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GAME OF THRONES: SEASON 4



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0
 04.17.2014 6:00pm
Thread Creator

reido
(\/)(o,,,o)(\/)



Probably next season.  I don't believe they've cast any of the new relevant characters.




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0
 04.17.2014 7:06pm


Coolsetzer
Formerly Furysetzer



I haven't seen any of season 4 yet. I think I'll wait until the entire thing is out before diving in. So far, the first season was epic. Two and three were less so. So I feel confident that I won't be missing out too much.

The only thing I really want to know is if the Stannis/ Nightwalker plotline is resolved. Maybe the book readers can spoiler tag that for me?




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0
 04.17.2014 8:14pm
Thread Creator

reido
(\/)(o,,,o)(\/)



Coolsetzer said:
The only thing I really want to know is if the Stannis/ Nightwalker plotline is resolved. Maybe the book readers can spoiler tag that for me?

Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.

LOL


Seriously though (and yes, book spoilers spoilers, but not particularly big ones):
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
I assume you mean the White Walkers, which are still looming as of book 5's (A Dance with Dragons) climax.  Stannis does some stuff, including heading to the wall.  Our perspective on the Stannis situation is shifted somewhat once we get direct Melisandre POV chapters.  Then we stumble into double cliffhanger town, where we've been hanging out ever since.




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0
 04.19.2014 8:01am


Coolsetzer
Formerly Furysetzer



^Thanks for the head's up. I suppose that the Winter storyline will be the main climax of the series when it is all said and done. The other half being who ends up surviving and ruling the continent. Unless GRRM ends up just killing everyone off. Haha.




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0
 04.21.2014 3:00am
 (Edited on 04.21.2014 at 5:06am)

Rhaegar
World Warrior 21007



Dadgummit.

Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
Jaime and Cersei in the sept WAS NOT RAPE D&D! Fucking hell. It was questionable enough that the setup for what was, in the books, one of the most spontaneous WTF-type sex scenes ever written, was already more or less fucked regardless. But that was consensual in the books. No fucking excuse for making it a rape scene. Gratuitious bullshit, and it puts an extra black mark on Jamie's character that wasn't supposed to be there.


Otherwise, mostly a setup episode. Next week should be awesome, though. At least it better be to wash the bad taste from this week out of my mouth.




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0
 04.21.2014 3:05am


kjonez
with a Z



I'm upset that one of my favorite characters isn't even in the show.

Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
 I've been waiting for Strong Belwas and I was pretty disappointed when he didn't come up as the champion.




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0
 04.21.2014 11:29am


Kal
yes



It's episodes like this that make me wish this show wasn't written by a bunch of men with minds of adolescent boys.
What the hell.




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0
 04.21.2014 2:05pm
Thread Creator (Edited on 04.21.2014 at 2:33pm)

reido
(\/)(o,,,o)(\/)



Dear HBO:
Thanks for making one of the weirdest, awfulest, and most unnecessary--and unnecessarily gross--scenes in the books somehow.... more weird, awful, and unnecessary and unnecessarily gross.  Wait, no, not thanks.  Fuck off.

You're usually okay, HBO--I've grown to accept more of your Male Gaze aspects--but, but... what the hell!?

The Sept:
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
So I guess Jaime's a rapist now?  What... what the hell?  I could see them trying to remind the audience that Jaime is Not A Nice Guy, but that's a pretty awful way to do it.  And it does weird things to Cersei's character who, in the books at least, is pretty much awful, but now some of that awfulness is gone because she... didn't have period sex next to her son's corpse... consentually?

I guess they could backpedal away from it with dialogue next week but I really doubt that that'll happen, or matter even if it did.

I cannot for the life of me figure any logic behind the change.  It just makes no sense for either character's development.


