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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #320 on: June 01, 2015, 09:32:48 PM »
And the ending creeped the fuck right out of me.  Seriously, my fuck went running.

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Offline Fortuna

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #321 on: June 02, 2015, 04:34:28 AM »
It just seemed like a regular old zombie sequence.

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #322 on: June 02, 2015, 11:34:48 AM »
It just seemed like a regular old zombie sequence.

Yeah I loved the giant in Shaun of the Dead.

Rama Set

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #323 on: June 02, 2015, 04:46:29 PM »
It just seemed like a regular old zombie sequence.

I meant the raising of the wild men dead specifically. I thought it was nice storytelling.

Saddam Hussein

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #324 on: June 04, 2015, 07:01:49 PM »
Watching "Hardhome" has restored my excitement for this show.

Why should everyone be killed off the same way? That seems like it would get really rote, boring and expected after a while. Having something happen differently every once in a while rather than going with a Dark Souls style "prepare to die!!" gimmick (though in this case it's "you're never gonna know who we shockingly kill next teehee!!") seems like it would be a refreshing change of pace.

Everyone isn't killed off the same way. ???  I'm just complaining that Jorah's eventual death has now been spoiled, essentially, by the show itself.  The setting itself is already so dangerous that we knew he was in danger by virtue of being on the show.  They didn't need to raise the specter of his death by giving him a terminal illness.

In other news, here's something from Martin about rapiness:

http://www.ew.com/article/2015/06/03/george-rr-martin-thrones-violence-women

This is my favorite part:

Quote
Just because you put in dragons doesn’t mean you can put in anything you want.

On the contrary, that is exactly what it means.  He can quite literally create any kind of world he wants - and that is indeed what he has done, incorporating a variety of elements and tropes from history and fantasy alike.  Everything that he decided to include or omit was a choice on his part.  He chose to include dragons, he chose to include murderous wedding guests, and he chose to include rape.  And I'm not necessarily saying that's a bad thing.  He's perfectly entitled to put such an emphasis on the dark, unpleasant elements of history, but he should take responsibility for his focus, and face up to the positive and negative criticism that comes his way for it.  For him to duck all that now that the criticism has been so negative and say, "Nuh uh, it's not my fault, I'm just being historically accurate here!" is lazy and irresponsible.

I also like the way he seemed to equate less rape with "people walking on their hands."  That's a very fair comparison.

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Offline rooster

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #325 on: June 04, 2015, 07:58:42 PM »
Are you seriously being all SJW because of the realism of a medieval world? C'mon.

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Offline Fortuna

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #326 on: June 04, 2015, 08:25:42 PM »
Watching "Hardhome" has restored my excitement for this show.

Why should everyone be killed off the same way? That seems like it would get really rote, boring and expected after a while. Having something happen differently every once in a while rather than going with a Dark Souls style "prepare to die!!" gimmick (though in this case it's "you're never gonna know who we shockingly kill next teehee!!") seems like it would be a refreshing change of pace.

Everyone isn't killed off the same way. ???  I'm just complaining that Jorah's eventual death has now been spoiled, essentially, by the show itself.  The setting itself is already so dangerous that we knew he was in danger by virtue of being on the show.  They didn't need to raise the specter of his death by giving him a terminal illness.

In other news, here's something from Martin about rapiness:

http://www.ew.com/article/2015/06/03/george-rr-martin-thrones-violence-women

This is my favorite part:

Quote
Just because you put in dragons doesn’t mean you can put in anything you want.

On the contrary, that is exactly what it means.  He can quite literally create any kind of world he wants - and that is indeed what he has done, incorporating a variety of elements and tropes from history and fantasy alike.  Everything that he decided to include or omit was a choice on his part.  He chose to include dragons, he chose to include murderous wedding guests, and he chose to include rape.  And I'm not necessarily saying that's a bad thing.  He's perfectly entitled to put such an emphasis on the dark, unpleasant elements of history, but he should take responsibility for his focus, and face up to the positive and negative criticism that comes his way for it.  For him to duck all that now that the criticism has been so negative and say, "Nuh uh, it's not my fault, I'm just being historically accurate here!" is lazy and irresponsible.

I also like the way he seemed to equate less rape with "people walking on their hands."  That's a very fair comparison.

