Game of Thrones Thread

[nikma]

It always astounds me when I see defenders of his who insist that he will finish the books, even after he's shown that he'd rather be doing anything else but finish them.

They moved the argument from "he will finish the books" to "he will finish TWOW".

But no, he won't. He will never finish The Winds of Winter either.

 

[Chunky Salsa]

Saying that there's no dragon-riders on Volantis is like saying there's no Spaniards in Mexico or the Philippines. Which makes no fucking sense considering those are Spanish colonies.

Martin should have just said "Dragons need Volcanos to breed." or something.

 

[LORD IMPERATOR]

They moved the argument from "he will finish the books" to "he will finish TWOW".

But no, he won't. He will never finish The Winds of Winter either.

And the fact is, the man can't string a coherent narrative without some glaring flaws. Sure, D&D are dumb frat boys, but GRRM is too busy smelling his own farts to come up with a conclusive ending.

Martin should have just said "Dragons need Volcanos to breed." or something.

That would kill the Daenerys plotline, because when was the last time Dany visited a volcano?

 

[FatR]

Don't forget how she got her Eunoch army, which was to sell one of her dragons to get an entire city's army (a city that is constantly in risk of Dothraki, pirate and slavers raids) and then had the army kill everyone rich there. An absolutely insane turn of events that somehow worked.

Daenerys was the blight on the books even when they were still good.

Look, I'm totally fine with characters having cheats, like three dragons in an allegedly scarce-magic world. Cheat powers are a narrative convenience, and not intristically worse than having a character start with riches and power - it can enable some plots, just as it can trivialize others. What I don't like is the world not reacting on clear presence of cheat powers, or reacting in such supeficial way that it beggars belief. Like... if fucking cultivation novels can weave the fact that possessing an alienable cheat thingy paints a big fucking target on you into the plot, why can't Martin? Daenerys' adventures in ACoK/ASoS should have been a tense thriller, where she's trying to survive, hide, and avoid falling under control of others until her dragons get big enough to be a viable defense. Instead, they are Daenerys' Magical Adventure, where she solves all problems with violence or wills them away with the cheapest treachery ever. Sure, Martin still occasionally tortures her, because that makes his fat pink mast hard, but nothing compared to fates of other characters.

I've mentioned before, in the HotD thread, that Martin just stopped advanced the story because he wrote almost every relevant character into predicaments so dire that he could not write them out in satisfying, non-asspull ways. But another reason the story stalled probably was Daenerys' side of the story getting into position where it should have increasingly taken over the rest of plot. I wonder if the above-outlined favoritism was not due to Martin especially liking Daenerys (except as fap material), but on the contrary - once she hit her lowest point before the end of Book 1, and ended in a place with nowhere to go, but up, he no longer enjoyed writing her chapters, and sought to "speedrun" them, resolving all the story beats necessary for the overall scheme of things as swiftly and easily as possible.

 

[Absolutego]

I wonder if the above-outlined favoritism was not due to Martin especially liking Daenerys (except as fap material), but on the contrary - once she hit her lowest point before the end of Book 1, and ended in a place with nowhere to go, but up, he no longer enjoyed writing her chapters, and sought to "speedrun" them, resolving all the necessary beats as swiftly and easily as possible.

That doesn't jive with how Daenerys spends two whole books doing nothing but lusting after a man with a blue beard and massacring brown people in Slaver's Bay.
He's even said his difficulty to deal with resolving what he called the Mereeneese Knot in a quick manner is why she didn't appear in A Feast For Crows, and why she still hasn't left Essos by the end of A Dance With Dragons.

I think he just had favoritism for the character because she's, in his mind, the 3rd most important to the story after Jon and Tyrion, and the source of near all the fantasy elements in it.

 

[FatR]

AFfC/ADwD are in general full of people doing nothing (or doing nothing of actual consequence). With Daenerys it is more noticeable, because she is so far removed other PoVs, and with no meaningful cast to interact with, the meandering nature of the story becomes clearer. But why Martin started procrastinating so? Mereen did not have to be a Knot. In fact, the entire Knot was almost entirely in Deny's head, It is not like the armies of the whole Essos descended on Mereen with magical assassins and whatever shit they had, to take her dragons, and she had to engage in difficult-to-write knife-edge political games to survive by playing them against each other. The actual external difficulties she faced still were almost a joke.

