Season 4 Episode 5 "First of His Name": *HAVE* read the books

Jelle1880

I don't know why but I'm getting tired of these unnecessary diversions from the books.

I can totally get that they change a few things that may not be suitable for TV audiences or to speed up the show compared to the books.

But why for example do they make Sansa Littlefinger's niece instead of his bastard daughter ?

username123

Nerdlingr wrote: »

Thought the John Aaryn reveal should have been done better. That for me in the books was a "F*CK!!!" moment. Had to take time and digest it all when I found out Littlefinger had basically set the whole thing in motion!! Thought they kind of rushed it here.
The whole Pod and Brienne comedy act is wearing a bit thin for me as well. Going all over the shop with his horse..hmmm..bit too benny hill . And the fact that Brienne was basically going at crawling pace when she was talking about heading for the wall. Eh..you'd want to hurry up there love!!
Overall not a bad episode. Wonder what they're gonna do with the whole Hound/Arya thing...how are they gonna tie that up?

Agree on the Jon Arryn reveal. I watch with a non book reader and the significance of it went straight over his head, I had to pause it and remind him who Jon Arryn was and why this was a big reveal. I'd say it was missed by a fair few.

Given the conversation between the Hound and Arya about the Mountain, I wonder will they run across the Mountain up to nasty deeds and that's where the Hound gets his injury? Would be a nice tie in for a later Hound/Mountain showdown.

On Locke, I saw an interview with Gwendolyn Christie(Brienne) where she says

that in season 4 she bites off a mans ear. I hoped it was Locke, but clearly not.

I've spoilered for anyone who hasn't seen the interview.

Daith

Jelle1880 wrote: »

But why for example do they make Sansa Littlefinger's niece instead of his bastard daughter ?

Yeah normally the diversions don't bother me at all but this seems weird. I thought it would have been good to show that there are bastard daughters particularly when we have Dorne coming into play too.

Gadgie

I was also disappointed by the Jon Arryn poisoning reveal. It shocked me when I read it in the book, but here it just felt like exposition. When Lysa said "what wife would do the things I've done for you?", I thought it was enough that it was being hinted at (for a full reveal in the season finale, when she exits through the Moon Door), but then she goes and blurts everything out in detail a few seconds later.

turnikett1

I thought it was better than EP4, but I'm still not overall mad impressed with how season 4 is turning out... I want some Belwas and Coldhands!

Daith

Gadgie wrote: »

I was also disappointed by the Jon Arryn poisoning reveal. It shocked me when I read it in the book, but here it just felt like exposition. When Lysa said "what wife would do the things I've done for you?", I thought it was enough that it was being hinted at (for a full reveal in the season finale, when she exits through the Moon Door), but then she goes and blurts everything out in detail a few seconds later.

I think it's the difference between the book and show. With the book you can stop reading and take in what has been said. With the show it just goes on.

Also do many people think it was the death of Jon Arryn that was pivotal? Catalyst certainly though. It seemed more about the crippling of Bran and the discovery of the Jamie/Cersei relationship from chatting to my non book reader friends.

RobbingBandit

Rosy Posy wrote: »

Didn't he die from his wounds after Brienne bit off his ear when he tried to rape her? I remember hearing somewhere (probably here in fairness) that GRRM made them change the name as the character was so different.

Found this online.

Commanded by Lord Tywin to retake Harrenhal, the Mountain's men arrive at the castle. A cook, who used to be in Lady Whent's service, opens a postern gate for them. Ser Gregor Clegane finds Vargo sitting alone in the Hall of a Hundred Hearths, half mad with pain and fever from his festering wound. The remaining Brave Companions are killed, with the exception of Vargo, for whom the Mountain has different plans. In a mockery of Vargo's preferred way of torturing his prisoners, Ser Gregor cuts off Vargo's limbs piece by piece over an extended period of time while he has the wounds bandaged so that Vargo stays alive. Vargo first loses his hands and feet, then his arms and legs. The extremities as well as other parts of Vargo's body are then fed as "roast goat" to northern prisoners that Ser Gregor has brought to Harrenhal, including Ser Wylis Manderly, as well as to Vargo himself.

Witcher

Daith wrote: »

I think it's the difference between the book and show. With the book you can stop reading and take in what has been said. With the show it just goes on.

Also do many people think it was the death of Jon Arryn that was pivotal? It seemed more about the crippling of Bran and the discovery of the Jamie/Cersei relationship.

It was Jon Arryn's death that caused Robert to go north and everything else followed on from there.

Mickeroo

I was enjoying the Locke character but jesus was he pointless in the end. Literally could have had him die in Harrenhall and nothing would have turned out different.The only meaningful contribution he made really was moving Bran out of Craster's so Jon didn't see him!

Seems like a waste of a very good actor in Noah Taylor.