Other observations:
--Speaking of awful sex scenes:  Gilly flirting with Sam gave me PTSD flash-forwards.  The fat pink mast looms on the horizon, ever-threatening us with its advent, and our doom.
--Overheard at HBO:  "There's a naked man in this scene!  Shit, shit, they won't stand for this--quick, angle the camera so those two girls are always on screen when the naked guy is!  Yes, yessss... *heavy breathing* now kiss.  Mm."
--Also overheard at HBO:  "There were one and a half  penises in this episode!  That's our season quota filled, people, good job!  Now back to nothing but boobs and vaginas!"  (The half penis is because the Mereenese champion's was almost certainly fake.)
--The timeline at the Wall is also all muddled, but I guess they're trying to add some meat to that plot... somehow?  I dunno, we'll have to see how that plays out.
--I spent the entire last section of the episode muttering to myself:  "Look at these Mereenese assholes."
--And, I really like show!Daario.  Almost enough to stop lamenting the loss of Strong Belwas.
--I really hope they find a way to keep Olenna in King's Landing; having her simply wander off-page would be a huge disservice to an awsome character.  They found a way to keep Bronn around, they can do the same for Olenna.
--The same could be said for Oberyn.  Book spoiler:
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
But it won't!  Poor, poor Oberyn.  That would be a change too far, I think.  Though I could see him replacing his brother in Dorne--who is a tertiary, plot-pushing character at best--without it being to huge of an ordeal.  The Mountain, say, cripples the Viper and he has to spend the rest of the series in a wheelchair instead of... whatever his brother's name is.

But, again, I don't think that will happen.


Edited for more Sept talk:
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
From director Alex Graves (who says, ick, it's one of the favorite scenes he's done):
"Well, it becomes consensual by the end, because anything for them ultimately results in a turn-on, especially a power struggle."

Which... okay, that's fair, except that if that was the case, you really fucking failed to express it on-screen.  I kept waiting for that intention to become clear as I watched it and it just never came, it just kept going and going and being awful and there was never a turn where consent was even vaguely implied. 

Rapey, rapey, explicitly rape, still rape, still rape, oh hey the scenes over what the fuck.




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0
 04.21.2014 2:45pm


Jaran
I'm going to try SCIENCE!



The Sept
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
I dunno, from what I saw she kept alternating between reciprocating and pushing him away. It doesn't magically make it not-rape, but it does make it more complex than simply  "Jaime is a horrible dude." If you haven't already figured out that Cersei and Jaime are the ultimate "it's complicated", you haven't been paying much attention.




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0
 04.21.2014 2:52pm


Kal
yes



Regardless of what their relationship is, the scene ends on 
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
Cersei whimpering "it's not right, it's not righ" as she is pinned on the ground, Jaime aggressively pounding at her while repeating "I don't care I don't care

I don't care if they intended it to come off as "complicated" or "ambiguous", there's no way that one scene could be interpreted as anything other than rape and I find it even more gross that the director tries to justify it and then go on to call it the favorite scene he's done.

Goes to show just how many people have no idea what constitutes rape.




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0
 04.21.2014 3:26pm
Thread Creator

reido
(\/)(o,,,o)(\/)



Book talk!  And explicit sex talk!
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
In the book it's--at best--ambigiously rapey.  These are complicated characters in a complicated relationship in a complicated situation.

These are people who are used to breaking taboos and sneaking around and getting it on the sly.  A little rough danger sex is par for the course for them, by the very nature of their incestuous relationship.  They do not have, by any stretch of the definition, a healthy sexual relationship.

In the book, Cersei does get into it (this is, after all, the first time they've sene each other in years(?)--which is different in the show), after initially resisting.    She spurs him on vocally.  She uses her hands to guide him inside (explicitly described in the text) (which, obviously, is harder to put on TV).  She calls his name and urges him.  The ambiguity isn't as much in the act itself, but in the emotions on both sides, and it's not hard to draw a line between how Cersei treats Jaime here with how she treated Robert in their marriage bed, especially when after the act she goes cold again.  It becomes ambigious as to whether or not she actually wants it or if she's just letting him have his way to get it over with, again, much like Robert.  Cersei has a degree of control, even if she's using that control to give in to something she may or may not actually want.