Anyway, at the end of ASoS Martin had the following options regarding Deny's plotline:

(1)Keep speedrunning. But that would cause Daenerys to crash into the rest of the story prematurely and in way that would not have been satisfying, because he just did not really use those two books he had to develop her.
(2)Make her settle down and write her learning how to be a good leader. In absence of a timeskip, the most rational option. But Martin's heart was clearly not in it. I think we had an insightful longpost on why he can't and doesn't want to write heroes a couple pages ago.

So he choose another option:

(3)Make her settle down and write her getting bogged in the tax policy bullshit, and learning nothing and, after much metaphorical and literal shitting, circle her down to the same "destuctive warlord in a skirt" point on which she entered Mereen.

 

[TheHarbinger]

The timeskip was designed around the sizes of the dragons and the ages of the young protagonists. Without the time skip we have teenage and even younger world leaders and dragons the size of a small cow. Unless we want to watch the characters and dragons age in real time we either need a timeskip. Or GRRM will be ending the novels with dragons the size of large dogs beating the Others. And children like Bran as a 10-12-year-old ruling the world. He's written himself into a situation that requires two more books of content to resolve. Or skipping a decade of story and just hand waving most of the timeline of the main series.

Imagine writing the 'biggest' fantasy series of all time only for most of its timeline and story to happen in a paragraph summary. And then for the rest of the chapters to be bogged down with food platters. And descriptions of Tyrion's penis and other fat pink masts. The next Tolkien. Where things like Dany ruling or the Others preparing to invade are never described to the reader. But Tyrion's sexual experiences with dozens of prostitutes are given vivid detailed accounts across multiple books.

AFfC/ADwD are in general full of people doing nothing (or doing nothing of actual consequence). With Daenerys it is more noticeable, because she is so far removed other PoVs, and with no meaningful cast to interact with, the meandering nature of the story becomes clearer.

If the main story of the series is "the Others" then almost every single chapter is of zero consequence. It still leads me to believe that the Others will die before reaching Winterfell just like in the HBO show. And that GRRM will get right back to writing about food and whores and King's Landing with only a brief interruption of the zombie snow apocalypse. And that the real story is the Iron Throne and Westerosi culture and not some existential threat that won't even reach Essos or more than few miles beyond the Wall.

That doesn't jive with how Daenerys spends two whole books doing nothing.

The entire cast of characters haven't done anything in the last two or three books depending on the POV. And the Others haven't really done anything either. The Wildings have made more of a presence at the Wall at this point. We're supposedly 75% of the way through the novels and almost no one has interacted with the Others aside from Jon or Sam. And Jon is dead and Sam is now hundreds of miles south of the Wall.

I think he just had favoritism for the character because she's, in his mind, the 3rd most important to the story after Jon and Tyrion, and the source of near all the fantasy elements in it.

It's clearly his 'gardener' technique making plotting the novels impossible. And those characters are not as important as Bran either. A character with even bigger issues regarding his plot and characterization. Bran is supposed to be the center of the story, future ruler, first POV chapter, etc. and has less direction than almost any main character.

Point is that this series cannot be salvaged. It needs to be rewritten from chapter one.

 

[LORD IMPERATOR]

This son of a bitch will take every excuse to delay TWOW:
"George R.R. Martin Hints at New Project with Arya Stark Star Maisie Williams; Says 'Do Not Want to Jinx It'"

https://www.msn.com/en-in/entertainment/tv/george-rr-martin-hints-at-new-project-with-arya-stark-star-maisie-williams-says-do-not-want-to-jinx-it/ar-AA1tTLtA?ocid=BingNewsSerp

Look, I'm totally fine with characters having cheats, like three dragons in an allegedly scarce-magic world. Cheat powers are a narrative convenience, and not intristically worse than having a character start with riches and power - it can enable some plots, just as it can trivialize others. What I don't like is the world not reacting on clear presence of cheat powers, or reacting in such supeficial way that it beggars belief. Like... if fucking cultivation novels can weave the fact that possessing an alienable cheat thingy paints a big fucking target on you into the plot, why can't Martin? Daenerys' adventures in ACoK/ASoS should have been a tense thriller, where she's trying to survive, hide, and avoid falling under control of others until her dragons get big enough to be a viable defense. Instead, they are Daenerys' Magical Adventure, where she solves all problems with violence or wills them away with the cheapest treachery ever.

That doesn't jive with how Daenerys spends two whole books doing nothing but lusting after a man with a blue beard and massacring brown people in Slaver's Bay.
He's even said his difficulty to deal with resolving what he called the Mereeneese Knot in a quick manner is why she didn't appear in A Feast For Crows, and why she still hasn't left Essos by the end of A Dance With Dragons.

