Game of Thrones 3x08-3x10

[oyceter]

Spoilers for the series AND all the books

Well, the relentless narrative drive that primarily got me through seasons 1 and 2 is mostly gone, so unless CB really wants to watch, I don't know how much more I'll be watching. This is also where I started losing interest in the books as well.

I am mostly bored by the action up north, largely because it is one of the more epic-fantasy-esque part of the series. That, and Jon and Bran don't interest me. I am warming up to Sam now that they are back at Castle Black (roadtrip narratives also usually don't interest me). I also hadn't realized that the "I am yours and you are mine" that Ygritte kept saying are from the Westeros wedding vows, or possibly some shared culture with the Wildlings, since she holds by it? Who knows?

I read in the ASOIAF wiki that she dies, and I'm very much hoping that the scene with her shooting arrows into Jon replaces that, because it's not like the series needs even more dead women. CB's main commentary was yelling, "Jon Snow, you are the world's worst boyfriend!" at the screen. And of course he and Bran just narrowly miss each other.

I love how the entire series is basically "Let's have the Starks narrowly miss each other!" with a large helping of "And let's make every bad thing ever happen to the Starks!"

And with that, the Red Wedding! I was not as traumatized as I had feared? Largely because I'd already read all the episode reactions when it aired. Well, that, and I closed my eyes through a great deal of the violence. I thought the way they wrote it and filmed it was very good, and Michelle Fairley indeed does a wonderful job. I also liked the touch of showing the day after, with the Frey servants having to clean up the hall as Walder Frey gloats. CB was pretty traumatized, as he has not read the books.

Also, Roose Bolton and Stannis Baratheon look exactly alike.

And poor Arya! I didn't realize they actually filmed the thing with the wolf's head on Robb's body; that was the part that nauseated me when I first read it in the books, and it's still awful. And now, Arya has commited her first deliberate hands-on murder...

I liked the Tyrion-Sansa scenes a lot, and THANK YOU whoever decided to not film Sansa part naked. THANK YOU. Also, thank you for the reminder that she is FOURTEEN. Given how the show is about female sexuality and nudity, I was really not sure what they were planning on. Also, Shae, take Varys' money and get out while you can! And yay for her fierce defense of Sansa.

Tywin disciplining Joffrey is never not hilarious. Also, I love his top at the wedding. How come everyone else wears various kinds of sofa upholstery while Tywin gets black leather and the like? ... because he's Tywin Lannister, I suppose.

Thank you writers for no more Theon torture. I guess with Theon and Gendry, the show has probably upped its male nudity as vulnerability quotient by 3000%, but I find that I am still not particularly fond of sexual violence or issues of consent. Also, I am guessing the Gendry-Melisande thing doesn't happen in the books, since in comments to a previous entry, shewhohashope said that it's starring a 13-year-old kid. I suppose they had to have more gratuitous Melisande sexuality and nudity, with the bonus of threats to the penis! It seems to be a theme this season...

In that vein, I was so annoyed when they had Dany getting out of the bathtub as well. I do like that she does it and gets a robe in front of what's-his-name and doesn't look threatened at all, but given all the rape jokes the second son guy was going on about earlier, not really in the best of taste. And are they going for a Dany-what's-his-name romance?

And then there are the billion grateful slaves hoisting Dany on their shoulders and calling her Mother! Her storyline has been rife with What These People Need Is a Honky throughout, but I think this has been the most egregious example to date. Sigh.

Oh Davos. I never really warmed up to you in the books, probably because I was reading as a high school student and not very into the non-nobility. I really love him in the show, though, particularly his scenes with Gendry and with Stannis' daughter. (CB was protesting Davos being about to sound out "enough" while stumbling on "night.")

And Jaime and Cersei are reunited! I think this might be the first actual reunion in the show? Aside from Ned and Cat reuniting in King's Landing way back in S1. I even awww-ed a bit, despite obviously not rooting for them as a couple.

