A review of “Hardhome,” the eight episode of the fifth season of “Game of Thrones”
by Miodrag Zarković
(DISCLAIMER: It’d be tempting to blame the ladies who run this site for the fact that the promised second part of “Not a Review” is still not posted. With their track record of torture and abuse of poor, unprotected journalists, who’d have a single reason to doubt it? But the truth is that they are not to blame, it’s all my fault. Job and life got in the way, the piece is still not done, and I’m sorry for that. It will hopefully be finished in a few days and post it here. Meanwhile, back at the Wall…)
Creatively, to a lot of fans and critics alike it made sense to really like “Hardhome,” because they wanted and needed it to be good. Lately, the fifth season of “Game of Thrones” was almost universally received as a letdown, so it was on much-hyped “Hardhome” to save what could be saved. And, by the reaction it was received with—almost universal praise—it looks like the episode performed beyond expectations even.
A pity that it definitely ruined any connection to the source material in the process. There wasn’t much left of it even before the episode, but after “Hardhome” the show is not just a completely separate beast from the books: it’s a completely different universe now.
What this hour (and it was just seconds shy of one full hour, which is very rare for “Game of Thrones”) managed to betray, is possibly the fundamental quality of the “A Song of Ice and Fire” book series by George R. R. Martin. All the complexity of the novels, the sophisticated political intrigue, the social structures that bite, the layered and vivid characters, all that came from the most important decision an author can bring: to write a story that is not simplistic. And Martin did make that choice in the early `90s, just when he was about to start working on the series.
Without that decision, ASOIAF would’ve been an essentially different narrative. Perhaps it’d be a success even in that case. Simplistic stories can be remarkable, just like complex stories can be utter failures. Nothing is guaranteed, one way or the other. But it wouldn’t even resemble the ASOIAF we know today.
The paramount importance of that decision lies in the simple fact that an author must know what he wants to achieve. Otherwise, it’s all just random. And, once the decision is made, the author has to stick with it. When the process of writing ensues, it’s not just about creativity any more, but also a matter of discipline. Many a Siren will try to lure Odysseus away from the actual Odyssey and into some other arc. It’s on the author alone to resist those challenges and stay true to the initial idea.
As said, Martin made the call. It’s not only evident by the series itself but he also confirmed the choice famously stating, many times and in various occasions, that he wasn’t interested in a rather simple Good vs. Evil narrative. He wanted ASOIAF, although a fantasy epic, to be much more true to the real life than to the genre tropes:
“The battle between Good and Evil is a theme of much of fantasy. But I think the battle between Good and Evil is fought largely within the individual human heart, by the decisions that we make. It’s not like evil dresses up in black clothing and you know, they’re really ugly.”
That’s what the man said. His actual words, from an interview he gave back in 2011 when, after the show’s debut season, mainstream media got a hint that fantasy can be so much more than gathering all the good guys on one side and all the bad guys on the opposite corner and pitching them against each other. Such a revelation led quite a few journalists on a task of finding where did all that complexity come from, and, since every single element of the show that fascinated both the audience and the critics was directly taken from the source material (while, on the other hand, all the annoying stuff, like the infamous “sexposition,” was produced by the showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss), the research couldn’t help but end with George R. R. Martin. He was quite a popular person that summer, and in each interview he gave, he was asked how he had managed to create a world as multifaceted as the one ASOIAF is set in. And every time Martin’s answer was the same. Here’s another example, also from that time:
“Much as I admire Tolkien, and I do admire Tolkien—he’s been a huge influence on me, and his Lord of the Rings is the mountain that leans over every other fantasy written since and shaped all of modern fantasy—there are things about it, the whole concept of the Dark Lord, and good guys battling bad guys, Good versus Evil, while brilliantly handled in Tolkien, in the hands of many Tolkien successors, it has become kind of a cartoon. We don’t need any more Dark Lords, we don’t need any more, ‘Here are the good guys, they’re in white, there are the bad guys, they’re in black. And also, they’re really ugly, the bad guys‘.”
Now, just compare that stance of his to the last 20 minutes of “Hardhome,” and you’ll clearly see why that entire sequence, much hailed as a savior of the season or even the best thing the show has ever done, is so different from the source material “Game of Thrones” is supposedly adapting.
What the Hardhome battle is both in substance and on facade, is the one thing Martin didn’t want his saga to be recognized as: good guys (the handful of Black Brothers and thousands of Wildlings) against the bad guys (White Walkers and Wights in seemingly endless quantities). Truth be told, prior to the battle itself there were some tensions between various factions of the “good guys,” but the cataclysmic evil that soon avalanched on them rendered all those tensions, as poorly-built as they were, practically irrelevant. When the battle started, all that mattered was that the attackers, every single one of them, were the menace, while the Black Brothers and the Wildlings, every single one of them, were either fighting the menace or running away from it.
One might say the books are also progressing to the same spot. Ever since the prologue of the first novel, it’s clear that the battle against the Others is what will determine the fate of the whole of mankind. Therefore, it is only logical to expect a grand showdown between Good and Evil in the books, too. Does that make Martin a hypocrite, then?
Not really, because his words aren’t to be taken literally. Avoiding a cliché shouldn’t be the same as avoiding the basic reasons that has been driving the art of storytelling since time immemorial. A story must have a climax. An epic story must have an antagonist. The most reasonable climax of an epic is a battle against the antagonist, and for it to be memorable, the stakes at that point have to be as high as ever. Hence, the battle versus undoubted Evil is a natural conclusion of an epic saga. The journey there, however, is what can make all the difference in the world. The manner, the moment, the atmosphere in which the forces of Good are lined up, can go a long way in renouncing the cliché and staying true to Martin’s intent of avoiding simplicity.
It stands to reason that Martin is doing exactly that: once ASOIAF is completed, the Others will probably be recognized as the prime antagonists, which is how they were built up ever since the beginning, but if the story is completed in style, everything that happened before the climax will only make it more impactful and memorable.
And that’s why discipline is important. The battle of Good versus Evil has to be left only for the climax. It shouldn’t be truncated before that, or else it hurts the narrative logic that drives the entire story. In some other story, created with some other intention, the final battle could be delivered in smaller installments that precede the ultimate one. Here, in ASOIAF, that’s not what the author wanted and he worked very hard to avoid it.
Just recall all the battles Martin wrote in the books so far. There isn’t too many of them. In AGOT, there’s the Battle on the Green Fork, which could definitely be seen as an early showdown versus Evil, because at that stage the Lannisters were as good as antagonists, if not for the most important fact that the entire battle is told through the eyes of the single Lannister who’s by that time already proven not to be an antagonist. Everything Martin did with Tyrion up to that point was meant to portray him as a sympathetic character, which serves, among other things, as a prevention against cliché the author wants to avoid. Two victories of Robb’s army, which was logically recognized by a reader as the forces of Good at the time, therefore it happened off-page, and we’re only told about them later on.
In ACOK, there’s the Battle of the Blackwater, told through three POVs—Davos, Sansa and Tyrion—all with their specific perspectives and neither as an antagonist. A reader is welcome to pick a side, but Martin evidently restrained from doing it and thus once again avoided the dreaded cliché.
In ASOS, there’s the Battle at the Wall, and while Jon Snow is one of the main protagonists, the author went to great lengths to convey both the ambiguous feelings Jon harbors for the enemy and also the perspective of the Wildlings themselves, with whom Jon had spent much time in the recent past.
