A review of “Sons of the Harpy,” the fourth episode of the fifth season of “Game of Thrones”
by Miodrag Zarković
Rest assured, dear reader, this review will eventually deal with the dualistic nature of TV Littlefinger: part human, part Wikipedia. But first, let’s address other issues.
One thing David Benioff and Dan Weiss, the showrunners of HBO’s “Game of Thrones,” can’t ever be accused of, is subtle writing. For the previous 43 episodes, they never bothered with it. So, when in “Sons of the Harpy,” the fourth episode of the fifth season, a coup d’état that was happening right in front of our eyes was never mentioned by name, it’s probably not because of Benioff and Weiss’ intention to keep the recognition under the radar—but because they actually don’t know what the hell they’ve written.
A little background: in the George R. R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” book series that they say the show is based on, we encounter the Faith Militant. Introduced in “A Feast for Crows,” it serves as the military arm of the Faith of the Seven. And it means exactly what it’s supposed to mean: the Faith Militant deals with transgressions against the religion, but not with matters that concern royal authority. That is why the High Septon arrests Margaery Tyrell, her cousins, Osney Kettleblack, and finally Cersei Lannister—all on charges related to the Faith. For example, both Cersei and Margaery are accused of extramarital fornication, which concerns the Faith only because both of them swore marital vows precisely in the sept. For comparison, they could never charge Ramsay Bolton or Jeyne Poole for the same crimes, regardless of whom they were having affairs with, simply because Ramsay and Jeyne didn’t swear anything to the Faith of the Seven. Ramsay and Jeyne never committed themselves under the jurisdiction of the religious institution that is headed by the High Septon.
It would also mean that one’s business manners are also of no concern for the Faith. Septons may preach against the greed and corruption, but that’s it. They don’t get to punish those who immorally took financial advantage of the social turmoil. Sexual appetites are also off-limits, at least until the person swears the sacred vows that he/she will be loyal to their spouse. In short, the Faith Militant and the Faith itself have no jurisdiction in matters the royal legal system deals with or in social customs and traditions. As another example, they’d absolutely have no business in a possible trial Tyrion could face for patricide.
That’s the books. The show has, of course, taken a different approach, and ended up with an unspoken coup.
In “Sons of the Harpy,” the Faith Militant is seen attacking what is probably a marketplace and destroying everything they deem excessive or sinful (one would assume it was ale that was spilled over those stairs). They also stormed a brothel and physically molested prostitutes and customers both, and launched a campaign against homosexuals, the arrest of Ser Loras Tyrell included. Practically all of these actions signal that a sudden overthrow of the entire political system the Seven Kingdoms rest on already happened. To clear any possible doubt, the show sealed the coup with the scene in which King Tommen is denied a meeting with the new High Septon while His Holiness is praying. Yes, royal authority is no more in King’s Landing. There’s a new ruler in town, and by extension in the realm. Thus, the War of the Five Kings was effectively won by the sixth one, who’s not even a king, by the way, but a barefoot humanitarian known as High Sparrow.
(Speaking of his bare feet, the High Sparrow didn’t burn his shoes, or throw them to the sea. As he himself explained in the previous episode, he actually gave them to someone who needed them more. So, why are his disciples acting in a completely opposite manner in this episode? Why are they destroying instead of distributing the excess?)
And yet, besides Margaery Tyrell, nobody seems disturbed by the coup. Not that she is concerned with the legal consequences of the Faith Militant’s actions, of course; she worries about her brother exclusively, but at least she’s visibly bothered. She, and no one else.
When the Anne Boleyn of TV Westeros is the only individual acting somewhat reasonably, you know Benioff and Weiss managed to outdo themselves once again in terms of incompetent storytelling.
After four and a half years of carefully watching their work on GOT, one can spot with ease the patterns and characteristics of Benioff and Weiss’ writing. Based on that, it is beyond doubt that the two of them have absolutely no idea about the consequences the actions of their Faith Militant would inevitably have in any social circumstances that can be considered realistic and logical. The thought that what they actually wrote is effectively a coup never crossed their minds. All their expertise on Martin’s world and legality starts and ends with the pure fact that HBO paid dearly for their right to mess with it big time.
However, that’s not to say the Faith Militant in the show didn’t serve its purpose. “Cersei, meanwhile, sees the High Sparrow as a weapon in her feud with Margaery, yet—as has happened a time or twelve in our own world’s history—doesn’t seem to understand how difficult it is to control religious extremists once you’ve armed them,” writes Alan Sepinwall in his review on HitFix. James Hibberd, reviewing the episode for Entertainment Weekly, ironically concludes this about Cersei’s move: “It’s an excellent idea, because if history has taught us anything, it’s that nothing bad can come from giving religious fanatics weapons.”