I'm pretty sure he takes responsibility by default since he wrote the f-ing books, but that doesn't mean he has to hold the same opinion as the SJWs.

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Offline Rushy

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #327 on: June 04, 2015, 10:57:49 PM »
In my opinion Game of Thrones doesn't have nearly enough dragon in it.

I also like the way he seemed to equate less rape with "people walking on their hands."  That's a very fair comparison.

I know this is sarcasm, but I have to say it really is a fair comparison. People get raped. A lot of people. And in medieval times, a hell of a lot of people got raped. In a dramatic medieval story about love and conquest, to not include rape is to miss out on a huge plot device. It adds a great deal of emotion to the story, proven thusly by everyone's reaction to it. Just remember Sadman, it is in fact a book.

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Offline Snupes

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #328 on: June 04, 2015, 11:02:05 PM »
On the other hand, I usually disagree with this stuff but it's not that "SJW" for people to complain about how much rape is in something. It's often lazy writing (don't know if it is here, since I've never read nor watched) and rape is a pretty real thing that happens and it sucks to be used as a plot device over and over, with the expectation that the negativity of it is just going to be seen as "wow they raped, what a bad person amirite??" rather than exploring the aftereffects of what it's like being someone who's endured that kind of thing.
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Offline Rushy

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #329 on: June 04, 2015, 11:04:16 PM »
On the other hand, I usually disagree with this stuff but it's not that "SJW" for people to complain about how much rape is in something. It's often lazy writing (don't know if it is here, since I've never read nor watched) and rape is a pretty real thing that happens and it sucks to be used as a plot device over and over, with the expectation that the negativity of it is just going to be seen as "wow they raped, what a bad person amirite??" rather than exploring the aftereffects of what it's like being someone who's endured that kind of thing.

Well I can't comment on the after effect since I haven't read that far in the books and I don't know how George Martin continued the characters.

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Offline JRowe

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #330 on: June 04, 2015, 11:16:53 PM »
Are you seriously being all SJW because of the realism of a medieval world? C'mon.

It's not a medieval world, though: medieval times had a distinct lack of dragons. It's a fictional world. Maybe I'm an optimist but I think reducing the amount of rape is much more realistic than freaking dragons.
The fact is, any and every detail of the world is something he chose to include. Realism has nothing to do with it. There is nothing automatically wrong with including rape in a book, but it's a serious issue, and it needs to be treated as such: not just thrown in for cheap drama, with no focus paid to aftereffects or consequences.
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Offline Rushy

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #331 on: June 04, 2015, 11:18:45 PM »
Are you seriously being all SJW because of the realism of a medieval world? C'mon.

It's not a medieval world, though: medieval times had a distinct lack of dragons. It's a fictional world. Maybe I'm an optimist but I think reducing the amount of rape is much more realistic than freaking dragons.
The fact is, any and every detail of the world is something he chose to include. Realism has nothing to do with it. There is nothing automatically wrong with including rape in a book, but it's a serious issue, and it needs to be treated as such: not just thrown in for cheap drama, with no focus paid to aftereffects or consequences.

Well, look at the bright side, he chose not to combine the two ideas.

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #332 on: June 04, 2015, 11:58:14 PM »
He's perfectly entitled to put such an emphasis on the dark, unpleasant elements of history, but he should take responsibility for his focus, and face up to the positive and negative criticism that comes his way for it.  For him to duck all that now that the criticism has been so negative and say, "Nuh uh, it's not my fault, I'm just being historically accurate here!" is lazy and irresponsible.

I also like the way he seemed to equate less rape with "people walking on their hands."  That's a very fair comparison.

I don't think GRRM is 'ducking' criticism of the sexual violence portrayed in his books.  He's spoken about it before, and his response has been consistent.  I also don't think it's lazy and irresponsible to, as a writer, want to portray a history and culture for what it was.  That seems like the opposite of lazy and irresponsible, and I think it would be naive to assume that GRRM was unaware of the potential pitfalls of such portrayals before writing them.

