value was there in secretly baking the sons (presumably in a kitchen - where you'd have to chop them up - a busy castle kitchen - chopping famous people up)?  Nobody sipped the wine early? Etc.

With the diversion from the books (due, one assumes, to the author's apparent writer's block) has come a diversion from subtlety and (intrinsic) logic. 

Dragons are zombies are fine, as long as they follow a narrative logic.  But how do you secretly bake people in a busy castle? 
++ A-Z ++  coma ++

radiator

The pie thing is in the books, but it's a different character that does it and it's only alluded to (I certainly didn't pick up on it on first read). It also takes place in a totally different location.

The incident/retribution of the Freys hasn't taken place yet in the books, but it's heavily foreshadowed* that [spoiler]there will be a second Red Wedding at Riverrun where the Brotherhood Without Banners (a formerly idealistic band of merry men that has been corrupted into a kind of nihilistic death cult by its new leader - a reanimated Catelyn Stark now known as Lady Stoneheart) will likely be slaughtering a lot of Freys at a wedding feast, possibly with the assistance of a certain direwolf[/spoiler]...

*Again, something I totally missed on my first reading. Though they certainly have their problems, I think a large part of the reason the latter two novels in the series are so dismissed/underrated is because there is a lot of very cool stuff being set up behind the scenes that is easy to miss if you aren't paying full attention.

The whole treatment of Arya is very different - I suspect that in the books (should they ever get finished) she won't be the one to cross many names of her list as in the show - her story is much darker and if anything shows the futility of revenge. Her actually getting any kind of satisfaction through vengeance seems too predictable and neat, and is one of those more conventional narrative tropes that the books generally subverts in some way.

sheridan

Love seeing Wil(iam)* Simpson's name in the credits...


*He was Will Simpson when he appeared in 2000AD, so I never get used to calling him William now...

sheridan

Speaking of credits - did anybody else notice that the credits for [spoiler]wolf special effects units rivalled that of the dragons[/spoiler] despite them not having appeared in the first episode of the series?

edgeworthy

Probably the best thing about episode one was that the writers appear to have grasped the North/ South British Divide.

Summed up with the "Who does this posh southern bird with her fancy dragons think she is!?" attitude the North had to Dany.

radiator

Quote from: sheridan on 18 April, 2019, 09:17:15 PM
Speaking of credits - did anybody else notice that the credits for [spoiler]wolf special effects units rivalled that of the dragons[/spoiler] despite them not having appeared in the first episode of the series?

That bodes well for later in the season! [spoiler]A great tragedy of the TV show is how sidelined the wolves have become. Perfectly understandable from a production point of view, given how difficult/expensive they must be to film, but a shame nonetheless. Would have been amazing to see Robb Stark riding into battle with a grizzly bear-sized Grey Wind at his side, as in the books...![/spoiler]

Funt Solo

Wolves:  I saw one of the "making of" bits from season #7, and the FX guys were saying that they basically had a budget decision to make of "giant or wolf", and went with the giant.  They could not afford both.
++ A-Z ++  coma ++

radiator

I really hope we haven't seen the last of [spoiler]Nymeria (Arya's wolf) in the TV show, but I suspect that we might have.

The brief meeting/farewell between her and Arya last season seemed pretty conclusive, but if so what an underwhelming tying up of a thread that started way back in season 1 episode 2...

(needless to say, but it's very different in the books, where Nymeria and her wolf pack are a constant background menace, and its clearly leading to some almighty payoff later down the line.).[/spoiler]

JayzusB.Christ

Quote from: edgeworthy on 19 April, 2019, 12:05:06 AM
Probably the best thing about episode one was that the writers appear to have grasped the North/ South British Divide.

Summed up with the "Who does this posh southern bird with her fancy dragons think she is!?" attitude the North had to Dany.

Yep, I love that aspect to it too, and wonder if US viewers manage to distinguish a gentile southern accent from a down-to-earth Northern one.

Seems a bit strange, though, that upside-down,-Northern-Ireland is Dorn. Last time I crossed the border I didn't see too many sun-kissed, dusky assassins. Makes me wish they could really tow thus country into warmer latitudes.
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"

radiator

QuoteYep, I love that aspect to it too, and wonder if US viewers manage to distinguish a gentile southern accent from a down-to-earth Northern one.

I live in the US and can tell you for a fact that the majority of Americans do not distinguish between the Northern/Southern accents on the show, no.