Similar stances can be found in any number of this week’s reviews. And it very much was the goal of Benioff and Weiss: to feed the liberal, politically-correct media with a desired antagonist that is easy to crucify. Of all those professional reviewers that continually avoid addressing any of the blatant, the obvious, the daringly evident missteps and fallacies of the show, not a single one missed the opportunity to take a shot at religious extremists and, by extension, at the religion itself.
It’s a travesty of today’s culture that people who obviously lack the understanding of basic rules of a society, get the opportunity to “adapt” a story that deals with human societies with possibly unparalleled depth. In Martin’s novels, Sparrows are a movement that is – historically accurate and believable—rooted in the need for a systematic response to the horrors of a devastating civil war. The movement gradually grows into a more prominent role and its depiction is never biased one way or the other: while some of their actions may seem disturbing, either by nature or by form, the just cause that triggered the creation of the movement is never forgotten.
Self-declared as an agnostic, Martin is remarkably balanced and thorough when dealing with religious themes. It is therefore a shame that the two guys who got to adapt his magnum opus don’t find it necessary to honor such an approach by translating it to the screen faithfully, but instead go for cheap sycophancy towards the liberal agenda that dominates modern media.
Truth be told, Benioff and Weiss never cared for the religions of ASOIAF. In the novels, religious themes are introduced in the second book, “A Clash of Kings,” when Stannis Baratheon and his retinue, headed by the Red Priestess Melisandre of Asshai, enter the story and up the stakes to the highest possible level. The prologue of ACOK may very well be the moment in which ASOIAF elevated itself above genre fiction once and for all. ASOIAF is speculative fiction, of course, because its many social and political themes simply couldn’t be covered in a setting from any particular period of actual history: no real chain of events ever combined a brutal dynastic war with a religious war and a war against oppression (slavery). With dragons and the Others or without them, ASOIAF simply had to be speculative fiction. But, at the same time, it easily transcends genre boundaries and grows into a work of literature worthy of analytical approach and detailed studying. And what drives that point home is the introduction of religious themes: was there ever a more important aspect of humanity than our relationship with the very concept of eternity, the concept that throughout history was most often represented by deities?
So, remember how did Benioff and Weiss tackle those issues? By having Stannis and Mel have sex in the second episode they appeared in!
Have things improved since then? Not at all, judging by “Sons of the Harpy” and the scene in which Mel tries to seduce Jon. The only thing that seems changed is the dress Mel takes off every now and then: for some reason, it isn’t red any more. Everything else is the same as always, with a Mel who’s unable to achieve anything without offering sex (or money, in Season 3). Amidst fierce competition, she may very well be the most ruined character in this “adaptation,” because, besides the name and gender, the TV version doesn’t seem to share anything with the book original.
For what it’s worth, this author really wouldn’t be surprised had Benioff and Weiss decided to let their Jon succumb to lust and have sex with Mel right there and then. Had the scene been interrupted before the resolution for some reason, I honestly wouldn’t be able to guess how Jon had reacted. That’s the legacy of Benioff & Weiss’ approach to adapting: they changed so much that nothing would be surprising at this point.
Another thing that gives depth to ASOIAF, its characters, is also criminally mishandled in GOT. And Stannis is a perfect example once more, as evidenced by the scene with him and Shireen: had he been properly developed and portrayed so far, such a scene wouldn’t be needed at all.
And if you wanted to know how badly Stannis is written in the show, the showrunners confirmed it themselves, in the “Inside the episode” video.
In general, those clips deserve reviews of their own. Imaged as the ultimate place where the show meets logic, the “Inside the episode” videos are actually the strongest hints about the storytelling talent “Thrones” desperately lacks. Take a look at how Weiss and Benioff explained the scene with Shireen and her father.
Weiss: “We’re so used to seeing Stannis in a single-minded pursuit of the Iron Throne and he’s done such a good job, by intention, of sweeping any complicating factor out of the way. And, obviously, having your love for your daughter is a complicating factor. It tempers you as a person. And I think Stannis doesn’t feel like he can afford to be tempered as a person in that way. And yet, he does clearly feel a real love for this little girl, which he expresses in that scene beautifully.”
Benioff: “It was important for us to see some different colors of Stannis. We’ve kinda seen him before standing above the map table, you know, trying to determine his next move, but there’s more to him than that. And this scene was a crucial one for us because we really wanted to see more what makes Stannis tick and what makes Shireen tick and we wanted to give him a scene that wasn’t just about him trying to conquer Seven Kingdoms, but it’s really just a father and a daughter talking.