Enjoyable episode overall though, Jon starting to loo like a proper leader this season too. Hopefully we'll still get Coldhands at some stage though not looking likely.

zl1whqvjs75cdy

Do we think coldhands is cut completely now? Wouldn't like that.

Gadgie

Daith wrote: »

I think it's the difference between the book and show. With the book you can stop reading and take in what has been said. With the show it just goes on.

Also do many people think it was the death of Jon Arryn that was pivotal? Catalyst certainly though. It seemed more about the crippling of Bran and the discovery of the Jamie/Cersei relationship from chatting to my non book reader friends.

I agree to a point, however for me it was more the fact that it was such a big revelation, with very little build up. It was something I was looking forward to being revealed in the show, but it didn't come across as dramatic or shocking (to me), being revealed so early on.

It's the first time we've seen Lysa and Robin since season 1, so we have Robin remind viewers (through expository dialogue to Sansa) that his father was poisoned - allegedly by the Lannisters. Then, once he and Sansa leave, Lysa hints that she's "done things" at Petyr's request - then a few seconds later, spells everything out in detail to him - unnecessary, since he masterminded the whole thing. So, more exposition.

It's been a while since I read the book, so correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the reveal happen just before Baelish pushes Lysa out of the Moon Door? It makes more sense that she blurts the whole thing out then, as she's in such a manic state after witnessing Baelish kiss Sansa, and very nearly pushing Sansa out the moon door herself. Assuming the series follows the book, are we going to have her repeat it again just before her death, this time for the benefit of Sansa (and viewers who may have missed it the first time around)?

I think it could have waited until the finale, or a few more episodes at least, until it was re-established how significant Jon Arryn's death was in the events that led to the War of the Five Kings, and that Littlefinger therefore actually set the whole thing in motion (including blaming Tyrion for the attempt on Bran's life), rather than simply taking advantage of the resulting chaos.

Nerdlingr

donkeyoaty0099 wrote: »

Do we think coldhands is cut completely now? Wouldn't like that.

I still think he might appear and save Bran when he gets attacked from the wights/white walkers. It'd be such a pity if the show lost out on a such a cool character as CH. Visually more than anything else. I mean who doesnt want to see a hooded dead guy riding around on an elk in the snow.

Sleepy

calex71 wrote: »

hate to say it but the imminent return of the "jack bauer power hour" aka 24 will be 1st on my list over GoT this week :pac:

For this crime you should be stripped of your modship honours and made to take the black!

Looking at the readers thread, they got the significance of the Lysa reveal alright and my other half got clearly got it too , as soon as Lysa said the line she was coming out with: "the sneaky ****er..."

The niece instead of natural born daughter irritated me too and the use of the word virgin instead of maid took me completely out of the story. Terrible writing.

TimeToShine

Thought the LF reveal was slightly more realistic and adapted to TV when compared to the book equivalent. It would have been very cliched if Lysa announced the grand plan right before she was killed. It was about as subtle as they could get away with on a TV screen (in other words not very much so) but they got the message across. I just couldn't imagine how they'd pull it off right before she exited the Moon Door, especially considering that the singer Marillion has to be there as a witness to take the blame and he needs to be kept alive.

ArmaniJeanss

No real problem with the reveal, and its plausible (likely even) that Lysa and LF would have continually discussed it between them.

Neither of them were POV characters in the books, so it only got revealed to us when a POV character Sansa was told. And obviously the TV Series isn't using the POV structure.

I actually like that such a crucial plot point has time to sink in and be discussed in a mid season episode rather than be a minor part of the expected mayhem of Episode 9 or 10.

PhlegmyMoses

Mickeroo wrote: »

I was enjoying the Locke character but jesus was he pointless in the end. Literally could have had him die in Harrenhall and nothing would have turned out different.The only meaningful contribution he made really was moving Bran out of Craster's so Jon didn't see him!

Seems like a waste of a very good actor in Noah Taylor.

Enjoyable episode overall though, Jon starting to loo like a proper leader this season too. Hopefully we'll still get Coldhands at some stage though not looking likely.

The only problem I had with Jon in that episode was that he was pretty much bested in combat by some lowborn bloke. Was a bit odd, imo.

Mickeroo

PhlegmyMoses wrote: »

The only problem I had with Jon in that episode was that he was pretty much bested in combat by some lowborn bloke. Was a bit odd, imo.

Yeah, it was nice having the girl stab him after the horrors of last week but tbh I'd have much rathered if Jon just put him in his place and made short work of him.

Jelle1880

To be fair, Oberyn warned us about that

"Longsword is a bad option in close quarters."

Nerdlingr

PhlegmyMoses wrote: »

The only problem I had with Jon in that episode was that he was pretty much bested in combat by some lowborn bloke. Was a bit odd, imo.

