A review of “High Sparrow,” the third episode of the fifth season of “Game of Thrones”
by Miodrag Zarković
Bold. What a word! “Merriam-Webster” defines it in three points: 1) not afraid of danger or difficult situations; 2) showing or needing confidence or lack of fear; 3) very confident in a way that may seem rude or foolish. Keep all three points in mind when you read the following excerpt:
“HBO’s Game of Thrones has been gradually edging away from its source material. Yet Sunday’s episode introduced what is perhaps the boldest departure yet from George R. R. Martin’s novels . . .”
It’s taken from Entertainment Weekly’s article about “High Sparrow,” the third episode of the fifth season of what was supposed to be the “A Song of Ice and Fire” book series brought to screen. James Hibberd, the author of the article, actually describes the departure in question immediately after the excerpt; but before getting to that part, let’s focus for a moment on the fact he called it “perhaps the boldest” one yet. According to “Merriam-Webster,” it should mean that the said deviation required courage, fearlessness, firmness and confidence from David Benioff and Dan Weiss, the two showrunners. That is what bold means, after all.
Bold. Has a very nice ring to it. One might fall in love with the term. One might even confuse it for identity and wish to take it.
Bold, Bold, it rhymes with told.
Okay, let’s see what are we told further in the article. What is this big, bold departure the show undertook in “High Sparrow”? Turned out it’s Benioff & Weiss’ decision to have Sansa Stark, the oldest living child of Ned and Catelyn Stark, marry the son of Roose Bolton, the man who, two seasons ago, murdered the firstborn child of Ned and Catelyn Stark. That is the departure EW called “perhaps the boldest” yet.
And departure it is. In the novels, the monstrous Ramsay Bolton marries not Sansa but her best friend Jeyne Poole, who was practically a nonentity in the show, where she briefly appeared—without a spoken line and never addressed by name—only in the pilot. In the books, Jeyne is the one who gets to be the lucky bride of the biggest psychopath in the saga (which says quite a lot, really), while Sansa at this point in the story is still in the Vale and has absolutely no connection to the storyline set in the North, the coldest region of the Seven Kingdoms.
Bold, Bold, it rhymes with cold.
EW’s stance implies considerable risks were taken by Benioff and Weiss in making the decision to move their Sansa into Jeyne’s role. Risks are an absolute necessity because, as Ned Stark would say, that is the only thing a man can be bold against. However, in the same EW article, just paragraphs below, Benioff and Weiss’ trusted wingman Bryan Cogman reveals something else entirely. Here’s the excerpt:
“Besides, Cogman pointed out: ‘You have this storyline with Ramsay. Do you have one of your leading ladies—who is an incredibly talented actor who we’ve followed for five years and viewers love and adore—do it? Or do you bring in a new character to do it? To me, the question answers itself: You use the character the audience is invested in.’”
Pay attention to what Cogman, also a writer for the show, says: “The question answers itself.” That does not sit well with risks and being bold. Answering questions that answer themselves is never a sign of bravery. It is quite the contrary, in fact. Letting a question like that answer itself may be smart or stupid, wise or shortsighted, rewarding or futile, but it can never ever be bold. Cogman actually says exactly the opposite of what was stated at the beginning of the article: that the show took a safer choice. Not more challenging, but more conventional one. In effect, the showrunners avoided risks by replacing a new character (which would be new in the first place, simply because Benioff and Weiss failed to introduce Jeyne Poole properly when the time was right), with an old one.
Bold, Bold, it rhymes with old.
But enough with the EW article. Let’s put the decision itself under scrutiny. So, how does Sansa’s marriage to Ramsay fit into the bigger picture in regards to logic, themes and narrative?
It doesn’t! For a number of reasons.
First, it could never be negotiated. How could Littlefinger and Roose Bolton ever discuss the idea of such a strange alliance? It’s unfathomable! It is already established that Littlefinger made the proposal (he himself said so in the previous episode, and his exchange with Roose this week confirms that), but really, why would Bolton ever accept any such suggestion at face value and not become suspicious to the point of alerting the Iron Throne of a possible traitor that resides in the Vale? Or even more, why would Littlefinger ever expect Boltons to accept it? Remember, this is supposed to be the world in which Ned Stark lost his head for being not too careful. The world in which the Northern army was massacred because Robb didn’t keep his word. How come the same rules don’t apply to Littlefinger and Roose Bolton, people who, on top of everything, were instrumental in the downfalls of Ned and Robb, so they can’t help but know the rules, which would only make them more cautious? Both Littlefinger sending the proposal and Roose Bolton accepting it are extremely careless moves that expose those who make them to drastic possibilities. Say what you want about Littlefinger and Roose, but however ambitious, greedy or brazen they may be, neither is careless. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be in their current positions.
Second, why the hell would Sansa ever go along with it? As seen last season, she’s the one who basically has control over Littlefinger now, not the other way around. She was the one who lied to save him a year ago, and one word of hers can get him killed in no time. After spending years as a prisoner of the Lannisters, she finally managed to not only escape King’s Landing, but also gain such a power over the Protector of the Vale. And now she’s going to throw all that and be the daughter-in-law of the man who can’t be anything but a nemesis and a usurper?
