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So I'm settling in for the night to watch one of my favourite TV shows of recent years on DVD....filmed in Ireland full of knights and jousts, a hot headed king who likes hunting and whoring who is married to a woman he doesn't love, a pie with live birds, a noble adviser who loses his head, a world where women are sadly the property of their fathers, fights over crowns and over faith, and Natalie Dormer as a young woman from a prominent family who doesn't want to be a queen, but wants to be the queen... granted there is a more female nudity than is strictly necessary.
Can you guess what I'm watching? That's right, The Tudors...such a wonderful piece of entertaining historical inaccuracy...as beautiful as it is incorrect and at times anachronistic. If you never saw it, can get past the nudity, and don't mind your history a little broken, I recommend it. She may not be historically accurate but Dormer's version of Anne Boleyn being told by her father that "I didn't raise you to have opinions" only to reply that the reason she was queen was not entirely due to her father or her brother or "any man you could name" but she too played a role in gaining her position is amazing.
That said, many of you probably went in a different direction with that description and thought of a newer show that is less based on history but lives in a fantasy world that is stuck in a time just before the time of The Tudors and which features Natalie Dormer in a very similar role- one could say playing Anne Boleyn was prep for playing Margery Tyrell. That is right, Game of Thrones.
Many of you have asked me over recent months about events in the latest season but I was waiting until the show was legally available to those who didn't have pay TV- I'm not entering into a piracy discussion...season 4 is on iTunes now, and it was been on google play each week at the same time as it was on pay TV I recommend any of these options if you wish to catch up.. it is due on DVD in February and can already be pre-ordered (I am looking forward to the arrival of my blu ray copy).
To start with a warning to those in Australia and the rest of the world who haven't seen it yet...spoilers are coming... many spoilers... so look away now... just so you don't end up having a spoiling fit like Sansa in season 1. There will also be reveals of the events from the books, though these will not go past the section of the books that the series has caught up with (they will only cover up until before the epilogue in Storm of Swords...the section in the epilogue hasn't appeared on screen and I'm hoping it will so unlike other book fans who have whinged that it didn't appear this season, I won't spoil and hope it becomes the prologue of season 5), so if you like to pretend the books don't exist, also see Sansa.
Hopefully you are gone now... just in case one more warning...
Hopefully everyone who would be angered is gone. So my opinions on the good, the bad, and the ugly of Game of Thrones season 4.
I will go backwards and start with the ugly and boy did it get ugly.
Once upon a time, I wrote a blog post that said once you got past the show's need to show more female nudity than was strictly necessary, it had a good politics of difference going especially as its female characters were diverse and complex (you can read it here). This season undid a LOT of what I liked about the presentation of women and did nothing to help some of its male characters. You have probably guessed that I am talking about the heightened sexual violence, particularly in episodes 3 and 4. Game of Thrones has never shied away from slight alterations to the plot of the book which has increased the sexual violence of the show (if not mentioned, the scene appears in the book too). In season 1, the consensual sex scene between Khal Drogo and Daenerys was changed to a rape scene...the scene in the book may be between a 14 year old girl and a man possibly twice her age, and she may be unhappy in her marriage but it was common practice in Middle Ages for marriages of this type to take place and the world of Song of Ice and Fire is akin to the world of Medieval England. In season 2, in my least favourite scene in all of Game of Thrones thus far (equal to the Red Wedding), Joffrey watched as Ros brutally beat another prostitute for his enjoyment...Ros does not exist in the books beyond one mention in the first book nor this scene definitely doesn't exist, Joffrey's sadism in the books take a different flavour as he turns it all in Sansa's direction having the King's Guard (except the Hound who refuses) beat her and though this is horrid and is glanced in one scene of the show, it has nowhere near the disgusting level of brutality of the prostitute scene and it is not sexual in nature (well Joffrey may see it as sexual but from Sansa's point of view sexual in nature, it is just violent). In season 3, Ros is brutally murdered in sexualised manner and then there is the big change to the Red Wedding which sees a pregnant woman being stabbed in the womb...aside from having a difference name, Robb's wife in the book is never pregnant (at least, it is hinted very strongly she isn't when she is last mentioned...whoops sorry after book 3 spoiler but I assume that isn't a huge revelation) and she does not die at or even attend the Red Wedding in a failed attempt to lessen Walder Frey's anger at Robb (this action and not the rest of the Red Wedding which I was expecting is why it equals the season 2 prostitute scene for horror in my mind). I was horrified by all of this but as it is in the books (and as Medieval England was too), Westeros was not a great place to be a woman and so I dealt with it to a degree. Then came episodes 3, 4 and to a lesser extent 5 of season 4...