They should've just brought Dany to Westeros after she got that army and once the dragons grew to a decent size. Full stop.

Cersei doesn't want Tommen to marry Margaery. That should've led to her inviting Dany to Westeros as a counterbalance against the growing Tyrell influence. Have Dany be set up by Cersei to be Tommen's bride-to-be, to deny Margaery the right of becoming queen.

At first, Ser Barristan argues against the deal, because it stinks of a trap, but Dany becomes desperate enough once the people of Slaver's Bay reject her reforms that she takes the deal, takes her army, her dragons, and her followers, and they sail west to Westeros. And Ser Barristan is right-it is a trap, but not for Dany.

When she arrives in Westeros, Cersei gives her every courtesy, and even tries to take the girl under her wing, almost like an apprentice, and outright promises Tommen to her in a public betrothal ceremony that ends with Dany taking Tommen for a ride on her dragon as it flies around the Red Keep.

It's also par for the course for Book!Cersei; she does things that on paper, sound smart, but upon close inspection, it causes a lot of problems, like how she made that deal with the Faith Militant. The deal sounds solid; the marriage will give Tommen a stronger claim to the throne due to marrying a Targaryen, and Dany has the dragons and the Unsullied army-a tempting asset for any tyrant who wants to remain in power. Cersei seeks to control the dragons through Daenerys, she sees the Unsullied as another unit full of cannon fodder to toss at the enemy, and her marriage deal between Tommen and Dany prevents Margaery from becoming Queen.

But what Cersei doesn't realize is that Dany has more of a spine of her own, and when she stops needing Cersei and Tommen gets old enough to wed her, she becomes more assertive, and her literal firepower becomes more of a threat as the Lannisters now have to contend with a bossy Targaryen Queen who has their new king under her thumb. Then you can have Stannis defeat the Boltons, join forces with Jon Snow, and plan for the defense of Westeros against the Others, and they have to persuade Cersei, Dany, and Margaery to join them.

Sure, Martin still occasionally tortures her, because that makes his fat pink mast hard, but nothing compared to fates of other characters.

It never ceases to amaze me all these preachy liberal men hiding their fetishes behind the guise of realism. Like dude, we get it, women getting tortured gets some men hard. It's nothing to be ashamed of. But the fact is, GRRM threw his lot in with people who would get pissy with him about his kink, so he hides it behind a guise of realism when in reality, as you said, he gives his female characters a hard time because that gets his willy wet.

https://ew.com/article/2015/06/03/george-rr-martin-thrones-violence-women/

I've mentioned before, in the HotD thread, that Martin just stopped advanced the story because he wrote almost every relevant character into predicaments so dire that he could not write them out in satisfying, non-asspull ways. But another reason the story stalled probably was Daenerys' side of the story getting into position where it should have increasingly taken over the rest of plot. I wonder if the above-outlined favoritism was not due to Martin especially liking Daenerys (except as fap material), but on the contrary - once she hit her lowest point before the end of Book 1, and ended in a place with nowhere to go, but up, he no longer enjoyed writing her chapters, and sought to "speedrun" them, resolving all the story beats necessary for the overall scheme of things as swiftly and easily as possible.

That's the problem with grimdork writers like GRRM. The situation becomes so dire that only an asspull can save the characters, but if they did that, it'd destroy the dark atmosphere that the novels rely upon as a selling point.

I think he just had favoritism for the character because she's, in his mind, the 3rd most important to the story after Jon and Tyrion, and the source of near all the fantasy elements in it.

Dumping most of the fantastical shit onto one character's story is a massive mistake, in my opinion. I mean, at this point, if we removed Dany's story from the equation, most of the fantastical elements not involving wargs, Others, and the Red Priestess disappear.

The timeskip was designed around the sizes of the dragons and the ages of the young protagonists. Without the time skip we have teenage and even younger world leaders and dragons the size of a small cow. Unless we want to watch the characters and dragons age in real time we either need a timeskip. Or GRRM will be ending the novels with dragons the size of large dogs beating the Others. And children like Bran as a 10-12-year-old ruling the world. He's written himself into a situation that requires two more books of content to resolve. Or skipping a decade of story and just hand waving most of the timeline of the main series.

It's clearly his 'gardener' technique making plotting the novels impossible. And those characters are not as important as Bran either. A character with even bigger issues regarding his plot and characterization. Bran is supposed to be the center of the story, future ruler, first POV chapter, etc. and has less direction than almost any main character.