If looked at closely, these words actually mean that in the previous three seasons TV Stannis was single-minded, obsessed with himself and uninterested in anything that isn’t connected to his goal. Is any additional critique of the TV character even needed? Can such a long mistreatment be remedied with a single scene, a scene that really isn’t worded or acted or filmed brilliantly? Of course it can’t, especially because the scene, as evidenced by Weiss and Benioff’s (possibly unintended) admission in “Inside the episode,” was designed specifically for that one purpose.
And not to mention that every “humanization” of a character Benioff and Weiss tend to undertake boils down to “he/she loves his/her children.” Just like they tried to humanize their Cersei by making a sort of iteration out of the statement that “she loves her children,” now they’re attempting the same thing with Stannis. “We need to make him more sympathetic, right? Let him show how much he loves his daughter! No, better yet—let him tell her that. In a lengthy monologue. It’s not like anybody’s going to remember we used to preach showing is always better than telling.”
While Stannis is revealing how he saved his daughter years ago, on the other side of TV Westeros Jaime Lannister is trying to save his. He’s accompanied by Bronn, who continues to ask one tricky question after another, all pointing to the inevitable conclusion: the mission Jaime brought him in makes no sense at all, both for the viewers and the characters themselves. But don’t worry, Ser Jaime, because your future opponents are not a bit smarter than you. See, war-pursuing Ellaria and three Sand Snakes, bastard daughters of the late Oberyn Martell, actually found out about Jaime’s secret mission, but at no moment they think of using it to their benefit. Like, Jaime’s mission gives them the perfect pretext to really start the war against the Lannisters. All they have to do is tighten the security around Myrcella, and when Jaime tries to take her away, instead they take him into custody or, better yet, kill him—not even a pacifist like Doran could ignore such a breach of the agreement he initially reached with Tyrion, and in the case of Jaime’s death the Lannisters would also be in a mood for war. What an opportunity, right?
Well, no. Ellaria and the Sand Snakes ignorantly stuck to their original plan, all the while participating in what is possibly the worst dialogue in the entire show. The scene could very well run with a disclaimer: No real-life brain cell was used for the scripting of this exchange!
And, finally, let’s visit the crypt of TV Winterfell, the most appropriate resting place for the “logic” of TV Sansa’s nonsensical arc. It was yet another victim of TV Littlefinger, who managed to kill it with a single line: “We mustn’t let her sniff out any trouble.” He’s talking about Cersei, of course. She summoned him to the capital, and he explains Sansa he has to go because—they mustn’t let Cersei sniff out any trouble!
Keep in mind that the man saying this is the same guy who was so relaxed while touring the countryside with Sansa and pronouncing her real name in packed taverns just a couple of episodes ago. The same guy who left the Vale supposedly because he feared someone could inform Cersei of Sansa’s whereabouts. The same guy, by the way, who undertook not a single measure to protect Sansa by hiding her true identity. That fellow is now persuading Sansa he absolutely needs to go to King’s Landing, because otherwise Cersei will become, pay attention, suspicious!
Well, if Cersei didn’t sniff out any trouble so far, then, Lord Petyr, you could return to King’s Landing under a banner with a direwolf, and no, the Queen Mother won’t be suspicious. As far as you’re concerned, she’s a moron.
Actually, everyone involved in this entire subplot has to be at least a little moronic, in order for it to have any chance at being received as somewhat faintly logical. That’s counting those Vale lords that allowed Littlefinger to take Sansa Stark with him, and the Boltons for not murdering Littlefinger as soon as he delivered Sansa to them, and of course Sansa and Littlefinger themselves for reasons stated in the previous review. But, most of all, it includes the person responsible for one more narrative theft committed by TV Littlefinger.
The episode as a whole was heavy on exposition, with multiple references to Rhaegar and Lyanna’s tragic love. The most important was, of course, delivered by Littlefinger, Benioff & Weiss’ stand-in for interactive encyclopedia.
The story of Sandor’s burnt face? He knows it. Prostitutes want to know more about the Starks’ history? He’ll teach them. Someone’s lost on the strict definition of chaos? Littlefinger will clear the confusion. Is it any wonder, then, that it’s TV Baelish who got to tell the story of the Harrenhal Tourney, along with the iconic “The moment when all the smiles died” detail that Ned Stark recalls in the book.