Third, how did Littlefinger manage to persuade Sansa so easily? She’s appalled by his idea at first, but then she accepts it a minute later. All it took to change her mind was a few badly-worded lines in which Littlefinger revealed nothing of importance nor offered any kind of assurance whatsoever. One would expect something stronger than “You’ll be running away all your life” is needed for such a radical change of heart. Actually, the entire scene of Sansa finally accepting Littlefinger’s plan was an exercise in heavy-handed, clichéd and baseless writing.
Fourth, what is Littlefinger’s plan actually? Let’s assume he hid it from Sansa (which only makes her more unbelievably stupid, though we’re well past that point anyhow), but is any viable plan by Littlefinger even detectable? Like, why would a man as ambitious and cunning as Littlefinger give away his most valuable acquisition, and to Roose Bolton of all people? In the novels, it indeed is Littlefinger who sends poor Jeyne Poole to Winterfell to pose as Arya Stark, but that in effect strengthens his grip on the Boltons, who are now ever dependent on anyone who can expose the ploy. By placing fake Arya in the hands of the Boltons, he risks not a single thing. In the show, however, Littlefinger practically gambles with literally everything. Just consider the possibility that Sansa accidentally slips who really murdered Lysa Arryn: at that moment, he, Littlefinger, would become the one who depends on the Boltons instead of the other way around. But even if nothing similar happens, Littlefinger is allying himself with the weakest ruler of the North in history, and in the process he’s giving away his main asset, who, by the way, could deliver the North to him without ever entering into any pact with the Boltons (in fact, this arrangement can only decrease Sansa’s reputation in her homeland): that’s not ambitious or brazen or unpredictable, that is outright absurd.
Fifth, once Sansa and Littlefinger reach Winterfell, it turns out Littlefinger lacks not only a plan, but also the basic information about the family he just formed a fateful treaty with. He doesn’t seem to know anything about Ramsay, a man we saw earlier being chastised by his father for allowing all the North to see what a monster he truly is. All of which means that TV Westeros is a land where the word of, say, Tywin Lannister’s death travels almost instantly, but news of Ramsay flaying lords and their families never reach the most informed guy in the realm (Varys is in another continent at the moment).
Bold, Bold, it rhymes with scold.
Yes, whoever came up with this “bold” departure from the source material deserves to be scolded and chastised over and over again, until he learns never to say Sansa is his favorite character ever again. Because he actually is saying exactly that:
“Sansa is a character we care about almost more than any other, and the Stark sisters have from the very beginning been two characters who have fascinated us the most,” Benioff was quoted in EW article.
Yeah, they love Sansa’s character so much they took her out of her arc and moved her somewhere she couldn’t belong in any meaningful way. The fact he’s saying that in the very article that deals with “perhaps the boldest departure” that actually involves Sansa, clearly proves the modern public increasingly looks as if adapted by Benioff and Weiss: who needs accountability anyway, accountability is for eight graders!
As a matter of fact, Game of Thrones may very well be the first show that doesn’t reflect the reality so much as accommodates it according to its own image. “You’re going to believe me or your lying eyes?” seems to be the order of the day at this point in the history of mankind, and nowhere is that more evident than in the case of GOT, the showrunners of which seem to have improved the catchphrase into: “What are you going to use for thinking, our interviews or your too-logical-for-its-own-good brain?”
Looks like too many choose to believe not their own eyes and minds, but Benioff and Weiss, even though the two were already caught lying in flagrante. And about the same storyline, no less. Back in Season One, when explaining why they gave book Sandor’s lines to TV Littlefinger, Cogman said it was because of the terrible weather conditions that messed up with the shooting schedule and forced them to make the switch. But in the scene itself, while Littlefinger’s telling Sansa the story of “brotherly love” between Gregor and Sandor, you can clearly see the latter standing behind, in the stands, right by Joffrey. The actor was actually there, in the scene, at disposal and very visible, and yet any number of viewers chose to believe Cogman and his ridiculous story about some weather conditions that influenced the script.
That arrogance in dealing with their own fans is the most annoying thing about the showrunners and their crew. But, one would be mistaken to confuse that arrogance with some sort of confidence. It is, in fact, the exact opposite: a calculated cockiness, aimed at leaving the impression of confidence where there is none.
Just look at the scene with the High Septon being forced naked out of the brothel. What purpose did it serve? The first part of the scene, in which the High Septon was picking whores, filled the nudity quota, of course, but the High Septon himself—no offense—certainly wasn’t disrobed for the same wisdom. He was made to walk naked through the streets of King’s Landing for one reason: to make the similar scene that is coming for Cersei at the end of the season not look too controversial.
See, last year, with the now infamous sex scene in the sept and the public outcry that followed it, the HBO executives most probably demanded from Benioff and Weiss never to repeat a similar controversy. And, while their understanding of the books is questionable at best, Benioff and Weis are probably very much in touch with the readers’ reactions to particular points of Martin’s novels. Like a politician obsessed not with his legacy but with his approval ratings: it’s not about what he wants or doesn’t want to do, it’s about how people are going to react to it. Therefore, Benioff and Weiss definitely know a significant part of the readership think Cersei’s Walk of Shame was a misogynistic measure against her. And they aren’t willing to risk their show being seen in the same light. No way. Hence the scene with the naked High Septon. This way, once Lena Headey puts her bare foot on the same streets, nobody will be able to accuse Benioff and Weiss that women are more tortured than men in their world.