I could accept that the show runners of Game of Thrones were uncomfortable with the idea of consensual sex between a man and his teen bride (even after the aging up of Dany) and also that they wanted another way to convey Joffrey's horribleness in a few concise snippets of brutal sexual violence instead of having him repeatedly have a 13 year old girl (granted 15 or 16 in the show) beaten. However there was NO reason for the show to make the scene between Jaime and Cersei in the sept a rape scene! It is an inherently disturbing scene as it stands in the books as it is still a sex sense between twins in what is effectively a chapel near the dead body of their bastard son. This is the scene that finally breaks their relationship in the books...I know show watchers will be confused as Jaime and Cersei had sex in the scene finale, but in the books, after the sept the next scene in which twincest looks imminent ends with Jaime turning Cersei down (I waited for Jaime to do the same in the finale and was highly disappointed when it didn't happen). There were three reasons to be horrified by the sept scene. The first being that it was unnecessary generally. I'm not sure why the change and the reasons given by the film makers (including the ridiculously attempt to say was consensual when it blatantly wasn't) did not explain or justify it in the slightest...I understand that it is a twisted, unconventional and generally wrong relationship (they are twins, it is pretty obvious that it is wrong in a big way from the get go) but that doesn't make what is clearly rape "just" violent sex, and I don't understand why the show runners thought having Jaime return to King's Landing and be rejected on a few occasions by Cersei before the Purple Wedding was necessary (I think leaving it like the books and having him return after Joffrey's death would have been better). The second being it was a blatant attempt to make Cersei more sympathetic by victimising her. This says there can be no such thing as a female villain unless men can overcome her easily and that rape is simply an acceptable plot tool for achieving this. Making light of rape in this manner is abhorrent and should never be acceptable! The rage of the internet after this episode hit this point many times and I could not agree more. Also I feel it needs to be said that women can be villains just a men can and there should be nothing uncomfortable for people in this...personally I love to hate Cersei in the books as she is an amazing villain. Third and lastly, it means the show must redeem (i.e. ask its audience to forgive) a rapist (for the second time, since they already did this with Khal Drogo). By the end of the third book, thanks to his time with Brienne, Jaime has become an increasingly more appealing character and he is well on his way to becoming the fan favourite among book readers that he now is. I could never get past him pushing Bran out of a window so he never became a favourite of mine but he did grow on me. It seems at just the turning point of his character, the show has stepped him back in the eyes of the viewers and made it so many readers of the books will be uncomfortable with what they have done with a favourite character and that it may take a while for viewers (especially women) to get anyway near liking him again (it took over a season for me to come to terms with Spike (one of my favourite characters) attempting to rape Buffy on Buffy...so I'm not sure when or if I will be okay with Jaime again). Also it means that the writers make light of a rape as they show Cersei approaching Jaime not as a rapist but as a desired lover in the finale- again I feel the need to refer to Buffy wherein Joss Whedon made it clear that Spike's attempted rape of Buffy was a horrid act and allowed the viewers to determine in the last episode of the show (not a mere 7 episodes BUT around 24 episodes later- sure I know different season length but the point remains!) to determine for themselves if they thought his redemptive journey was complete and whether Buffy would allow him to have sex with her on the night before the apocalyptic battle they are to engage in by fading to black as they faced each other across a room (I love that he gave the viewers their own space to determine this especially as I believed that they definitely wouldn't have had sex...and in his brilliance, Whedon voices in the commentary of this episode, that whilst he allows viewers to make up their own minds, he doesn't think the characters would have resumed the sexual side of their relationship because he didn't believe that the attempted rape was distant enough or that the act had been fully forgiven by either Buffy or Spike himself at this point).
