For the last five years readers of George R. R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire book series, like me, have operated with a selective silence around Game of Thrones viewers. Season after season we have so badly wanted to reveal what was coming–especially when it seemed that Joffrey had all but won–but at the same time we knew better than to rob TV viewers of the deep emotional thrills regarding Ned’s fate, the Red Wedding, or any of the other plot twists awaiting TV viewers.
Now, with Game of Thrones having caught up with the Ice and Fire books, readers and viewers are united in their knowledge of the series. Unfortunately, the nature of this common ground is bleak and TV viewers are left wondering, just as book readers were after the 2011 publication of A Dance With Dragons, if there’s anything more to this series than repetitive brutality.
Spoilers ahead for all published books and Game of Thrones Season 5.
A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones have always depicted a world where humanity’s worst instincts bubble through a thin veneer of propriety, and author George R. R. Martin’s skill at presenting this through clear, iconic moments is unparalleled. As readers, we have been trained to approach the world in terms of stories, and Martin’s work turns that expectation against us in a darkly constructive manner. Ned’s fate at the end of book/season one is a shock, not just because it defies the common trope of honorable characters persevering to fight another day, but because it points out that we, readers and viewers alike, have ignored our own personal instincts as to what kind of monster Joffrey is in favor of how we thought the story was supposed to unfold. Essentially, we accepted the familiar constructs of fiction as more real or weighty than our own judgement, and that’s a wonderfully complex lesson to impart through something as simple as a beheading.
The concept of expectations based in reality versus expectations drawn from fiction has been explored in a number of detailed plots as the book series and the show progress. Game of Thrones viewers learned that not only should they not expect their personal wishes to be fulfilled (Tyrion won’t be put in charge of everyone, for instance) but that the characters themselves needed to be mindful of the expectations of those around them. As these plot lines continued and the characters grew, we as readers and viewers learned that we could love a Lannister and hate a Stark, that true resolution was rare, and that a character could not take a long view towards readying the Seven Kingdoms for supernatural war without being buried under day-to-day politicking. When taken as a whole, the characters in A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones are as uncertain as we are in real life. Thus, we hang on their every action, hoping against our own expectations that the ASOIAF/Game of Thrones characters can struggle through that uncertainty and save their own world from the very certain mystical evil that is about to shroud them all in darkness.
While we’ve become conditioned to having our fiction-based expectations and comfortable conventions overturned in favor of grimmer, more reality-based outcomes, at this point in the narrative–five books in, five seasons in–the expectations of fiction have begun to reassert themselves. Although true to its characters, Game of Thrones Season 5 is largely without purpose as a work of fiction, a trait that it shares with A Dance With Dragons and A Feast For Crows, the books that this season’s plots were based upon. Almost every character is unsure of their purpose or next step: Stannis’ siege of Winterfell fails spectacularly and his claim to the throne–long an extraneous plot–finally sputters to an end. Brienne revenges Renly but still despairs of finding the Stark girls, despite being a stone’s throw away from one of them. Sansa and Theon try to escape the Boltons and Winterfell, but have no real plan to do so. Cersei is literally given orders as to what she should do and say, reduced to following the High Sparrow’s script. Tyrion is wandering around Essos trying to find a plot line to be a part of. Jaime is wandering through Dorne, failing to save his daughter. And Daenerys is actively rejecting her own plot line, finding ruling Meereen so boring that she just flies away on her dragon.
The books feature an even greater loss of momentum than the TV series, keeping Tyrion apart from Daenerys, introducing yet another new contender for the Iron Throne, and promising huge battles in Meereen and Winterfell without actually delivering them. (The book series comes to a complete stall in one of Davos’ chapters, where the contents of a stew are described at length over two terrifying pages.) Jon Snow still dies in the same manner, and while it’s a thematically strong death–he dies doing the right thing, just like Ned, assuming a loyalty amongst his peers that has never actually been demonstrated–it feels transparent and cynical in comparison to the lack of momentum in the series. As if killing a main character is now the only way to keep Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire interesting.
This is an utterly cynical way to think about Jon’s death, but can readers and viewers be blamed for presuming such cynicism after experiencing it season after season, book after book? That A Dance With Dragons and Game of Thrones Season 5 also share a peculiar focus on brutality certainly adds to this sense of cynicism. Altering Sansa’s plotline in Game of Thrones to make her the victim of rape was essentially the last straw for The Mary Sue, and the conclusion of this season of the show saw the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Vox, and other outlets noting the unrelentingly grim nature of the show, as well. A Dance With Dragons features depictions of abuse, executions, and rape with such frequency that, when I first read it, I began noting how many pages it had been since the last mention or instance of sexual violence. It was rare for that number to reach double digits. And while that might not be entirely new for the series, it felt gratuitous when compared to the relatively motionless plot. A Song of Ice and Fire, and by extension Game of Thrones, has always been about the conflict between the realistic actions of a society versus the demands of an epic fantasy storyline, but these days it feels as if there’s no story being told at all, leaving us with the realistic actions of Westeros and Essos’ disturbingly violent society.
So far, this is where readers of A Song of Ice and Fire have been left: bereft of purpose (and Jon Snow) and stalled out in a fantasy kingdom where torture and sexual violence are ubiquitous. Readers have been here since 2011 and now, with the conclusion of A Game of Thrones season 5, TV viewers have finally joined us on these grim shores. But will a sense of purpose, of momentum, of hope, return to the book and television series with The Winds of Winter, or Game of Thrones season 6? And will we care?
I wonder if the ultimate battle in this series is already before us. Not a struggle between Others and dragons, fire and ice, Starks and Lannisters, but between our gut reactions to this fictional world and the desire we have for it to conform to our story expectations. The part of us that celebrates epics and stories wants these characters and this world to rally and move past the abuse that defines it. But the instinctively emotional part of us is done caring. If the book and TV series is going to keep grinding up the people and things we care about and are invested in, then we don’t care if Westeros lives or dies. Hell, as far as we know this IS a series about how an entire world dies. Fuck it. Let winter come.
This is what it’s like to feel done with A Game of Thrones. After a while it’s a lot like not being done with A Game of Thrones.
Chris Lough would still suggest picking up A World of Ice and Fire, however. That book is a lot of fun.
Ummmm…. yeahhhhhh…. I’m going to go ahead and disagree with you here, Peter.
We’ve had the interesting experience of having left the show late in season 4, which is interesting because it means that instead of getting mad mad quitting this year we’ve had the opportunity to sit back and simply feel justified..
I thought I was done after A Feast For Crows, but eventually succumbed and read A Dance With Dragons. Now I’m trying to figure out how to avoid reading The Winds of Winter because I am so very done with this series. Yet, reading some of the chapters that have been released just makes me want more. I’m reduced to hoping that if I chase down enough spoilers I’ll able to avoid reading the whole thing.
I agree the series (and now the book) is bogged down in plot. I agree that killing off many main characters and replacing them with new folks we don’t have nearly as much invested in has hurt the story. I know GRRM kills off characters in many of his works (remember he has written more than ASOIAF). Everyone is scattered to the wind right now. I am hoping this is a plot device-that the next book starts to shape the direction they all must head towards now. I wonder if the writers of the show (even though they took it a bit too far) were attempting in their plot adaptations to try to overcome much of the drudgery of the last two books. If you think back to any great epic, the middle of a story always bogs down. The heroes are without hope. It looks like evil will finally win. Then, in Act 3 of the story, the heroes defeat the odds and win the day. Will this happen here? I don’t know. I don’t know if GRRM has a happy ending planned. But I will see it to the end. I want to know where the story goes. I want to know who finally ascends the throne. As with others, I have had my times where I toss the book across the room. I am sure those times are not over. Oddly enough, the long food descriptions never bugged me. Actually, I never noticed them. I read Jean Auel’s Earth Children’s Series many years ago (and occasionally re-read them) Maybe her 6 or 10 pages of prose describing the flora and fauna at the start of every chapter prepared me for this. When I first started hearing people complain about the long meal descriptions ASOIAF I couldn’t recall ever reading one. So, even though the bloom is off the rose, I am in to the end and hoping the story (both book and tv show) find their footing again.