On the contrary, I agree with GRRM that it's lazy and irresponsible to avoid writing about those unpleasantries:

Quote
I wanted my books to be strongly grounded in history and to show what medieval society was like, and I was also reacting to a lot of fantasy fiction. Most stories depict what I call the ‘Disneyland Middle Ages’—there are princes and princesses and knights in shining armor, but they didn’t want to show what those societies meant and how they functioned[...]I’m writing about war, which what almost all epic fantasy is about. But if you’re going to write about war, and you just want to include all the cool battles and heroes killing a lot of orcs and things like that and you don’t portray [sexual violence], then there’s something fundamentally dishonest about that. Rape, unfortunately, is still a part of war today. It’s not a strong testament to the human race, but I don’t think we should pretend it doesn’t exist.

I want to portray struggle. Drama comes out of conflict. If you portray a utopia, then you probably wrote a pretty boring book.

To me the only issue is the manner (and frequency, perhaps) in which such violence is portrayed.  If GRRM made writing choices that glorified rape or otherwise advanced some notion that rape is an acceptable element of human behavior, then I think that would be problematic.  I personally haven't felt that way while reading the books, although I think the TV writers have made some poor choices.
« Last Edit: June 05, 2015, 12:07:26 AM by garygreen »
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Rama Set

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #333 on: June 05, 2015, 09:41:22 PM »
My problem with the rape and also the use of violence in the TV show, is that I feel like it relies on those elements to create a lot of the tension and drama rather than the characters relationships. 

Saddam Hussein

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #334 on: June 07, 2015, 10:29:19 PM »
Good posts from all.  Also, it looks like tonight's episode briefly went up on HBO Go before getting yanked, and I was warned by a friend that it contains a terrible, terrible scene that ruins established characters, spits in the face of the books, and confirms that D&D are retarded.  I wanted to avoid spoiling it for myself, but I couldn't resist guessing at what it was, and I got it right.  Do you want to know what it is?  You'll hate it, I promise.

Stannis actually sacrifices Shireen.

Also, this isn't a spoiler or anything, just speculation, but it's totally going to be Olly who stabs Jon.  I hope it isn't true, but they're foreshadowing it pretty hard.

Rama Set

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #335 on: June 08, 2015, 12:18:51 AM »
Good posts from all.  Also, it looks like tonight's episode briefly went up on HBO Go before getting yanked, and I was warned by a friend that it contains a terrible, terrible scene that ruins established characters, spits in the face of the books, and confirms that D&D are retarded.  I wanted to avoid spoiling it for myself, but I couldn't resist guessing at what it was, and I got it right.  Do you want to know what it is?  You'll hate it, I promise.

Stannis actually sacrifices Shireen.

Also, this isn't a spoiler or anything, just speculation, but it's totally going to be Olly who stabs Jon.  I hope it isn't true, but they're foreshadowing it pretty hard.

I don't mind that spoiler, but then I have not read the books. To me it makes sense in the context of the story being told.

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Offline rooster

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #336 on: June 08, 2015, 02:22:31 AM »
Whhhy? D&D are so retarded. What's the point in building up characters a certain way and then throwing it out the window? I don't understand.

Saddam Hussein

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #337 on: June 08, 2015, 02:26:51 AM »
And there we have it, just as bizarrely out-of-character and shockingly distasteful in execution as it was in concept.  Fuck D&D.  I'm also getting pretty tired of Ramsay being an untouchable super-awesome badass who wins at literally everything he does because he's just so awesome that you can't even touch him.

The rest of the episode was good, though.

Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #338 on: June 08, 2015, 04:55:22 AM »
I don't hate the decision on the face of it, but I do think it was poorly written.  That aside, I don't think it's out of character for Stannis.  One of his hallmarks is that he's a strong-willed, decisive authoritarian.  He's willing to do whatever he believes is necessary, including death and violence, for the fulfillment of what he perceives to be Good/Right/Just/whatever (killing his daughter obviously isn't good, but saving Westeros is).

I sort of think it's D&D's devotion to this archetype that ruins this particular plot line.  I think this would have been better written if they had focused more on an internal conflict with Stannis over this decision, one where he suddenly, and perhaps for the first time, doesn't know what to do, and doesn't know what he thinks is right.  Then the moment he decides to kill his daughter becomes much more interesting; it would represent an all-in moment for Stannis; a total conversion to the faith.

Instead they just made him seem like a naive dick who murdered his daughter because he's scared.
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Offline rooster

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Re: Game of Thrones
« Reply #339 on: June 08, 2015, 12:17:37 PM »
Huh, apparently the Stannis switch was GRRM's idea. They talk about it during the "inside the episode" junk after the credits.