And that’s it. Three big battles so far in the series, and in each of them the author covered multiple angles in order to rule out the Good vs. Evil context. Of course, it was deliberate and in service of the coming showdown reserved for the climax.
Also, recall that one instance where the early battle against the Others could’ve been written: at the Fist of the First Men, when Jeor Mormont’s ranging expedition is attacked. The battle itself is skipped, which some readers deem a mistake. The mistake, however, would’ve been to depict the battle, for the same reason the depiction of Robb’s victories would have. (And, anyway, opting to deliver the aftermath of the battle through Sam’s first POV chapter was definitely not the easy way out.)
The show abandoned that path for good, with the battle in “Hardhome” that was like the textbook case of a clash in which the sides were already and clearly picked by the authors. As already stated, that is the betrayal of the narrative logic the source material’s driven by.
In another story, a move like that wouldn’t necessarily be bad in theory. But for the story that was meant to be an adaptation of ASOIAF, that was all kinds of wrong. And that’s why, after “Hardhome,” GOT and ASOIAF don’t even belong to the same universe anymore. It’d be like remaking “Apocalypse Now” but with a skirmish between Kurtz and Willard somewhere around the midpoint: no matter how effective the added scene might be, it’d inevitably change the story in its core. Or, like remaking “The Sopranos” having Dr. Melfi engage in an affair with Tony for a little while.
Not that GOT viewers minded the change. The reaction to the episode points to a conclusion that, perhaps for the first time this season, Benioff and Weiss managed to satisfy their audience. Which, in turn, means exactly what it sounds like: the show’s audience is by now completely different to the books’ audience.
It doesn’t mean the book readers don’t or shouldn’t watch the show, or vice versa. But regardless of how much they do overlap, those are still different audiences, in the sense that an ASOIAF reader can also watch “The Walking Dead” and enjoy it even, but for reasons that have nothing to do with his/her interest in ASOIAF. It was pretty clear from the early days of the show, but now it’s just too damn obvious, that ASOIAF and GOT are consummated for vastly different rationales. Sometimes you want just sex; sometimes you want to spend the entire life with the one you love; the former may lead to a decent marriage, and the latter may end in an emotional disaster, but no person with healthily developed sentiments would ever confuse the two.
Analyzing GOT on its own is, therefore, a completely futile assignment at this point. Why would anyone put a strictly sexual relationship under scrutiny? They meet, they have sex, they part ways until the next time. That’s it. Nothing to talk about. You can film the intercourse and later watch it, share the video with friends even, but any reasonable interest ends there.
Why talk about Dany and Tyrion’s scenes then? Of course they’re offensively stupid if you think about them, but they’re not there to be thought about. They’re there for people who enjoy simply seeing Dany and Tyrion on screen at the same time. Whatever he or she said, it doesn’t matter. They’re interacting and that’s all that is important.
Why discuss TV Sansa and TV Theon? Of course she behaves in a way that creatively makes sense to the showrunners because that’s how they wanted her to behave; whether her behavior is logically sustainable or not, that’s a completely different issue that, honestly, doesn’t matter at all. Same with Theon, who not so long ago bit his true sister, but now breaks before his foster one: it’s not supposed to make any sense, other than that “creative” one Benioff illustrated so vividly.
TV Ramsay will do whatever the showrunners’ famous creativity wants him to do. He’s going to kill Stannis. Or get himself killed. Or neither. But why bother with it? It’s just a casual relationship. You can get in bed with TV Ramsay, or find another sex buddy in some other story, just don’t think about any of it.
One zombie is stopped by an arrow, the next one eats arrows for breakfast; the Thenn leader hates Jon Snow so much he opts to face the White Walkers on his own, but minutes later the same Thenn leader sacrifices himself for Jon Snow; a group of zombie kids patiently wait for that young wildling mother to make up her mind about fighting them, and only after she realizes she can’t they kill her; and zombies are afraid of sea water for some reason . . . But so what? It is not supposed to make any sense at all. Creatively, Benioff and Weiss are absolutely certain this Hardhome business was a great idea, because they wanted it to happen.
And they’re clearly not alone. They found their sex buddies again. The relationship was in a little crisis for the past seven weeks, but now everything’s okay, because, obviously, zombies are the most powerful aphrodisiac the medium of television has to offer at this point. Good for them. All of them: zombies, Benioff and Weiss, their sex buddy of an audience. Honestly.
For the rest of us, if we’re so hell-bent on analyzing things, we can talk about all the ways GOT keeps betraying its source material week after week. But analyzing the episodes on their own? No, thanks. It’s someone else’s sex party. No reason to spoil it.
PAWN TO PLAYER 
Another excellent article (though I do have a different opinion about what GRRM may do with the Others in the upcoming novels). Out of curiosity, however, you said you regarded Jon XII in A Dance With Dragons very highly. In that case, what are you feelings on having the chapter in which the Wildings walk under the Wall and into the Seven Kingdoms after sealing peace being scrapped for the Hardhome nonsense ridden with cliches, illogical and minute-by-minute contradictions?
Anyhow, the reaction to this episode only further convinces me any backlash Benioff and his sidekick receive for their poor writing will never truly mount up with the nice set of tactics they have developed for themselves. And even worse: the notion of them being superior writers to GRRM and improving the “dreadful” source material becoming a more popular one.
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@ The Weeping knight
Well, truth be told, Wildlings giving up their way of life and walking under the Wall wouldn’t make for good television.
Seriously now, when I hear those “arguments” that this book material or that one wouldn’t make for good television, I can’t help but wonder did people ever hear of “The Sopranos”. That show had its fair share of violence and sex, but the backbone of it was – Tony talking to Melfi. That’s right, two people sitting alone in her office and just talking. Sometimes there were tensions between them, sometimes there were emotions, often there was humor, but it was never boring. Two people just talking is what made revolution in TV industry. By the way, “The Sopranos” were a way bigger cultural phenomenon than GOT and even their ratings were bigger, on average at least, even though they didn’t inherit their fandom from a book series, but had to build it from scratch.
What wonders David Chase and his crew would do with a material like Jon’s arc in ADWD, his dealings with the Wildlings especially, I can only imagine. But it’d be memorable for sure. It’d start a new revolution in the business, most probably. So yes, in the hands of competent showrunners, that material would be adapted into something infinitely more exciting and fascinating than “Hardhome”.
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Two people talking was what made the Before Sunrise films starring Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy some of my favourite movies of all time. Two people talking is pretty much what captivated me about True Detective, not the hunt for the serial killer. As you note, when done right, it can be brilliant and memorable. When D&D try to do “meaningful” conversations between characters, they come up with stuff like Tyrion and Jaime’s beetle talk.
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@Miodrag
In my eyes, Jon XII itself conveyed the forebode and terror that comes with the Others much more effectively. How GRRM wrote the chapter as Jon notes the Wilding’s fear as night draws closer, the burning woods, Tormund’s dialogue with Jon and Pyke’s letter… not a single wight or Other to be seen and everything conveyed so well without the Hardhome rubbish the show featured. It’s a testament to GRRM’s superior skill that an abrupt letter from a minor character is much more effective than showing the actual attle/siege thwarting the Night’s Watch’s efforts… in my opinion, of course.
Curious what you mean be “revolution” in the industry through adapting Jon’s ADwD material however. How so?