This is the same thing that happened to “Wild Cards”. First all the violence, then the realization that there’s nothing but the violence, and finally the feeling that the author gets off on it. Eventually it was just too much for me. ((I don’t think George actually does, but giving that impression is something he really has to watch out for.)
Right now, he’s on probation. I’m not buying “Winds” until I’ve read at least half of it and actually see some believable plot movement and decent editing.
I am the right target audience for the books and TV series, and I continue to be happy that I have never succumbed to either. I’m just not that interested in stories of horrible people being horrible to each other. I suppose there must be a nice peasant or two to root for, for whom we don’t want Westeros to freeze to death, but the stories don’t seem to show them. It’s almost as if GRRM is writing an allegory in which the Republicans and Democrats and Russians and Chinese and ISIS and EU are too busy picking petty fights with each other to band together against global warming or the killer asteroid that is heading to take us out, until it’s too late and we all die. Fun reading?
I don’t know what happened to SFF lately. We used to have Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, where good eventually triumphs over evil and there are (guardedly) happy endings. Now we have Divergent and Hunger Games and ASOIAF where there are no clear heroes, the winners turn out to be as bad or worse than the losers, and the survivors (if any) all have PTSD.
http://imgur.com/gallery/P87Nys7
I’m glad I’m not the only one feeling this way. All the violence and brutality and such just feels lazy at a certain point. Yes it can be a great hook, but the more I got into this series the more it felt like Martin found a formula and just kept reusing it to try and keep shocking his audience. I was done at the Red Wedding, that much death and the way it happened just felt a little obnoxious. I feel like it’s constantly being shoved in our faces that the world is a horrible place full of horrible people and nothing good lasts if it happens at all, and the overall story is being a little overlooked in favour of more shock value. I want the story. I want progression. I want the darned White Walkers to show up already! Five seasons of everything falling to pieces, how much longer before things get picked up again?
I have felt a similar way for some time. These books are about the worst humanity has to offer being in charge and so caught up in their struggles for power, have lost sight that the end of the world is just around the corner and nothing has been done to prepare.
Is this social commentary? Satire? Warnings of the effects of Climate Change? Or am I missing something all together?
Repetitive violence, sex and rape. People will continue watching it.
So, apparently I’m the only one in the whole world that really really liked AFFC and ADWD? Crows was my favorite book in the whole series. And I think a lot of people miss the poetry of these two books. They are like extended character studies and I really love them for that. Also I’m disagreeing with the notion that the books are nearly as brutal as the show, or as emotionally exhausting. I can’t think of a scene in the books where a main character’s death didn’t feel deserved, and didn’t make sense. In the show, I can think of a good 3 off the top of my head. I think that this television series is a failed adaption because it relies on sex and violence. The books rely on characters. So I am done with the show, but I’m anxiously anticipating the next book.
I like the food descriptions too. They’re nice and non-grim. They’re like little islands of sanity in the middle of a world of horrible.
There are also immensely long descriptions of battles and castles and things, and the food is (from time to time) every bit as important to the plot as the battles are. Especially the pies!
I think this can only end with the heroes failing and the Walkers taking over the world. If it happens otherwise, would it even seem like the same series? He can’t just flip the happy switch.
I wouldn’t mind the brutality and bleakness so much in either the books or the series if only they still had a compellling, engaging plot. Three first books did, and so did the first three seasons; we felt like we were moving towards something, that scenes served a purpose. Now most of the events and situations described just feel incidental, gratuitous and frankly, pointless.
Crows was a bit of an ordeal, but the DwD finally made me say the eight deadly words: I don’t care what happens to these people.
Completely agree with you Chris. I have rigidly resisted watching the entire series, have not seen a single episode. But your post encapsulates exactly how I feel about the books. It’s no wonder GRRM takes so long to get anything done on these books. Surely it gets tiresome writing such bleak fare without moving the plot along meaningfully.
I’m going to echo what Peyton said above (#10):
“So I am done with the show, but I’m anxiously anticipating the next book.”
Makes me want to go read Brandon Sanderson. Good plots, good characters, and it doesn’t make me despair for mankind…
StrongDreams@6:
>>I don’t know what happened to SFF lately.
It’s grown up some and this is no bad thing ?
>>We used to have Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, where good eventually triumphs over evil and there are (guardedly) happy endings. Now we have Divergent and Hunger Games and ASOIAF where there are no clear heroes, the winners turn out to be as bad or worse than the losers, and the survivors (if any) all have PTSD.
Characterising Frodo Baggins at the end of LotR as not having PTSD would seem a bit of a stretch, to me.
Personally, I trust GRRM’s control over his material, I am confident in the degree to which the last third or so of Dance with Dragons is visibly starting to converge again, and given that he has previously delivered endings as sublime as The Armageddon Rag, I am confident in his ability to give aSoIaF an ending that is satisfying and solidly hopeful (which is not the same thing as happy, but all the more satisfying to me personally because it resonates a lot more with reality to have an ending where things are imperfect but it’s possible to deal with them than one where everything is fixed.)
(Since the site redesign I’m having trouble seeing where things are italicised, neither BBCode nor html is consistently working for me. Am I missing something here ?)
‘Grown up some’. Please don’t confuse tits, violence and lazy cynicism with maturity.
I am ashamed to admit I abandoned the book series somewhere in the middle of vol. 3. Approaching middle-age, I just thought life was too short for another Malazan. But I did keep watching the TV series. I don’t really mind the relentless nastiness, violence, etc. But I always feel that if you’re going to take your audience that low, you owe them a nice flash of redemption every now and then. That was thin on the ground. I think I’m probably done.
I felt that regardless of the external events, all of the journeys in Feast and Dance were internal, and the characters were substantially different when they ended up from where they started
What I got from Feast + Dance:
Jamie finds his comfort zone (soldiering), finds that he has a new skill (negotiation), comes to terms with the human cost of the war his family has waged, comes to terms with his relationship with Cersei and ultimately chooses to abandon her.
Cersei tries to imitate Tywin, builds herself a power structure, makes new allies and ultimately it all fails and she is left with nothing. Politically and emotionally stripped down and raw.
Tyrion, left without money or power, sinks to an emotional low, works out some of his internal demons regarding his dwarfism, and ultimately returns to what he’s good at – political manipulation, using his mind and outthinking everyone around him
Jon comes to terms with what being in the Night’s Watch really means, does everything he can to actually help them, but ultimately finds that he is a flawed human and his desire to seek revenge against Ramsay is greater than his desire to remain neutral at Castle Black. He breaks the last of his vows, incites open rebellion and asks for a mass exodus of crows, and the loyal members of the watch kill him.
Dany runs the full political gauntlet, finds out what kind of ruler she can be when she tries to value human life over everything else, compromises every principal she has as long as she can keep that one – and ultimately she decides that she can’t do it. She cant compromise her goals and values just for the sake of human life anymore. She re-embraces conquest, “fire and blood”, and has decided to accept loses of life if they achieve her greater goal. The book ends with her positioned to reshape the entire world, and taking the first step.