One might think it’s Benioff & Weiss’ strange view on egalitarianism: “Ned got the woman Littlefinger loved, it’s only fair Littlefinger now takes Ned’s famous lines.” But, after more than four years and 44 episodes and counting, we know better than to associate their take on Littlefinger with any kind of legitimate reasoning. They possibly have the obligation to feed Aidan Gillen, one of the most established actors in GOT’s cast back at the time of making the debut season, with a certain amount of screen time, which considering their storytelling “talent” actually backfired with this abomination the character of Littlefinger became long ago.
If such an obligation does exist, it would mean that, opposite to the character he plays, Gillen is a pretty smart fellow, who sensed early on he’s dealing with talentless amateurs way out of their depth. If only he shared that wisdom with Ian McElhinney, who tried to embody Ser Barristan Selmy. Or with Martin himself, who, like McElhinney, made the mistake of having faith (pun intended) that Benioff and Weiss really wanted to adapt ASOIAF, and not use the opportunity to run their own fan-fiction. Had Martin been on the same page as Gillen, perhaps GOT wouldn’t be in a mess it finds itself in at the very moment, the mess that eerily resembles the last scene of the episode: both Unsullied viewers and ASOIAF veterans lying helpless on the ground, bleeding, wondering what the hell just happened.
Excellent review.
It becomes clearer and clearer that D&D’s failure is not even that they aren’t trying, but that the task of successfully adapting this work is so beyond them that this is actually them doing their best.
They have no comprehension of the deeper underlying themes of the books. All they know, they learned from watching other Hollywood movies and TV shows, that’s why the only things that comes out of them when they write are the same cliches.
I use to make fun of Lost but honestly now I think Lindelof and Cuse would have done a better job with the material.
“Sons of the Harpy” was a travesty even by GOT’s standards. I struggled to think of which scene could take top honour of biggest mess, and it’s a toss up between the Sandsnakes/Ellaria and Sansa/LF, closely followed by the nonsense happening in KL with the Faith. Without going into the obvious reasons of why seeing LF in the Winterfell crypts in this context was such a sacrilege, what really boggles my mind is why the show continuously warps his interaction with Sansa, making it appear as though some genuine bond has developed between the two that could even be mistaken as romantic! Let’s recall that per the show’s own changes, Sansa is no longer masquerading as LF’s bastard daughter. In the books, Sansa has to pretend to be his loving and loyal daughter, Alayne, who is still fearing Cersei’s wrath in KL and LF’s manipulative strategies: “Do you want more blood on your hands, sweetling?” But now? Is LF even a villain anymore and on who’s say so? Brienne the Brute? One of the worst possible things he did in the books was to have Jeyne Poole brutally trained in his brothels and eventually sent North as a bride for Ramsay. With Sansa taking over that spot he’s now just the kindly uncle looking to make her Wardenness of the North and enjoy some kickbacks for himself.
RIP, Ser Barristan. As Ian McElhinney said, he made the mistake of reading the books and that’s how he knew something was wrong when he saw the limited material his character had this season. We all share the pain of that mistake, don’t we?
Wardeness isn’t even a proper word!
I think that they know that the major part of the audience aren’t book readers – hence all the things that book readers would call sacrilege, like LF providing exposition on everyone’s backstory. I always found it ludicrous how LF knew the deepest, darkest secret of the Hound’s scars.
The Sandsnakes were horrible! Could Dorne (ahem, Porne) be more of a crude stereotype?
The Sandsnakes aren’t known for their depth of characterisation in the books, but bejeezus, this scene was so moronic on so many levels!! The dialogue, the acting, the direction… It all came off as incredible campy and shallow. The informant brings them useful intel and they kill him for what? Oh yes, silly me, we needed Obara to have that badass exclamation point to her engaging monologue.
Don’t ya know that violent posturing is what Strong Women Characters TM do! Otherwise we wouldn’t know they are strong because women can only be strong by acting as violent brutes. *sarcasm off*
Don’t forget that they also curse and use the C word.
Here’s a link to a really good and detailed analysis of why the introduction of the Sandsnakes fell flat:
http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/128530-book-spoilers-an-analysis-of-why-the-sandsnake-introduction-fell-short/
“Or with Martin himself, who, like McElhinney, made the mistake of having faith (pun intended) that Benioff and Weiss really wanted to adapt ASOIAF, and not use the opportunity to run their own fan-fiction.”
This is the crux of it right here. They truly believe they’re able to write a better story than Martin, I think, but it’s worse because they’re profiting off of his ideas. Critics praise the depth of the world with idiocy like LF’s info-dump, when that’s not D&D’s doing at all. They’ve given us nothing but straight-forward stories stripped of any nuance or reason for examination, rely on modern-day sentimentality to save them the trouble of establishing context, and yet somehow manage to have completely illogical character motives even with their simplified version of events.