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It really is a brilliant chapter that is actually the climax of the especially brilliant subplot about the Wildlings. As I said before, they are literally giving away some liberty to gain some security. They’re paying a very high price for it. And the price is memorably depicted in the chapter we’re talking about. All the implications that chapter carries not only to the story itself, but also to any reader who’s interested in the subject of liberty vs. security, are simply breathtaking. I don’t know of any other fictional work that deals so sensitively and at the same time so disturbingly (just like it should) with decisions an entire nation (Wildlings pretty much are a nation) may face in a dire situation.
As for the revolution, I was talking figuratively. It’d change TV industry in a way masterpieces usually influence their artistic surrounding. Will it constitute a revolution or not, I don’t know, but if adapted properly, that chapter would definitely be recognized as one of the finest moments TV industry produced like ever.
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With the acting, directing, cinematography and writing all nailed? Certainly an excellent scene. Not as certain as you are on its impact on the industry, as even among the forums I think it isn’t appreciated too much as a chapter (though frankly I could be looking in all the wrong places for threads dedicated to Jon XII). Nice point on it being disturbing as well, when thought about on various levels, e.g. the Wildings stripped off thousands and thousands of years old treasures and materials marking their own unique way of life to be sold off for food. Like that comparison Edd made.
Though perhaps Jon or Daenerys from ADwD adapted correctly would garner much more positive feedback from television audiences than with the book audience with the nuances and themes perhaps more evident. Not sure. Alas themes and philosophical insights into things like freedom are above D&D, given that they have already sneered at the very concept.
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Regarding those “arguments”… what makes me view them as even more wrong is my certainty if they adapted the books nigh fanatically the show would receive far more praise for beautiful, masterful storytelling, not hype for the next weekly twist and big shocker. Imagine an adaption of Theon in ADwD nigh fanatical in its faith to the books and nailing every element from the directing to the acting to the music. HOW that would not work on television and be much more positively received than the hollow mess in the show would certainly be a mystery. That’s only one storyline of course. And furthermore I see those “arguments” often parroted by people who have never even touched the books before.
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Absolutely perfect review, as always.
It’s funny, because I couldn’t exactly put into words what that made me so utterly not engaged in this episode. Objectively, it looked pretty…
But this is absolutely it. GoT transformed into something utterly unrecognizable. And a lot of people praised it as fixing Martin’s “mistake” for not better showing us the Others in his books. I’ve always liked Hitchcock’s “There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it,” sentiment. This felt incredibly premature, and for the very good reasons you pointed out: the book series is based on moral ambiguity and the interpersonal tensions. Shoving something like this up front and center…it didn’t just casually dismiss the central theme of the novels, but the foundation.
Also, loving the continual shade over “creatively it made sense because we wanted it to happen.” That quote was the real “gift” from last episode.
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What is worse is that making it utterly unrecognisable seems to have stripped it of all soul as well. The march on Winterfell, Daenerys’ Meereen storyline, Brienne… it feels hollow and empty. The first 3 (even 4) seasons were quite bad in my opinion (upon later reflection), though I at least felt like there’s something there… I’m not quite articulating this quite well though, do you know what I am getting at? It all leads back to the lack of engagement.
I cannot see any reason to be on the edge of my seat over whether Stannis and his army will survive the onslaught of winter to triumph over the Boltons, liberate Winterfell, see Theon freed and rally the North as one of many examples.
Oh, and that “creatively” quote… you may as well make a page dedicated to the wisdom of the Lords Benioff and Weiss with such gems as themes being 8th grader book reports… or Tywin’s lawful, neutral nature. That one however should be at the top along with the harrowing tale of Mr. Hill.
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Haven’t seen the last couple of episodes yet since I decided to take a break after Sansa’s rape because it was too triggering for me. However, I already know I won’t like Hardhome very much. Basically because I find extended battle scenes incredibly boring. The decision to use 20 minutes on a battle scene in a show that has so many convoluted plotlines is a bad one for me since I hate how we are just dropped in for a brief visit in one plotline and hurry on to the next, and the next, and the next… That is the essential problem with Martin’s narrative when it comes to a TV adaptation, which is why I feel that his books aren’t really that well suited to adaptation (though I know that I’m in the minority here). Incidentally, in early interviews from the 90s, Martin actually said that he wanted to write a series that was “unfilmable”.
However, I’m clearly not in the showrunners’ target audience since mostly people seem to have been thoroughly distracted by this “big shiny thing” that is called the battle of Hardhome. Personally, I couldn’t be less interested.
And I’m still waiting to see what the payoff is for slotting Sansa into Jeyne Poole’s plotline. Especially since the double Ds in their infinite “wisdom” have decided to erase everything that made the WF story in Dance so interesting and suspenseful – the Northern Lords and a possible conspiracy against the Boltons as well as the quiet menace/suspense of the Ghost of Winterfell offing Bolton men, which gives the meancing atmosphere of everything falling apart within the walls of WF. The problem with the current WF story in the show, apart from Sansa Poole, is that it lacks conflict and suspense, and Sansa is simply too isolated to do much besides engineer an escape (to where?). So not only do I expect the showrunners to simply have Sansa’s abuse handwaved away (despite the fact that this will impact her in a very profound way – and not just in a “vengeful badass bitchTM” way) but I also expect that after ep 10 nothing more will have come of this storyline than that Sansa knows her brothers are alive, which makes me believe that the main reason for having Sansa marry Ramsay was to create a shocking moment to exploit in the cheapest possible manner.
Note:
Martin clearly found his inspiration for the Others in Tad William’s “memory, Sorrow, Thorn” trilogy.
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Well, there is a first time for everything and this time I’m going to disagree with you. All along I’ve maintained that what I want is a good TV show adapted from GRRM’s source material.
I never expected them recreate the books 100% in visual format, so I always knew that changes were inevitable. And to me the standards has always been do the changes make sense in the TV show as a show, is it good storytelling for a TV show. When they make changes that ignore the themes in the source material, introduce plot holes, character inconsistencies in personality and motivation, that’s when I object, particularly when it’s done for seeming no reason. I understand when certain battle scenes are omitted, I understand why certain minor characters have to be combined or cut because of budget and time. Those are the realities of TV production.
So therefore my main problem with this episode isn’t the Hardhome battle. I thought that was fine, it was good television, and what happened there probably isn’t that far off from what happened in the books with the exception that Jon and Tormund aren’t there to witness it.
My main problems are:
1) Arya’s scene, why have the insurance guy ask for oysters? The whole tension in that story in the books is Arya figuring out how to kill the guy when he’s surrounded by guards and she has no way of getting close to him. It was a puzzle she had to solve and the tension was “how is she going to do it” and “will she be able to get away with it?” In the show, they basically made the killing trivial when Jaqen gives her the vial, there is no doubt about how she’s going to do it. The entire tension in Arya figuring out the puzzle is removed. Now it’s just ho hum watching her carry out what we know she’ll carry out. This is the kind of change I hate. They changed it for no apparent reason and it’s now telling an inferior story, less suspenseful, less thrilling, and less interesting.
Why? It doesn’t even save them money, just changes made for no reason.
