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*UNMARKED SPOILERS ALL BOOKS* Game of Thrones |OT| - Season 7 - Sundays on HBO

Judging from the Alx Shift X video
I don't think there would any teleportation on this one :)

You have to know how to set it up.

E03: Euron brings the Sand Snakes before Cersei.

E04: Realising the power of the plot-convenient teleportation, Dany ends the episode by stating that she has a plan that requires ALL the Sand Snakes and then stares into the middle distance with that smug look that she gets. BOOM, E05 has to open with them back with Dany.
 

kirblar

Member
Let's take a look at the prophecy:



"Sun rises in the west and sets in the east." This already happened in the books (Quentyn Martell, who was omitted from the show). "The seas go dry": IIRC, in the last Dany chapter in book 5 where she gets back her menstruation (or possibly has another miscarriage TBF) Dany notes that the Dothraki Sea is going yellow. The Dothraki Sea is going dry. So two parts of the prophecy could be interpreted as having already came true. Not sure about "Mountains blow in the wind like leaves" though.

But yeah, the book prophecy could definitely be interpreted as her becoming fertile again. First time I read Dany's final Dance chapter, that was the impression I got
"Mountains blow in the wind like leaves"
I'll give you one guess as to what this is referring to.
 
I have preached for years that the show and the novels had a villain problem since the end of ASOS.
the night king/others are a faceless force of nature, the boltons and cersei are incompetent and bland buffoons compared to Tywin.

Now after many years of distance and after the show covered the same content, killing off Tywin was just a huge dramatic failure of GRRM. No one could fill the hole he left, not in westeros and not in the dramatic plot of the saga. the result is the disarranged, boring mess we had in AFFC/ADWD where you don't care about anyone winning anymore.

They should have made Dany/Tyrion the villains and I hope they will do that in this season, otherwise this will just become a fantasy Walking Dead clusterfuck.

edit: and bran of course, remember he is the big bad

IMO it's less of a villain problem and more of a focus problem. When Tywin was alive the war was in full effect and we got to see it on page across multiple POVs. From battles, battle reports, scheming, strategy, etc etc. Catelyn and Robb's deaths are the first events that lead to a reduced amount of "on-page war shit." Even if Tywin had lived, AFFC would have featured many chapters about the process of the Riverlands surrendering.

The end of ASOS feels like an act break. The next act starts way too slow in terms of moving pieces where they need to go, which results in lots of travel-logues. Tywin being alive wouldn't fix that. The issue is Martin's focus. More and more interesting things start happening off page (Loras' siege of Dragonstone, Hardholme come to mind first). It takes too long to set up the next phase of the war, as well as the next villain: Euron. Based on that Damphair TWOW sample chapter it seems pretty clear that he's the real deal.

(I really liked AFFC/ADWD, I'm not shitting on them. They ultimately got the story where they needed to go...but just a few changes could have made them significantly better. Specifically shitcanning Brienne and including at least ONE battle in Dance.)
 

Gigglepoo

Member
Totally agree, Cesare Borgia. If I'm not mistaken, The Battle of Fire was supposed to be in Dance but was cut for space reasons. I loved the post-War of the 5 Kings reports. Shows the cost of war which the show mostly ignores.

It may be closer to the book that way, but imagine the uproar from show only fans.

I really hope it happens now.

It won't. Tormund is being sent to Eastwatch (which is totally smart!) while Karhold and Great Hearth are being defended by children. Jon should have married Alys to Harry the Heir or something, reward the Vale for winning a lost battle.
 

jett

D-Member
Let's take a look at the prophecy:



"Sun rises in the west and sets in the east." This already happened in the books (Quentyn Martell, who was omitted from the show). "The seas go dry": IIRC, in the last Dany chapter in book 5 where she gets back her menstruation (or possibly has another miscarriage TBF) Dany notes that the Dothraki Sea is going yellow. The Dothraki Sea is going dry. So two parts of the prophecy could be interpreted as having already came true. Not sure about "Mountains blow in the wind like leaves" though.