That’s how bold they truly are. That is the boldness that stems only from a corporate giant that paid millions of dollars for your right to play petty games with a source material that is anything but petty.
Bold, Bold, it rhymes with gold.
And yes, the games Benioff and Weiss seem to be playing with fans of the novels often appear as petty. Just look at the Janos Slynt’s death scene. Really, how hard can it be to include “Ed, fetch me a block?” It wouldn’t take more than a few seconds for Jon to change his mind and instead of hanging to outright behead Janos. But no, Benioff and Weiss probably find some mysterious joy in omitting all the iconic lines they know the most faithful book readers simply adore.
Bold, Bold, it almost rhymes with “Ollie, bring me my sword.”
It is, after all, what they managed to do even with the first of those iconic lines: Ned’s “That is the only time a man can be brave.” There is no such line in the pilot, it’s only referred to much later on, near the end of the second season, when Robb tells Talisa about his late father.
What Benioff and Weiss possibly don’t get is that those lines didn’t become iconic because fans confused them for passwords that give access to their secret nerd societies. (Before the show, actually, ASOIAF was pretty immune to the entire nerd culture.) No, those lines are so beloved precisely because they are written as important points in the development of this character or that plotline. It’s never just about Edd or fetching or a block, but also about decisions these characters make and then go on living with them. Lines like those are what makes not only dialogues in ASOIAF but also characters so damn memorable and brilliant.
Partially because of those omissions, characters in the show are often flat and/or inconsistent. The aforementioned Janos Slynt, for example. A few episodes ago, in last season’s penultimate hour, Janos was hiding in Gilly’s room during the crucial battle with the wildlings. One episode ago, during the elections Sam was openly ridiculing Janos and his cowardice in front of everyone, and Janos did nothing at all—in effect, it means he’s a way bigger craven than Sam. But now, in this episode, all of a sudden he’s all disobedient and even rebellious when the new Lord Commander gives him a direct order. One might ask, what did Benioff and Weiss turn their Janos into such a wimp for, when they eventually ended his arc the same way as in the books? Really, how hard, or bold, it is to write a side character like Janos Slynt consistently, especially when someone else already did it for you in the novels?
And in those rare instances Benioff and Weiss are consistent (sort of), it’s for the worse. Enter Tyrion, a character who, if personal opinions are allowed, I find absolutely brilliant and one of Martin’s best in the books. But I like Tyrion only with both his best and his worst parts, and his absolute worst happens in “A Dance with Dragons,” when, all the while believing he was infected by greyscale, he penetrates a poor sex slave and thus possibly exposes her to the deadly disease. In the show, however, not only that greyscale is removed from his Essos arc but Tyrion also doesn’t sleep with prostitutes anymore. Like, he would but can’t! He appears to be an even better person than he was before killing Shae and Tywin. Some call it the whitewashing of Tyrion, but I prefer to call it the dumbing down of the entire story to the point where characters are allowed only to walk the narrow beats that were chosen for them somewhere in HBO’s focus groups-dealing departments. Tyrion is recognized as a protagonist up there, and therefore he’s stripped of layers and layers of complexity that made him such a wonderful creation.
Bold, Bold, it rhymes with mold.
It is what the show does all the time with all the characters. Benioff and Weiss are frequently praised by servile TV critics for their alleged boldness in deviating from the source material (and in the first season they were actually encouraged to do so), and looks like they came to believe it really is a question of courage. But what’s really going on is exactly the opposite. The ultimate result is that each and every deviation only made the story and the world and the characters more lame and flat and dumb, but in all fairness, the show’s deviations could never be bold. Not with all the push for them coming from all directions. Not with HBO demanding them, as evidenced by the reshooting of the pilot. Not with all the money HBO’s been pouring on the media, in the name of promoting Game of Thrones. With all the resources HBO invested in this project, taking the easier, safer route every time is never bold. On the contrary.
Bold, Bold, it rhymes with sold.
PAWN TO PLAYER 
Very good review as always.
These “critics circle reviews” are becoming more and more unbelievable. At least the EW one doesn’t try to sell us D&D as some kind of “top notch artists” and redeemers of wrongs as the review from Grantland.
Sansa’s plot is so ridiculous! But some people seem to believe in it with passion. They take everything that is given to them at face value, without any reflexion, and still bitch around after being proven wrong.
LF told Sansa that she was going to AVENGE herself, so everything is OK.
Who needs a believable plan! LF has a plan, we’re the ones too dumb to understand it, lol
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Cogman’s comments say it all, really. Instead of actually committing to Sansa’s arc and finding the dramatic pulse therein, they’ve decided to pull her into a Northern conflict that makes no sense within the logic of the story and stretches the believability of many characters. Even if the wedding to Ramsay doesn’t end up happening, it’s still a massive disservice to her storyline, putting her back into a situation where the potential for even more depraved victimization is present, and where crucial aspects of her growth will be glossed over or outright neglected. There was a reason each of the Stark children had their separate and distinct “training grounds” in the novels, but the showrunners have displayed a clear contempt for Sansa’s development, which makes their comments about her being the character they care about the most an utter absurdity.
Great points on why they had the High Septon walk naked through the streets. You have a knack for highlighting the underlying pressures that inform their decisions and it’s one of the reasons why these reviews are so enjoyable and insightful.