That was episode 3 and then it was followed immediately by the massive divergences from the book in episode 4 and 5 which saw Jon and other men of the Night's Watch heading north to fight the mutineers who killed Jeor Moermont. Surprisingly the internet didn't rage as much about these as the sept scene is key to the book plot so book readers were more easily enraged by changes to it. It was big warning when Burn Gorman showed up on the scene that creepiness was coming...he is an actor that makes my blood curdle when he appears on screen, not because he is bad but because he is so good at playing slimey, creepy or just plain evil, and I felt that way long before he played Owen on Torchwood (one of my least favourite TV characters- almost up there with Joffrey albeit for less sinister reasons). Next thing you know the character he played (one who doesn't appear in the books) is sitting in Craster's Keep drinking wine for Jeor Moermont's skull and threatening the teenaged Meera Reed with rape whilst his fellow mutineers perform an orgy of gang rapes around him. I liked that scenes in these episodes allowed Jon to have a moment to show emerging leadership qualities and gave Ghost a moment to shine BUT they also added multiple rapes that do not occur in the books, and threatened with rape Meera- a teenage girl! The second half of the third book at the Wall, after the siege in which Ygritte dies and Mance Rayder is captured which occurs significantly earlier in the books, is about politics and I'm sure the show is getting to them so I won't go discuss them but I will say by delaying the battle and filling the gap with another set piece that included rape, once again said that GoT was a show that was fine with sexual violence as a throw away plot device. And again I was horrified!
People I know have declared that after the above they will no longer be watching GoT and I can see why. I won't be joining them in this boycott as I love the books and I still believe that there is something of quality in the show broadly BUT the writers of the show need to learn that rape should NEVER be a plot device used to "spice up" bits that you find less interesting or stick in where you think the translation from book to TV show leaves gaps! You may be portraying a world where the position of women is horrid but you are portraying it to 21st century people, many of them young men and you need to allow your tone and your choices to reflect this and not to ever give them the opinion that sexual violence is acceptable. I hope that they listen to the rage of the internet on this topic and take it to heart as they think of how they will adapt books 4 and 5 (likely to come as a bit of a combo over multiple seasons in my reckoning). I will applaud the continued amazingness of the Tyrell women, Arya Stark and Daenerys, the introduction of the awesome Ellaria Sand, the changes to Dany's seduction of Daario Naharis (a brief attempt by a show that is so about the male gaze, to show the female gaze in action) and to Sansa's role in the Eyrie after the death of her aunt, and the lines like "Everywhere in the world, they hurt little girls" from Cersei and "I will do what queens do, I will rule" from Dany....this all was good but it does nowhere close to allowing me to forgive them for the manner in which sexual violence was employed by the show this season.
And to add just remember sexual violence can of course be enacted against men too and the vast bulk of the Theon events in this season don't exist in the books...though the removal of body parts does (or at least is very strongly hinted at when Theon, after disappearing for about two books, reappears as Reek in book 5). The bath tub scene where he is forced to sponge Ramsay Snow, though not physical sexual violence was most definitely psychological sexual torture, and was again not called for. Again there is NO excuse for this GoT!
Before the bad, the good...
I briefly hinted at a few of them above. As in season 3, I delighted in every scene featuring Olenna Tyrell or Tywin Lannister and particularly when they appeared together- I would love a show that where just Charles Dance and Diana Rigg compete in a verbal sparring match every week and nothing else happened, anyone else? I never warmed to Tywin in the book but losing Charles Dance almost bought me to tears (Also where is his Emmy nomination! Quite the oversight!). I hope we get more Diana Rigg in season 5- I'm not sure a conversation between Lady Olenna and Cersei will be as interesting as her and Tywin but it might be, and I really want more of her instructing Margery on how to get her way with men.
I cheered at the Purple Wedding as I had been waiting to for over a year for it to happen and the Sigur Ros guest spot just added to it.
The other highlights were the interactions between Brienne and Pod, the interactions between Ayra and the Hound, Hodor being Hodor (going to miss him next season but the Bran storyline does get dull so I understand the change), the heartbreaking dismissal of Jorah by Dany (I did cry a lot in this scene as Iain Glen's performance just shattered me- though I knew it was coming and they did delay it ALOT as it breaks up two of my favourites and my wish-it-would-happen-but-never-will couple...that said it sets up interesting paths for these characters if the books are followed but no spoilers I promised), the way Ygritte's death played out (slightly changed from the book but again with the heart break and tears and great performances by Kat Harrington and Rose Leslie), and Littlefinger and Sansa just owning it in the scenes at the Eyrie.
