Game of Thrones begins....

[Viking]

As a side note, for the record, there is no plot by the Lord of Highgarden, but by the mother of the Lord - as far as we know from the books, Mace Tyrell is a big oaf.

Olenna certainly plots on a higher level than Mace but there is no doubt he wants one of his kids on the throne and is plotting to do it.

I'd rate the Queen of Thorns as the nr2 plotter in the game ahead of Tywin and behind Littlefinger.

[viper37]

well except the "White Walkers" they are sorta important.

I thought they would be, but someone here said we would never see them again.

Yes we do, and the wildlings do march south.

Now, that's more like it   Someone was playing me for a fool 
Can't be bothered to look back who it was though.

These things, do we know what they are exactly?  The people they killed, how did they bring them back to life, zombie-style?

Well the wildlings did march south so we know a lot about them, about the White Walkers we've seen little of them, so don't know much beyond that they're scary and evil.

I confused both then.  I mean the undead skeletons, not the humans living beyond the wall.

[jimmy olsen]

well except the "White Walkers" they are sorta important.

I thought they would be, but someone here said we would never see them again.

Yes we do, and the wildlings do march south.

Now, that's more like it   Someone was playing me for a fool 
Can't be bothered to look back who it was though.

These things, do we know what they are exactly?  The people they killed, how did they bring them back to life, zombie-style?

Well the wildlings did march south so we know a lot about them, about the White Walkers we've seen little of them, so don't know much beyond that they're scary and evil.

I confused both then.  I mean the undead skeletons, not the humans living beyond the wall.

Probably going to invade in the next book.

[grumbler]

One of the posters seemed to think that the attempt to murder Bran was not to cover up for his witnessing the incest, but rather an unrelated plot to convince the Starks that the Lannisters were evil (which seems to be the effect) by murdering Bran after he fell to get the Starks to blame the Lannisters. In this case the person behind this plot would obviously not have known that Jamie actually threw Bran out of the tower. It actually made sense.

I thought we knew that Joffrey ordered that murder, and had no idea that Jaime had been the one to cause the fall.

[Valmy]

I confused both then.  I mean the undead skeletons, not the humans living beyond the wall.

Well yeah...eventually.

[Martinus]

Nope. I think you are reading more into that scene than there is. They are showing us more than they did in the books that early, but that does not mean they are showing us everything.

They are showing us something that didnt happen in the books at all.  There was no gay sex  in the books.  There was a lot of other sex but no gay sex.  That was just put into the series to attract gay viewers.  All you are left with is, well if we imagine something that didnt happen in the books that might have been in some way consistent this might be one of those possible things.

Which is really my point isnt it.  They have added material for no particular reason (or rather reasons other than being try to the books) at the cost of not including great material that was in the books.  Rather than seeing shaving scene I would rather have seen the flaming sword in action during the tournament - as just one example of the really interesting stuff missed because of this alt version of the books.

What do you mean "did not happen in the books"? They are showing us scenes that were not showed in the books, but they likely happened (same goes for the Cersei and Robert scenes, or the Varys and Littlefingers exchanges).

To me, these scenes are actually one of the best part about the show so far, since they add interesting PoVs and develop characters. You are suggesting a slavish recreation of the books, as if they were a script (and the show is already surprisingly faithful to the books, considering a completely different medium) - if they did it, it would be very boring for me, as someone who read the books.

[Martinus]

well except the "White Walkers" they are sorta important.

I thought they would be, but someone here said we would never see them again.

Yes we do, and the wildlings do march south.

Now, that's more like it   Someone was playing me for a fool 
Can't be bothered to look back who it was though.

These things, do we know what they are exactly?  The people they killed, how did they bring them back to life, zombie-style?

Well the wildlings did march south so we know a lot about them, about the White Walkers we've seen little of them, so don't know much beyond that they're scary and evil.

I confused both then.  I mean the undead skeletons, not the humans living beyond the wall.

Just to clarify (in case you have them confused, as it is common), the Others are not zombies - they are the "icy Predators". They raise zombies from human corpses.

[Martinus]

One of the posters seemed to think that the attempt to murder Bran was not to cover up for his witnessing the incest, but rather an unrelated plot to convince the Starks that the Lannisters were evil (which seems to be the effect) by murdering Bran after he fell to get the Starks to blame the Lannisters. In this case the person behind this plot would obviously not have known that Jamie actually threw Bran out of the tower. It actually made sense.

