Board 8 > ~~~Game Of Thrones Discussion Topic~~~ Sundays at 9 (Spoilers as occur on TV)

(+) Yeah! (+)

WHY DO I NOW NEED TO WAIT A WEEK FOR EPISODE 2

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"i could have a phd in ass studies." -Rusty

Stannis so good

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Damnit, I want to hear feedback from the non-book obsessed people.

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"Shut up and put your tinfoil hat back on." - Ulti

Also HOLY **** AWESOME

http://viewers-guide.hbo.com/game-of-thrones/season2/#!/map/special/areas-of-control/

Don't need an account.

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Hmm, kinda weak but what I expected on a re-introductory of the show.

Any major changes from the books? A few things felt off like the whole Melisandre/Maester scene. I thought she drank first and then he was forced to. But Melisandre is sooo awesome, and hot.

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Alec, I haven't read the books. Just a viewer here and here are my thoughts!

Overall, a terrific hour of television and one of the few times I feel glum about not owning cable. But I'll continue to support the series via other means, so I'll try not to lose too much sleep over it. (Besides, without a Nielsen box I wouldn't be contributing to the numbers, anyway.)

At any rate, good episode. Not as good as several of last year's showings but I expected as much from the first hour. (My least favorite episode to-date is still last year's pilot. All the setup and jumping around and not much actual execution is positively to be expected.)

I'm using parentheses entirely too often tonight.

The Melisander introduction sequence felt very rushed. The whole Dragonstone (that's the name, right?) sequence just felt rushed to me. The episode could have used the extra runtime last year's pilot had but as I understand it the showrunners are trying to skim a little off the top here to make the season's climactic battle as strong as possible.

But complaints of such things are rather small when comparing the series to anything else on television.

Oh, and all the comet-esque scene openers and finishers made me think of Final Fantasy VII.

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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Joffrey is still a little s***, no surprise there!

I liked Stannis; don't know about the sorceress though.

So Mance Rayder was part of the Night's Watch huh? Pretty interesting; I wonder what made him abandon them?

I also enjoyed the exchange between Jaime and Robb, and the scene where Robb detailed his demands. He's not half-a**ing this; the Lannisters killed his father, and there's going to be hell to pay. I hope that Theon's offer is legit, but given how everything else in the story has played out, I kind of doubt it (or maybe it'll just be his dad who isn't trustworthy; who knows)

Killing all the b******s at the end was a pretty cold blooded move; Cersei I take it? I wouldn't be surprised if it was someone else though. Things are looking pretty bad for Gendry (and Arya!)

There are supposed to be five kings, right? Stannis, Renly, Joffrey, and Robb are obvious, but who's the fifth? Rayder?

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DAENARYS!

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Oh yeah right I'm dumb

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No I'm not a damn furry. Looney Tunes are different. - Guiga
I wanted Sonic/Shadow romance at that time, not sex. - MWE

As far as who killed the bastards, that's actually open for speculation right now it seems. I mean, people who have read the books ought to know the answer plain as day I guess, but whereas io9's write-up (remarkable write-up, by the way) pinned it on Joffrey as though there were no question, there's a lot of argument as to whether it was him or his mother.

There are even some pointing out that Littlefinger ought to have had that kind of intel... but it's hard for me to come up with rationale for him doing such a thing with the limited knowledge I currently possess on his machinations.

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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The episode was pretty good! Nothing amazing, but a good start. Though I may be a bit biased, having read the books beforehand.