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Yep, I call BS on their claim that Sansa is the character they care the most about. If that was the case, then they wouldn’t have shafted her arc in season 3 where they not only made her seem stupid but also made her forced marriage all about Tyrion. Tyrion angsting about agree to the marriage, angsting about consummating it, angsting about telling her her brother and mother have been murdered – and we don’t even get to see her reaction! The scene about that reveal is all about Tyrion angsting about him having to give her the bad news!
Sansa’s whole KL arc is about her subtle acts of resistance. She is outwardly meek and compliant but she never ever lets any of her enemies in, especially not her unwanted husband, who in the books comments about her icy wall of courtesy. In the show, however, they have Sansa bond with Tyrion fairly soon after the marriage, laughing and joking.
Nope, they don’t care a bit about Sansa! To be fair, I don’t really think that they care about any of the characters, or the story for that matter. They care about creating shocking and titillating moments in an ever increasing spiral of viciousness and depravity. Because – hey! Sex, violence and sexual violence sells. Why bother with plot coherence and character arcs when you can just throw in some naked women, some gore and some nifty special effects.
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Seriously! It’s getting ridiculous already with the gratuitous sex shots in made up scenes solely for the purpose of shock and titillation. The one that takes the cake in this episode and maybe the overall show so far, has to be the slow motion zoom in on the female prostitute’s groin area and pubic hair during the made up scene of the High Septon in the brothel.
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I also call BS on their claim that they’ve planned this storyline since season 2:
” In fact, the showrunners first thought about putting Sansa and Ramsay together back when they were writing season 2. ”
http://www.ew.com/article/2015/04/26/game-thrones-sansa-ramsay-interview
If they had, then why end season 4 with Sansa and LF gearing up to a tour of the Vale with SweetRobin in order to secure LF’s hold over the Vale. Suddenly, at the start of this season that storyline has been dropped with no explanation and this storyline with Sansa marrying Ramsay in Winterfell is put in place. Can’t they even remember what they do with their plots from season to season? Sloppy work, indeed.
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Completely agree about their alleged plan for Sansa that dates back to season 2: I’d bet that is an outright lie, simply because they don’t usually reveal when did they come up with this “brilliant” idea or that one, so when they find it necessary to tell it to us this time around, they’re probably lying.
On top of that, last season, when the episode with Yara’s failed rescue of Theon aired, some people on Westeros forum noticed how oddly it was edited: one minute Ramsay is having sex with Myranda, next minute he’s standing shirtless and all bloodied against Ironborn. Something’s missing there, some closure for his sex with Myranda. My guess is that her death by him was filmed, but later, when D&D came up with Sansa/Ramsay/Myranda triangle that is going to happen this season, they cut Myrcanda’s death out. If that is true, then they though of Sansa+Ramsay somewhere between the filming of Season 4 and its premiere, which is good two years later than Season 2.
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All of this was brilliant, and thank you for calling attention to the reviews. I really feel like I’m going insane here. 5×03 demonstrated a complete departure from logic, while also providing what was possibly the most sexist episode to date.
Your “bold” stuff was great. There’s an Office episode where Jim says ” It is a bold move to photoshop yourself in a picture with your girlfriend and her kids with their biological father. Then again Michael is a bold guy. Is ‘bold’ the right word?” You’ve given it new meaning for me.
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Well said on all counts. Your explanation of why the Sansa storyline in particular is anything but bold is pretty much how I was thinking of it but I couldn’t articulate it as well as you did here. I also agree with Brashcandie’s comment too about how this negates Sansa’s character growth.
Another aspect of this that I have only seen minor mention of in discussions is if the storyline goes on to have Theon rescue Sansa, then this could have negative consequences for both characters. It will affect Theon’s character development because it turns Theon’s big moment of taking the steps to finding his way back to himself into a side story of what will happen to Sansa whereas in the books his rescue of Jeyne and escape from Ramsay is the major turning point for his character. That’s why it actually makes sense in the books for Theon’s character to rescue a “minor” character because the focus of those chapters is on him just as the focus of the Sansa/Alayne chapters is on her. On the flip side, having Theon rescue Sansa, if that is what will happen, will also negatively affect Sansa’s character as it would take away the agency from Sansa who in the books is learning that she needs to rescue herself and not rely on anyone else to rescue her. Or the opposite effect is that it makes Sansa’s storyline a side story to Theon’s great moment of rescuing Sansa which would also be a tragedy to Sansa’s storyline. (Maybe this criticism is premature as I don’t know exactly how this will play out on the show yet, but it does look like they are going in this direction and if so it seems very likely that one of these two characters would be sacrificed at the expense of the other.)
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Yup, agreed. But according to the showrunners, why bother with bringing in a minor character when we can just take Sansa and use her instead! To hell with her development and the overall logic. And don’t worry about being premature in your comments. There’s really already no way for them to salvage this without diminishing both Theon and Sansa’s storylines, and it’s already in effect, moreso with Sansa. Their experiment literally boils down to “let’s plop this character down here and watch what happens” because we have psychopath Ramsay and their version of newly strong Sansa. Spare no thought that vengeance is not something that motivates Sansa, and even if it were, this would be an atrocious way to go about it.
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No way to salvage it, indeed, even the actress thinks the same. Read it here .
That is telling, and she also said she was shocked at finding out about this plotline when she was sent her script for the season.
