Game of Thrones begins....

[Viking]

Robb's raven mail account got hacked!  He should have never listened to that former Targaryen official who promised him a large sum of gold for only a small investment...



Catelyn is my least favorite casting choice.  She seems.... just not attractive enough.  She's a good enough actress, just not what I imagined physically.

I first heard that Peter Dinklage, Sean Bean and Lena Heady were cast. I though they would make great Tyrion, Ned and Catelyn respectively. I always felt that the Heady of Sarah Connor Chronicles might be in danger of being typecast as the pseudo-psycho überprotective mother. I thought she was just so obviously Catelyn not Cersei.

[Slargos]

"Young Robert" (Mark Addy):



"Beardless Renly" (Gethin Anthony)



Hmm, not sure, do they look alike?

Mark Addy kinda looks like Slargos. 

I was going to protest, but now that I look a bit closer, I can sortof see it. 

[Josquius]

Yeah, knock a bit of fat off Addy (given Robert hasn't always been a chodder that is fair enough) and there's a decent resemblance.
There's certainly been much worse on TV.

Robb's raven mail account got hacked!  He should have never listened to that former Targaryen official who promised him a large sum of gold for only a small investment...



Catelyn is my least favorite casting choice.  She seems.... just not attractive enough.  She's a good enough actress, just not what I imagined physically.

She reminds me of a certain...unattractive and specialist porn star.

[Sophie Scholl]

She reminds me of a certain...unattractive and specialist porn star.

...?

[The Larch]

Catelyn is my least favorite casting choice.  She seems.... just not attractive enough.  She's a good enough actress, just not what I imagined physically.

Was she attractive in the books? I think the actress is doing the right job of portraying her as this intense, focused, "family above all else" momma bear (or fish, or wolf, well you get the picture).

I think that in the books she's characterized as an aged beauty, homely but most of all motherly.

True, that being said don't we only see her through the eyes of her husband and children?

And her own.

[The Larch]

Robb's raven mail account got hacked!  He should have never listened to that former Targaryen official who promised him a large sum of gold for only a small investment...



Catelyn is my least favorite casting choice.  She seems.... just not attractive enough.  She's a good enough actress, just not what I imagined physically.

I first heard that Peter Dinklage, Sean Bean and Lena Heady were cast. I though they would make great Tyrion, Ned and Catelyn respectively. I always felt that the Heady of Sarah Connor Chronicles might be in danger of being typecast as the pseudo-psycho überprotective mother. I thought she was just so obviously Catelyn not Cersei.

Well, Cersei is also a pseudo-psycho überprotective mother, so... 

[Viking]

Robb's raven mail account got hacked!  He should have never listened to that former Targaryen official who promised him a large sum of gold for only a small investment...



Catelyn is my least favorite casting choice.  She seems.... just not attractive enough.  She's a good enough actress, just not what I imagined physically.

I first heard that Peter Dinklage, Sean Bean and Lena Heady were cast. I though they would make great Tyrion, Ned and Catelyn respectively. I always felt that the Heady of Sarah Connor Chronicles might be in danger of being typecast as the pseudo-psycho überprotective mother. I thought she was just so obviously Catelyn not Cersei.

Well, Cersei is also a pseudo-psycho überprotective mother, so... 

full psycho.. besides, my inner eye has cersei as voluptuous.

jenna jameson looks

[jimmy olsen]

Ratings high.
http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/06/07/game-of-thrones-ratings/

[Berkut]

I very much like the actor playing Tywin, and his portrayal in general, when he is not busy being a skinner. Leave that to the Boltons.

I think both Catelyn and Cersei are fine. In the books, Catelyn is portrayed as very attractive - but then, it is easy to write a character that is old enough to have 5 kids, one of whom is a young man, and who is still very attractive. A little harder to find an actual actress of that age, who can actually act, and is also very attractive. I am pleased that of all those traits, those doing the casting worried the least about finding someone "hott" and instead worried about finding an actress with the right gravitas. Same with Cersei, although obviously Cersei's beauty is more integral to her character than Catelyn.

[Admiral Yi]

It's too bad Joanne Wallie-Kilmer was tied up playing the hott MILF in The Borgias.

[Berkut]

So here's my thought on the great venison debate.