I found all of these plotlines to be well written, well expressed, and fully formed ideas. Person A did not travel to location B and complete quest C – but characters,characters that feel like people, went on an emotional journey that was more important than their physical one. It was about reshaping the story from where it was in book 3, into something larger in the coming books.
And…you didn’t like that?
You keep saying Jon is dead. I don’t think you know what that word means. When we last saw Jon he was bleeding in the snow, then the camera went to black. That’s not dead, that’s a cliffhanger ending. Was JR dead too?
If Jon is not dead (which is likely), doesn’t that make his “death” even more gratuitous? In that case it’s there just to finish the book with a shocker.
I’ve never watched the TV series because I had already abandoned the books. People I care about die in RL, for no apparent reason (or for horrible reasons), with no sense of plot. Why should I read a fantasy novel for more of the same?
This is nonsense. If you were already done with the books on their own merits and for your own reasons, fair enough, but don’t make a decision about the books based on what the show is doing when the two are clearly diverging significantly in context, tone and content. The show has always been more graphic and more nihilistic than the books are. It’s logistically impossible for some of the major twists of the last few episodes to happen in the books – clearly the show is making changes. We don’t know exactly what changes yet, but there’s good reason to think the events of TWOW will play out very differently, even if the core plot points are the same. The show is the show, the books are the books. And Feast and Dance are better books than you’re giving them credit for.
And now we are beginning to see what terrible, juvenile writers D&D are on their own merits. Nothing complex up their sleeves, just cheap shock and sensationalist brutality.
@22 paivi,
That’s exactly how the chapter ended in the book. Stabbed, fade to black, book over. Classic cliffhanger ending. People who keep saying Jon is dead aren’t paying attention.
I think as long as you still feel something, you should keep following the story. Even if it’s not something positive. Any work of art that elicits strong emotion is a successful effort.
The fact that people care so much about a fictional character, that they cry when this character dies, means that the author did a good job. When people get upset about this, it reminds me of an uncle I have. He hates some songs because they make him sad. But the very fact that the song can affect him this way means that it’s a good song. He just doesn’t like being sad. And let’s face it: who does? But all emotions are important. Being happy all the time would be boring.
The problem arrives when people stop caring. Or when all the good characters are already dead, and only the monsters survived. Who cares when a monster dies?
@5: How are you going to read half the book before you buy it? That sounds odd.
@23: That’s the best reason I’ve heard so far.
In response to memefan2000 (#20), it’s all well and good that those things happened, but it probably didn’t require 2000 pages to get to that point.
I may or may not read the next book (never watched the show), but I did feel that the last 2 books were far longer than they needed to be. After slogging my way through those books, and not feeling any closer to any sort of resolution to the series, it makes me hesitant to want to slog through the next one. I would be much more likely to want to read it if there was some glimmer of hope that the world won’t just go on forever with everyone killing each other (or at the very least, that they will stop killing each other long enough to fight the real villains).
GRRM has always written bleak stories, even back in the day when he was writing SF. But he writes powerful stories with compelling characters, though, which is why people keep coming back for more.
In this series, he could continue the bleak theme from beginning to end. Or, he could just be showing us that it is always darkest before the dawn, and end on a hopeful note. I think that, more likely than not, his ‘season’ motif gives us a clue. Yes, Winter is Coming, but every winter is followed by a spring…
@@@@@ 10
What he said.
@26: Yeah, I’ve read the books – I just can’t make up my mind whether I’d prefer Jon being dead for real or for him to get resurrected. His “death” just felt like such a calculated, scheduled event. I suppose for Martin to shock me, he’d have to stay dead – but as you said, it’s not very likely.
I’d have been more shocked and surprised if Sam had died. He’s sort of always felt like he’s protected by some kind of plot shield like Arya and Tyrion.
For me the show has always been a companion to the books, and while I’ve mostly enjoyed it, I have begun to lose interest and would prefer to just wait for the next novel. The first three books were excellent. They were compelling, fast-paced and well plotted. The last two books have seen us come to a sort of stand still where the plot is concerned. There is character development and there are some wonderful insights into the world, but for many readers this can feel like a waste of time or the result of poor editing. People might ask if George is lost in his own world? Has he lost sight of his own plot? I don’t think he has lost sight of his own plot. I feel fairly confident he knows what he’s doing. But in terms of getting lost in his own world… Well, yes I think he has a bit. Books like this are so massive and epic that the ability to expand the world is endless. George has made it very clear he is a student of history and that it inspires his work. He has also made it clear that he is not simply interested in telling a story that involves a conflict, a great battle, and then a victory with no in-between or aftermath. George is telling a story of politics, power, and how difficult it is to rule. We of course saw the politics heavily in the first three and it certainly is present in the last two, but in a different way. Now we are working in the drudgery of day-to-day rule, something that contributes to the sense of realism and the fine details that George is known for, but it also deviates from the standard rules of fiction and what we have come to expect. I have seen readers and viewers alike begin to lose interest and to grow bored as they express feelings that nothing is happening.
I won’t lie, season 5 was brutal and witnessing Jon’s death was something that made we want to throw my television out the window. I read the book and knew what was coming, but it has been years and maybe I was a bit in denial. Maybe I still have some hope, but either way I will have to wait to find out. Much has been said of the sex and violence. I don’t want to say much on the topic, but I will say that it has contributed to the bleak tone of the show. The characters all feel lost, confused, and without purpose. Again they are all consumed by politics and the drudgery of rule. They have in a sense been forced to step back from the larger picture and operate in their own individual corners of the world. This is a shock for us since before we had witnessed all of these interlocking characters and stories seemingly moving forward to a perceived end. Now that end seems forgotten and out of reach. I think this is intentional though. The end is not out of reach just for us, but for the characters as well. Clarity has been lost and they cannot see the forest for the trees.
Some of this reminds me greatly of Harry Potter. I remember the momentum of the first four books and how at the end of Goblet of Fire we see the return of Voldemort. I was so ready for the next book, so ready for the impending battle and chaos, only to be let down by the whimper of Order of the Phoenix. It’s still perhaps my least favorite of the series, but then we did gain some valuable knowledge and in a way it was very much true to how the world is. But in the fictional world events can be manipulated and any lull in activity glossed over. J.K. clearly was not interested in skipping directly on to the Battle of Hogwarts and Martin is no different in his own work. The characters are in the dark now, but I hope it is only so they might begin to come into the light again. I hope this feeling of wandering will come to an end and we will see the original characters and plot merging together and moving in tandem once again.
One final thought. Character death is beginning to grow old. While I embrace the realism of George’s work there is still that part of me that feels that it is just a book and to defy certain conventions is to defeat the purpose of storytelling. You can remove too many characters, too many of the people that have made the book worth reading. Doing this does not endear yourself to the reader because they will stop feeling invested. If Jon is in fact dead, I don’t know where I will go from here.
@16: yes, Sanderson gives us the good side. Even when his characters are depressed and suffering PTSD.
Rape happens, but off screen and the nameless villains that do it to nameless victims are punished.
After attending a World Con interview with GRRM in 2013 I came up with the idea that – if he could get away with it – GRRM would finish ASoI&F as a bunch of short stories. This huge epic ran away from him. He doesn’t know how to tame the dragon. If he could break it up into smaller bits and finish it he would.
But the public and his publishers would not allow that. So now he’s trying to string all his short stories together to create a finished story.
I didn’t read DwD until 2 years after it came out, and got it from the library. I really don’t know if I’ll spend money to finish the story once it’s out.
GRRM use to write for TV. His TV style cliff hangers have gotten stale. He’s jumped his own shark too many times.