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They do seem to boil everything down to vengeance – they actually said that Needle represents vengeance to Arya (though I can’t remember the interview). The seem to have misunderstood some very basic things about the story – Needle is a symbol of Arya’s identity as a Stark and her connection to Jon, and Arya is in a place where she has to masquerade under other identities, just as Sansa.
It seems that D&D, who don’t like themes, has decided on simplifying things – power-hungry people do bad things to honorable people, the children of the slain honorable people want vengeance, end of story.
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Great review, great review, I enjoyed the rhetorical device of the word bold, very clever and was certainly apt as a kind of double edged metaphor.
So… Should we have a funeral for the show Sansa’s character? Or did you guys already have that a couple seasons ago? Because yeah. This ain’t Sansa anymore. I feel like these moments come for all the characters at various times, where they crash a threshold and become definitively NOT thier book character. Of course then D&D may suddenly decide to try to cram them back into their show role, and of course it’s always super disjointed when they do that. I know this was back in the first episode, but Jaime suddenly turning into Mr. Lannister Patriarch with his “he built this for us!” and “everyone is going to try to tear us apart.” Not only does this not fit with his book character at all at this point, but it’s a polar opposite of his TV character from last year who was telling his father to shove Casterly Rock up his gilded ass. But I digress.
It doesn’t even need to be said how nonsensical it is to take someone who, as the reviewer said, is slowing increasing in agency as she learns to play the game, and marry them to Ramsay. They’ve either got to subject Sansa to more abuse, which doesn’t fit her arc at this point, or they’ve got to cut all that, which ruins Ramsay’s excellent villain that he has played so far (love the frantic eating while his father talks to him, very nice subtle signs of a disturbed individual). It’s just stupid. And what happens when Stannis comes south? Is he going to try to take Winterfell from Ramsay after he marries Sansa? Won’t that kind of fuck that up really badly?
All the logical objections about Littlefinger and Roose are spot on… makes no damn sense. Nothing to add, except I was having trouble holding my tounge during the episode (I wasn’t spoiled by the leaks). Littlefinger has no intelligence in the North? Really? Laughable.
In contrast, many scenes in this episode lifted dialogue right out of the book – and whenever they do that, it always turns out great. Facepalm, facepalm. They came so close to getting the Janos Slynt execution right… I do also wonder if they change these things just to send fans the message that they are the boss. Ed was right there! Anyway.
My overall take on the TV show is increasingly becoming “the more they deviate from the books, the better.” The less spoiled we will be, that’s for the good. This show is hard to take seriously, it’s essentially fan fiction with little dabs of ASOIAF material thrown in.
The main thing I value the show for is the visual depiction of certain scenes. Some things have to be depicted that way for people to understand. The burning of Mance Raydar is a great example. You read about these burnings in the book, and you think “well its medieval fantasy and dark magic, shit is rough, but you know, nobody is perfect and Melisandre wants to fight the Others…” But then you see a bunch of people standing around watching someone be dragged up onto a pyre, chained to a pole, and burned alive. It’s unquestionably evil, well beyond the reach of any Machiavellian reverse-justification mental gymnastics that might try to see it is anything other than evil. The actors did a good job depicting the horror and confusion one would feel in their place. What are we doing here? What are we taking part in?
The corpse stuff in the HOB&W was another good one. I found it way creepier in person. They did a great job with that – again, they drew a lot of stuff from the books, directly or closely adapted. All the stuff about becoming no one, the “waif,” the decision to throw the sword in the water or not, all well done. They can do an actual adaptation if they really try…. Which makes the rest of the shit show the more tragic.
But again, I really only care about the books. I’m happy the show exists, if only because it has made my favorite author very successful and exposed more people to my favorite books. But I am increasingly glad to see it go off the rails, because that’s all the less we will be spoiled in the future. “The show is going to end like the books!” Right, just like the show has gone by the books so far…
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Considering how poorly directed many of the scenes are, Mance’s death was not half bad in terms of how it was filmed. But in my eyes the horror of burning people alive was conveyed better in the books. That Asha’s chapter in ADWD, when three men are burned as she watches, was memorable, and the part about the burnings was worded brilliantly. What stood out for me was the smell of their pubic hairs in flame, I almost felt it myself while reading the passage. Perhaps I’m just a hater by this point, but TV Mance’s death really didn’t leave the same impression on me. Not even close.
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An insightful and entertaining review, with an amusing use of Reek Rhymes. Your creative juices are flowing in abundance, Miodrag.
Both you and the other commenters have said all that needs be said, and I concur. However, for me personally what stood out in a long list of follies was how they’ve chosen to shoehorn the theme of vengeance into all three Stark children’s arcs.
Starting with Sansa: Littlefinger has given her one motivation for her to go along, vengeance. Not only does he mix “justice” and “vengeance” into one (which says a lot about the writers’ understanding of these) and tries to sell it to a girl whose family he himself is guilty of destroying but she also seemingly goes along with it with no questions asked. Yet this is a girl that’s not vengeful at all, in fact, she’s the contrary. The most she does is wish ill on her family’s enemies or those who offended her in her thoughts and pray for Joffrey to die, and that is it. Following their trend of making the pacifist and non-vindictive females into revenge advocates, they’re now pushing the character that’s the most compassionate one into a role of Stark avenger that doesn’t go well with her core self.