But yeah, the book prophecy could definitely be interpreted as her becoming fertile again. First time I read Dany's final Dance chapter, that was the impression I got

Where does shatting come into tho the equation
 

Speevy

Banned
Where does shatting come into tho the equation

giphy.gif
 
Let's take a look at the prophecy:



"Sun rises in the west and sets in the east." This already happened in the books (Quentyn Martell, who was omitted from the show). "The seas go dry": IIRC, in the last Dany chapter in book 5 where she gets back her menstruation (or possibly has another miscarriage TBF) Dany notes that the Dothraki Sea is going yellow. The Dothraki Sea is going dry. So two parts of the prophecy could be interpreted as having already came true. Not sure about "Mountains blow in the wind like leaves" though.

But yeah, the book prophecy could definitely be interpreted as her becoming fertile again. First time I read Dany's final Dance chapter, that was the impression I got

"seas going dry" could also refer to the seas getting frozen, if it is supposed to allude something to happen for real. but the thing about these prophecies to begin with is that I thought GRRM cares little for prophecies
 
And, yes, I know you all want to know about THE WINDS OF WINTER too. I've seen some truly weird reports about WOW on the internet of late, by 'journalists' who make their stories up out of whole cloth. I don't know which story is more absurd, the one that says the book is finished and I've been sitting on it for some nefarious reason, or the one that says I have no pages. Both 'reports' are equally false and equally moronic. I am still working on it, I am still months away (how many? good question), I still have good days and bad days, and that's all I care to say. Whether WINDS or the first volume of FIRE AND BLOOD will be the first to hit the bookstores is hard to say at this juncture, but I do think you will have a Westeros book from me in 2018... and who knows, maybe two. A boy can dream...
http://grrm.livejournal.com/544709.html

No Winds this year...and maybe no Winds next year. Congratulations. But hey, more fake history! I remember a couple years ago when Martin was saying we wouldn't get Fire & Blood until after he completed the series. Now it's probably coming out next year. Amazing.
 
http://grrm.livejournal.com/544709.html

No Winds this year...and maybe no Winds next year. Congratulations. But hey, more fake history! I remember a couple years ago when Martin was saying we wouldn't get Fire & Blood until after he completed the series. Now it's probably coming out next year. Amazing.

He enjoys writing these history lore books far more than the messy and frustrating tangle that is the main series. I'm not surprised we're getting Fire & Blood early.
 

Gigglepoo

Member
He expanded the scope to the point where he genuinely doesn't know how to fix it.

Seems like it. Shit is super complicated. I'm willing to wait as long as it takes for his to realize his vision. Even if another book never comes out, it's still the best fantasy series I've ever read.
 
He really should have gone ahead with his original plan of a 5 year time skip.

The way George delivers details of the history of westeros could have been employed to describe major events in the time period.
 

John Dunbar

correct about everything
we can always look back on those wonderful days when everything would go smoothly after "the meereenese knot" was untangled.
 

jett

D-Member
http://grrm.livejournal.com/544709.html

No Winds this year...and maybe no Winds next year. Congratulations. But hey, more fake history! I remember a couple years ago when Martin was saying we wouldn't get Fire & Blood until after he completed the series. Now it's probably coming out next year. Amazing.

I can only imagine what the comments in his blog would say if he allowed them lol.

I can't say I'm surprised. I've given up on the books myself.
 

Turin

Banned
I have preached for years that the show and the novels had a villain problem since the end of ASOS.
the night king/others are a faceless force of nature, the boltons and cersei are incompetent and bland buffoons compared to Tywin.

Now after many years of distance and after the show covered the same content, killing off Tywin was just a huge dramatic failure of GRRM. No one could fill the hole he left, not in westeros and not in the dramatic plot of the saga. the result is the disarranged, boring mess we had in AFFC/ADWD where you don't care about anyone winning anymore.