The show runners wanted to produce a story of magic & prophecy, without having to show magic or prophecies. Instead they show us charters making bad choices for completely illogical reasons.
I quite agree with you. I am one of those readers who lost fate on the plot with the feast for crows, a sensation only worsened with dance with dragons. For me it’s been a while that beloved George RR Martin lost track of what he wants to accomplish with the series. In the beginning it looked like a (high) fantasy story but the elf-like children of the forest never appear (and if they appear in book 7 just to save the day it’s going to be ultra-lame), those who I think are the only capable of stopping the Others -meaning Bran and Daenerys- have not met or have any clue of the other’s existence. Daenery’s is in a great position to gain control of her dragons by growing again as a person and character and it would be nice for her to grow above human bickering about ruling kingdoms and instead saving the human race. But instead books 4 and 5 have nothing and move the plot nowhere. I truly love Martin and his work but the only thing left is to have faith he will do something -anything- to finally get somewhere -anywhere.
Ambryn@18: I’m not mistaking “lazy cynicism” for maturity; I don’t see lazy cynicism in the narrative, as opposed to from some of the characters, in aSoIaF to mistake for it.
A world where people occupy a complex range of shades of grey and evolve ways of coping with things and finding happiness without guarantees of justice or happy endings, on the other hand, strikes me personally as maturity. And as emotionally uplifting, because the victories are more precious for how much harder they are to attain.
Argh. It’s book 5 of a 7 book series. Of course it is bleak at the end of the middle section, before the surviving good guys and gals start climbing upwards towards a positive resolution of the principal plot threads. Bailing out now is taking your money out of the stock market at the bottom of the business cycle (i.e., a losing bet that permanently locks in a crappy result).
This is something that happens to a lot of epic fantasy series. They get several books in and get bogged down in plots, subplots and sub subplots. Pretty soon, characters are swinging in the breeze and none of the plots are moving forward. It’s why I gave up on the wheel of time around the 9th book. It’s why I gave up on the sword of truth when Richard would spend page upon page monologuing. I by no means have a short attention span in series, but when I’m tens of thousands of pages deep into a story, I need to see the light at the end of the tunnel, not slogging through a100 page prologue. (I’m looking at you WoT)
As for GoT, I’ll admit I’m not a reader just for the reasons listed above. I have been keeping up with the show, though and I feel some of the same way. The deaths are shocking. The rape is horrifying. The violence is gruesome. The plot, however is spinning its wheels. Winter needs to come and stop relying on gratuity.
Also, there actually is a lot of the books left in the Show. Bran’s jedi training, more Arya ninja training, some revised teeing up of a Davos rescue attempt for Rickon, lots of Ironborn plot (we’ll at least get the attack on the west coast that threatens Highgarten and allies (including Tarlys)), the beginnings of Sam’s stay in Oldtown, some piece of the FFC Brienne plot (Septon Meribold looks like he’s being cast), some piece of the Riverlands plot (Blackfish, Edmure and Walder will need resolution, with or without Jaime), partial resolution of Margaery in jail plot (she’ll get out of Sparrow jail because…reasons).
@37 … and you missed KoD at Book 11 of WoT, which was awesome in all respects and a top 5 book for the entire series, as well as the three solid Brandon wrap ups. KoD proves the rule, as everything starts moving up and moving faster at the end of the series. That’s where we are now with ASOIF. I expect to see substantial, positive progress in AWOW.
Good article. I stopped reading after the red wedding and just watched the series from there. I’m pretty happy with that decision. I’m also rooting for the the White Walkers to just conquer the seven kingdoms. I’m not even joking I think that would be the best ending possible. Cause, I couldn’t care less what actually happens to the remaining characters.
@10, 30. Me too, although I like ADWD much better than AFFC. (I’m not an Ironborn fan and too many Brienne wanderings that went nowhere).
@16 – the second two Mistborn books are far more depressing to me than anything GRRM has written. I like them but they are really downers. Not a good counterexample. I see the point much better with Stormlight and some of his other works.
@39 Agreed about WoT. After book 10, the series took off ad finished on a great note. I am, unfortunately, behind on my reading and haven’t read DwD yet, but I will. At this point, I want to see how it ends.
@41 I see your point about the second two Mistborn novels. Maybe I just prefer Sanderson’s style. Even when everything looks bleak in his books, I feel like he’s going to pull it out and give us a satisfying conclusion, even if its not what we expect (like Hero of Ages). It also seems like GRRM is skirting around many fantasy elements, while Sanderson embraces them.
@42 if you want to see how it ends, you can always check Wikipedia. That’s what I intend to do if I can avoid reading the series.
@39 a lot of people have told me Sanderson did a great job finishing the series, but to be honest, if forgotten a lot of the details of all the subplots and can’t bring myself to reread the first 9 books. I have, however, got sucked into his word of radiance series.
@45 If you’re looking for something else to read, Sanderson’s Mistborn series is pretty great. I’m going to read Words of Radiance this summer hopefully (school and family get in the way). LOVED Way of Kings.
@44 I’m actually considering it. So many books to read, but I hate to cheat.
Certainly not. Yes, it’s bleak, violent, dark and brutal, but that just makes it compelling and ratchets up the intensity.
No, I’m not done with the books or the show. Not by a longshot.
And to be honest, why are people only noticing now just how brutal and cynical this world is? If you think this has a happy ending, you haven’t been paying attention.
I have to admit that I really enjoyed Feast and Dance. I feel like we are building momentum again and not losing it. After A Storm of Swords we really had lost a lot of momentum because we hit the end of the first leg of the journey. Everything that seemed to be on its way to being resolved wasn’t and new wrenches were thrown into the works. I think that people are experiencing dislike or boredom toward the books because Storm just kicked so much ass. We had a lot of build up in the first two books and it feels like we are building up again. Just my two cents though.
(I’m sorry if they’re no breaks in this paragraph but the new tor.com is useless.)
Here’s how to not lose momentum in the last two books:
1.Don’t have Dany stay in Mereen. She should begin traveling west and planning her invasion straight away.
2. Tyrion stays in westeros. Goes to Dorne instead. Basically adopts Arianne’s plan to put Myrcella on the throne.
3. Cersei and Jaime both stay in Kings Landing. One of them assumes control of the city after they turn against each other. Kevan, the faith militant and Varys all play a part.
4. Jon and a rapidly improving Bran fight against the first major attack by the white walkers.
5. Keep the Reek and Ramsay plot, because it’s awesome, but by the end of ADWD Stannis and the Boltons have fought and only one controls the North.
6. Remove all the needless filler, like the Ironborn stuff, the whole of Brienne’s travels, the whole of Sam and Gilly’s journey, all of Littlefingers politics in the vale, everything to do with Quentyn Martell and that lost Targaryen bs.
This pretty much sums up my thoughts on fantasy, and to a lesser extent SF. It’s been that way for a long time now. Decades. The weird thing is, ask anyone and they’ll tell you fantasy is this syrupy-sweet paladin-infested idealized genre where everyone comes out at the end dripping with butterflies and puppies. I can’t even remember who the last straightforward hero was that I read about. Paksenarrion? It may have been Paksenarrion. I’m kind of sick of grimdark and antiheroes (aka “sarcastic jerkwads with their empathy surgically removed”) by now.
And I think this season of the show may finally have lost me. The first three seasons were amazing, the fourth started to go off the rails and the fifth…there was one episode that was entirely worth watching, and what an episode it was. But the character assassination of Stannis, one of my favorites since the first few pages of A Clash of Kings and masterfully acted by Stephen Dillane, might have been the last straw for me. They trample his characterization, put him through hell and give him a meaningless death, all in the space of two episodes — and have Brienne break an oath to give it to him, to boot. I have to (however reluctantly) throw in the towel.