I will also put it out there and say, as much as I despised the sexual violence of episodes 4 and 5 with their book changes, I was intrigued by the change with regards babies and white walkers. I'd like to see that explored more but considering where characters will be based (according to the book) in the next season we aren't likely to see that again for a while- that said more changes from the books have been hinted at.
Oh and biggest highlight of the season....here be the Martells!!! My favourite family from the book FINALLY made it to the screen. I've waiting for this for over half a season. The show's portrayal of Oberyn was perfect, as was their Elliria Sand- just oozing charm and intrigue. The Martells getting to be the family that is on the side of female empowerment- of course girls can rule in their own right in Dorne if they are the eldest- was brilliantly unchanged. Oberyn's cockiness and wit was played perfectly by Pedro Pascal and he completely got me past the fact that I imagined the Martells as Middle Eastern not from the Iberian peninsular (OK the Martell actors aren't- being Chilean, and next season even Kiwi- but that is the look the show is trying to go with). Sad to have such a powerhouse of charisma only around for one season but it is probably a really good move that the showrunners kept to the books on this one, even if that meant eye gouging, as Pedro Pascal was a massive scene stealer. Bring on next season, time in Dorne and the Sand Snakes(though I still don't see a casting for my favourite Martell, Arianne is yet to be cast and it seems much to my sorrow, she has been cut from the show...I guess too many kick arse women from one family is too much for the GoT showrunners)!!!!! FYI, none of that is a spoiler in my books as it has already been announced.
And just to end the good, one of my favourite Oberyn quotes... which summarises why Dorne is better than the rest of Westeros and why it is so good that the show will head there next season!
And now the bad...
The bad does not stack up against either the good or the ugly (aka the horrendous) but it is a big deal in my opinion. The bad comes down to the changing of two sections of the final episode from the book (aside from the twinsect scene already mentioned which was also bad). I don't mind too much when the show messes with the books except as detailed before in the case of the addition of unnecessary sexual violence. I didn't mind in the slightest that they killed off Jojen Reed especially as George R R Martin struggles with how to use him in the books, or that the Hound fought Brienne and Brienne met Ayra, or that the Hound and Ayra got so close to the Eyrie, or the changes to Sansa at the Eyrie, or the white walker baby, or the changes to Dany and Daario's relationship...the list could be longer. The changes I mind (aside from the ugly ones) are the changes that will impact character motivation and there are two interactions in Tyrion's escape from prison that are key to the motivation of both himself and Jaime in the subsequent books.
Interaction one: the interaction between Tyrion and Jaime. In the book, Tyrion tells Jaime of all the men in King's Landing that Cersei has cheated on him with (a larger number in the book than the series). The line where he lists them haunts Jaime for the next two books, and is part of the death of the twincest- the combination of Tyrion's revelation and Jaime's guilt about the sept scene (because of where they were and that Cersei had her period at the time and was therefore a little hesitant...not because it was rape, it was not) result in Jaime's rejection of Cersei by the end of book 3.
Interaction two: the interaction between Tyrion and Tywin. In the book, this interaction ends with Tyrion demanding to know what Tywin did with his wife, who he now knows (thanks to Jaime) definitely wasn't a whore. Tywin replies with what I have chosen to title this post and what is one of my favourite GoT lines because of horrible yet subtle way it conveys everything that is wrong with Westerosi attitudes to women without having to use sexual violence (listen up GoT showunners, George R R Martin pitched it wrong, you got it profoundly wrong!)- "Wherever whores go". This line is what motivates Tyrion ultimately to kill his father and also is what drives where he chooses go in the next season after his escape. Charles Dance has hinted he will reappear in season 5 and I hope it is just for his ghost to utter this line as he would have delivered it perfectly.
These two changes mean that I have no clue how they will motivate Jaime and Tyrion in the next season if their actions follow those in the book...
Anyhow enough on GoT especially as it finished months ago...I just felt it was time to finish this as it has been sitting as a draft for an age.
