Alright, before I start my discussion of the first few episodes of the new Game of Thrones TV series, I would like to note I might let slip a few big plot twists and surprises from the books. Here’s the first one.. incest. Here’s the second one, underage sex. Boom goes the dynamite.

I want a cloak like that, screw the activists..

So, that’s your only warning. Lots of crazy stuff happening all the time. For pete’s sake, the episode starts off with Bran being tossed out of a window and crippled after catching the queen getting banged by her brother.. dark stuff! Characters dying all the time, backstabbing, and all sorts of other nasty business. I think that might be the most fascinating thing about the books, is that you never know who’s gonna bite it next. On top of that, it’s sometimes done with a bit subtlety, making you question if it’s actually really happened. Your brain knows it’s happened, you just hang onto a bit of hope that perhaps it’s a trick.. You know, like when you go to the Dr. for a prostate exam.. exact same thing.

I was a big fan of the books. Dark, cold, depressing, violent, and often dirty. Just like what you would imagine a post apoc medieval world to be like. I mean, sure things don’t start like that, but once the shit relaly hits the fan, all the lands turn into a Road Warrior type setting without the cars.

He may be a dwarf, but he's still got big Dinklage

The whole thing is set in a fantasy world, but a very low magic type of setting. There are some supernatural beasts starting to resirface, but for the most part magic and dragons have been absent for thousands of years.

Ok, enough about the books though for now, I want to movie into the HBO show. Two episodes have aired so far, and I am in awe. The one thing that I sort of forgot about was how actual little fighting there was in the books, especially for a fantasy type setting in the midst of war. Yeah, there are definitely some stand-out fight scenes, and alot of violence, but alot of it tends to take place in the background and you hear about it after it’s happened, if that makes sense. So, you get the sense that these nasty things are happening, but you don’t always “see” it.. when you do though, it’s gruesome.

This is George, not a crazy wizard form the TV show..

See, George R.R. Martin has this odd way of structuring the books. Each chapter is dedicated to telling the story from one character’s view, but the main story is always moving. So, lets say we have a chapter dedicated to Eddard Stark. He’s talking about the stuff he’s doing, feeling, etc. , all from his point of view. Then a war breaks out. Well, the next chapater might be from the view of Tyrion Lanister. He’s telling his story now, all from his point of view, but that this point the war has already has several major battles played out, or someone important has died. It’s such a bizarre way of setting up a book, but it works so well. Each chapter shifts focus back to a different character, and is told form there point of view. You get such a variation in the story it’s relaly hard to put down. Especially when you’re emoving from a fairly good character, to a fairly evil character.. the views are so different.

You gain so much character development amongst the different players, even the evil ones. The first book had little to do with Jaime Lannister besides him being just some incestuous evil kingslayer who cripples little boys, into receiving his own chapters in later books where alot of insecirities are revealed, and regrets about former actions. He goes from being a despised character for me, into one that is like alot of the other ones, not really good or evil, but somewhere in between. Almost everyone is like this save, a few really, really evil people, and a few extremely righteous ones. I mean, most of the more evil things he does is because he’s hopelessly in love with his sister. Twisted indeed..

One of the first problems that Game of Thrones as a tv show was going to have was the cast. There are a ton of characters. The Lannisters themselves account for what, about 8 roles. The Starks got another 8 at least, more so bringing in in brothers, in laws, etc. Take that, then start multiplying by al the other major families like the Tully’s, Baratheons, FReys.. etc… it goes on and on. Oh boy… it’s pretty much impossible to keep track of everything. Martin would include a family tree at the back of every book in an appendix because of the complexity. They’ll probably trim alot into the show, but even heading over to the IMDB for the show you can pull up quite an extensive list of cast members… just for season 1.

That leads into the casting itself. Aside from Jason Momoa as Khal Drogo, I love the casting of everyone. The standouts for me in particular are Joffrey, Arya, Viserys, and of course, Tyrion the Imp. I’m not a big fan as Joffrey or Arya as characters in the books, but I loved Tyrion and Peter Dinklage’s acting so far in the role has been spectacular. I can’t wait to see more of his character develop.