Somehow people keep defending this as “different mediums require different stories.” But at this point it’s the equivalent of if Harry Potter adapters made Hermione go to Durmstrang or something. I can’t even come up with a suitable analogy because no “adaptation” has been this off the rails.
And I keep saying it, but as its own entity, this show isn’t even holding up.
I must confess that I still don’t know who’s supposed to be who amongst the Sand Snakes, hard as I keep trying. That must be a very bad indicator, because I’m one of those that can easily tell one Kettleblack from another, but these women defeat me with their uniformity. I might as well end up following Olenna’s example and call them Spear, Whip and Dagger.
I fully expected Melisandre and Jon to be the second “sex in the Lord Commander’s office” scene in the show after the Jaime/Cersei one that the truly surprising part was that they didn’t. That scene does a disservice to both of them, but especially Melisandre, who in the books is more savvy and can offer Jon more than her body in order to get what she needs. But then, with the alterations they’ve made and the type of woman they’ve made her into, it’s her best bet now. She’s more like a vulgar temple prostitute than a priestess in the show, with that readiness to disrobe.
The Faith stuff felt like someone was reading some truly skewed version of the Inquisition with a modern flair. It’s disturbing that they’ve decided to focus the brunt of the fanatic hatred on sexuality at the cost of a very valid theme that was the reason for the Sparrows’ resurgence in the first place and at the cost of making Loras a joke. And they made it Cersei’s decision to rearm them just so she could have Margaery in trouble? Book Cersei isn’t very bright, but not even her was that foolish; her rearming of the Faith was a terrible move in the books, but it had a reason that from her perspective was valid. Here, it doesn’t. Also, book Cersei would be incensed at the way these fanatics treated her precious son, but this woman doesn’t even worry about any possible harm that could come to her son if he went. It was she who pushed him into that!
The crypts scene didn’t make any sense. How does Littlefinger know where they are? The crypts aren’t public knowledge, besides the Starks only Theon knows now, and just because he used to go there with the boys. But it seems in the show everyone knows everything, especially when they’re called Baelish. I cannot believe they made him be at Harrenhal watching the tourney with a wide-eyed eagerness he likely never had in the first place. And I won’t say anything about his plan for Sansa, because it simply has no redemption: it’s stupid from start to end.
There seem to be 3 types of female characters on the show:
1) Strong Woman Character TM = violent brute (Daenerys, Brienne, Sand Snakes, and I guess Arya is heading that way).
2) Manipulative Temptress = the power of boobs/sex (Melisandre, Cersei, and I guess Sansa is heading in that direction).
3) Victims = the women who don’t fall into the above categories (Catelyn, Shae, Ros and, for a long time, Sansa).
Olenna is somewhat outside these categories because she’s an old woman. However, the show takes some time to firmly establish that she was a Manipulative Temptress in her youth. Now she is the Redoubtable Matriarch, but she is the notable exception and that is what there’s only one of her kind in Showverse while we have several Redoubtable Patriarchs (Tywin, Ned, Roose).
“The same guy, by the way, who undertook not a single measure to protect Sansa by hiding her true identity. That fellow is now persuading Sansa he absolutely needs to go to King’s Landing, because otherwise Cersei will become, pay attention, suspicious!”
This has been driving me crazy! How on earth does it make any sense for LF to go back to King’s Landing? He’s going because Cersei summoned him? They really expect us to believe this?
And Mel, well, I guess they realized that she hadn’t shown her bewbs in a while so it was time for a seduction scene. She even has the right dress for it now. With one slight arm movement she can push her dress aside and there they are – her bewbs! And wasn’t Mel supposed to be focusing on the real threat/true fight which she recognized as being centered at the Wall? But now she wants to go south to Winterfell with Stannis and she needs to seduce Jon to get him to agree to go South too? Hellooo, remember the Others? Azor Ahai? Ring any bells?
Seriously, I have an easier time believing that there are no sharks in Dorne over this stupidity. And speaking of no sharks in Dorne, are there sharks in the ocean waters off of Volantis and Meereen? Because Jorah and Tyrion sure are in one teeny tiny boat. Is Jorah going to row all the way to Meereen? Maybe he’ll run into Gendry along the way. Jorah, I have some advice for you, you’re gonna need a bigger boat.
I think that one of the problems about this season so far is that the show has lost some significant talent on scriptwriting and directing. They’ve lost Michelle McLaren and Neil Marshall who directed some of the better episodes and they’ve lost the scriptwriter Vanessa Taylor as well. They still have Bryan Cogman, who is the only moderately talented in the bunch.
It does make me wonder why they lost their best talent. Michelle McLaren was supposed to direct Wonder Woman but has for some reason pulled out of that one.