2) I was not that impressed with the Dany/Tyrion scene. I’m not buying that was all it took to convince Dany to take Tyrion into her service, and frankly I’m not buying why Tyrion would want to serve her. He questioned Jorah in a previous episode and none of his doubts were actually answered. He didn’t even ask for Casterly Rock as his reward, and she never asks what he would want in return for his service. So we’re supposed to believe that Tyrion is going to help her why? Out of the goodness of his heart? And she’s not even the least bit suspicious of a man who came thousands of miles to offer his service all out of the goodness of his heart? The show neither established Tyrion’s motivation nor Dany’s motivation. It’s exactly the kind of lazy writing that I hate, Tyrion working for Dany is a plot point to be ticked off because it happens in the books. But no attempt is made to make it believable that the characters in the show would do this. They could have rewritten the dialogue to address this, but didn’t.
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@SyrioForel
It’d be a little boring if everyone here agreed on everything, I guess. But, to tell you the truth, I wasn’t particularly pleased with the Hardhome sequence even on its own. The only part I liked without reservation was the introduction to the battle. It was eerie and suspenseful. However, it also shows how much can be accomplished just by sounds. That entire part immediately before the battle is so effective because of the sounds and the background music. So, my question is, why didn’t they use the same method in previous instances? RW, for example? Sound is a very powerful tool in filmmaking and, as far as I remember, not once was it used in this show as effectively as in that minute or two before the Hardhome battle begins.
On the other hand, the battle itself was not without problems that actually pull a viewer out of it. Like that moment when the fighting obviously pauses for Jon to look at the Night’s King. Or when that WW Jon fights pushes Jon from behind (or something like that) instead of killing him. Or all those things I mentioned in the review. I know that such tropes aren’t unusual for TV, but other TV shows aren’t based on a brilliant book series. Where some other authors have to lean on tropes when they run out of inspiration, D&D just have to lean on the source material and avoid tropes. But no, they stubbornly keep moving away from the books and in the process they include one trope after another.
About Hardhome in the books, I’m really not sure the Others or Wights are afraid of the sea (“dead things in the water…”) or that some Night’s King is commanding one wave of mindless zombies after another. And I’m positive NK from the books isn’t into showmanship as much as the show NK definitely is, with his trick at the end of the episode. Though, to be honest, that was at least effective. It wouldn’t make sense in the books, but for the show universe it was nicely done.
All in all, that’s what I liked about the Hardhome battle: the introduction, and the closing moments with the NK. The stuff between? Definitely not my cup of tea. Have to say I’m quitting better shows for even lesser nonsense. I quit “Peaky Blinders” after the Season 1 finale because the climax was resolved in a rarely stupid manner, but that show is actually better written, better acted and better directed than GOT (direction is especially superior). I quit “Americans” after the Season 2 finale because of the ridiculous plot twist, but that show also outdid GOT in almost every area. I quit “Mad Men” after Season 1 because it was so full of itself and so taking itself too seriously, but it is clearly a better written and better acted show than GOT. I’m not persuading you or anything, just explaining where I’m coming from when I say the battle at Hardhome was really underwhelming for me. The battle itself had quite a few tropes, and some of them are really tiring. After seeing in the hundredth show and for the millionth time a villain that doesn’t kill the protagonist when he clearly has the chance, it’s hard for me to take such a battle seriously. Of course, I don’t deny that one can legitimately enjoy the same battle, but also it has to be said that the battle does stand out among all the other battles in the books (or in the show for that matter) in the Good vs. Evil context. GRRM is building the tension toward some clash with the Others. D&D decided to quit the build up and have a teaser. That is fundamentally different.
Needless to say, I completely agree about Arya and especially about Dany and Tyrion.
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I agree that D&D uses tropes a lot, like the standard peasant girl who sasses the king trope that GRRM explicitly hated but D&D uses any way. I really think this is all they are good for, their writing cannot rise beyond this stuff because this is their level. Might as well complain about a fifth grader not being able to do calculus. It’s simply beyond them.
My issue with your review is that assertion that depicting the HH battle somehow deviates from the theme of ASOIAF. I don’t believe it does. The event still happens in the books in largely the same way as the show.
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Something happens in Hardhome in the books, but it happens off-page. And when you think about it, there’s a pattern to it: Martin just doesn’t want to show us the Others in their full menacing glory. He didn’t want to go there at the Fist of the First Men, and he didn’t want to go there in Hardhome. It had to be a deliberate decision. I don’t think it’s a theme, but the structure the author chose for a reason. And the structure is based on that initial idea of his: “I don’t want my story to be Good vs. Evil”. That’s why he’s so careful not to overuse the Others at this point, That’s why he’s working so hard to prevent any other battle, even the really epic BBB in ACOK, from being seen as some ultimate Good vs. Evil showdown. He’s building the anticipation for the Others and for the final Good vs. Evil battle both. He truncated neither of those two aspects. And, if the final act is as impressive as expected, it will be precisely because the author was so patient in building up the event. That’s where, ideally, all the wait will pay off.
So, D&D didn’t betray the theme, but the basic idea that gave birth to all the complexity of ASOIAF as a story. I’m positive that was the crucial decision of Martin. Like, inspiration is not a matter of will. Just like Martin explained many times, an idea just strikes you out of the blue. That’s how “A group of men and kids find these orphaned direwolf puppies in summer snow” did strike him all those years ago. But then an author must decide what to do with the idea. Good authors decide to use it to full potential, and great authors actually not only live to that expectation but go even beyond. That’s why I think Martin’s decision to write something that can never be confused for traditional Good vs. Evil narrative was so important, and why he so firmly didn’t want to make any exception, no matter how small, so far.
And we can test this notion as soon as TWOW is out. I predict that whatever Martin does with Stannis vs. Boltons, and it’s probably going to be all kinds of insanely good, we’re definitely not going to see the battle in a usual way, because at this point that would actually be Good (anyone vs. Boltons) vs. Evil (Boltons). Martin’s going to twist it somehow. Or connect it to the battle against the Others in some way. Or spice it in some other manner. In any case, he’ll make sure Boltons alone are not the Big Evil in a narrative sense.
And what I’m even more certain of, is this: when the battle with the Others finally begins in the novels, it’s going to dwarf great many famous battles of epic fiction (be it literature or motion pictures), let alone “Hardhome”. When that moment comes, I’m positive everyone will be glad Martin didn’t tease us with some “preview battle” against the Others like D&D just did.
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@SyrioForel
Just to add, yes, in theory adapting huge books to the screen may result in omissions and merging. But in GOT I’m still to see a change that makes sense, or is justified because of money/time constraints. Actually, there’s one exception, and that’s the Battle on the Green Fork, for which they apparently had neither money nor time. As for other decisions, every single one of them was arbitrary. They cut the Tullys off from the first two seasons for what? So that Ros can appear? So that Theon can bully Osha? So that Littlefinger can spar with Varys? If not all the Tullys, at least they could cast Brynden in Season 1, and then add Edmure and dying Hoster and Riverrun in Season 2. But no, Ros was more important to them than Brynden, obviously. And from Season 2 onwards they definitely don’t have problems with the budget. Only with time, but, with the way they keep wasting time on secondary characters they like for some reason (Margaery, Olenna, Shae, Bronn, Grey Worm and Missandei, Gilly and so on), and characters they invent (Talisa, Olivar, Locke, Olly), they themselves are creating the problems with time actually. Perhaps I’m forgetting something, but, besides battle reduction in Season 1, I don’t think any of their changes was necessary or justified.
The main problem with adapting ASOIAF isn’t the number of characters or number of episodes. That was all solved in negotiations with HBO, on a relatively satisfying note. The main challenge is the structure of the books, because Martin usually covers a lot of time and space both in a single chapter. That’s one of the reasons readers get so attached to the POV characters, because a small novella happens in almost each of their chapters. To replicate that on screen would be a true challenge of this adaptation. But, seeing that D&D only talk about money and number of episodes, they most likely didn’t even think about that aspect.