Yay Yara! I do not actually remember Asha and the Kingsmoot stuff from the books, though I wish they had some of that, because it sounded interesting, but I am glad she gets to be active. Aside from that, it feels like all the Theon scenes from this season were put in to a) keep the actor on board and b) provide gross torture porn.

Please feel free to liberally discuss spoilers in the comments! As you have all probably noticed, I am not particularly attached to this series and am enjoying learning about stuff via fannish osmosis.

Comments

[netgirl_y2k]

I suspect the decision not to show Sansa naked had more to do with the actress not being eighteen yet than any of the showrunners deciding to take the highroad. Still, THANK THE OLD GODS AND THE NEW.

Yeah, I totally agree that the Theon scenes had the feeling of being there to keep the actor onboard. Especially irksome, seeing as Yara's return showed that you can bench a character for most of a series and still bring them back to great effect.

[marina]

I think it was more about the fact that Theon's actor was a "regular cast" actor so depending on his contract they couldn't just not give him any scenes (just like they gave Jaime a ton of scenes even when he was a non-character in the books because they wanted the actor there full time) whereas Yara was a guest star so they just bring her on whenever.

[oyceter]

Yeah, I was pretty sure the lack of nudity was due to the actress, but still, thank the stars and everything else!! Dear GoT: it's not a good sign when people are not actually sure if you would put in underage nudity or not.

[marina]

Yeah, I stopped caring about anything up north once Jon Snow was done with his Full Metal Jacket training crap. Pretty much everything after that is just "what the fuck ever" to me. It never gets interesting and never gains a point.

It's so sad and fucked up that the show responses to criticism of there being too much sexualized violence against women by putting in Theon and Gendry scenes, both because they don't actually make anything better and because the violence Gendry and Theon are subjected to is still so, so different from the violence the women endure. First of all, they're not nameless or unimportant characters, their torture has context and narrative, second all of it is so much "fear of damage to the penis" instead of "being penetrated without your consent" - it has entirely different connotations, imo. It's like saying it's OK that women are half naked in comics because men are half naked too. Yes but LOOK AT THE NATURE OF THAT NUDITY and at how their bodies are drawn. In the same way - yes it's (somewhat) sexualized violence with Theon and Gendry but it's SO DIFFERENT than what we see with women.

I was also shocked at how much I liked Davos. In the books I skipped 90% of his chapters because he was so boring.

I'm really happy Jaime and Cersei are reuntied but... I'm very O_o at the show doing it so early. Jaime and Cersei reuniting is actually one of my favorite scenes from the books, because it happens right after Joffrey is killed and Cersei is standing by his grave after the funeral, and then Jaime kind of comes along out of nowhere and they're so happy to see each other, and both so in need of comfort, that they fuck right there, on their son's grave, while Cersei is on her period. IT'S JUST. Such a perfect encapsulation of Martin's writing, lol.

So, first I'm disappointed that we're robbed of that scene (IDK they might still do it? Would give them an excuse to slip it though) and plus it kind of fucks up their entire dynamic to me! Like, Cersei great drama was that Joffrey was killed when Jaime was away. There's no one to support her, no one to avenge Joffrey, just, she's still missing half her own person and there are consequences to that (it also impacts her attitude towards Brienne). And now he's going to be there for Joffrey's death? Buh? And also the whole point with Brienne is that she's in King's Landing to take Sansa back to Catelyn, and in the books by the time she and Jaime show up Joffrey's been dead a while, Tyrion's been accused of his murder (and how is that going to play out exactly? Cersei and Tyrion have an entirely different dynamic once Jaime's in the mix) and Sansa's been given to Littlefinger and taken to the Vale or whatever. So, Brienne's like "sup Cersei I brought your brother back now give me Sansa" and Cerise's like "lol sorry". Whereas if Brienne's already in King's Landing now... how's that going to play out? O_o IDK IDK it's just all very weird.

[oyceter]

Ah, I didn't remember all that re: Jaime and Cersei and Joffrey's death! I do actually like that S3 is starting to deviate from the books more, even though I don't always like what they end up doing (cutting down Cat's role, frex).

And very yes to all the Threats to the Penis versus rape threats.