I’m just bored with it all. His unrelenting cynicism and grim tone, the deaths, the lack of anything positive or light, it’s all become one big boring cliche. It’s like a game where characters keep bumping into walls and going nowhere. It’s kind of funny that he set out to subvert standard high fantasy tropes and in doing so just replaced them with his own.
Also, you can call Martin’s fantasy mature and grown up if you like, but I think those qualities are overrated by those who lose the powers of childhood. To dream and hold hope, to have a positive vision for the future, those are the truly powerful aspects of fantasy and science fiction that make people work to achieve them. I’d bet Star Trek has motivated more people to do good than all the post apocalyptic fiction ever written.
As someone who began watching the show, then went back and read the first two books while knee-deep in season three, I would like to thank you for the article and the comments here. I’ve grown utterly exhausted with book readers lording their knowledge of the books over those watching the show with smug vanity. Virtually every book reader I’ve talked with has complained at length about books 4 and 5, hence I’m bored to death with hearing book readers pronounce the show a disaster versus the utter perfection of Martin’s writing. GRRM is far from perfect, and his annoyance with the genre he’s working in at times feels like he’s gleefully torturing his audience for the sake of being perceived as bold and adventurous.
Maybe this series will find its way with book 6/season 6, but at this point I feel like I’ve spun my wheels watching an entire season of a TV show where numerous characters I liked are now dead (one must assume for the moment) and those living have either made no real forward progress or regressed backwards. It’s a monumental amount of wheel spinning at this point, and regardless of whether or not you approve of the show it’s obvious that Martin has employed shock value five times too many. I can admire defeating expectations and nullifying cliche to a point, but your characters must progress and plot points must feel as though they have weight.
Ultimately I’ll probably return for 20 more hours of TV, but I will do so with much lower expectations. I’m not sure I will ever have the patience and fortitude to read the remaining books at this point, and while that may be my loss I can only tolerate so much pain and suffering in my desire to escape reality. The first two books offered more than enough of that.
Totally agree with you concerning the show but couldn’t disagree with you more on the books. Both AFfC and ADwD are great books and I am eagerly awaiting ADoS.
@billiam, Ditto
Since reading the 5th book, I cling to the idea that the red lady will realize that she has chosen the wrong hero and will bring Jon Snow back to life like the red priest did. The clues are there but it remains to be seen if this is what GRRM had in mind.
I don’t see cynicism in ASOIAF. I do not see deaths for the sake of deaths or for the sake of shocking the reader. No, Martin does not do this. And while I can understand if people feel that way about the series overall anyway (the acceptable bar of violence for some readers is lower than for others), it’s actually weird for me to see people accusing exactly FfC and DwD in that while praising the first three books. Because no, theses two books do not have more cynicism than the first three, nor do they have more violence. If anything, SoS is probably more brutal than both FfC and DwD. These accusations feel like a cover-up of a true reason why people are dissatisfied with the last two books – they just find them to be boring, nothing more.
Using the show to argue about the books is wrong. No, you can’t compare season 5 and FfC and DwD because they are vastly different in tone, purpose, characters and plot.
At this point, if Martin wants to surprise people, if he wants to subvert expectations, he’ll have just one victory for someone who isn’t awful. Have Brienne or Jon Snow or Danaerys or Tyrion achieve a decisive win that matters and makes a difference in the plot. That would be shocking.
Now when you say done, do you mean throw down the book at the of a dance of dragons “i’ve never picking up this series again” done?
Or just completed all the material that currently exists done?
I feel like when I finished book 5 I was done in the first sense, but after reading the R+L=J theories, I’m convinced. I’ll be picking it back up.
Wiener, weiner Weiner, weiner Weiner, weiner Weiner…,
@46 Loved Mistborn. The 2nd and 3rd books weren’t quite as strong, but I enjoyed them. It took me two tries to get through Way of Kings because it was slow moving through the first half and I was already leery of epic fantasy, but once I got into it, I ate it up. Words of Radiance went down soon after.
How are you going to read half the book before you buy it? That sounds odd.
Just get it from the library.
When I read ADwD for the first time I was in no hurry to finish the book, which is very unusual. I’m only rereading it because I enjoy Leigh’s reactions.
I also thought the Mistborn books were too bleak.
52. Shellywb: Very true. This tendency to rate a series’ maturity by its sexuality, violence and/or hopelessness baffles me a bit, since there are plenty of writers who manage to handle serious real-world issues in fantasy or scifi framework without these themes.
Vorkosigan Saga by Lois McMaster Bujold is the first one that comes to mind. It certainly contains plenty of bleakness and violence, but the characters don’t get relentlessly punished for daring to dream and holding on to their optimism. There’s no cynicism in these books, but I don’t think anyone could argue that they’re somehow ‘immature’.
@63
I think the problem is some people are confusing maturity and realism. There’s nothing mature about cruelty, sexual abuse, selfishness and random violence. But then again this is a representation of the worst humanity has to offer, and since when has that been anywhere near mature?
@10 – No. You are most certainly not.
@20 – Excellent summary. Very well said.
And to anybody who is done with the books: that is totally cool. I’m sure there is plenty of other good stuff out there that will satisfy your needs.
@63 – Vorkosigan, heck yes. I’m also a huge Rothfuss fan, and I unreservedly urge all on this post to read the first two Kingkiller novels if you haven’t already. Brilliant stuff and far less of a downer than ASOIF or most other things mentioned on the post (albeit, we know from framing story that Kvothe has rough going ahead in early part of next/final book of the trilogy).
@3 Finally I read a comment that mirrors my own feelings. I got to the end of A Dance With Dragons but now I just want to wait for someone to post a summary of what happens next on Wikipedia so I can avoid having to read the rest of the series.
@66 But Rothfuss writes even slower than Martin.
I think Tor.com had a post on non-grrmdark fantasy. My personal recommendation is The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison, although it’s not a quest/adventure/epic hero kind of fantasy.
The problem I have with Martin is I feel he’s lost control of his deconstruction. The story and characters have taken second place to ‘realistic’ depictions of fantasy tropes. The last two books also feel like the worst of the pre-Knife of Dreams slog in Wheel of Time. Too many people with too many plans getting too little done.
@57 ethered this thread.
Well done!
In regards to the show, I’m done with it because It’s a bad show (declining since season 2, but really only bad in season 5) set in a very cool world…I may watch it if I don’t have anything else to do, but won’t go out of my way.
I await the next book eagerly.
I haven’t read “A Song of Ice and Fire.” What I’ve learned from those who have is that the TV series “Game of Thrones” is, in the area I’m concerned with, a faithful adaptation of it.
Mark Twain wrote a list of invaluable rules for storytelling. It begins with this:
The rules governing literary art in the domain of romantic fiction shall require:
01. That a tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere.
This is what the problem is with the various major-character deaths in “Game of Thrones.” It’s not that likable characters are snuffing it, often in brutal ways. In fact, the brutality is irrelevant. No, the problem is that none of the series of unfortunate events that the show follows (and, I’m assure, that the novels follow) AREN’T STORIES! Beheading Ned Stark didn’t bother me because a heroic character was laid low, it was because it meant that NONE OF WHAT I SPENT TIME WATCHING HIM DO MATTERED. The Red Wedding? The poisoning of Joffrey? The same. The vast majority of what we’ve seen in five seasons of “Game of Thrones” has been, not story, but backstory. It’s all the guff that sets the stage for some actual story, perhaps involving Daenarys and Tyrion, but who the hell knows, that will be told sometime in the future.