They should have made Dany/Tyrion the villains and I hope they will do that in this season, otherwise this will just become a fantasy Walking Dead clusterfuck.

edit: and bran of course, remember he is the big bad

Roose had potential but there's a risk of him being too similar to Tywin.
 
but maybe the development and subsequent enormous success of the show has slayed some of his incentive.
It could be. He's also gotten older and he's far past his writing prime. Even if he finishes TWOW, he'll be in his 70s writing ADOS (which probably won't be the last book) and the track record for writers in that advanced age is not great.

i thought he already had the ending planned out?
He he has a broad idea of how things end, but doesn't have the steps to get there planned out. He doesn't outline. Hence all the problems he's run into discovery writing a multi million word epic fantasy story written over several decades.
 

jfkgoblue

Member
http://grrm.livejournal.com/544709.html

No Winds this year...and maybe no Winds next year. Congratulations. But hey, more fake history! I remember a couple years ago when Martin was saying we wouldn't get Fire & Blood until after he completed the series. Now it's probably coming out next year. Amazing.

I wish that he would just be honest to his fans and say that he is never finishing the series and that we best enjoy how HBO does it because that is all we are getting.
 

Speevy

Banned
If GRRM wrote 150 words a day for 6 years, he could write the amount of an average ASOIAF novel.

For reference, if you're reading this, you've probably written more than 150 words a day.

Now obviously it takes more thought to write a massive novel than a Neogaf post, but if you're an author who's done one of these five times already, it should be much easier than an average person.
 
You think he's lying that he's writing the book with some good days and some bad days?

There's absolutely more going on than he's saying otherwise he wouldn't have been a few months away 2 years ago and now not even certain he can make 2018.

Though I suppose it was the same story with ADWD, this time it's just taking even longer.
 
It could be. He's also gotten older and he's far past his writing prime. Even if he finishes TWOW, he'll be in his 70s writing ADOS (which probably won't be the last book) and the track record for writers in that advanced age is not great.


He he has a broad idea of how things end, but doesn't have the steps to get there planned out. He doesn't outline. Hence all the problems he's run into discovery writing a multi million word epic fantasy story written over several decades.

well like others in this thread have said, if he doesn't feel like finishing the rest of them i'd rather he simply states as such.. it's his life, he doesn't have to finish them if he doesn't have the will for it. we are at least getting an ending to the story with the hbo show
 

Gigglepoo

Member
There's absolutely more going on than he's saying otherwise he wouldn't have been a few months away 2 years ago and now not even certain he can make 2018.

Though I suppose it was the same story with ADWD, this time it's just taking even longer.

I just think it's hard to write a book. And his books are really complicated. He thinks he's got something figured out and then realized it won't work. Or he gets a better idea. There doesn't have to be anything nefarious.

Plus, he writes and edits other books, too. He gets distracted or frustrated then works on another project for awhile. He's just a human. As long as he's still plugging away, that's good for me. I love the direction he's taken things post-SoS so I'm fine waiting. Excellence takes time.
 
Gigglepoo, has anyone ever told you you picked a funny username

I chuckle in my head every time I read that you were the last person that posted

(I mean no disrespect btw)
 

Wvrs

Member
If GRRM wrote 150 words a day for 6 years, he could write the amount of an average ASOIAF novel.

For reference, if you're reading this, you've probably written more than 150 words a day.

Now obviously it takes more thought to write a massive novel than a Neogaf post, but if you're an author who's done one of these five times already, it should be much easier than an average person.

Writing fiction is a completely different process; it's art, whereas forum posts are essentially a written mode of speech.
 
I just think it's hard to write a book. And his books are really complicated. He thinks he's got something figured out and then realized it won't work. Or he gets a better idea. There doesn't have to be anything nefarious.