The good:

+ Tyrion is awesome, as usual. I find it interesting that they decided to open the season with a Tyrion scene (well... he's only in half of the scene, but yeah). Methinks they're trying to play to their strengths and know that he's the most popular character right now. Interesting also that in the credits, his name has been bumped up to replace Sean Bean's.
+ Jack Gleeson (Joffrey) is doing an incredible job right now. I absolutely despise Joff in the books, but I'm actually looking forward to his scenes in the series. Dinklage, Gleeson and Maisie Williams are the best three actors as of now, IMO, although the whole cast is obviously very good. Anyhow, Joffrey/Sansa and Joff/Cersei were two really strong scenes.
+ I like the casting for the new characters. Stannis and Davos are convincing, Melisandre seems solid, too. Looking forward to further episodes.
+ Special effects were really well done. Drogon was perfect, and Grey Wind is much better that way. The move to CGI was a sound decision on their part.
+ Robb scenes were good. Richard Madden's doing a good job, as are Catelyn/Jaime. I like the little scenes they added. It's a good addition.

The bad:
- The scenes on Dragonstone seemed rushed. Maester Cressen, especially (the old man who was poisoned) was... very awkward. As was the poisoning - I don't remember exactly how it went in the books, but I *think* Melisandre drank first and he was kinda forced to drink afterwards. Here, drinking first with such a fast-acting poison is really, really stupid. Poisoning the goblet in plain sight and then awkwardly offering to drink in the middle of a war meeting seems unplausible, too. Didn't like how they adapted that.
- Winterfell scenes were maybe just a tad too long. Nothing too annoying, but I think they could've done without the first scene with Luwin and fleshed out Cressen/Melisandre a bit better.
- Still don't like Shae's actress. Although it may come from the script. Oh well.

Still uncertain about:
--> Not too sure how I feel about that scene with Cersei and Littlefinger. I really liked how they handled Cersei - they're fleshing her character a bit better than in the novels, which is a good thing. Littlefinger, on the other hand, seemed a bit too open there. Yes, he always has that snarky attitude, but he's not the type to badmouth the Queen in her face and accuse her of incest while she's surrounded by four guards. And is it me, or did Aidan Gillen change his voice from Season 1 to Season 2?

All in all, strong episode. Scenes in King's Landing were fun and interesting. The North was cool too (excluding Bran in Winterfell). Looking forward to next week's episode.

Aside from that, I'll definitely be buying S1's Blue Ray some time during the next month! A great series indeed.

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When you have nothing to say, quote yourself ~ Solfadore

I don't even remember the whole Littlefinger outburst from the book, seemed way out of character to me.


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Menji+ What Will Never Be the Greatest.
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It wasn't in the book, IIRC.

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When you have nothing to say, quote yourself ~ Solfadore

It wasn't in the book, neither of them are POV characters for Clash of Kings so you'd have no way of knowing if such a scene took place.

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my reaction to the episode



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SuperNiceDog did a SuperNiceJob

- Winterfell scenes were maybe just a tad too long. Nothing too annoying, but I think they could've done without the first scene with Luwin and fleshed out Cressen/Melisandre a bit better.

Hmm. Would have been a worthy tradeoff, I concur.

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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From: _Harmonica_ | #065
my reaction to the episode

Hahaha

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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yeah the episode definitely suffered from the (supposed) need to show what everyone was doing AND having to introduce new major characters. I'm sure future episodes will fix the pacing.

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SuperNiceDog did a SuperNiceJob

For whatever it's worth, I read a few pre-release screener reviews and while the general tone was one of tremendous enjoyment all throughout, several posts remarked on how the first episode might go over a little weakly because it suffered from a bunch of jumping around and introductions that episodes two through four did not.

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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Are you gonna keep this spoiler-free for those of us not into the books?

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Hey, its that SuperNiceDog! Congrats to the Guru 2011 winner

I think that first and foremost, they need a stronger focus. There's a ton of plotlines going on at once, but they don't need to show everything at all times. Just taking yesterday's episode as reference:

> King's Landing
> Robb
> Dragonstone/Stannis
> Daenerys
> North of the wall
> Winterfell

Of these, the first three seem pretty important to the overall action (as in they interact with each other), the last three seem to be of lesser importance in the short term (i.e. what the Night Watch does north of the Wall has no immediate impact on the power play in King's Landing). I think they needed to indeed look at the first three, but they could have, for instance, just picked one minor plotline and really focused on it ; then moved to one other minor plotline in the 2nd episode, and so on and so forth. I'm sure the fandom could have waited one episode for Dany's return.