The show is nothing but "no", "don't", "it's not right", and "I don't care".  And--oh yeah--in the show she has explicitly told him that their relationship is over.  So at this point they're not even "together" romantically, to use simplified terms.  Now, it could be argued that everything I said about the book version (of this awful, awkward, gross scene) could hold true to the show.  It's possible that Cersei's physical actions indicate that she's really into it even when she's saying "no".  But if that's the case, then the director has failed to show that completely.  If the scene was really meant to show--and I hesitate to even use this phrase--consentual rape play, then their film direction is absolutely inept because that's not what was on the screen.

What was on the screen was a man, overpowering a vulnerable woman, and having intercourse with her while she says, repeatedly, "no" and "it's not right".  And the man says, "I don't care."

And while this is happening the soundtrack is essentially nothing but sinister string music.  At first I thought, "Wow, that's hilarious, the incest is getting sinister music cues, that's a nice touch."  But then Cersei never gave any form of consent, and the music made so much more sense.


I go now to my feed reader, fully expecting Tumblr to have a fucking field day with this shit.




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0
 04.21.2014 7:25pm


Kellios
Yikes and away!



...Yeah, that scene was way more uncomfortable.

(book and show differences/light spoilers)

Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
The way I interpreted in the book was far more akin to a hate-sex between couples sort of thing than outright rape. Cersei in the books does consent eventually (which, granted, is an entirely other can of worms about Jaime's intentions before she consents), and I think her biggest deal was more being so out in the public about it, as oppose to having sex with Jaime in a more private setting (like either of their rooms). It was hugely ambiguous, and uncomfortable on that level.

This had very little ambiguity; it was rape. If the director says it becomes consenual at the end, then it failed in coming across on screen. I did not feel like it had the hate-sex vibe to it - and it was much, much, much darker than it was in the books. It was an uncomfortable scene to begin with, but this made it so much worse.


Here's the actual book passage, for those curious:
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
??You shall,? Cersei promised . ??There??s to be a trial. When you hear all he did, you??ll want him dead as much as I do.? She touched his face. ??I was lost without you, Jaime. I was afraid the Starks would send me your head. I could not have borne that.? She kissed him. A light kiss, the merest brush of her lips on his, but he could feel her tremble as he slid his arms around her. ??I am not whole without you.?
 
There was no tenderness in the kiss he returned to her, only hunger. Her mouth opened for his tongue.
 
??No,? she said weakly when his lips moved down her neck, ??not here. The septons ??
 
??The Others can take the septons.? He kissed her again, kissed her silent, kissed her until she moaned . Then he knocked the candles aside and lifted her up onto the Mother??s altar, pushing up her skirts and the silken shift beneath. She pounded on his chest with feeble fists, murmuring about the risk, the danger, about their father, about the septons, about the wrath of gods. He never heard her. He undid his breeches and climbed up and pushed her bare white legs apart. One hand slid up her thigh and underneath her smallclothes. When he tore them away, he saw that her moon??s blood was on her, but it made no difference.
 
??Hurry,? she was whispering now, ??quickly, quickly, now, do it now, do me now. Jaime Jaime Jaime.? Her hands helped guide him. ??Yes,? Cersei said as he thrust, ??my brother, sweet brother, yes, like that, yes, I have you, you??re home now, you??re home now, you??re home.? She kissed his ear and stroked his short bristly hair. Jaime lost himself in her flesh. He could feel Cersei??s heart beating in time with his own, and the wetness of blood and seed where they were joined.
 
But no sooner were they done than the queen said, ??Let me up. If we are discovered like this ?? Reluctantly he rolled away and helped her off the altar. The pale marble was smeared with blood. Jaime wiped it clean with his sleeve, then bent to pick up the candles he had knocked over. Fortunately they had all gone out when they fell. If the sept had caught fire I might never have noticed.
 