Now, there’s nothing wrong with Martin, or any other author, working out their backstory in that sort of excruciating detail, but it’s a sin to waste an audience’s time with endless doomed characters wandering hither, thither and yon, fighting, scheming, plotting and dying when all of that amounts to nothing, and all of the events we’ve seen just sink down a hole, never to be seen again.
When I first began writing professionally (in 1986 — there’s precious little of it, but it’s real) I received editor George Scithers’ submission guidelines for Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, and one thing from them that has stuck with me is this: There’s nothing wrong with tragedy, where the hero meets a grisly fate through his own failings, but that’s not the same as futility. (That’s not verbatim, but it’s faithful.)
A tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere. “Game of Thrones” not only fails that obligation, it is baldly contemptuous of it.
And that is the problem with the deaths in the series, and why I gave up on it two or three years ago.
I echo the sentiment of the commenter who said “I don’t care what happens to these characters anymore.” But that’s not going to stop me from reading Winds of Winter, because I still want to know what happens to Westeros. I don’t particularly care, but I want to know.
So, I’ll do what I did for aFFC and aDwD… I’ll pre-order the hardcover on Amazon, getting the lowest price over the months leading up to the purchase of the book, as Amazon always gives you, then as soon as I open the box, I’ll snap a picture and list it in a ten day listing on eBay, then I’ll read the book and box it back up. I’ve made my money back every time I’ve done this. I actually MADE money on aDwD.
@71, Whoever assured you that the show follows the books is wrong.
Beheading Ned Stark didn’t bother me because a heroic character was laid low, it was because it meant that NONE OF WHAT I SPENT TIME WATCHING HIM DO MATTERED.
Like this. Yes, none of the time you spent with Ned in the show mattered. But the show excised much of his internal narrative, that is actually crucial to the story.
The Red Wedding? The poisoning of Joffrey?
Again, these events are catalysts that change the very nature of the books and jumpstart many different arcs in the story. THESE EVENTS MATTER. The show has erased what made these events matter however.
A tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere.
The books can be slow about this, but it DOES do this. Some people(like those above) don’t like the pacing which this is accomplished, nor the destination, but they do this.
@71, 73:
An important distinction in what was said @71 is “the area I’m concerned with” part. For some people, and it appears from the comment @71 that the poster may feel this way, nothing matters apart from the characters. So, developing a character as the primary character you want your readers to follow, and then killing that character before they, really, accomplish or learn anything, can feel like a waste of time, regardless of what important plot points were launched during his arc, or how much backstory for the series at large was given during that time.
There’s an assumption made in the comment that only character arcs matter. Obviously, not everyone feels that way, and, quite frankly, ASOIF is a completely different type of story than Mark Twain could have imagined. Whether it is a good or worthwhile story is completely subjective.
@71, 73 I don’t remember where I saw this, but:
I think more male charaters should be like Ned Stark: killed off to further the character development of his wife and children.
I haven’t read any of the other comments, so I apologize if I repeat.
And I also want to say I’m operating under the assumption that you mean you’re done with the series as in, not going to read or watch anymore. I didn’t see where you say that explicitly, but that’s the gist I got. If I’m wrong, apologies.
I can’t blame you for feeling as you do, and obviously you have your right to your opinion, but I think you’re being rather uncharitable when it concerns the books. People like to talk about book 4 and 5 as if they are bad and terrible books with no redeeming qualities, and they treat this as fact. I’m sorry but I have to disagree. After rereading the series several times, I would say book 4 and 5 are just as good, they simply are different.
Now, I won’t argue that the pace does slacken, and there is some definite meandering. But AFFC and ADWD are actually the most philosophical of the books yet and delve even deeper into themes of good/bad, just/unjust, what it means to rule and be a ruler, etc. These two books are much more introspective, and we spend a good majority of the time inside the characters’ heads, rather than watching action unfold. This may make them “bad” books to some people, but for me I have a great appreciation for the themes that GRRM explores within them.
I also don’t agree with the assessment of how bleak the two books are. They are certainly no more bleak than the first 3, and there are also way less character deaths. The bleakness they get is more because we are in the middle–act 2–where the problems begin to unfold, where crises arise, and where the prospects seem most dire. This is no different than any other 3-act work. Most people consider Tolkien’s The Two Towers to be rather bleak and boring compared to the other two, but that doesn’t mean they dismiss the entire trilogy.
Admittedly the fact that the once-imagined trilogy is now going to be 7-8 books, yes there is some bloat. But I personally don’t think that offsets the rest of the work.
As far as the show, I agree a little more. But then the producers have a product to sell and I guess they feel shock/violence (and more the chatter it causes after the fact) is worth more than keeping the story well-written and the characters intact. However, I personally don’t feel they’ve butchered the story beyond redemption (yet) so I will be keeping with it next year. I will admit I have my concerns though.
I will definitely be looking forward to the books and hopefully the eventual resolution to the series. Part of me though does worry as to whether there will be any kind of satisfying conclusion, moreso because I get the impression that GRRM is more troll than author at this point (meaning I get the impression that he would sacrifice writing quality just to “stick it” to his fans). The show I’m a little also rocky about, but I managed to make it through all of Lost so I can probably make it through the rest of GoT.
I feel like I might just go ahead and chime in. I actually liked Feast and Dance, but I can kind of see what people mean about the plot, because sometimes it doesn’t seem like as many events happened, or the events don’t have that “car chase” kind of thrill to them. And I get that the main plot arc of those books can’t be summed up as easily in one or two sentences like the first two or three. But I don’t necessarily understand the arguments that the plot didn’t move along fast enough or went no where. It went somewhere, just maybe not the place you wanted it to be. Although it would help me making or avoiding assumptions like that if people provided more details. Perhaps one thing was that people did not like Dany being in Mereen and wanted her to get to Westeros (at least one person DID mention that, actually).
But does Dany NEED to get to Westeros? It’s where we’ve maybe been wanting her to go, and that was her goal since the beginning–but why can’t a character change goals? The staying in Mereen was a consequence of her actions–she realized she couldn’t just go through freeing slave cities and proceed on without a bunch of shit happening. She also deals with the problems of actually ruling, something she’ll need to learn if she wants to rule Westeros. And keep in mind that getting to Westeros was never actually her goal–it was really a goal that was pushed by her on others. It was really her brother’s goal, and he used her to get it. She just took it up, but maybe she’ll realize that she doesn’t want it after all. She’s been told Westeros is her home, but it’s really not–she would just prefer the house with the red door (perhaps the Full House house?) I actually would not mind if this happened (actually, now I have this secret wish for the books to put Stannis on the Iron Throne after the Others are defeated, just to spite the show). Admittedly, she should probably get her ass to the Wall at some point, because those dragons would be very usefull against the others, not just for direct assault purposes, but because they can make dragon glass and Valyrian steel.
And honestly, sometimes things can be resolved too quickly. Tyrion magically appearing in Mereen, or Bran comleting his training too fast and bringing Jon and Dany and everyone together can be a little too plot convenient. I’ve definitely read books before that seemed like they went by too fast. In fact, I would say that was a problem with Feast in Dance, that things for some of the characters went by a little too quickly. It’s part of the problem of how he’s set up the books–each chapter being from only one character’s point of view-no switching, and requiring that consecutive chapters be from different points of view. And maybe there were just too many characters too far apart, but sometimes it felt as if by the time we came back to a certain character, a LOT had happened in between chapters that we didn’t get to see.