Then there’s Jon, also someone who’s not vengeful at all and who, like Sansa, only goes as far as wishing to bring doom and destruction to the Lannisters for the death of his family and nothing else. He’s someone who’s trying to reach peace with the Wildlings, and who accepted Janos, one of his father’s killers, well enough due to the vows of the Watch. But during the execution, which is supposed to be for disobeying the Lord Commander, when he’s sobbing for mercy, they’ve filmed it in a way that Jon seems almost vindictive, to take a measure of satisfaction from beheading this man. And, of course, Stannis’ offer to make him Lord of Winterfell comes with the motivation of avenging the Starks. Revenge, again, where it doesn’t belong.
And finally Arya, the only Stark motivated by vengeance, although fueled by too much trauma at an early age that makes it comprehensible. She’s the only one with whom the revenge theme can be utilised in full, as it’s intrinsic of her arc, but even hers possesses some aspects that have nothing to do with vengeance, and it’s in such an aspect where Benioff and Weiss are trying to artificially fit it in. I am referring to the scene where she gets rid of Needle, or tries to. The real reason Arya cannot throw it away is Jon, her roots, but from what the showrunners said in the Inside the Episode video, we’re all wrong and the real reason is . . . revenge. Arya clings to revenge and cannot let go, and Needle represents that revenge, so that’s why she didn’t get rid of it. That’s it, no “Needle was Jon Snow’s smile.”
What’s their excuse for doing this? I wonder if they think that, since the Starks have suffered so much, it’d please the viewership to see them even the score and murder their enemies. But that’s not what the Stark children’s arcs are about, in the author’s vision of the story. But in D&D’s vision, no, and the old gods know if they’d follow this trend and go for making Bran use his super-warg powers for revenge, too, instead of the greater purpose they seem to have.
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It’s not that they are putting vengeance in the Stark children, haven’t you noticed, they are putting vengeance in EVERYBODY.
Ellaria is all about “Vengeance” now, contrary to her books. Brienne is all about “vengeance” now, even though in the books she rarely (never?) think about it.
It seems like revenge is the only motivation that D&D identifies with and understands so when they write every character is motivated by it.
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That’s true, I had noted that when the second episode aired and compared what they’d done with Ellaria to what they did with Catelyn, who was also against vengeance in the books, before she became a zombie. What they’re doing with the Stark children is just more of the same pattern to make vindictiveness a trait (or a plot point) in people who don’t have it, a perversion of character that’s hard to understand. Isolated cases one can comprehend depending on the context, but not such persistence in applying it to so many characters.
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And of course you have Varys who plots an elaborate revenge on the man who castrated him, Dany who locks Xaro and Doreah in the vault to get revenge on them, Jon who goes to Craster’s Keep to “avenge Lord Mormont”, Catelyn with the “we will kill them all”.
Now looking back I can see why they got rid of Stoneheart. With everyone in the story seeking revenge it kind of makes her character redundant.
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I think they do this because they think their audience is stupid. They already demonstrated that in season 1, when they had Littlefinger practically spell out his intentions and motivations, which wasn’t necessary since the astute viewer could put that together based on what LF had already said to Ned. However. they were apparently unsure that people got it so they had him do a long monologue about his intentions – while having some naked women simulate sex in the background.
They probably have some focus group or marketing research saying that people don’t like overly complicated stories and characters – and that what the audience essentially want is revenge for the Starks that they are so invested in. And let’s face it, the audience (and most readers) want revenge for the Starks – so it becomes less about the original story and the original characters and more about what the audience wants.
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Nailed it here. There’s obviously too much triangulation which ends up in assuming the viewer is dumb. We can call that the “idiocracy filter.” It’s a shame because it’s exactly the opposite of how George writes. My favorite aspect of his style which I think all writers could benefit from using is to make the reader have to think to figure out what is happening. Unreliable narrator is part of that; but it’s also about giving you reader just enough info to put the pieces together and no more. This forces the reader to have to think and turn things over in their mind, not just passively read. It’s far more engaging. When I read other fiction now it often seems like the author thinks we are thick and need to be be spoon fed every step of the way leading to the desired conclusion. I simply love this aspect of George’s writing, and it’s one of the things I hate about modern Hollywood movies. They all go through the idiocracy filter which boils down all dialog to one or two lines. We’ve seen far too icy of this crap on the TV show, where they overuse “I will burn their cities and kill their whole family!” type lines very badly, and it just falls flat.
I think the manufactured “revenge” theme for this season fits into this category. Pretty lame. HBO is supposed to be smart TV for adults. I mean, House of Cards has passed GoT for maturity, complexity, cleverness, etc, as HBO has gone the way of ratings chasing or crowd pleasing or whatever.
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Lucifer,
I’m not familiar with House of Cards but it sounds like it might be an intresting show.
There’s plenty of really good fantasy fiction out there that makes demands of the readers, both in terms of themes, plot construction and writing style. I may be committing sacrilege here but I think that a lot of it is much better than what GRRM produces. Catherynne Valente is one of my favorite authors, she is incredibly talented, imaginative and since she started as a poet she has an incredible command of the English language – Her duology “The Orphan’s Tales” is amazing! Elizabeth Bear is another interesting writer, so is Amanda Downum and Guy Gavriel Kay (especially “under Heaven” and “River of Stars”). I’d also recommend Katharine Addison’s “The Goblin Emperor”, where a young, unpopular and unprepared ruler succeeds with courtesy, kindness and a willingness to learn what he doesn’t know – it is such a refreshing change from all the grimdark fantasy that GRRM has inspired.