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Thanks for another superb review, Miodrag (it won’t get you out of the torture chamber just yet, though 😛 ) It’s been a long journey for so many of us in discerning the essential worthlessness of GOT, especially as it involved the constant struggle of viewing it as an adaptation of the books and wanting to see the characters and events which enrich Martin’s narrative be portrayed in a complex and conscientious manner. With this review you’ve expertly explained why this struggle should no longer cause any consternation, especially when D&D pull out their usual season ending tricks and completely hoodwink their audiences to ignore all the logical failures and botched dynamics it took to get there.
Can one enjoy Hardhome for its own sake? Of course. Can you absolutely love the battle that played out? Why not? Good television follows certain rules, after all, and whatever D&D’s failings, they are not completely ignorant of the mechanisms involved in delivering such, and they have a sizeable budget for it. I’m sure that in terms of its visual scale and dynamic elements, Hardhome more than delivered. But did it amount to good storytelling? Did it service Martin’s narrative in the long run? Did it offer anything besides the spectacle enacted in and of itself to delight viewers?
For someone still feeling the aftershocks of the complete evisceration of Sansa’s character on screen, I am immensely comforted in knowing that no attempt need be made to reconcile ASOIAF to this orgy of inanity.
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As usual, you articulated my thoughts on this episode and the fandom’s reaction to it, Miodrag. Very well said!
Any effort towards reconciling both versions will be fruitless, as you and others have posited, but one thing I’m not willing to let pass is Benioff and Weiss’ cowardice with regard to the whole Winterfell debacle, and I sure do not appreciate their shiny display of insane battles as a method to keep the viewership distracted from fundamental failures in handling the show. I say their cowardice because that’s the only qualification I can possibly find for their attitude with Sansa’s invented arc.
You see, as I’d explained to you before in my usual journalist-abusing way, the “explanations” they give in the Inside the Episode video featurettes are comedy gold material most of the time. But from episode 6 onwards, I am failing to see the humour anymore and instead there’s a deep sense of anger at the showrunners for their avoidant behaviour. In the ITE following the rape scene, Benioff and Weiss circumvented the issue, they mentioned the need to create alliances through marriages and quickly went on to talk about . . . Daenerys! Daenerys, who wasn’t even in that bloody episode.
In the ITE for the next episode, in which we saw Sansa with bodily proof of her beatings and heard her tell that she was nightly raped, you know what Benioff and Weiss said? Nothing. It was like what Sansa experienced hadn’t happened and wasn’t happening.
In the ITE for this 8th episode, they said what for me was the nail in the coffin, their words were:
And Benioff and Weiss don’t even call this by the right name. It’s not that Sansa is “oppressed,” they decided to toss her into that, discarding her own story, her own themes, her own personality, in order to get her into this “absolutely terrible situation” she shouldn’t have had to be in if they’d cared as they claimed. This is, to me, the final insult, that they don’t have the balls to face the fans and own up their deeds. If you think the storyline wasn’t made well, then explain it and rectify. If you think it was good and made sense, then step forward and defend it, for goodness’ sake, and don’t hide behind some ready-made video featurette where you’ll do your best not to mention what you’ve done!
You see now why I call this cowardice? Their behaviour is the typical avoidant attitude of someone who knows they’ve not everything on their side but aren’t willing to answer for their messes. True, a lot of us would’ve disagreed with every syllabe they’d said if they had, but that’s not the point. The point is that they avoided it completely and hid behind already-prepared videos like the Inside the Episodes and that insulting special featurette on the Winterfell plot they released, and sent Iwan and Sophie to do interviews that smelt of avoidance and damage control even worse than the own showrunners’ actions. I’d have at least given them credit for being brave and bold enough to face the storm and weather it, no matter how much I disagreed. But they avoided it and came back with this battle and gods know what else, and they’ll just wait and hope we all forget what they’ve done, as memory is short-lived.
I simply cannot hold any shred of respect for these men anymore, and why should I, when they’ve behaved so insultingly towards fans like me?
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I’m not disagreeing with you, I’m just saying they keep doing that for every controversial decision they make and with every character whose arc they twist in some illogical manner. Which, of course, means: every decision and every character.
I mean, just recall what they did to Ramsay. Of course, Ramsay doesn’t have his own fans, so nobody was too upset when they left him out completely from the second season. And they gave his role to Dagmer! And in the next season they brought Ramsay in just like nothing happened. Oh, and they happen to love Theon’s arc in the books, especially the ADWD part with Ramsay. Not like Sansa, whom they remember to “love” only when they need to somehow justify the butchering of her arc. They actually love the Theon/Reek storyline. And just look what they did to it at the very beginning. It was stillborn, it could never work, not after they eliminated Ramsay from Season 2 and gave his role to Dagmer. And did they ever talk about it? As far as I can recall, not a single time.
You’re right about their cowardice, of course. That’s one of my strongest impressions on them from the get-go: these guys are afraid of their own shadows. They’re afraid of the HBO executives (and, truth be told, that Doelger guy does look creepy, with that one face expression he refuses to change for four years now – he’s probably giving nightmares to D&D); they’re scared of book fans, so they keep throwing empty excuses like time and money; they’re afraid of the actors, so they keep praising them beyond any measure and write scenes they think the actors will like… and so on. When on round tables or in TV interviews, their body language always emits fear, in my eyes at least. When something controversial needs to be addressed publicly, their first option is to send Cogman to talk about it in the media. In the writing team, they’ve been gathering absolute beginners and glorified interns, because those are the only people they could ever hope to impress. They really look like ultimate cowards with practically no self-esteem. Why would we respect them, then?
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Yep they are cowards! I’ve been saying that for a while in different foras. It became really clear to me during last year’s debacle about Cersei’s rape where they maintained radio silence while letting Alex Graves and the actors take the media flack.
This year is even worse because they deliberately put Sansa in a rape scene that isn’t part of her story. They pride themselves for having the courage to do what the show demands (in their own words!) but they are too cowardly to engage directly with the criticism, especially when it comes to rape. The fact that they can’t even bring themselves to say the R-word should be enough reason to avoid rape plots because that certainly means that they cannot handle it in a sensitive way. I hate it when people use euphemisms for horrible things because it is a way to diminish something horrible because it makes us feel uncomfortable – the euphemism I hate the most is “ethnic cleasing” instead of “genocide”. Sansa being “opressed” could mean a lot of things on a sliding scale whereas “raped and beaten nightly” is horrific in its very specificity.
Since they’ve put one of their main characters in this particular situation, the least they could do is acknowledge it instead of trying to slide around an issue that is both controversial, uncomfortable and is affecting millions of women every single day. They are of course entitled to making their own creative decisions but we, the audience, are entitled to criticising those decisions. However, how can you respect someone who creates a scene on a extremely hot-button subject with a character whose story is completely different in the story they are adapting – and then shy away from not only facing and engaging with that criticism, but not even have the guts and decency to name the issue. That is actually what I find the most disgusting about them – especially because they weren’t shy of telling the world how they “loved” the Jeyne Poole plot before the season premiere. I think it is very telling that they only do pre-season interviews but instead let the directors, writers and actors deal with the fall-out from controversial scenes.