Neil Marshall’s last episode was Blackwater and he later made no secret of the fact that he was pressured into putting a full frontal nude woman into a scene for no other reason that a producer wanted it. He didn’t say it outright, but I certainly got the sense that he was pissed about it, which it very understandable since it was a very good scene, but it was ruined by a visual element that worked as a very strong distraction from what that scene was about – the differences between Bronn and the Hound and the characterization of the Hound as a man who has no joy in life but simply goes through the motions. That may not have been received well with the producers, but I also think that he didn’t appreciate his artistic choices being compromised because HBO wanted to up its nudity quota for gratuitous reasons.
Vanessa Taylor went on to write the screenplay for Divergent, which is a markedly better move in terms of her career. With the success of Divergent, she may very well be going places.
GRRM’s editor voices her displeasure:
http://winteriscoming.net/2015/05/06/george-r-r-martins-editor-is-unhappy-with-game-of-thrones-departures-from-the-books/
Just as the UK editor, Jane Johnson, didn’t mince words in calling the HBO show “completely gone rogue” and bashed one of the most controversial changes, the one for Loras, we have now another that’s not happy with the changes.
No less than Aidan Gillen in person deems himself surprised by the Winterfell arc they latched onto him:
Sophie had already said that arc had no salvation, but when even the supposed beneficiary, Littlefinger, isn’t amused, you know beyond a doubt that it’s a very, very bad change. It’s really eye-opening how many actors are coming to the front and voicing their opinion as of late.
Quotes have to be seen in the larger context of the interview and sometimes they can interpreted differently. Sophie Turner didn’t specifically say that Sansa’s arc couldn’t be salvaged. She said “getting married to Ramsay can never be salvaged” – this can mean a lot of things and the interview in question can be interpreted in many ways. However, this specific quote happens in the context of Sansa and her abilities to deal with psychos. I read it as that something very traumatic happens to Sansa that will change her character profoundly, that she can’t go back to what she was before – the same can also be said about the execution of her father and the abuse she suffered in KL. That changed Sansa too. However, her quote can also be read in the way you do – since she was quite upset with the new storyline where Sansa once again is betrothed to a sadistic psychopath.
Regarding the Gillen quote – I see nothing in that nor in the entire interview that he isn’t amused. The only thing he does admit to is that he was surprised by the new arc, which I think we all were since it has no foundation in the source material.
It is very easy to fall prey to confirmation bias, i.e. we see what we want to see – especially if we already have strong views on the subject. However, and this is my academic training speaking, we ought to be very careful about that and consider other viewpoints and explanations. Furthermore, there’s an echo chamber effect that tends to increase confirmation bias – that can clearly be seen on some of the show threads on westeros.org.
It’s also very easy to read comments superficially and ascribe to the commenter things they’ve not said nor thought. For starters, taking into account the very context you speak of before implying confirmation bias is at play would’ve been beneficial, and it’d have been more appreciated if done so before implying that I am getting this from the w.org show-discussion threads in which I don’t participate.
I said Sophie had stated that arc had no salvation because that’s what she specifically said in the interview, and by “that” arc (emphasis on “that” not “her” or “the.” Context, again) I meant the plotline currently onscreen, not her whole arc as we’ve not seen it yet, we’re barely midway through the season. I didn’t state anything about her feelings, but if she’s displeased as a result of that plotline, that in itself reinforces that she meant the negative consequences of that plotline on her entire story and not just on herself have no remedy. That’s the implication of “salvaging,” to remedy, to rescue it from something bad.
As for Gillen, the context of my comment is the bolded part that you ignored, in which he says “playing dumb.” Because that’s what is alluded to as a bad change, as book Littlefinger is smarter than that, and not the entire Winterfell plotline that’s still to be seen how it’ll play. Littlefinger is way more cunning and Gillen knows it, he’s read the books, which is the larger picture in which I place my highlighting of the “play dumb” line, that is the aspect which fans are criticising, both fans and non-fans of Littlefinger, because that also does a disservice to his character.
Milady,
I wasn’t implying that you had gleaned your opinion from w.org – I simply put that in my comment because I’ve observed a lot of confirmation bias in those threads. I could have been clearer on that point and I’m sorry if I offended – it wasn’t my intent.
I think that Gillen’s quote can interpreted several ways – I interpreted that LF was playing dumb in relation to the Boltons – fx the line about him not knowing anything about Ramsay. I read the whole interview and I don’t think that anything in the context of it looks like he’s commenting on the storyline itself but rather on the dynamic LF has with the Boltons and I have to disagree with your interpretation. I think it is easier to infer from Sophie’s interview that she wasn’t entirely happy with Sansa’s new Winterfell plot whereas Gillen’s interview is rather neutral. Written interviews are notoriously difficult to interpret for what we assume is unsaid – for that we need intonation, gestures and facial cues.