That was episode 3 and then it was followed immediately by the massive divergences from the book in episode 4 and 5 which saw Jon and other men of the Night's Watch heading north to fight the mutineers who killed Jeor Moermont. Surprisingly the internet didn't rage as much about these as the sept scene is key to the book plot so book readers were more easily enraged by changes to it. It was big warning when Burn Gorman showed up on the scene that creepiness was coming...he is an actor that makes my blood curdle when he appears on screen, not because he is bad but because he is so good at playing slimey, creepy or just plain evil, and I felt that way long before he played Owen on Torchwood (one of my least favourite TV characters- almost up there with Joffrey albeit for less sinister reasons). Next thing you know the character he played (one who doesn't appear in the books) is sitting in Craster's Keep drinking wine for Jeor Moermont's skull and threatening the teenaged Meera Reed with rape whilst his fellow mutineers perform an orgy of gang rapes around him. I liked that scenes in these episodes allowed Jon to have a moment to show emerging leadership qualities and gave Ghost a moment to shine BUT they also added multiple rapes that do not occur in the books, and threatened with rape Meera- a teenage girl! The second half of the third book at the Wall, after the siege in which Ygritte dies and Mance Rayder is captured which occurs significantly earlier in the books, is about politics and I'm sure the show is getting to them so I won't go discuss them but I will say by delaying the battle and filling the gap with another set piece that included rape, once again said that GoT was a show that was fine with sexual violence as a throw away plot device. And again I was horrified!
People I know have declared that after the above they will no longer be watching GoT and I can see why. I won't be joining them in this boycott as I love the books and I still believe that there is something of quality in the show broadly BUT the writers of the show need to learn that rape should NEVER be a plot device used to "spice up" bits that you find less interesting or stick in where you think the translation from book to TV show leaves gaps! You may be portraying a world where the position of women is horrid but you are portraying it to 21st century people, many of them young men and you need to allow your tone and your choices to reflect this and not to ever give them the opinion that sexual violence is acceptable. I hope that they listen to the rage of the internet on this topic and take it to heart as they think of how they will adapt books 4 and 5 (likely to come as a bit of a combo over multiple seasons in my reckoning). I will applaud the continued amazingness of the Tyrell women, Arya Stark and Daenerys, the introduction of the awesome Ellaria Sand, the changes to Dany's seduction of Daario Naharis (a brief attempt by a show that is so about the male gaze, to show the female gaze in action) and to Sansa's role in the Eyrie after the death of her aunt, and the lines like "Everywhere in the world, they hurt little girls" from Cersei and "I will do what queens do, I will rule" from Dany....this all was good but it does nowhere close to allowing me to forgive them for the manner in which sexual violence was employed by the show this season.
And to add just remember sexual violence can of course be enacted against men too and the vast bulk of the Theon events in this season don't exist in the books...though the removal of body parts does (or at least is very strongly hinted at when Theon, after disappearing for about two books, reappears as Reek in book 5). The bath tub scene where he is forced to sponge Ramsay Snow, though not physical sexual violence was most definitely psychological sexual torture, and was again not called for. Again there is NO excuse for this GoT!
Before the bad, the good...
I briefly hinted at a few of them above. As in season 3, I delighted in every scene featuring Olenna Tyrell or Tywin Lannister and particularly when they appeared together- I would love a show that where just Charles Dance and Diana Rigg compete in a verbal sparring match every week and nothing else happened, anyone else? I never warmed to Tywin in the book but losing Charles Dance almost bought me to tears (Also where is his Emmy nomination! Quite the oversight!). I hope we get more Diana Rigg in season 5- I'm not sure a conversation between Lady Olenna and Cersei will be as interesting as her and Tywin but it might be, and I really want more of her instructing Margery on how to get her way with men.
I cheered at the Purple Wedding as I had been waiting to for over a year for it to happen and the Sigur Ros guest spot just added to it.
The other highlights were the interactions between Brienne and Pod, the interactions between Ayra and the Hound, Hodor being Hodor (going to miss him next season but the Bran storyline does get dull so I understand the change), the heartbreaking dismissal of Jorah by Dany (I did cry a lot in this scene as Iain Glen's performance just shattered me- though I knew it was coming and they did delay it ALOT as it breaks up two of my favourites and my wish-it-would-happen-but-never-will couple...that said it sets up interesting paths for these characters if the books are followed but no spoilers I promised), the way Ygritte's death played out (slightly changed from the book but again with the heart break and tears and great performances by Kat Harrington and Rose Leslie), and Littlefinger and Sansa just owning it in the scenes at the Eyrie.