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Miodrag,
I do think we need to grade controversial decisions on a sliding scale. Some decisions are controversial only to book fans, like the example with Ramsay that you quote above – and since the show’s audience is made up of more people who haven’t read the books than the other way around, I’m perfectly fine with them not addressing minor issues like this because if they did, then they’d do nothing else.
What I do mind is that they litter the show with scenes of objectified female flesh regardless of narrative purpose and that they use sexual violence as the go-to solution for creating dramatic tension around a female character.
So why do I find the latter example much much more important than a minor book change? Because the problem of rape is endemic to our societies! In western countries 1 in 5 women are subjected to sexual assault, and many many more a threatened with it – I myself have received outright threats from strangers in broad daylight! This issues is then compounded by the fact that many people refuse to acknowledge rape in situations other than stranger-rape. Besides this there’s the issue of blaming the victim. I’m not against entertainment using rape in a story but since it is such a politically loaded issue, it needs to be used responsibly and to address not only the profound effects it has on the victim but also the way we talk about rape, its perpetrators and its victims. That is way those tired tropes that surround the cultural depiction of rape are so damaging – because they are narrative short-cuts that skirt the real-life issues of sexual violence. When an artist, producer, etc. chooses to use rape as a plot device then they also need to go out and engage with the public response, especially when it comes to extremely popular movies, books, shows. Why? Because when they decide to use rape as a plot device they become part of the cultural and political debate on this issue and as such they have a responsibility to further the debate they’re already participating in qua their narrative choices.
The fact that D&D refuses to engage this debate, a debate they indirectly participate in every time they decide to depict sexual violence in the show, is infuriating to me and cowardly of them.
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@Trinuviel
I hope this will not open a can of worms, but I really have to take a big issue with what you said in the post above, addressed to me. (I’m not replying directly to that post because I hate that narrow formating.)
Why would just rape be treated as a politically loaded issue? Why is that worse than burning people alive? And yes, in case someone isn’t informed because the mainstream media wasn’t particularly interested in that incident, around 100 people were burned alive last year in Odessa. Did anybody answer for that? Was anyone held accountable for that? Did the regime that encouraged such action loose the support from abroad? No. None. By the way, among those burned in Odessa, there were both men and women.
Are we going to talk about the physical and psychological violence my countrymen are exposed to daily in the province of Kosovo? Let’s talk statistics: after 1999, out of some 80.000 Serbs left in the southern and central parts of the province (parts controlled by Albanians), 1.012 were murdered. Or, almost 80 murders a year per 100.000 people. Only Honduras has the higher ratio in the world. The difference is, of course, that in Kosovo you have international military forces tasked with preventing those crimes. Serbs live in “protected” enclaves. And yet, the murder ratio is so high. And how many of those murderers were caught and convicted? Not a single one! A handful was apprehended, but they were all released soon after.
Were you ever forced to vote on a EU-organized local elections because it suits the political goals of Washington and Brussels? And when I say forced, it doesn’t even begin to describe what was actually happening in Kosovo in November 2013. A single soon-to-be mother in the late stage of pregnancy was being openly threatened she’ll loose the social support if she doesn’t vote. I reported on it, and just a handful other journalists. Not a single foreign reporter covering the elections, and there were dozens of them, reported on it. Some human activists informed EU bodies of the abuse the poor woman suffered. You think any of those bodies reacted? Think again. You know who helped the woman at the end? Locals. Her neighbors. The community itself. Men and women both.
And that’s just from the areas I cover professionally, or follow on my own. I can only imagine what horrors I’m missing in other troubled parts of the world, like Middle East. I mean, Libya! Need I say more?
So yes, isolating any particular form or criminal behavior, be it sexual violence or something else, to the point where it gets treated as something special and unique in comparison to other forms of crime and violence, is nothing I want to take part in in any way. It insults victims in general. I have too much respect for victims, rape victims included, to use them for some political agenda that perhaps suits me at the moment. I’m not saying that’s what you’re doing, but I’m damn sure mainstream media and politically correct “elites” are doing exactly that when they deliberately choose to address only those issues that suit their agendas. It doesn’t mean I don’t have my own focus. Of course I have. I’m predominantly focused on issues that concern my country and my nation. That’s the canvas I feel I can produce at least some effects on. But the difference is that I don’t go around saying someone else’s focus is less important or even less human than my own. I’m not imposing on any author to think about Odessa victims or Serb victims before he/she pens some story. All I expect from them is to treat victims in general with respect. More precisely, to treat humanity with respect. Are D&D doing that? Not really, because 90% of the time they have no idea what they’re actually writing and what consequences their decisions will have on the story itself, let alone how’s that going to look to someone who was raped or to someone whose relative or a friend was burned alive or beheaded. Is Martin treating victims of his story with respect? I’m pretty sure he is.
I understand Sansa fans being particularly angry this season and at TV Sansa’s arc. It was a process of mishandling their favorite character that culminated at one point, at the end of episode 6. I understand female fans who feel the show is misogynistic, because they see female characters written in offensive way. I completely agree with those objections and complaints. I just don’t think those perspectives are the only ones that should be publicly addressed. Male characters in the show are written as poorly and offensively as female characters. Or, better yet, almost as, because, as I said earlier, D&D are even worse in writing women than in writing men, but I think it’s not a reflection of some dirty agenda of theirs, but of their utter incompetence and fundamental lack of empathy. For example, with Talisa they probably wanted to appease female fans, and look at the disaster that resulted in.
All in all, I have no problem with fans. Even when we disagree, I can learn a lot from them, if they’re well-intended of course, and I only hope it goes both ways. But when media professionals and other public figures start mixing their shallow agendas into discussions about art, that’s when all the hell breaks loose. Especially since, as we all know, those very same media were actually congratulating D&D on a job well done just few weeks ago, when, for comparison, people gathered on this site couldn’t believe how ridiculously stupid TV Sansa’s “arc” is.
Viewers who were alarmed by TV Sansa’s “arc” from the beginning, earned their right to be specially upset at any particular instance of it. Media that were congratulating D&D and promoting (their words) GOT all this time? Not really.
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I was commenting on one topic that has caused a lot of media attention – and because that it is something that has had a direct impact on my daily life. I did in no way imply that it was more important than other types of crime and suffering. However, when discussing one issue it is countproductive to compare it to all kinds of other atrocities in the same breath. It tends to derail the conversation. You need to pick your battles and as I said it isn’t productive if the debate of one issue is derailed by dragging in other issues, such as the ones you mentioned. This is often used as a derailment technique used to silence the debate – and I’ve seen it countless times in various internet fora. I don’t think that you intended to derail my argument but it certainly reads that way.
I am in NO way telling people what they should be invested in and I rather resent that implication as I never raised it in my comment, which specifically addressed the way D&D continually shy away from acknowledging and addressing their use of sexual violence. That is the coward’s way out.
We all are invested in different things regarding to our circumstances. But I do think that some of these debates need to focus individually on the issue they want to critize. Otherwise the debate is diluted and becomes ineffectual. I am particularly invested in this debate, not just in relation to GoT but to representations of sexual violence and women in the media in general. I also contend that media representation matters greatly because they play a huge part in shaping our way of thinking and talking about things – and the issue of rape is one of them, just as racism, etc. These are issues that are part of a great number of people’s everyday lives, issues that requires a new and public conversation to change very deep rooted prejudices.