Maybe that's what they'll do - and in that case, kudos. But they shouldn't show everything at once. It's just hard to care for the characters if you only see them three minutes per episode.

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When you have nothing to say, quote yourself ~ Solfadore

From: BK_Sheikah00 | #070
Are you gonna keep this spoiler-free for those of us not into the books?

I intend to do my best, and definitely no plot spoilers.

It's much harder to keep out discussion of stuff that already happened in the books, like how the book handled certain scenes differently. That's not really spoilers, but if you want absolutely 0 book references you might be in a tough spot.

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"i could have a phd in ass studies." -Rusty

Bumping this for more opinions!

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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The scene with Cersei and Tyrion definitely had a different tone. They were actually somewhat amicable towards each other, rather than him mocking her for screwing Jamie and her slapping the s*** out of him.

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Well played, SuperNiceDog. Well played.
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He definitely hit a nerve though.

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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Finally got to see it, so well done :3

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Joyrock
Fresh from my first justified ban. Ever!

Ratings yo http://towerofthehand.com/blog/2012/04/03-s2-premieres-best-ratings-yet/index.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

And episode 2 is awesome. Much better than the premiere imo.

/hint

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KING STANNIS

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Episode 2 was even better. I do not like the casting of Yara/Asha. Mel is great though.

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-Merc

BOOK SPOILERS
http://www.gameofthronesmap.org/

Map with current character locations. I hope they do a version without spoilers.

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"Link has spoken for years. And music is his language" -YoBlazer

yeah I noticed that pretty quickly. There aren't any MAJOR spoilers but at least one of the characters has a quote listed that comes from one of the later books.

pretty lame considering it's supposed to be a CURRENT map.

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AlecTrevelyan006 posted...
BOOK SPOILERS
http://www.gameofthronesmap.org/

Map with current character locations. I hope they do a version without spoilers.

Berric!

That's all I noticed at a glance, I'll have to look at it more when I have time.

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Oh I was thinking that was an official HBO map, and I was excited they were considering Berric important enough to show on the map. Pardon my excitement.

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finally just got around to watching the premier. Fantastic episode.

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Actually, that map is really outdated too. Essos (where Dany is) is way off.

The official HBO map is out now that shows us what it really looks like.

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Just watched the opening episode.

I'm still surprised that people who haven't read the books enjoy the show / can understand what's going on. I feel like jumping from plot to plot without being able to stop and look at the glossary/maps would be really hard... apparently it isn't as bad as I am thinking it is.

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No amount of planning will ever replace dumb luck.

I have not read the books, and I keep track just fine. However, I pay more attention to shows than most people. I know some people who say they love the show but never seem to understand what I am talking about when I try to talk about it with them.

EDIT: Also, it usually gets way easier past the first episode which has to set up like every single plot...subsequent episodes usually focus more.

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http://theoatmeal.com/comics/winter_is_coming

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As a former ratings analyst for Nielsen, I actually came rather close to accurately predicting the numbers for Game of Thrones. But I ended up shooting too low on the coveted 18-49. Still, good to be wrong in this case.

Shame too. Almost won some swag from winteriscoming.net.

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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Where do we begin. OH I KNOW: MUTHA F'ING DRAGONS, SON! Dany didn't get much screen time but that's ok I'm used to it as is Emilia Clarke; she does more with less than anyone in recent memory. The look on her face when that horse died was priceless because she is quite aware of the dedication her people have for her. I also love what's his names answer as to why they couldn't go in any other direction, "if we go here they'll kill you and take your dragons. If we go here they'll kill you and take your dragons."