But the lowborn bloke is from flea bottom and we'd been told he was handy with a blade. As he said fighting Jon, Jon learned his stuff behind closed walls in a castle from some Maester. Bad evil bloke learned his on the dirty streets, no substitute for experience.

PhlegmyMoses

Nerdlingr wrote: »

But the lowborn bloke is from flea bottom and we'd been told he was handy with a blade. As he said fighting Jon, Jon learned his stuff behind closed walls in a castle from some Maester. Bad evil bloke learned his on the dirty streets, no substitute for experience.

Yeah, maybe. Jon learnt his trade from Rodrik Cassel, not a maester.

And Jon is not inexperienced at this stage. I could understand in the books when Rattleshirt gives him a good go, as he is fairly revered within the wildling community, and they pretty much follow strength.

But some lowborn bloke who we haven't really heard about until the last 2 episodes a few cursory lines about being tough in Flea Bottom? Nah

TimeToShine

PhlegmyMoses wrote: »

Yeah, maybe. Jon learnt his trade from Rodrik Cassel, not a maester.

And Jon is not inexperienced at this stage. I could understand in the books when Rattleshirt gives him a good go, as he is fairly revered within the wildling community, and they pretty much follow strength.

But some lowborn bloke who we haven't really heard about until the last 2 episodes a few cursory lines about being tough in Flea Bottom? Nah

Rattleshirt was actually Mance by the way, which is why Jon got destroyed. Also in the show they like to hype up the battles a little bit, makes it more interesting. Same thing happened with Jaime vs Ned in S1. Jaime would hack him to pieces within seconds going by the books but the added drama makes for a good watch.

Sleepy

I never got the impression that Ned was so incompetent a swordsman that he'd be hacked to pieces in seconds but the show did depict him as being bested by Jaime (hence Jaime's annoyance at the guy who hamstrung Ned: he didn't need the extra advantage, he was already wearing Ned down).

jones

Sleepy wrote: »

I never got the impression that Ned was so incompetent a swordsman that he'd be hacked to pieces in seconds but the show did depict him as being bested by Jaime (hence Jaime's annoyance at the guy who hamstrung Ned: he didn't need the extra advantage, he was already wearing Ned down).

Me neither infact i read it as Jamie seeing this as a good test of his skill to fight Ned (i'll have to reread to be sure)

As for the Jon versus fleabottom thug i had no problem with it, as mentioned earlier they like to big up these fights and we havent really seen jon do a lot with his swords against a hardened foe...all part of the journey ;-)

TimeToShine

Ned was only ever an average swordsman, there is nothing in the books to indicate he was good. Pretty sure there's a quote from GRRM confirming that he was a capable fighter but nothing special. He was more of a tactician. Jaime was one of if not the best fighter in the Seven Kingdoms at that stage, it was never a contest really but for the sake of TV it had to be done.

Tom.D.BJJ

TimeToShine wrote: »

Ned was only ever an average swordsman, there is nothing in the books to indicate he was good. Pretty sure there's a quote from GRRM confirming that he was a capable fighter but nothing special. He was more of a tactician. Jaime was one of if not the best fighter in the Seven Kingdoms at that stage, it was never a contest really but for the sake of TV it had to be done.

He must have been pretty handy, or he would have been killed at the TOJ

TimeToShine

Tom.D.BJJ wrote: »

He must have been pretty handy, or he would have been killed at the TOJ

7 versus 3 with Howland Reed...there's a lot of theories going around about that so I suppose we'll have to wait and see!

Sleepy

Yeah, GRRM has said that Brandon was the great swordsman of his generation of the Starks and that Jaime was "better than Aragorn" but even still, this isn't Kenjutsu, it's slash and parry sword-fighting. Against lightly armoured men-at-arms or peasent foot-soldiers, either of them would cut their opponent down in moments but against similarly armoured, properly trained opponents I don't see a victory happening in seconds... it's a style of fighting based more on strength and endurance than really fancy moves...

jones

I always got the impression ned was pretty capable as a swordsman maybe that was just how i was reading it (Willing him to be good) I think the way it was written though that Jamie was definitely the more skilled but it wasnt exactly men against boys :-)

krudler

jones wrote: »

I always got the impression ned was pretty capable as a swordsman maybe that was just how i was reading it (Willing him to be good) I think the way it was written though that Jamie was definitely the more skilled but it wasnt exactly men against boys :-)

Yeah, I don't remember the way it's put in the book exactly but in the show it was put across that Ned wasn't exactly useless with a sword and he does probably give Jaime the only decent scrap he's had in years. Jaime at that point is probably used to demolishing anyone in front of him aside from the few he says who could best him, Barristan Selmy being the main one. ( I really wish we got to see him destroying the Kingsguard soldiers when Cersei and Joffrey relieve him of his post, even as an older guy he's a complete badass)

Witcher

Ned never fights Jaime in the books, only the show.

Bronze Yohn beat the crap out of him when he visited Winterfell.