It is of course your prerogative to interpret his quote as you do but I strongly disagree with you. I really don’t think that his comment can be construed as a dissatisfaction with the plot since the whole context is on the interaction between the characters as stated in the earlier part of the quote: “It’s always nice to enter in a new world and interact with new people and characters you may not have interacted with.” – That sentence frames the sentence you put in bold text and I honestly don’t think that there’s any basis to construe that he is unhappy about this new plotline from this interview. I guess we have to agree to disagree on this one.
Thanks everyone for replying.
About crew members voicing displeasure, I always had the impression that actors are not fascinated with D&D. Like, Jason Momoa managed to persuade them into changing the scene in the pilot (Drogo/Dany wedding night), which was a pretty strong hint at how little respected D&D really are on the set. Not that Momoa’s suggestion was necessarily a sign of disrespect, but their acceptance definitely was. It really sent a message that these guys aren’t too sure about what they’re doing. And a reputation like that is something many actors will try to capitalize on, just like, as rumors have it, many actors actually did – for example, Charles Dance blackmailed them into giving him more screen time in Season 2, and, as I already speculated in the review; Gillen probably forced a clause in the contract that guarantees him a certain amount of screen time.
There’s also a story that Kit sent them mails explaining they should stick closer to the books in portraying Jon (I think Kit himself confirmed it, but for the life of me I couldn’t provide a link, which is buried somewhere in my Westeros account that is now erased), and also Emilia’s refusal to do more nude scenes. Also, Stephen Dilane openly admitted he doesn’t actually watch the show, and when an actor goes public with something like that, it speaks how comfortable he feels about it, and in turn that suggests he’s hardly alone in that attitude. And not to forget the actress for Shae, who said she wasn’t too happy about the way her character is written. (I think Esme Bianco also had to show some resistance, because after the first season she suddenly stopped appearing naked on screen, until her death scene at least.)
And that’s just the stuff that surfaced. God knows what else’s been happening on and around sets. For example, I’m pretty sure Dinklage influences the writing for Tyrion, or, even worse, he doesn’t have to, because D&D actually are writing Tyrion to accommodate Dinklage. In any case, by now it’s probably more visible than before, but the disrespect for D&D was there pretty much from the beginning. The sad thing is that the guy who was probably their biggest and longest supporter, is probably the same guy they showed utter disrespect to – Martin himself. Finally, even he seems to realize by now how incompetent D&D truly are.
I doubt Dinklage does that – a more book-accurate Tyrion would only be in his favour, since that would give him the opportunity to stretch his talent.
However, many of the examples you mention don’t really jive with me. So they changed a scene because an actor suggested it – it actually happens sometimes in Hollywood, especially if the director likes to improvise or let the actors try out different things. Personally, I liked the changed wedding night between Dany and Drogo because that particular scene was really, really off in the books and it, frankly, read like some kind of slightly creepy wish-fulfillment scenario.
Exactly how would Charles Dance blackmail the double Ds into more screentime? He has an amazing charisma and presence – and apparently a very good chemistry with Maisie Williams, and I think that the showrunners wanted to capitalize on this. I loved every scene that Dance was in, though I still think that those scenes with Maisie were unnecessary, despite how enjoyable they were to watch.
It is hard to tell what people who work with the double Ds really think about them – mainly, because there are constraints, as there would be in any work environment. So I do think one should be very careful about such rumours.
The double Ds, especially Benioff, give off a slightly douchy vibe interviews – and I still can’t get over the interview where he mentioned an actor that wrote a letter to them asking for his character not to be killed off – and then B said: “That made us want to kill him even more”. That was such a classless move and really unprofessional to talk about it in public. So it seems to me that the double Ds don’t have very much respect for the people they work with. (I think there’s also a story about how the actress who originally played Myrcella found out her character had been recast in a way that also makes the producers sound callous and disrespectful).
I do find it interesting that they have lost significant talent – as I mentioned in a post above, especially Neil Marshall, who subtly complained about producer interference with his direction of Blackwater (producer demanded full frontal nudity – in an ep. where there was no narrative space to support having buck naked ladies prancing around). As it turned out, Blackwater was Neil Marshall’s last episode for GoT – we can make of it what we will, since we don’t know why he didn’t return to the show. All we can do is speculate.