??This was folly.? Cersei pulled her gown straight. ??With Father in the castle ? Jaime, we must be careful.?
 
??I am sick of being careful. The Targaryens wed brother to sister, why shouldn??t we do the same? Marry me, Cersei. Stand up before the realm and say it??s me you want. We??ll have our own wedding feast, and make another son in place of Joffrey.?
 




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0
 04.21.2014 7:48pm


Onyx
Butts
Administrator



I still think Drogo and Daenerys' wedding night back in S1 was a lot worse than this.  This was bad, but it was still kinda rapey in the books at first. Like Kellios said, it came off like hate-sex there, but still weirdly consensual. If they tried to capture that feeling in the show, they failed miserably.

With Drogo and Dany, the show's writers took a fairly tender and sweet scene under the stars into Drogo just mounting and raping Dany from behind really. That was horrible and I thought it was a complete character assassination of Drogo and Dany both. Though this scene does a good job of making Jaime come off as some carnal rapist as opposed to "just" someone who wants to consensually fuck his sister in the same room as their son's corpse.

Mind you, the ASOIAF books already take place in a really misogynstic place where rape is treated like just a thing that's expected to happen to women. But the showrunners don't need to make that point even more obvious by putting in rape scenes that didn't happen in the books.




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0
 04.22.2014 12:41am
 (Edited on 04.22.2014 at 12:57am)

Nelfichu
I've been there, hombre.



Sept:
Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
It's failure on the director and editors for sure. Everyone (the director, the guy that plays Jaime) says that it turns consensual, but that's not what came across on screen.

That whole scene has ruffled some feathers in the ASOIAF subreddit. A lot of the defenders of the scene claim the book version is 100% rape (disguised by Jaime's point of view), and although I don't really buy into that, someone did make the good point that this is the same guy who attempted to murder a little boy in the first episode. Jaime's not an evil sociopath like Ramsay or Joffrey, but he's certainly not a white knight either, no matter how much he reforms.


And from Martin himself:

Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
Since a lot of people have been emailing me about this, however, I will reply... but please, take any further discussion of the show to one of the myriad on-line forums devoted to that. I do not want long detailed dissections and debates about the TV series here on my blog.

As for your question... I think the "butterfly effect" that I have spoken of so often was at work here. In the novels, Jaime is not present at Joffrey's death, and indeed, Cersei has been fearful that he is dead himself, that she has lost both the son and the father/ lover/ brother. And then suddenly Jaime is there before her. Maimed and changed, but Jaime nonetheless. Though the time and place is wildly inappropriate and Cersei is fearful of discovery, she is as hungry for him as he is for her. 

The whole dynamic is different in the show, where Jaime has been back for weeks at the least, maybe longer, and he and Cersei have been in each other's company on numerous occasions, often quarreling. The setting is the same, but neither character is in the same place as in the books, which may be why Dan & David played the sept out differently. But that's just my surmise; we never discussed this scene, to the best of my recollection. 

Also, I was writing the scene from Jaime's POV, so the reader is inside his head, hearing his thoughts. On the TV show, the camera is necessarily external. You don't know what anyone is thinking or feeling, just what they are saying and doing. 

If the show had retained some of Cersei's dialogue from the books, it might have left a somewhat different impression -- but that dialogue was very much shaped by the circumstances of the books, delivered by a woman who is seeing her lover again for the first time after a long while apart during which she feared he was dead. I am not sure it would have worked with the new timeline.

That's really all I can say on this issue. The scene was always intended to be disturbing... but I do regret if it has disturbed people for the wrong reasons.




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0
 04.22.2014 1:22am


Zubis
Registered Member



To be perfectly blunt about this

Spoiler: Move your mouse over the container to reveal.
The amount of people who don't like this scene - not because it's rape, but because it's not "true to the arc" in the books - is pretty disgusting.




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