The rest are fairly standard I would say, although no one in particular stands out as bad. Cersei and Jaime are fine, although I always pictured them as a much brighter blonder, with Jaime being a bit more slender. The Stark’s are all just fine and well cast. I was hoping for a much bigger person cast for Robert Baratheon, in terms of height and muscle, but his acting has more than made up for it. Sean Bean being included in the cast is fantastic, and as Ned Stark is a great role.

Does she look 13 to you?

Danaerys is another good casting. I’ve heard, although never seen anything officially publicized, that they upped her age to about 16 for the series. Sansa acknowledges she’s 13 in the series when the Queen asks her, but the age for Danaerys is never given. I’m quite sure I remember her being around 13 in the books, just starting to mature as a woman when she’s married to Drogo. That was some of the charm of her’s chacter’s development. A young, naive, and tiny little Danaerys given to Drogo so her brother could gain access to his army. She’s forced to mature extremely quickly. In the series, some of the first scenes involving Danaerys has her stripped down naked, then later on some graphic sex scenes. So, is she cast a 13 year old? I hope not.. or HBO has suddenly upped the stakes for their show? If the actress is 25 though.. is that ok that she’s portraying a 13 year old in graphic mongol sex? I’m guessing not.. but who knows.. it’s HBO.

Past the casting, the set’s are amazing. Made much more pecatacular with some unbelievable costuming. I loved the Winterfell giant cloaks and wolf pelts everywhere, exactly how I imagined it while reading the books. It’s no wonder that HBO has acknowledged it’s a very expensive series to produce, it’s gorgeous.

I’ve been heaping so much praise on the show so far, let’s hit the negatives. First and foremost, Jason Momoa. Well, after the second episode he started to grow on me a bit more, but he still hasn’t done anything. And .. spoiler incoming, at least we don’t have to deal with him for too long.

I can't wait till Viserys gets crowned..

There’s also an inherent fear for me that when the CGI starts to be required, it’s going to be ugly. So far we’ve seen a good use of real blood, such as when Summer rips out the assassin’s throat. They didn’t feel the need to include a giant CGI’d blood spray, just some good ol’ fashioned real leaking fluids. Also, when they find the dead dire wolf in the first episode, it’s a nice beautiful and bulky REAL model, no CGI. So I have high hopes here, but we’ll have to see what happens when the Dragon’s hatch. There’s no getting around the CGI there. Please make it good.

Now, onto my expectations. Besides a couple of spoilers I’ve listed above regarding the Dragon’s and Drogo, what am I expecting coming up? Well, let’s start off with a quick discussion of Lord of the Rings movies. I loved them, and I think they are probably the best fantasy movies ever made. However, I’ve never been able to read the books. I love reading fantasy books and read alot of them, but I can’t stand Tolkien’s writing style. I feel like some sort of fantasy reject for not being able to fight my way through them. But hey, I have the movies now and will never have to try and torture my way through them again.

The point here is that they were able to take each book and turn it into a 3 hour movie. We’ve got 10 episodes for each book so far so I can only imgine they’re going to give the books adequate representation, so I have high expectations on them being true to the original story.

Begone Dog.. !

Beyond that, I find myself giddy with excitement with a few of my favorite parts ofthe book, such as the first tournament when the Hound and the Mountain square off. I also find myself dreading some of the more tragic parts of the book, especially involving Ned. However, those parts, as tragic as they may be, are what make the books so fascinating. There’s so much darkness and evil that permeates throughout them, that when you have the small shining moments of goodness happen, they are so welcomed. Like when Joffrey finally bites it. He’s is so vile of a character, and causes so much destruction in such a short period of time, that when he finally reaps what’s he’s sowed, your so happy

So, I’m dreading some of the more tragic parts, and relishing in some of the small glimmers of hope and goodness that pop up occasionally.

The series has only been beyond spectacular so far, and I can’t see how anyhting at all could change that. I’ve watched both episodes 3 times now, and can’t wait for more. I need more!!