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@Trinuviel
Since you talked about “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide”, I found it fit to bring up some other examples of strictly political topics that could be as connected, or even more so, to the main subject we’re discussing here, and that is GOT. However, I don’t think it’s necessary to involve all those topics in this debate. This should be, first and foremost, a discussion about GOT, ASOIAF and everything in between. Stories have been analyzed and debated since time immemorial and such a discussion doesn’t have to involve agendas imposed by the media. If someone here wants to discuss a specific topic, be it rape or anything else, that’s fine. But, honestly, I feel obligated in no way to be guided or influenced by media attention. Their goals are their goals. I disagreed with them when they were celebrating D&D, and I can perfectly continue to challenge the show without their “help”.
The media attention only interests me as a topic on its own. It interested me while they were praising the show, and it still interests me now, when some of them seem to change sides. And, since we’re already discussing them here, I’d like to hear your explanation about why they were so disturbed by the Jaime/Cersei scene. Again, this year’s Sansa controversy is something that belongs to entirely different context. Literally everything about TV Sansa’s arc this season is completely and utterly ridiculous/nonsensical/insulting. The rape scene is a clear culmination of the process. All that makes this year’s controversy very different to last year’s. Perhaps I’m missing something, but I still don’t know why were the media so upset over it last year. It could not be the culmination of a process that involves Jaime or Cersei or both, because for Jaime it was just the latest in a string of equally damaging decisions (for example, he killed his cousin for no reason at all, which was certainly not a lesser crime), and for Cersei it was something nobody could predict how it’s going to progress. So, if critics were upset because of Jaime’s ruined characterization, well, they were at least two years too late. If they were worried about something else, that’s another matter, but I still can’t point my finger to what is it that upset them so much.
All in all, if you or anyone want to focus on a particular aspect, fine by me. I just don’t know why would I feel the obligation to get involved in it. And your post kinda suggested I should follow some order (for the lack of a better word) and priorities. If that was really what you suggested, I’d have to politely disagree. If that’s not what you suggested, then all this is a hopefully harmless case of misunderstanding.
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I didn’t suggest that anyone should follow my priorities and I’m kind of surprised that you read it that way. However, that’s all water under the bridge since it seems to have been a misunderstanding.
Regarding the Jaime/Cersei scene last year. It wasn’t so much the scene itself that disturbed me, it was the director publicly saying that he didn’t think it was a rape, which I found extremely odd since that scene presented itself unequivocally as a rape and many people saw it as such. It showed a fundamental lack of understanding on the part of Alex Graves that reflects a lot of attitudes about spousal rape not being rape (as in the idea that only stranger rape is really rape). The fact that Graves made Sophie Turner the butt of his joke about her marriage to Ramsay being a “love interest” for Sansa this season now makes me suspect that the guy is simply a douchey tool.
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People often make light of things in fiction for humour, like sarcastically remarking something horrific like a vicious sack of a city (Troy, why not) is something much lesser, e.g. “a small fire, little squabble”. Typically humour. I often think people read far too much into Benioff/Weiss and the two lackeys beyond being awful writers. WHY people are so intent on doing this eludes somewhat me though I have something of an inkling as to why with this pattern. Now his statements about Stoneheart last year (or was that Cogman? Both are essentially interchangeable underlings for me) I would agree if you used that to denote him to being a “douchey tool”.
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@Trinuviel
This line of yours I had in mind: “I do think we need to grade controversial decisions on a sliding scale.” It kinda implied some controversial decisions are more significant than others. To which I actually agree, though I difer about some of the reasons you stated, e.g. media attention. I have my own sliding scale for D&D’s controversial decisions and, if I’m doing something right in these reviews, then it probably means my scale is not too different than scales of majority of visitors here, which, in turn, as a group may be representative to an extent of readership as a whole. Just saying why my sliding scale doesn’t have to be entirely subjective.
As for Jaime/Cersei, Graves’ comment came only after the storm begun. In fact, he was answering questions about the storm when he said what he said. Which means that it couldn’t start the storm. And his comment is precisely why I think people sometimes should stay away from stereotypes imposed by media. The way I took it, his comment wasn’t a reflection of some attitude about marital rape. Perhaps he does share that attitude, and perhaps he doesn’t, but this comment of his didn’t have to be taken in that context. His comment was actually a reflection of his utter incompetence as director, and also of D&D’s utter incompetence as writers. As I speculated last week, there might have been a solid reason for D&D’s wish to alter the scene from the book, and that reason was to preserve the characterization of their Cersei. When that’s taken into account, their decision becomes more understandable and logical – but not a bit less wrong. In fact, it isn’t the case of insensitivity toward the issue of marital rape any more, but the case of complete lack of understanding of characters they are supposed to be adapting, which, by extension, possibly indicates lack of understanding of human behavior in general. Not only that they wouldn’t understand or care about what is marital rape and what isn’t, they also aren’t able to understand and don’t care about what it means to be a mother, a sister, a lover, a brother, a father, what is grief and how people deal with it, what is empathy and what’s lack of it, and so on.
So yeah, I do think that’s the reason D&D ultimately let that controversy go by without their explanation. They actually prefer to be seen as guys who are not too sensitive toward matter of rape, than as guys who basically have no understanding whatsoever of characters and the story they’re trying to adapt. And that’s possibly the only similarity with this year’s Sansa controversy: I think they’re also silent because the alternative they’d trigger by their explanation would be even worse. That’s why I wrote they’re like Theon: “better to be cruel than weak” is their reasoning most probably. Because, if critics weren’t thinking about rape as an act that was depicted on screen, they’d have to talk about the entire TV Sansa’s arc this season that was an incredible chain of ridiculous decisions that kept coming with every scene she was in. And in the context, everything looks only worse, rape scene included. So when I concur they are cowards, this is the cowardice I have in mind: their main goal is to avoid any responsibility for the decision to have TV Sansa mindlessly accept TV Littlefinger’s nonsensical “plan”. In order to do that, they’re going to remain silent and hope all this rape talk will soon die, just like it ultimately will. But, had they been held accountable for the storytelling crime of putting TV Sansa in Winterfell this way, that’s something that wouldn’t go away so soon because it is a whole new level of TV absurdity. I’m still to find a reasonable person who doesn’t think TV Sansa marrying Ramsay was the stupidest thing a writer can come up with. I’m still to see or hear about something as stupid in some other show. I actually do think that no character in the history of television shows made such a offensively ridiculous decision like Littlefinger and even more like Sansa this season. Marrying into a family that betrayed and butchered your family is really like nothing that’s ever been done in the history of storytelling, as far as I can tell. Stupid movies and TV shows just don’t deal with matters of such gravity. Those works that do, never make decisions that are so ridiculous. That is why I can’t stress enough how revolutionary moronic was the way this whole Winterfell mess was set up. And that’s why I’m so boring in repeating that TV Sansa’s arc this season must be analyzed in the context D&D themselves chose and embraced, and that is when the full measure of their frightening incompetence is exposed.
And on a side note, I always wondered: why marital rape? Why not marital violence? I did explore that subject as a journalist, and rape is never an isolated thing in a marriage. It never ends with rape. If a husband is sexually abusing his wife, he’s surely physically and mentally abusing her as well. The former doesn’t come without the latter. Never happens. It’s theoretically possible I guess, so if it ever happens then treat it separately, according to the actual crime. But since marital rape is always, or almost always, part of marital violence, why does only marital rape look like the social issue? Why treat marital rape only, when marital violence is actually the real problem?