The problem with Tywin for TV is that he is kind of a cipher as a character.  His viewpoint is never presented and he mostly appears to us through the eyes of his sons, both of whom have "issues" with him.  There is some backstory given about him, not all of which is entirely consistent -- at one point IIRC it is said that he was "hard" from the beginning b/c of the weakness of his father, at another point that he used to be different but changed when his wife died.  Most of his impact on the story involves consequences to actions he takes behind the scenes.  He is potrayed as cold, disciplined, somewhat taciturn -- kind of like Ned, but unlike Ned, we never get any real view of his inner life and motivations. 

I think the teleplay people saw him as a problem in terms of how to present the character to viewers, and the Deerslayer meets the Kingslayer scene was their awkward effort at a solution.

Yeah, I think this is a fair point. Also, for some reason (which, in light of your explanation, is not that entirely clear), there is this overwhelming feeling in the fandom that Tywin is a real "badass". I think the scene was meant to convey it.

Uggh, but that is the thing that bugs the shit out of me!

How is him skinning a deer make him about to be a "badass"? His dialogue with Jaime  - sure - but on the other hand, it is not surprising that Jaime, no matter how badass, is still cowed by his father. The dialogue of the scene worked very well, IMO.

I just do not understand how his skinning a deer is supposed to send the message "OMG, he is so badass!"

I know we've argued this well beyond any kind of actual interest, but I really think you are simply taking the message you know you are supposed to get and superimposing it on the scene. You know Tywin is a badass, you know that they want you to take that as a conclusion, therefore you assume that his skinning a dear sends the message.

My point with my wife is that as someone who does NOT know what the expected message is supposed to be, she was completely mystified at the point of the deer. Her response to the scene was "Why is he skinning that deer?" And I think her response makes sense, because the scene itself makes no real sense. If anything, the deer distracts from the power of the dialogue, since it makes viewers like her think about what this deer means, and she missed the power of the dialogue.

Tywin can skin a deer/Tywin likes to skins deers != Tywin is a badass. It simply does not add up. It is "awkward", and pretty much fails at what it intends to do.

I think the scene with the making out whores suffers from the same problem. Here we have this monologue from Littlefinger that is clearly trying to give us some background, and you are mostly distracted by this chick finger banging another chick, and to top it off you have the disconnect of Littlefinger pouring his heart out to a couple whores in a brothel? Huh?

I think both scenes are basically failures. They both have this visual distraction from the point of the scene, one over the top visually gross, the other over the top visually titilating, and neither really works with the dialogue they serve as the background for...

This is in contrast to say the conversation with Cersei and Robert, where the exposition works, and the viewer is focused on what the characters are saying, rather than what they are doing. Honestly, I think the viewing audience is in fact mature enough that they don't need visual stimulation in order to pay attention to what is being said. But on the other hand, this is HBO. And they do love their visual candy.

[The Larch]

I think both Catelyn and Cersei are fine. In the books, Catelyn is portrayed as very attractive - but then, it is easy to write a character that is old enough to have 5 kids, one of whom is a young man, and who is still very attractive. A little harder to find an actual actress of that age, who can actually act, and is also very attractive. I am pleased that of all those traits, those doing the casting worried the least about finding someone "hott" and instead worried about finding an actress with the right gravitas. Same with Cersei, although obviously Cersei's beauty is more integral to her character than Catelyn.

Catelyn and Cersei are also an interesting contrast in how they see themselves and the image they project. Theoretically in the books they are two women of roughly the same age and social standing, daughters of great Lords married politically to men that would become great Lords themselves. Catelyn had 5 children and Cersei had 3 and several abortions, which would put their bodies through quite some wear and tear, yet Catelyn has embraced a more matronly demeanour, even if she retains a part of her youthful beauty while Cersei still clings to her looks and sensuality and, even if a mother of three, seems to reject the "matron" aspect of her role in the society of the time. Also with Cersei this aspect of her personality gets exacerbated with the profecy that a younger Queen would replace her and her own physical aging and increasing decadence, as seen in Feast (how she flips out when her dresses start getting too tight for her, for instance).

[Tamas]

I think Cersei is rather weak compared to the otherwise excellent cast.
Looks aside, I think -or might be imagining- that the actress not having read the books shows.

[Martinus]

I think Cersei is perfect.

[Tamas]

I think Cersei is perfect.

Yes but you are gay so you can have no idea