That being said, I DO understand peoples’ feelings. I gave up on the new Battlestar Galactica at the beginning of the third season (really kind of during the second season, but when Starbuck was routinely murdering the same Cylon over and over again as a matter of course that sealed it for me). Even Adama was really indecisive. All the characters were so “flawed” that they had no redeeming qualities and I didn’t care if any of them ever got back to Earth.
I also had the feeling during KOTOR that the destruction of Taris was too much and none of the side quests I did on that planet mattered. But what I’m hearing from these arguments about plot is that it just didn’t go where YOU wanted it to go. I was extremely fascinated by all the new stuff we got to see, as well as being able to dive inside of Cersei’s head. I am probably the only one who thinks this, but I actually wanted Tyrion to spend more time with Griff and Co., and thought they were going to make it all the way to Mereen together.
The other thing is, while you can criticize those last two books, I don’t know that you should hold the first three on too high a pedestal for the same reasons. Certainly Arya’s plot didn’t go anywhere for books two or three, bouncing around between different masters in Harrenhall and such. And Jaime spent a lot of time with Brienne and his Frey cousin escaping Riverrun, when Martin might have made the decision just to make him show up in King’s Landing. I’m not criticizing these things; I liked them, just as I like the journeys in AFFC and ADWD. But I don’t see how they would escape the same criticism.
To me, one of the main themes of the book is how the royals are really caught up in stupid, meaningless politics, and they think themselves better than lower classes when all the while there’s this threat of the Others that should overshadow all the Iron Throne crap, and unite all of humanity. That theme seems to continue throughout these last two books, but at least Dany has some concern with the common people, even if she is started to now get too mired in the politics of ruling.
I was over Game of Thrones mid way through Season 2.
It took Linda and Elio until the end of this season. I don’t mind Dance, and it’s the time between books that is the cause of the stall not the plotlines.
@@@@@77. crzydroid
Sure there were lagging plotlines in books 1-3. I didn’t particularly care for Arya’s wanderings, for example – I thought the TV show managed it much better. But in those books, other plot lines delivered the goods and held up my interest. In the last two books, it seems that almost every plotline has stalled. This effect is made worse by constantly introducing new POW characters whom I just can’t be bothered about at this point of the story.
I’m not sure if my misgivings are really about a plot that didn’t go where I wanted it to go – I like to be surprised by a writer. I think there just isn’t enough of what I – in my subjective view as a reader – think as ‘plot’ to go around anymore. As someone said, the individual character stories of the new POWs would work magnificently as short stories centred around a theme of a continent in turmoil. I’m not sure Arianne’s, Griff’s, Victarion’s etc. stories work so well as extended chapters/plotlines in a series of books where they were brought in relatively late.
The structure aSoIAF has adopted reminds me a bit of soap operas and telenovelas that are designed to run theoretically forever by introducing potential new plot loops and characters at the high points of story arcs. I don’t mean this derogatively – it works marvellously for some people, but it just doesn’t work for me.
@75
Can we be more specific and say further the character development of female children? I think we’ve had enough of young men in fantasy to last us the lifetimes of several pan-dimensional beings.
Ned Stark as a character serves a purpose. The deconstruction of the noble warrior. In the same way that Robert is the deconstruction of the warrior king, and Robb/Joff is deconstruction of the boy king. Their deaths end their story but that doesn’t mean they weren’t valuable to the story. Without Ned as an example, the Stark children wouldn’t act the way they do. Without Robert being a bad king, Westeros wouldn’t have been so primed for war. Without Robb making youthful mistakes and disregarding the very wise advice of his mother, the war wouldn’t have turned out the way it did. These characters are not useless to us merely because they are dead.
All of the “on-screen” events on the first five books are profoundly influenced and impacted by the events of Robert’s Rebellion. I think that, much in the same way that Howland Reed, Varys and Littlefinger will never be POV characters because it drains the mystery swirling around the narrative out of the story, that there will never be a kind of prequel book or show/film of the Rebellion because it would give away too much. This is why Martin gives us prequels set 100 years before the Rebellion – to give us info but to never give too much away. This is why he gives us characters like Dunk and Hotah, who don’t bring much to the story except for witnessing the swirling stories around them. The audience needs a vehicle into the story that doesn’t know whats going on, so it can all be revealed during the story.
Oh, undoubtedly, I am done with A Game of Thrones after this dreadful season, but I’m certainly not done with the books which tell a far better story than the show. The books still have hope, even in times of adversity, which the TV show does not. The show does not counterweight the brutality with humanity in the way that GRRM does. The show values hype, shock, nudity and crass one-liners over character and plot development. It deserves to be abandoned, but the books series does not.
GRRM had better start writing a few payoffs at some point.
I have reached the point where I want the next book and could not care less about the next season. If the next book just meanders, it’s probably over.
The real elephant in the room is GRRM himself. At 66 years old and at least 100 lbs overweight, he better start writing faster or eating slower. The alternative is for the idiots writing for the show to slap an ending on it. Paging Mr. Sanderson…
The show just consists of nihilism and repetitive brutality for shock value – and at this point, nothing else: no characters that can be called consistent or that are doing anything rational or properly motivated, no storylines that make sense, no character arcs, and definitely no depth or complexity.
And at this point, the “realism” argument of show defenders has become completely absurd, since the show is completely unrealistic, its storylines incredibly contrived and implausible and the characters’ behavior illogical and poorly motivated. To quote someone on Tumblr, “The reason bad things happen on GoT has changed. GoT has gone from being a show that wouldn’t cheat to help the good guys to a show that will cheat to help the bad guys.“
The books are different. Please don’t confuse the two. Saying things like “well, there are murders, rapes and tortures in the book, too!” misses the point by a mile. By that logic, I could say that Macbeth or King Lear are the same as The Saw or The Human Centipede.
@83 – Yep. Massive logic fails took me out of every storyline this season. And the 2-demensional treatment of characters such as Melisandre made me feel like I was watching a cartoon from the 80’s.
Yeah, I’ve gotten to the point of wishing a meteor would streak down and end the whole sordid mess. It would be quicker than this piecemeal mass execution of characters and plot.
We get it — all the sympathetic characters die and/or act stupidly, Cersei will be more obnoxious and loathsome and powerful than ever, Jaime will go around with his gold hand acting sort of likable and honorable in spite of his monstrous moral shortcomings, and Walder Frey will “get his” for the Red Wedding sometime around the year 2027.
Cut to George RR giving us the finger.
Chris Lough has pretty much encapsulated everything I feel about the series at the moment. I loved the first few books when they were recommended to me back in about 2004. Gritty and sprawling, yes, but there was some momentum to the plot(s) and the character arcs were interesting. Ned Stark’s death I saw coming a mile off, largely because he just reminded me way too much of Duke Leto Atreides in the original Dune.
Feast and Dance (even more so) were a complete let-down and the over-riding impression I got was that GRRM had effectively written himself into a corner regarding some of the sub-plots and didn’t know how to get himself (and his stories and characters) back out of these dead-ends. I completely agree that the violence (and especially the sexual violence) had gone from being part of the story and an exposition of the poor lot of the “small folk” to being a tedious and gratuitous stand-in for the lack of anything else of any great significance in the overall ongoing story-arcs. It really felt like GRRM had gotten to be too big a “name” and was was being allowed to ramble, when what he really needed was a much more authoritative editor to pull him back on track.
I also can’t help feeling that GRRM had some nice plot-twists and reveals / denouements planned but, now that the internet fan-base has exploded since he first started writing (and because he’s taken so damn long over it), the fans collectively have likely guessed what many of these twists will be — and he doesn’t like this. So, rather than accepting that we’ve sussed out what he was planning to do and just getting on and publishing the darn stories, he’s now desperately trying to work out how he can re-structure and retcon some of his plans so that he he can turn round and say, for example, “Ha! You all thought that R+L=J was unavoidable — but look what I’ve done now to change that!”