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The Cersei/Jaime scene:
The problem I had with the director’s explanation was not only his blindness to what he was depicting, which is certainly professional incompetence but also read as a kind of blindness to the fact that the sex between Jaime and Cersei wasn’t consensual. His argument ran something along the lines of “didn’t start out consensual, but it became because of her body language”. I didn’t see any of that and his argument was so similar to the tired old clichee that “her mouth said No but her body said yes”, which I hate because it is so wrong and it is so widely used in fiction, especially romance fiction, that it becomes easy to not even see what one of the implications of this trope it. I guess I’m sensitive to this issue, that’s all.
D&D are being cowards, not just on the issue of their use of sexual violence but to every controversial decision the make on how to tell the story on this show. I’ve always got the feeling that they don’t like criticism. Well, boo hoo, that is simply a fact of the game when you’re producing anything and putting it out in the world – whether it be a movie, a novel, a work of art or a an academic paper. The mature response is to counter the criticism or strive to do better.
I know we disagree about whether something is controversial due to media attention. Well, the massive media attention around Sansa’s rape this year and Cersei’s rape last year certainly proves that it is a controversial issue. I simply state this as a fact, the show is criticised for its use of sexual violence. I don’t mean to imply that this is the most important reason to criticize it, only that many do critize it and that people were angry. This year stems very much from the anger that they gutted Sansa’s storyline in a way that completely screws over a lot of the characterizations and for what? They’ve cut out almost all of the aspects that make the WF story from Dance so compelling (though I still hate the brutal torture of Jeyne Poole or Theon. It was extreme and I really don’t care much for the body horror that GRRM puts in his books). There are no Northern lords to create tension inside Winterfell and that makes the reasoning for this marriage null and void. Granted, Roose told Ramsay that they need her to hold on to the North – but SHOW, don’t TELL. it is bad storytelling. Another reason I disliked this is the way that they built up this whole story for a big mid season shock for the audience – and Sansa’s storyline was certainly promoted as shocking! GoT are really bad when it comes to this kind of story-telling. If the story is compelling and the characters are well drwan you don’t need big shocks (deaths, rapes, mutilations) and shiny things (over-the-top sexposition) to keep the audience. I really feel that D&D don’t trust their audience.
I recently watched season 1 of Vikings and was really struck by what a great way they ended the season. Not by a big shocking thing but with a quite simmering tension that grew out of the who the characters were, their relationships and what decisions they made. It was great TV – a show that manage to be thrilling, immersive and sexy without going over the top and without constantly shoving the plot points down the audiences throat (“cough” OllyCheckov).
When I meant grading the changes on a sliding scale, I was actually reffering to your argument about the whole Ramsay/Dagmar Cleftjaw thing. I didn’t feel that this was an important change because with so many characters the show needs to practice a sort of narrative economy.
Another minor change that annoyed me but that I don’t really think is particularly significant was the change of the Thenns to be savage cannibals – just to show that they are really EWUULL, which is quite contrary to the books where I saw them as much more adaptable in terms of the possibility of eventually becoming apart of Westerosi society in the North. I liked that part of the story but I don’t think that there’ll be room for it in the show.
I find the introduction of Olly much more annoying. Not just because he so overdetermined as a Checkov’s Gun waiting to go off, but also because this simplifies the whole the way the Night’s Watch betrays Jon. It removes all the nuance of how well-meaning actions for necessary change sometimes founder on the ground of ingrained prejudice. It is incredibly difficult to get people to accept something that goes so completely against the grain of their entire worldview. That was a great part of Jon’s story – he means well, his decision about the wildlings is completely necessary but he fails because people don’t behave completely rationally.
I hate the change of Sansa’s arc and the insinuation that this is much better than her Vale arc, which I quite enjoyed. It also messes with a lot of the characters. Furthermore, sometimes you need a little bit of lightness, a break from all the misery. Otherwise the audience might just come to a point where people are saying: “Nothing good ever happens so why bother?” I certainly feel like that. % seasons of unrelenting misery is just exhausting to watch – no matter how many big exciting battles and shocking twists they throw in.
In some ways I do understand the reasons behind the decision because I do think that they’d have to be very creative because her future arc is unknown. However, I do not understand why they only wanted to keep the Jeyne Poole story in the WF and not the plot that revolves around the northen plot because it created a lot of dramatic tension and I think it would have been a much more compelling story if Sansa had had the opportunity to work alliances between the old Stark supporters to bring down the Boltons. To have completely alone, isolated and locked in her room reduces her agency significantly and makes for a much more boring storyline.
Jaime in Dorne is actually the worst change. Without Arianne the Dornish plot seems utterly pointless and could have been completely scrapped.
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Another brilliant essay, Miodrag. This one had something more: catharsis. It gave me such a feeling of relief, somehow! A necessary therapy – like waking up from a bad dream and telling yourself that it was just a dream and it cannot have any power over you any more. Your review is a glass of cold, clear water and it simply tasted great. Thank you.
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Another great essay.
For me the Hardhome battle was everything the showrunners wanted it to be. Thrilling, exciting and very entertaining. Production values were sky high, the fight choreography was excellent and the design of the White Walkers continues to be top notch. All very enjoyable.
But it raises three damning problems, not necessarily with this episode specifically, but rather about the season in general. First, the overwhelmingly positive reaction from critics and fans proves that this is the first episode which a lot of people (including myself) actually found entertaining. To go seven episodes before actually producing an hour of enjoyable television is a huge problem.
Second, it raises the awful prospect that since they are failing to adhere to the books and convinced of their own writing prowess, D and D are growing incapable of entertaining their audience without a huge budget to back them up. When we have an episode like this to enjoy it doesn’t matter, but neither I nor anyone else will be willing to sit through turgid episode after turgid episode simply so that the show-runners can conserve their money and time for a single high concept episode at the end of the season. That’s no way to produce a TV show. The expense of this battle is almost certainly why the Sand Snakes scene from ep 6 looked so cheap.
Third, this is all filler. It’s an argument that can be thrown at some parts of AFFC and ADWD as well, but the counter argument to that has always been that GRRM has characterization coming out of his ears and puts it on every page and chapter even if the progression of the plot is not immediately apparent. The characterization on the TV show has been so spotty it practically doesn’t exist, which is why the show’s only recourse is to fall back on the big budget action which served it so well in S2 Ep 9. What did we learn from Hardhome? That white walkers are coming in strength to destroy the world of men? That the Wildlings are under threat from them? That Valyrian steel harms white walkers? That last one is the only new information and to build a whole episode just to tell us that is absurd. It’s not as if Jon Snow wouldn’t try to hit them with his sword if he hadn’t had this experience – it’s a sword! So what was so vital about this scene other than to include a big battle? The irony is that this whole scene has been extrapolated from a single letter from Cotter Pyke to Jon in ADWD which claimed there were dead things in the water… the only place in the whole episode we didn’t see any dead things.
So we have a good episode in what has otherwise been a hugely disappointing season, and yet faith in D and D has apparently been completely restored. All the problems with the plot, the characters and the pacing will still be here come episode 9; to me this didn’t feel like a restoration – more like a brief reprieve from the pain.
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So, um, does really no one think that the Others aren’t in fact “evil”? Because I don’t expect a great battle versus the evil Others, I expect the novels to deconstruct the whole good-evil thing completely by showing that even the Others aren’t just evil. Am I really alone with that?
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No. Heresy.
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