I’d also recommend anything by Marie Brennan and Gail Carriger (the latter is more lightweight but sooo much fun).
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Yes, and this is one time where I am really glad that it actually did not come off this way in the show. I never got the sense that Arya was keeping needle out of some need for revenge from watching the episode this week and it was obvious that Arya couldn’t do it because of what it represented to her about her home, Winterfell and her family. Thank goodness Maisie got the right idea.
I was also going to mention Brienne and Ellaria as Syrio Forel did and how their characters have also become simply about revenge. It looks like Brienne is going after Stannis at some point. Though I have to say that one of the brighter spots for me this episode was when they allowed Brienne to have a more tender moment with Pod when she explained why she was devoted to Renly. I was surprised they kept that story in given how the show has portrayed her character but I’m glad they did.
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Nice review. There is one thing that you are wrong about thought. And that’s about D&D making sure that the Cersei’s Walk of Shame isn’t viewed as misogynistic by making the High Septon being paraded naked beforehand. And you are wrong here simply because this scene actually happened in the books. Not with the HS, no, just with a random septon but it doesn’t matter anyway. Many readers completely miss it and than dismiss WoS as entirely misogynistic, something that could never happen to a man. But, well, that’s not really true. It can and has happened with a man.
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That’s a good point and actually I didn’t find this scene amiss either. To me, the brothel scene with the ridiculous seven whores dressed up like the Seven reminds me of the kind of stuff we heard about recently with a certain regulatory agency in the U.S. federal government, where they were snorting blow off of strippers and doing really bizarre, kind of silly / kinky drug stuff which I don’t recall exactly, but the point being, it was ridiculously over the top. That’s what people with absolute power do sometimes – they get totally disconnected from reality and extremely self indulgent. I found this high septon scene, both in the brothel and the WoS, to be right on the money. They want to show the corruption of the institution – corrupt institutions produce debauchery like this on occasion. I bet this is no stranger than many Goldman Sachs parties, you know? Anyway, yes, they are softening Cersei’s character in a couple ways here, that’s true. They made the decision to promote him to HS her doing, and they made it seem like an eminently reasonable decision. I’m assuming the decision to allow them the Warriors Sons will be a separate decision in the show that they haven’t gotten to yet, but in the books this is clearly a REALLY BAD decision at the time Cersei makes it. It’s clearly another blunder in a long list of blunders, whereas here in the show she’s actually doing the right thing. The High Sparrow seems like a great person to be HS in the show.
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It goes without saying that I have no direct information about D&D’s thinking process (nor would I like one, truth be told), but what you’re saying doesn’t necessarily mean my assumption was wrong. Of all the details from the books they could put on screen, they opted for that one. They’re cutting all the iconic lines, they removed all the backstory about the Sparrows, they run away from religious themes as far as possible (or they sexualize them – Melisandre!), but they found the time to put HS through his own walk of shame: why did they do that? My money would be on the reason I stated in the review.
For the record, I don’t think Cersei’s WoS was misogynistic, but what matters is that a large part of the readers do, and I’m positive D&D are aware of that fact.
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Trinuviel, thanks for the reccomendations. I’m sure there are other authors that use this technique and aren’t “spoon feeder” types which I haven’t heard of, I don’t mean to say George invented this technique. But I don’t think I read anything of this quality prior to running in to ASOIAF, so this has been the eye opener for me. I also didn’t go to college to take a real English class and learn to to do literary analysis – I’ve learned through the literary analysis of ASOIAF by many intelligent people such as the Radio Westeros folks and websites such as this, and just by reading many many books – so I’ve only recently started really developing the skills to read literature on this level. Going hand in hand with this has been learning the language of symbolism, which I was somewhat familiar with already from my mythology readings and was really developed by studying ASOIAF. When I am done with my current batch of essays about astronomy as it relates to the myths of ASOIAF, I look forward to turning my newly sharpened vision on to other things, especially literary classics such as 1984, Assimov’s works, etc etc. In any case thanks for the reccomendations 🙂
House of Cards is basically a real show about what politics is really like. Like, for real. It stars Kevin Spacey (hooray) and has several other strong actors and actresses (his wife is a total badass). It’s called the “Game of Thrones” of politics in the sense that it is realistic, brutal, and written by people who understand the workings of power and human psychology. It’s a Netflix original and can be found there or on blue ray / dvd. Quite good.
Now back to Sansa… Sorry for the off topic stuff there.
So, the big question for this Sansa plot train wreck, will they just have Brienne rescue her before Stannis arrives at Winterfell and try to resume the course of the books? They do tend to try to do that – make this little fanfic cul-de-sacs and the just jump right back in, no matter how daft it seems. Or will they totally change shit and leave her there when Stannis attacks? Obviously Mance Raydar isn’t going to try to smuggle her out. If they send Tormund to Winterfell I am going to laugh really hard. Or will they have her actually try to or succeed in killing Ramsay?
My vote is on cul-de-sac, Brienne gets her out, she goes back south. Of course, we don’t know where her book arc is taking her, location wise, so we don’t know where she needs to go “back” to, presumably the Vale, but… Book Sansa doesn’t seem like she’s going to be in the Vale forever.