Plus, he writes and edits other books, too. He gets distracted or frustrated then works on another project for awhile. He's just a human. As long as he's still plugging away, that's good for me. I love the direction he's taken things post-SoS so I'm fine waiting. Excellence takes time.

I don't think there is anything nefarious, but the excellent takes time argument doesn't really work either. Continuous delays like that are usually the result of problems in the writing process and aren't the sign of great books in the making. ADWD is kind of a rushed and unpolished mess and it took 6+ years.
 

Gigglepoo

Member
Gigglepoo, has anyone ever told you you picked a funny username

I chuckle in my head every time I read that you were the last person that posted

(I mean no disrespect btw)

Thanks! I chose the name so people would take my posts seriously.

I don't think there is anything nefarious, but the excellent takes time argument doesn't really work either. Continuous delays like that are usually the result of problems in the writing process and aren't the sign of great books in the making.

It really comes down to how you felt about Feast and Dance given than books took forever. I loved them so Martin has proven to me that he can excel given more time. But if you don't love those books (or just think they aren't as good as the first three), I understand getting frustrated. But, for those people, I'd assume they gave up on the books years ago if they don't like where things are headed.

I'm almost always in favor of artists taking as much time as they need. Delays usually make me happy (though I really really really want Winds now...)
 
Thanks! I chose the name so people would take my posts seriously.



It really comes down to how you felt about Feast and Dance given than books took forever. I loved them so Martin has proven to me that he can excel given more time. But if you don't love those books (or just think they aren't as good as the first three), I understand getting frustrated. But, for those people, I'd assume they gave up on the books years ago if they don't like where things are headed.

I'm almost always in favor of artists taking as much time as they need. Delays usually make me happy (though I really really really want Winds now...)

That's fair. Though I'm not frustrated either. 10 years ago I may have been, but I've long since resigned myself to the reality of the situation with these books.
 

Brakke

Banned
i thought he already had the ending planned out?

There's "the ending" and then there's actually getting forty characters to some resolution. Like I don't doubt he knows how the living vs the dead will sort out, but does he know what the heck he's going to do with Penny or Dick Crabb of Crackclaw Point*?

* I know he's dead.
 
I've said it before but I firmly believe the problem is he has too many chapters/pages with no end in sight. All the POV characters being back together requires a certain pace - ie, ASOS' pace. It's simply impossible to slow walk so many characters in one book, and I get the impression that's what he's doing. If I could reference some minor Arianne spoilers: he has released two of her chapters. The first one starts with her traveling to meet someone. The second ends with her arriving at her destination, but she still hasn't met the person she set out to meet. That's almost 30 pages with little to no plot movement (although some interesting plot hints/dialogue/etc).

Some characters are set up for immediate action/plot progression. Tyrion, Barristan, Victarion, Melisandre, Jamie, Cersei, etc. Then you have Sam, Arianne, Dany, Bran, Sansa, and others with slower stories. Minus 300 or so pages that were originally in Dance, and Martin suddenly has 1200 manuscript pages to get all these stories to some type of penultimate position to set up the last book. I just don't see it happening unless he stops world building, stops adding on side plots, etc and just focuses on ending what he has. Clearly he's not doing that...
 

Moff

Member
oh dear, "months away", "maybe more", "maybe 2018", "FIRE AND BLOOD"

I don't even know why this bothers me anymore

I always said he should enjoy his fame and wealth when he is still fit enough to do all he wants. But it's obvious he has other problems as well. He likes to get shit done, just not these books.
And I can understand, I mean take a huge twist like Hold the Door, which is obviously straight from his mind, it's way too good for D&D. But how does he feel writing it? He must feel like he is writing the novel to the show. releasing 4+ years later. What is going through his mind writing it? A *twist* the whole world already knows about? And that is just one example, I expect season 6 and 7 to have more of those. I would not be surprised if it ends up way different just because he doesn't want to use the same as the show, even if that was his own original idea.
 
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