I will also put it out there and say, as much as I despised the sexual violence of episodes 4 and 5 with their book changes, I was intrigued by the change with regards babies and white walkers. I'd like to see that explored more but considering where characters will be based (according to the book) in the next season we aren't likely to see that again for a while- that said more changes from the books have been hinted at.
Oh and biggest highlight of the season....here be the Martells!!! My favourite family from the book FINALLY made it to the screen. I've waiting for this for over half a season. The show's portrayal of Oberyn was perfect, as was their Elliria Sand- just oozing charm and intrigue. The Martells getting to be the family that is on the side of female empowerment- of course girls can rule in their own right in Dorne if they are the eldest- was brilliantly unchanged. Oberyn's cockiness and wit was played perfectly by Pedro Pascal and he completely got me past the fact that I imagined the Martells as Middle Eastern not from the Iberian peninsular (OK the Martell actors aren't- being Chilean, and next season even Kiwi- but that is the look the show is trying to go with). Sad to have such a powerhouse of charisma only around for one season but it is probably a really good move that the showrunners kept to the books on this one, even if that meant eye gouging, as Pedro Pascal was a massive scene stealer. Bring on next season, time in Dorne and the Sand Snakes(though I still don't see a casting for my favourite Martell, Arianne is yet to be cast and it seems much to my sorrow, she has been cut from the show...I guess too many kick arse women from one family is too much for the GoT showrunners)!!!!! FYI, none of that is a spoiler in my books as it has already been announced.
And just to end the good, one of my favourite Oberyn quotes... which summarises why Dorne is better than the rest of Westeros and why it is so good that the show will head there next season!
And now the bad...
The bad does not stack up against either the good or the ugly (aka the horrendous) but it is a big deal in my opinion. The bad comes down to the changing of two sections of the final episode from the book (aside from the twinsect scene already mentioned which was also bad). I don't mind too much when the show messes with the books except as detailed before in the case of the addition of unnecessary sexual violence. I didn't mind in the slightest that they killed off Jojen Reed especially as George R R Martin struggles with how to use him in the books, or that the Hound fought Brienne and Brienne met Ayra, or that the Hound and Ayra got so close to the Eyrie, or the changes to Sansa at the Eyrie, or the white walker baby, or the changes to Dany and Daario's relationship...the list could be longer. The changes I mind (aside from the ugly ones) are the changes that will impact character motivation and there are two interactions in Tyrion's escape from prison that are key to the motivation of both himself and Jaime in the subsequent books.
Interaction one: the interaction between Tyrion and Jaime. In the book, Tyrion tells Jaime of all the men in King's Landing that Cersei has cheated on him with (a larger number in the book than the series). The line where he lists them haunts Jaime for the next two books, and is part of the death of the twincest- the combination of Tyrion's revelation and Jaime's guilt about the sept scene (because of where they were and that Cersei had her period at the time and was therefore a little hesitant...not because it was rape, it was not) result in Jaime's rejection of Cersei by the end of book 3.
Interaction two: the interaction between Tyrion and Tywin. In the book, this interaction ends with Tyrion demanding to know what Tywin did with his wife, who he now knows (thanks to Jaime) definitely wasn't a whore. Tywin replies with what I have chosen to title this post and what is one of my favourite GoT lines because of horrible yet subtle way it conveys everything that is wrong with Westerosi attitudes to women without having to use sexual violence (listen up GoT showunners, George R R Martin pitched it wrong, you got it profoundly wrong!)- "Wherever whores go". This line is what motivates Tyrion ultimately to kill his father and also is what drives where he chooses go in the next season after his escape. Charles Dance has hinted he will reappear in season 5 and I hope it is just for his ghost to utter this line as he would have delivered it perfectly.
These two changes mean that I have no clue how they will motivate Jaime and Tyrion in the next season if their actions follow those in the book...
Anyhow enough on GoT especially as it finished months ago...I just felt it was time to finish this as it has been sitting as a draft for an age.
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