I thought we knew that Joffrey ordered that murder, and had no idea that Jaime had been the one to cause the fall.

Yeah, I thought it was canon already.

[Berkut]

I think those scenes are fine, but not at all for the reasons that Marty does.

The books get hundreds of pages to subtly develop plots and relationships. Martin is good at it too - by the time Robert goes off on his hunt, you know all about his relationship with Cersei, why they hate each other, what happened to bring them to where they are - and the author has the luxury of revealing that carefully and slowly.

You don't get that in a TV show. There simply is not time. So you ahve to be a little more blunt about telling the viewer what is going on and why. SO Cersei and Robert just having a discussion about it certainly is not very subtle, but hey - it is important for the viewer to understand.

I think those scenes are important not because they keep things interesting for those who have already read the books, but because it provides nuance to the characters that those who read the books take for granted, but those who have NOT read the books are likely to miss completely.

The problem here is that most of us HAVE read the books. So we go into the show already knowing why Cersei and Robert have a such a screwed up marriage, so those extra scenes makes us think "Hey, that wasn't in the book! Why are they adding stuff that isn't even necessary?". It seems superfulous. But it isn't - if you have not read the books, it is not at all obvious that Renly and Loras are lovers, and very close. After the scene in the show, that is clear.

[Martinus]

Yeah I totally agree. I may have not been saying this directly, but that's what I meant when I said about this being a different medium.

[Tamas]

Yeah, Berkut is right.

The Cersei-Robert scene did nothing except compassing a lot of subtle hints in the book into a TV-compatible format. Same goes for the gay scene. Really, I much rather have that, than having to waste time episode after episode on subtle hints about the magnitude of faggottness of that two.

[Viking]

One of the posters seemed to think that the attempt to murder Bran was not to cover up for his witnessing the incest, but rather an unrelated plot to convince the Starks that the Lannisters were evil (which seems to be the effect) by murdering Bran after he fell to get the Starks to blame the Lannisters. In this case the person behind this plot would obviously not have known that Jamie actually threw Bran out of the tower. It actually made sense.

I thought we knew that Joffrey ordered that murder, and had no idea that Jaime had been the one to cause the fall.

Yeah, I thought it was canon already.

We get that Idea from a Tyrion POV where Tyrion, after Joffrey hacks Tyrions wedding present into small bits asks if he wants a knife instead and describes the knife. Joffs response is "You... yes" and then goes on how he wants a much fancier knife. Apparently this convinces Tyrion, I think it is quite possible that Joff is freaked out and thinks that Tyrion just threatened to have him stabbed.

[Solmyr]

One of the posters seemed to think that the attempt to murder Bran was not to cover up for his witnessing the incest, but rather an unrelated plot to convince the Starks that the Lannisters were evil (which seems to be the effect) by murdering Bran after he fell to get the Starks to blame the Lannisters. In this case the person behind this plot would obviously not have known that Jamie actually threw Bran out of the tower. It actually made sense.

I thought we knew that Joffrey ordered that murder, and had no idea that Jaime had been the one to cause the fall.

Yeah, I thought it was canon already.

We get that Idea from a Tyrion POV where Tyrion, after Joffrey hacks Tyrions wedding present into small bits asks if he wants a knife instead and describes the knife. Joffs response is "You... yes" and then goes on how he wants a much fancier knife. Apparently this convinces Tyrion, I think it is quite possible that Joff is freaked out and thinks that Tyrion just threatened to have him stabbed.

Jaime later comes to the same conclusion, though.

[Josquius]

Which is really my point isnt it.  They have added material for no particular reason (or rather reasons other than being try to the books) at the cost of not including great material that was in the books.  Rather than seeing shaving scene I would rather have seen the flaming sword in action during the tournament - as just one example of the really interesting stuff missed because of this alt version of the books.

Definitely. Its going to be weird for Thoros to totally pop out of nowhere. He and Beric already sort of do, I can't recall them appearing early in the books beside people talking about them a little and they've been doing this somewhat with Thoros in the series but still....seeing the melee would have ruled.

[Solmyr]

Beric appeared at the tournament in the books. The tournament did serve as an early introduction to various characters.