There will undoubtedly be a wide range of opinions on this and I fully accept that there will be plenty of folks who still love this series (in both media) and who remain very much engaged — but there are also many who have lost interest because it’s just taking so long or because they perceive the overall quality of the writing and the story-telling to have faded. I’ve tried to stick with it, I really have, but as many have similarly commented, The Winds of Winter is going to have to display some really tight plotting and meaningful character / story development if it’s going to convince me that this series can be redeemed. Right now, I can’t say I’m holding my breath…
Sensitive and PC much author?
IMO the books aren’t slowing down, they’re introducing new interesting players, building characters like Arya and setting the field for the grand finale, whatever that may be. If it comes down to 7 books in the ends, you’ve had a frenetic pace in the first 3, a slower build up with 4 and 5 and let’s see what comes from that on 6 and 7.
The show started losing a lot when they had to move away from the books, when the realities of tv vs writing settled (Things like, people wanting Tyrion or their favorite characters on screen for a lot of time, production costs vs maintaining steady or growing ratings) and GRRM’s sluggish release pace has forced the show to depend on it’s writers more and more instead of book material and frankly, D&D are failing miserably at it (bad pussy anyone?). If season 5 is a prelude of things to come, yeah bye bye series, I’ll stick with the books.
Preston Jacobs (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXU7XVK_2Wd6tAHYO8g9vAA), a great youtube channel about ASOIAF does a brilliant episode by episode commentary of season 5, showing just how bad the writing and plots have become, check it out if you will.
@86/Aesculapius: GRRM has said in an interview though that he doesn’t get why people get so uptight about spoilers, giving an example that he still likes Civil War fiction even though he knows how the Civil War ended. Also, I imagine an author doesn’t provide clues to things if they don’t want some people to figure it out. In the least they want to have some twists based on established things instead of seeming to come out of thing air, but then they should realize this comes with people potentially piecing things together. My point is, it doesn’t seem too likely that he will change some of those things out of spite for not being secretive enough.
@88, Where did this idea come from that Martin spent all this time painstakingly establishing R+L=J just to change his mind because we figured it out? It’s a pretty common idea, but Martin strikes me as a good natured guy, not some massive bridge dwelling troll just out to get his fans goats. Is it just bitterness that he’s taking so long to finish? If so, let me introduce you to being a fan of Stephen King’s Dark Tower in June 1999…
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“A**holes”…? That’s a bit harsh, isn’t it?
I realise that GRRM has said many things in interviews over the years and, like many, I’ve been following this series for well over a decade. I don’t think I’m either sensitive or overly PC and nor am I in any way “bitter” about waiting for the next book (or the one after that…). It’s his series and he can take as long as he likes about writing each book — we may follow his work but he doesn’t “owe” us anything.
Its not about the waiting, its about simply being progressively less impressed with the each successive book as it arrives and an overall feeling that the author has lost focus. Now, I’m well aware that ASoIaF has come to develop some fairly polarised opinions among fans over the last few years (and I’m just talking about the books, not the GoT series) and everyone is entitled to express their views on this; some fervently believe this is the best fantasy series ever and that’s fine, but you also have to allow that there is a pretty big group who are losing interest, and this, pretty consistently, comes down to all the reasons expressed by contributors above.
This isn’t science, there isn’t an absolute answer; this is literature and art, and therefore open to personal interpretation and opinion; the whole point about a discussion forum is that folks are allowed to express those opinions.
@90, If you aren’t bitter at Martin for taking so long, then that statement isn’t directed at you. If it’s not your shoe, don’t try to wear it. And I’m certainly not saying don’t express your opinion. What I’m asking for, is some basis for that opinion, that Martin is nothing but a massive troll who will change his intended plan for his story just to spite his fans.
Aeryl, with all due respect, I’m trying to be rational and even-handed and engage in what is a genuinely interesting debate but you seem to be determined to be angry. This is not about trying to wear anyone’s shoes but given the nature of your response, I don’t think it was unreasonable to suppose that your comments were being directed at me, in part if not in whole.
Anyway, back to the discussion: I’m not suggesting that GRRM is “massive troll who will change his intended plan for his story just to spite his fans” — far from it, I’m well aware of just how much he expresses his appreciation of his fans, and has done for many, many years before GoT hit the screens on HBO and the whole thing exploded into some other dimension.
If anything, I was thinking that GRRM, as a writer and literary artist, delights in throwing us curve-balls; let’s face it, for anyone reading it for the first time, without any prior knowledge, the events that became known as “the Red Wedding” were one of the greatest “Whoa !! WTF?! …?!!” moments in fantasy fiction. I’m not suggesting that GRRM is trying to spite his fans, rather I suspect that he doesn’t like the idea that some of his bigger plot reveals have been guessed (and discussed to death on the internet) and so will likely want to continue to present us with the *unexpected* rather than the long-presumed.
Other than speculation, the impression we get from the books themselves and the bits we pick up from other discussions, what *absolute* “basis” do we have for many of the discussions in here? [If you happen to be GRRM’s PA and are therefore privy to information the rest of us don’t have then, of course you may know more than I do but in that case, don’t grump, just tell…!]
For the most part, the original article and the posts in this thread are about the artistic content of ASoIaF and GoT, the story-arcs and character development (or increasing lack thereof, if you so feel) and, as with all such interpretation of the aesthetic, that is subjective, not objective.
for anyone reading it for the first time, without any prior knowledge, the events that became known as “the Red Wedding” were one of the greatest “Whoa !! WTF?! …?!!” moments in fantasy fiction.
No they weren’t. GRRM completely telegraphed everything that was about to happen as soon as Robb established his plan to go North. Once that was established, I knew it would never happen. The two Catelyn chapters leading into it were full of dread, especially her deep deep concern that Robb make himself “safe” via guest rights of food and water.
and he doesn’t like this…he’s now desperately trying to work out how he can re-structure and retcon some of his plans so that he he can turn round and say, for example, “Ha! You all thought that R+L=J was unavoidable — but look what I’ve done now to change that!”
Speculating what will happen in the books, and speculating the state of mind of the author are two totally different things and you know it. One is to makes guess as to what story the author is telling, the other is casting aspersions against an author’s character.
And finally, I’m not angry. I’m passionate and irritated and I’d appreciate it if you’d stop implying such.
@93
He/She’s an angry elf.
Given the amount of passionate buzz generated in the comments of this one article alone, I think George RR Martin has created two masterworks of fantasy in two very desperate genres; the ‘high’ world of literature and the ‘low’ of television. Disinterest is the enemy of art. If you truly are offended by this man’s work, why are you spending time reading or writing about it? The truth is that you care about this story. Energy flows where attention goes.
As for the brutality and rape……I find it odd that literary people would tread a road so close to censureship. Would you claim Moby Dick is unacceptable because it is about whaling? Do you think books like Huckleberry Finn or Catcher in the Rye should be banned? Why does one book get a pass on political incorrect content yet another does not? If Martin released these books under the ruse of being recovered from a past era, would you automatically forgive the objectionable parts because people in the past are always more ignorant than we of the enlightened present?
If you can’t separate your own politics from the book your reading, put it down. You won’t possibly understand it beyond the most literal interpretation. I hear ‘Goodnight Moon’ is an excellent read. Very positive, too.
@71, i just wanted to say that the point may not be that Ned Stark had a character arc, because maybe while a central character for the book, it does not need to mean that he is the central character. Also, people die all the time, before finishing whatever the set out to do, what is wrong with a story replicating that.