I did not realize that was Roose Bolton. I pictured him bigger with slimmy, powdery white skin. Spoiler I wonder if he will make it to Harrenhall or if they will ignore that part?
Spoiler I'm willing to bet he'll make it there eventually. There's no way that they cut Weasel Soup, and Harrenhal has to change hands eventually (and I would think Roose has to be there next season to send Jaime on to KL). It actually makes more sense for Roose to take Arya as his cupbearer if she had previously served in that capacity for Tywin.
Yeah, not as striking as I think. But then again Robert was supposed to be 6'6" and the Mountain is supposed to be 8' tall.
I think the shadow birth was supposed to be jarring and out of place. Go back and watch Davos' reaction. The "Lord of Light" is pretty new to Westeros where the Old Gods (Ned's religion) and The Seven (Cat's religion) are dominant, though the Ironmen worship the Drowned God (Greyjoys). R'hllor doesn't have many followers in Westeros and not many put any faith in him. Stannis has bought into it and tried to force it on his followers, but many (like Davos) are resistant. It's not surprising that Davos seeing Melisandre give birth to a shadow demon shocks him. It should. Just like it's a shock to us, it's a shock to him because that kind of thing has been non-existant in Westeros.
It's definitely very faithful to the books, and that includes the birth. But yeah, I felt a little bit the same way when I read the books... that happened and I felt like "hey, that's cheating/cheap." It's sort of funny how we all have our own lines of what we accept and what we consider cheesy fantasy though. I was reading the Berserk manga (FANTASTIC, by the way), and I was all cool with the fantasy elements of it, demon holocausts and living creepy amulet things, etc. But then at some point Gattsu has this party of people following him around, and they get to this part where someone gives them all these magic weapons... for example a sword imbued with wind spirits. On the one hand, that's not any less plausible than demons and living amulets. But it just struck me wrong and took away from the grittiness of it to me. Thankfully, I don't think that effect ever becomes pronounced in the Martin books.
By the by, did anyone else think the Joffrey scene with the whores was just god-awfully unnecessary? It seems to only have two purposes: further establish that he's a sadistic b*stard, and add another scene where HBO gets to show nudity. Well, his craziness has CLEARLY been adequately established, and I would think the last scene alone would fulfill their per-episode nudity quota. Couldn't they have left the extra Joff scene out, and instead taken the time to explain Storm's End a bit more? Some of the added scenes are great... this one, and the Littlefinger vs Cersei scene, notsomuch. Other than that scene, good stuff again though.
I think it's going to be important that they establish the cost of Mel birthing the shadow. In the books it's pretty clear that she's literally sucking the life out of Stannis, and that if they were to make another one it would probably kill him. Otherwise you'll just have people wondering why they don't just make a bunch of shadows to kill joffrey and everyone defending Kings Landing.
i agree, they've missed out on A LOT, they did a good job but they could have made this epic, unnecessary scenes was my exact sentiment.
I thought the point of it was not only how ****ed up Joffery is, but to show him striking back at his uncle (they were to go back to Tyrion when they were done), something we never really see much of, even in the books (which I always thought was odd).
The original actor for The Mountain WAS a big dude. I think the same dude who Achilles killed to start the movie "Troy". (I'd have to check.) Don't know why they replaced him.
Couldn't agree more. The actress playing Ros is bem quente, rapaz, but they're wasting scenes on her. The books are already pared down to make 10 hours (probably more like 9 hours, since each episode seems to end well short of the hour mark, plus you have the 2-minute opening credit sequence). There's enough skin in scenes that flow with the storyline; enough! (But HBO needs their skin/ratings quota.)
The original guy who played the Mountain was cast in the Hobbit. Maybe they'll bring him back in later seasons. The new guy's the same height, but probably 50lbs lighter. He did tower over Charles Dance, who's 6'3"
I was reading that pic and kind of nodding my head in agreement and then busted out laughing when I got to Hodor.
I just started watching season 1 two days ago and I'm caught up to last episode of season 2. I hope I'm not the only one but does anyone else read wikipedia episode review after? It clears things up much better for me and helps me out with the characters
There are lots of reviews that come out after each episode James Hibbards are usually pretty good here's last week's recap