Actually, Blackwater wasn’t Marshall’s last episode, because he directed the penultimate episode of the last season, The Watchers on the Wall. And they made a pretty big deal out of it, so I really don’t think there was any bad blood between him and D&D.
I agree one shouldn’t automatically trust rumors, that’s why I speculate about them instead of stating them as facts, and why I do that in the comments instead of in the review. However, such rumors often end up being pretty truthful at the end, not just in the case of GOT but with many other shows. If you ask me, a lot can be concluded from the official reaction, especially when there isn’t one: if crew members don’t address those issues in interviews, then it’s probably because someone instructed them not to, and that is always a big indication. For example, Dance gave dozens of interviews about GOT, and, though I certainly didn’t watch/read all of them, I watched/read quite a few, and in none of those he was actually faced with a question about those rumors. To me, it indicates he said in advance he won’t answer questions of that kind: that’s what celebrities often do with tricky subjects.
By the way, he probably threatened to quit the show unless they give him more scenes, and if the threat came right when the shooting of the second season was about to start (meaning, finding a replacement would’ve delayed everything), it can be considered a blackmail – if that happened at all, of course. And if it did, I’d bet that’s what gave birth to Tywin/Arya scenes, which are problematic in numerous ways (though the audience, to my endless surprise, did and does adore them).
So, while I wouldn’t trust those rumors blindly, I also wouldn’t dismiss them so easily. And there’s one more scandal to consider: the infamous incident with Bush’s head. The way HBO reacted, the speed with which they distanced from and embarrassed D&D, speaks volumes about the ‘reputation’ those two have inside the company. And I think HBO wouldn’t do that if D&D were more respected among the crew and on the sets. HBO’s reaction indicates D&D are easily replaceable, which, in turn, goes great lengths in explaining ‘the pressure’ D&D often talk about. When they say they have to change things in order to prevent the cancellation of the show, I think part of them believes in it, probably because HBO executives are very effective in coercing them. And they are effective from the very start, as evidenced by the reshooting of the pilot. People often overlook it, but, if we count both the added scenes and alterations, the pilot is one of the episodes with the most changes to the source material.
You’re right that actors in general sometimes influence changes, but it’s seldom for the better, and almost always it speaks about the creators’ incompetence.
About the Dany/Drogo wedding night, I have to completely disagree. It wasn’t creepy in the books at all. That’s probably because in the books their relationship isn’t reduced to the Stockholm Syndrome fairy tale as in the show. While certainly not the nicest guy around, book Drogo is, from the get-go, more than just a barbaric savage he was portrayed as in the first half of the first season of the show. In the books he is not reformed by Dany’s sexual skills: quite the opposite, in that brilliant scene of their intercourse in the open, their two worlds came together. His decision to break the ancient tradition of his people and cross the Narrow Sea was built more convincingly in the novel, precisely because he was more than meets the eye from the very beginning, and all that was reflected in their wedding night.
About Dinklage: yes, a more complex Tyrion would display more of his talent, but show-Tyrion as it is possibly brings him more fans. Perhaps Dinklage recognizes GOT as his five minutes of heaven and wants to capitalize on it as much as he can. He already won an Emmy, after all, so now he’s maybe more into increasing the fan base than winning awards. Anyway, that’s how he strikes me in his interviews and with his ever present cynicism. I mean, in that promotional video, when asked to summarize GOT in 30 seconds, he actually told the main story of Breaking Bad. That alone speaks of the special treatment he probably enjoys in GOT: it wasn’t funny at all, in fact, it was disrespectful to all those poor fans who think Dinklage and other actors take GOT seriously and not as a unique opportunity to earn money and gain fame.
But, once again, this is all my own speculation. It is not based on any information or rumors or anything similar, but on my own conclusions, which can be proved wrong.
My bad on Neil Marshall, I read his Imdb site wrong.
I have a lot of issues with some of your other claims and arguments but it’ll have to wait because I’m quite busy today.
This review sent me into thinking that I’d be interested in hearing what GRRM really has to say on the changes in this season, because the few comments he’s made are of a general and politely-worded sort that can be filed under “The show is the show and the books are the books” or the more recent “How many children does Scarlett O’Hara have?”, and don’t say much specifically about plotlines and details such as which one he disagrees with the most or which he might like best.
I am aware that we’re not likely to find out in his own words so long as the show is ongoing, and perhaps not after either, because he’s said he doesn’t agree with authors accepting money and then complaining, and also because in his position as former TV writer, he might be more understanding of changes or have a better insight into the need for those than the average author. But regardless of what his opinion truly is, he must know the negative opinion of a large segment of the fandom, through people in his circle or that know him who think likewise, some of the media, and also fans that send emails and ask in his Not a Blog.