This is what happens when you have a story writer who dismantles the outline he made for himself just to watch his characters organically grow. Things such as stories need structure and a direction, otherwise, it's just a jumbled mess that goes nowhere, which is what the ASOIAF series has been since books 4 and 5.

Imagine writing the 'biggest' fantasy series of all time only for most of its timeline and story to happen in a paragraph summary. And then for the rest of the chapters to be bogged down with food platters. And descriptions of Tyrion's penis and other fat pink masts. The next Tolkien. Where things like Dany ruling or the Others preparing to invade are never described to the reader. But Tyrion's sexual experiences with dozens of prostitutes are given vivid detailed accounts across multiple books.

Next Tolkien my ass. It's a hilarious joke that GRRM picks on Tolkien for supposed "flaws" when Tolkien actually managed to finish his fucking story and have a substantial message behind it. Not to mention said story became the framework for 90% of western fantasy in the years after LOTR. GRRM's focus on things like Tyrion's dick or his escapades with whores while skimping on more substantial matters goes to show where his focus lies.

Maybe he should've been more honest and made ASOIAF as smut, like hentai. Then at least, it'd be more honest.

If the main story of the series is "the Others" then almost every single chapter is of zero consequence. It still leads me to believe that the Others will die before reaching Winterfell just like in the HBO show. And that GRRM will get right back to writing about food and whores and King's Landing with only a brief interruption of the zombie snow apocalypse. And that the real story is the Iron Throne and Westerosi culture and not some existential threat that won't even reach Essos or more than few miles beyond the Wall.

The entire cast of characters haven't done anything in the last two or three books depending on the POV. And the Others haven't really done anything either. The Wildings have made more of a presence at the Wall at this point. We're supposedly 75% of the way through the novels and almost no one has interacted with the Others aside from Jon or Sam. And Jon is dead and Sam is now hundreds of miles south of the Wall.

I wouldn't be surprised if GRRM makes it so that the real enemy is the patriarchal culture and the monarchy instead of the Others. The Others have always felt more like a peripheral threat; they're not like the Undead Scourge from Warcraft who devoured the Kingdom of Lordaeron and the other human realms in Azeroth. They're basically there to be the zombie equivalent of Picts that the Romans have to keep out.

Point is that this series cannot be salvaged. It needs to be rewritten from chapter one.

I'd probably scrap most of books 4 and 5 outside of the Winterfell and Sparrow plotlines.

 

[Tasty Tatty]

Well, Arya's among Martin's fav characters. Unluckily for me, she's among my most 'meh'.

 

[LORD IMPERATOR]

Well, Arya's among Martin's fav characters. Unluckily for me, she's among my most 'meh'.

It's another distraction for GRRM to hide behind. Dude's procrastinating on purpose. It's probably because, as a previous poster said, he wrote himself into a corner and can't resolve the plot lines without it being an ass-pull.

 

[Hijo de D. Woodchucks Jr.]

Martin should just troll everyone and write (LMFAO) a book that is entirely composed of timeskips that ends with whatever bullshit twist he has lodged up his fat ass after the GOT tv show spoiled Bran becomes the king in the end and Jon leaves to join Frodo and the elves.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

I was looking for good audio books to listen to the ASIOF series again and I found this guy's amateur readings on YouTube, completely free. "David Reads ASOIAF"

He puts lots of effort in to his voices and his cat makes many cameo appearences. Despite the occasional roughness it's a great listen. I'm almost finished AGOT again. The foreshadowing is everywhere once you know where things are headed.

Spoiler: Foreshadowing spoilers

Ned remarking that they often don't see kings in the North, to which Robert jokes they're probably hiding under the Snow. Deanerys' dreams of returning to King's Landing to see every window alight and all the doors are red. No doubt Jon's dreams of the crypts opening at Winterfell are meant to come true also, him also being part Valyrian with their prophetic dreams.

 

[God of Nothing]

It's painfully obvious at this point the show did what GRRM was planning to do. All those anti-climaxes and unadapted plots really are how he planned to resolve things. Edgy Caitlin, FAegon, the Sand Snakes, Euron, Mereen, and the White Walkers. The fact there are so many plotlines that need to be resolved are a sign the fat fuck has no idea how to finish this. He should've been scaling down instead of up constantly.

Bookfags are so in denial it hurts. They're never going to see the next book.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

The fact there are so many plotlines that need to be resolved are a sign the fat fuck has no idea how to finish this. He should've been scaling down instead of up constantly.

