5 ms·

I agree that D&D are plotters now. The real problem is that they were panters for every season up to these last 2. They'd look at book characters and think "not

by joecot 7y ago

I agree that D&D are plotters now. The real problem is that they were panters for every season up to these last 2. They'd look at book characters and think "not that important" and leave them out, or wildly change events from the books to put out something that seemed more dramatic. But like a kid who partied too hard senior year and found out his final project is due in a week, they seem to have woken up one day and realized they'd moved way, way too far from the source material, and then just jerked the wheel to steer it back in a straight line towards the intended book ending. Characters who've developed differently in the show than in the books? Whiplashed back to the book versions. The Night King taken down in a single episode, with no real understanding of what he was trying to do, or what any of it really meant. Dany destroying all of King's Landing, but instead of a culmination of increasingly morally grey choices as she takes the throne from a loved leader, she's murdering civilians who don't even like Cersei because a bunch of dudes kept saying she was crazy (or something). Frankly I'd have preferred they just made up some hollywood ending that vaguely fit the direction they'd brought the show, instead of giving us all whiplash.

dragonwriter 7y ago
> Dany destroying all of King's Landing, but instead of a culmination of increasingly morally grey choices as she takes the throne from a loved leader, she's murdering civilians who don't even like Cersei because a bunch of dudes kept saying she was crazy (or something). From, like, season 1 on Dany is established to be explosively vindictive, especially to perceived betrayal by those who are either personally trusted or whom she feels owe her duty, as well as desperate for (and violence tempered only by) receiving love on both an individual and mass level. And those factors are directly the source of the violence she turns to in S8E5. The direct lead up has been decidedly unsubtle and started before S8. It wasn't a culmination of increasingly morally gray choices, it was a simple continuation of a pattern of behavior that's been constant the whole show combined with a pattern of increasing erosion of the factors that were previously established as mitigators combined with an increasing accumulation of factors previously established as triggers. That it was headed for something like this has been evident for some time, that it was likely to erupt at the particular time it did against the particular target was clear in S8E4 with Missandei’s killing even before they laid on more triggers in the part of S8E5 preceding the break.
- doubletgl 7y ago
  You can rationalize this all you want, it felt out of character and rushed to most people.
- orwin 7y ago
  I stopped following GoT since S05E04 or around that so i did not see nor do i understand what's all this noise; but from the writing lessons i took years ago i learned that foreshadowing is NOT character development. If you use foreshadowing, especially if it's not subtle, you still have to "earn" your twist (see: Frodo if front of Mt Doom, Gollum). You can only foreshadow and drop hints about a character changes if you do those change away from the action (the protagonist that will change is away from the limited narrator), or if the spectator do not know the character that well (he is one of the antagonist). Let's compare to other "masterpieces" with a lot of public love. Does the character change feel as justified as Darth Vader's one in Return of the Jedi? Or even as Severus Rogue (Harry potter) change? Those change are not really well written imho (a bit too rushed for the 1rst one, a bit forced for the second, but that's only my opinion). If the character change in GOT is not at least on this level, i would understand why people are disapointed. The error GoT have done for me is from way back. The first few seasons used realistic plot, few plothole, believable and clever characters, pretty realistic choices and political stuff. My suspension of credulity bar was set pretty low. Season 4 was weird regarding time and distance, but still mostly believable (and the dialogs were really good too). But S05 broke my suspension of credulity almost every 10 minutes and that made the show a bit boring (imo). That's the issue for GoT: they did set the bar too high at first, then couldn't reach the same level again.
  - dragonwriter 7y ago
    The thing is Dany doesn't have a character change, just a change of location, available power, and other circumstances. She has a consistent pattern of “This is how she acts in in this kind for circumstance”. And then those triggering circumstances recur in a different time and place and when she has vastly more power. And she acts exactly the same way she always has. In fact, I'd argue that a distinguishing feature of GOT as a series (and ASOIAF, the book series) is that there is remarkably little character development in the narrative, and even further that a major theme of the narrative itself is that binary positive and negative character assessments tend to be made on the basis of circumstances when the same character in other circumstances would be assessed very differently, and that changes of circumstances are easily (and dangerously) mistaken for changes of character.

by joecot 7y ago

dragonwriter 7y ago

> Dany destroying all of King's Landing, but instead of a culmination of increasingly morally grey choices as she takes the throne from a loved leader, she's murdering civilians who don't even like Cersei because a bunch of dudes kept saying she was crazy (or something). From, like, season 1 on Dany is established to be explosively vindictive, especially to perceived betrayal by those who are either personally trusted or whom she feels owe her duty, as well as desperate for (and violence tempered only by) receiving love on both an individual and mass level. And those factors are directly the source of the violence she turns to in S8E5. The direct lead up has been decidedly unsubtle and started before S8. It wasn't a culmination of increasingly morally gray choices, it was a simple continuation of a pattern of behavior that's been constant the whole show combined with a pattern of increasing erosion of the factors that were previously established as mitigators combined with an increasing accumulation of factors previously established as triggers. That it was headed for something like this has been evident for some time, that it was likely to erupt at the particular time it did against the particular target was clear in S8E4 with Missandei’s killing even before they laid on more triggers in the part of S8E5 preceding the break.

doubletgl 7y ago
You can rationalize this all you want, it felt out of character and rushed to most people.
orwin 7y ago
I stopped following GoT since S05E04 or around that so i did not see nor do i understand what's all this noise; but from the writing lessons i took years ago i learned that foreshadowing is NOT character development. If you use foreshadowing, especially if it's not subtle, you still have to "earn" your twist (see: Frodo if front of Mt Doom, Gollum). You can only foreshadow and drop hints about a character changes if you do those change away from the action (the protagonist that will change is away from the limited narrator), or if the spectator do not know the character that well (he is one of the antagonist). Let's compare to other "masterpieces" with a lot of public love. Does the character change feel as justified as Darth Vader's one in Return of the Jedi? Or even as Severus Rogue (Harry potter) change? Those change are not really well written imho (a bit too rushed for the 1rst one, a bit forced for the second, but that's only my opinion). If the character change in GOT is not at least on this level, i would understand why people are disapointed. The error GoT have done for me is from way back. The first few seasons used realistic plot, few plothole, believable and clever characters, pretty realistic choices and political stuff. My suspension of credulity bar was set pretty low. Season 4 was weird regarding time and distance, but still mostly believable (and the dialogs were really good too). But S05 broke my suspension of credulity almost every 10 minutes and that made the show a bit boring (imo). That's the issue for GoT: they did set the bar too high at first, then couldn't reach the same level again.
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  The thing is Dany doesn't have a character change, just a change of location, available power, and other circumstances. She has a consistent pattern of “This is how she acts in in this kind for circumstance”. And then those triggering circumstances recur in a different time and place and when she has vastly more power. And she acts exactly the same way she always has. In fact, I'd argue that a distinguishing feature of GOT as a series (and ASOIAF, the book series) is that there is remarkably little character development in the narrative, and even further that a major theme of the narrative itself is that binary positive and negative character assessments tend to be made on the basis of circumstances when the same character in other circumstances would be assessed very differently, and that changes of circumstances are easily (and dangerously) mistaken for changes of character.