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Lucifer,
That’s one of the best ways of learning! I seriously improved my English language skills when I was a teen by reading my Anne McCaffrey books with an English-Danish dictionary. I still read a lot of English literature, it is a good way for me to combine fun and language training.
There’s a Guy Gavriel Kay website called BrightWeavings where a lot of interesting essays on his work is published. His novels are fantasy based on different historical periods and reworked according to the themes he want to explore. The two books I mentioned are inspired by the Tang and Song dynasties of Chinese history.
Catherynne Valente often works with fairy tale archetypes that are reinterepreted in different way – especially in her short fiction. “The Orphan’s Tales” draws on mythology and fairy tales, but reworked into something new and exciting. it is told in the style of Arabian Nights – a story within a story within a story… – but at he end of the books everything is connected.
Amanda Downum writes secondary world fantasy where the conflict that seems to be about good and evil turns out to be much more complicated that what it appears at first sight.
Elizabeth Bear is insanely productive and has written more than a dusin novels and many many more short stories, and the cover all sorts of genres. The “Eternal Sky” trilogy is most like traditional fantasy but her “Jacob’s Ladder” series and the “Jenny Casey” series is intelligent sci-fi.
I’d also recommend Ursula le Guin – though her Earthsea novels are a more introspective type of fantasy.
I also think that you’d like Garth Nix’s Abhorsen series. It is young adult but it is an original and interesting concept.
If you can find them then I’d also recommend Meredith Ann Pierce’s Darkangel trilogy. It is one of my all time favorite books that I have read and reread since I was a teen.
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I completely forgot two of my favorite series of epic fantasy!
Jacqueline Carey’s Kushiel books, especially the 3 first: Kushiel’s Dart, Kushiel’s Chosen and Kushiel’s Avatar. They are exquisitely written and they have the most amazing heroines that I’ve ever encountered in fantasy fiction: Phèdre no Delaunay – courtesan. spy and scholar. A brave woman who not only uses her talents, wit and learning but also embodies the idea that a woman doesn’t have to be hard and ass-kicking to be strong: “That which yields is not always weak” (an important line in the books).
Daniel Abraham’s “The Long Prince” quartet is another excellent series that not only features a very interesting and unusual world but also a variety of very diverse but fully formed characters and a story that explores the unexpected and long term consequences of the actions of the characters
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Another great review, Miodrag, and a refreshing one, as well. Searching for negative reviews of this show (which only gets worse) has become a pastime of mine, only to find nothing but praise, even by book readers who claim D&D’s decisions are far better than GRRM’s, especially the direction they’re taking with Sansa and Jaime. It’s quite flabbergasting. At least the Unsullied I’ve been watching the show with validated my opinion. After this episode he said, “I really don’t like this show anymore. It’s poorly written, nothing really makes sense, and I don’t think I can watch it anymore.” I used to watch the show twice: the first time I would rant through the whole thing, and the second viewing I would just check my brain at the door and take it for what it is. But this season I’ve only watched each episode once with complete apathy since I don’t recognize any of the characters, therefore have no invested interest.
Cogman’s comment: “You have this storyline with Ramsay. Do you have one of your leading ladies—who is an incredibly talented actor who we’ve followed for five years and viewers love and adore—do it? Or do you bring in a new character to do it? To me, the question answers itself: You use the character the audience is invested in,” reminds me of Grave’s arrogant comment about bringing Michelle Fairley back: “But to bring back Michelle Fairley, one of the greatest actresses around, to be a zombie for a little while — and just kill people? It is really sort of, what are we doing with that? How does it play into the whole story in a way that we’re really going to like?” So, you’re not going to bring back Michelle Fairley because she’s too good for the show, apparently, but you’re going to completely reinvent Sansa’s arc because you don’t want to waste such great talent but can’t come up with a better way to use said talent? Sure, that makes sense. Also, wouldn’t the Northerners consider Sansa a turncloack for marrying into the Bolton family? I can only shake my head.
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“We really wanted Sansa to play a major part this season. If we were going to stay absolutely faithful to the book, it was going to be very hard to do that. There was as subplot we loved from the books, but it used a character that’s not in the show.”
D&D
This quote doesn’t specify precisely what subplot they really loved but I do think that it is implied that it is the Reek/fArya plot in Cogman’s statement:
“You have this storyline with Ramsay. Do you have one of your leading ladies—who is an incredibly talented actor who we’ve followed for five years and viewers love and adore—do it? Or do you bring in a new character to do it? To me, the question answers itself: You use the character the audience is invested in.”
I have to say that I find it weird that anyone would love this subplot. Why? Perhaps because of Reek becomes Theon again – but that also means that they’ll use Sansa as a prop to Theon’s arc, like they used her as a prop for Tyrion during the whole storyline about her forced marriage and the loss of her mother and brother. How does that fit with their claim that Sansa is the character they care the most about?
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Oh god! I’m so happy I’ve found you Miodrag! You do not know me but I used to follow your comments about the show on asoiaf.westeros.org. Since the beginning of the 5th season I’ve been searching for your lovely rants and nitpicks and the ever precisely critique, and here you are! Keep the good work, me and my friends from Brazil just love your posts, brother! You are officially a symbol for D&D opposition for these parts! lol
Now excuse me ’cause I’m going to read this beauties you’ve wrote.
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