I think he tired of writing the main ASOIAF story and instead wants to write new stories in his world like with Dunk and Egg and the Targaryan book. He got carried away with side stories and worldbuilding in the ASOIAF books and now there's too many loose ends to even finish the story, assuming he desired to, and I imagine the fact that many of the climaxes to the major arcs having already been revealed in the show would greatly contribute to that lack of motivation. He's trying to emulate Tolkien's fantasy worldbuilding except he got too ambitious with his LOTR and now doesn't want to finish it, instead he's occasipnally working on his Silmarillion.

 

[TheHarbinger]

I think he tired of writing the main ASOIAF story and instead wants to write new stories in his world like with Dunk and Egg and the Targaryan book.

It's not that. It's that he knows that his story is bloated and out of control in the main series of books. And he cannot end the story satisfacorilty because the main 'Others' plotline has been handled improperly. So his only options to continue writing ASOIAF books are to write prequels that almost entirely largely ignore the issue of the Others and eternal winters and other sloppily developed plots.

He's not tired of writing. He writes all sorts of stuff. Movies, television shows, sci-fi shows, video games, comics, Westeros history books. He just cannot write about the Others anymore because he has no idea what to do. He's like a murder mystery novelist that has no idea about forensic work or homicide investigations and doesn't know how to conclude the story in a way that isn't contrived and ridiculous.

Jon or Arya killing the head Other like the head vampire and wiping them all out is mediocre and generic. His grand ASOIAF series will be reduced to nothing more than a standard fantasy series with the current ending. He's not tired he's afraid of his legacy. And all those "Aragorn's tax polity" and "pulling a Lost" quotes coming back to haunt him.

 

[Judge Holden]

Oh gawd no....last I looked Maisie williams looked like a fucking gargoyle sent from hell to torment the souls of the living while selling shitty arts and crafts on etsy. The hell does she even look like n...

I.....I promise you. I genuinely did not know she looked like dis now. I thought she would still look like a fugly gargoyle and not...fucking....the actual FUCK is this?!

 

[TheArtilleryman]

It's not that. It's that he knows that his story is bloated and out of control in the main series of books. And he cannot end the story satisfacorilty because the main 'Others' plotline has been handled improperly. So his only options to continue writing ASOIAF books are to write prequels that almost entirely largely ignore the issue of the Others and eternal winters and other sloppily developed plots.

He's not tired of writing. He writes all sorts of stuff. Movies, television shows, sci-fi shows, video games, comics, Westeros history books. He just cannot write about the Others anymore because he has no idea what to do. He's like a murder mystery novelist that has no idea about forensic work or homicide investigations and doesn't know how to conclude the story in a way that isn't contrived and ridiculous.

Jon or Arya killing the head Other like the head vampire and wiping them all out is mediocre and generic. His grand ASOIAF series will be reduced to nothing more than a standard fantasy series with the current ending. He's not tired he's afraid of his legacy. And all those "Aragorn's tax polity" and "pulling a Lost" quotes coming back to haunt him.

Ironic then that the Others are the first damn thing you read about

 

[Tasty Tatty]

I think he tired of writing the main ASOIAF story and instead wants to write new stories in his world like with Dunk and Egg and the Targaryan book. He got carried away with side stories and worldbuilding in the ASOIAF books and now there's too many loose ends to even finish the story, assuming he desired to, and I imagine the fact that many of the climaxes to the major arcs having already been revealed in the show would greatly contribute to that lack of motivation. He's trying to emulate Tolkien's fantasy worldbuilding except he got too ambitious with his LOTR and now doesn't want to finish it, instead he's occasipnally working on his Silmarillion.

If he just stop wasting time with all the new stories and devotes one full year to finish ASOIAF alone, he'd be free to then write anything he wants.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

If he just stop wasting time with all the new stories and devotes one full year to finish ASOIAF alone, he'd be free to then write anything he wants.

That as it may he doesn't seem enthusiastic about it whatsoever right now and unless he finds that enthusiasm again, whatever he writes will be poor quality compared to our expectations. If he were to rush it out of obligation or just to ensure it's finished before he dies, it may very well be trash...
Part of me thinks the story remaining unfinished would be preferable to that.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Oh gawd no....last I looked Maisie williams looked like a fucking gargoyle sent from hell to torment the souls of the living while selling shitty arts and crafts on etsy. The hell does she even look like n...
View attachment 6646223


View attachment 6646225

I.....I promise you. I genuinely did not know she looked like dis now. I thought she would still look like a fugly gargoyle and not...fucking....the actual FUCK is this?!
View attachment 6646247

Fell to the Hermione trap of being subject of attraction to too many pedos, and now q broken human.