Robb Stark need a spinoff series. Jaime's witty, albeit fatalistic humor and Robb's brash and confident optimism play so well off each other. "It's better than losing 3 battles". Those 2 just work.

Didn't like the Dragonstone scenes but in sure it will grow on me. I want to see the other Brother so we can get to the character who is soon to be everyone's new favorite.

Tyrion was amazing as usual. Alan Sepinwall said it best: The only way Dink doesn't win best supporting actor is if he wins best leading actor. Which he should. Without Ned around Tyrion is the closest thing we have to not only a main character but a person to objectively cheer for. In Westeros everyone is out for something but Tyrion is the only one who seems like a real human being. He empathizes with Sansa and then bashes his own siblings

"it's your only redeeming feature...and your great cheekbones."

It's like Cersei trying to kill Bran while simultaneously feeling sorry for his mother's loss.


Speaking of Cersei, she was involved in the episodes 2 biggest scenes and like last season, Cersei stands between 2 levels of power. She has free reign over everyone, including masters of coin and knowledge, but Joffrey is no longer the little puppet she controlled. Joffrey,'like his fake father before him, has Power she can't possess.

And finally we come to Joffrey, the Boy Who Everyone Wishes Didn't Live. I love him. He's now the 2nd best character on the show. I love him for the same reason I love Commodis from Gladiator: they are misunderstood miscreants l, by-products of fathers who weren't good at their jobs. What else would Joffrey be but petulant and sadistic? His mother raised him to be better than everyone else and his father was a womanizing drunkard who publicly embarrassed his mother. This is the monster she made and watching him threaten her was great. His anti feminist jokes are hilarious as well.

"Robb Stark makes the same mistake all fools do, they put too much stock on the lives of women".

And finally we've come to the strange and maniacal circle of life and death that Game of Thrones is becoming infamous for. While Jon Snow witness daughters born from daughters, Joffrey is murdering little babies out of anger and spite. Great ending.

This premiere was better than last years and that's all you can ask for.

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Realo won gold at the Sex Olympics with a BROKEN FRIGGIN NECK.-Voltch

realopinions

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"Shut up and put your tinfoil hat back on." - Ulti

From: TheConductorSix | #090
Where do we begin. OH I KNOW: MUTHA F'ING DRAGONS, SON! Dany didn't get much screen time but that's ok I'm used to it as is Emilia Clarke; she does more with less than anyone in recent memory. The look on her face when that horse died was priceless because she is quite aware of the dedication her people have for her. I also love what's his names answer as to why they couldn't go in any other direction, "if we go here they'll kill you and take your dragons. If we go here they'll kill you and take your dragons."

Jorah Mormont, who as we learned in season 1 is the son of Night's Watch Commander Jeor Mormont.

And as to spinoffs, Jaime Lannister insults Westeros would get me every week.

Love the realopinions!

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"Shut up and put your tinfoil hat back on." - Ulti

I do reviews on the blog for each episode so I've been dishing out opinions like crazy!

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Realo won gold at the Sex Olympics with a BROKEN FRIGGIN NECK.-Voltch

Peter "Middlefinger" Baelish don't give a f*** 'bout your parlor tricks Lena Headey

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
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excellent write-up Realo

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Realo, what's the blog address?

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It was a great write-up of course and I'm not trying to be contrarian, but I did feel like pointing out that all those quotes are way off >_>;

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
http://img.imgcake.com/Jeffzeropngus.png

Gawd, I already feel like an ass for pointing that out, disregard any seemingly ill intent >_>

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"Later..." <Toonami> <4/1/2012> <Never Forget> ~SCP~
http://img.imgcake.com/Jeffzeropngus.png

I'll link it when I'm not typing from a phone

Yes the quotes are a tad off but they're close enough.

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Realo won gold at the Sex Olympics with a BROKEN FRIGGIN NECK.-Voltch

Oh man only ~56.5 more hours until the episode I've already seen.

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