Amph A Song of Ice and Fire Discussion Thread

I think the soldier is Arthur Dayne. Reason being he's got a white bladed sword. IIRC, it was described as white in the books. It was called Dawn

 

No. If Winds doesn't come out until, say, August, it will still have been published faster than both Feast and Dance.

 

There is no way it is coming out this year.

 

Fixed.

 

Might be, what about the guy with Two swords?
Didn't Arthur Dayne have two swords?

I have no idea- I am no where near there in the books, still at the Purple Wedding.

 

Spoiler

That strikes me as the most likely explanation - Targaryen soldiers outside, with Arthur Dayne and the other Kingsguard inside, closely guarding L&J (not sure if that's exactly how it is in the books).
I also don't recall anything about Dayne making a habit of fighting with two swords.

The other explanation I've seen mentioned elsewhere is that they're in hiding, so not wearing full Kingsguard regalia, but I can't see a flashback being able to elaborate upon a detail like that.

No way it's Rhaegar, unless they're taking the screwing up of basic, well-known plotlines and details to a new level. I don't think we'll be seeing Rhaegar until next series, or the one after that.

 

Dayne only has the one sword, Dawn. And he should be wearing King's Guard armor, not Targareyen.

 

This will be a 2017 drop. Really can't see it coming out this year.

 

Who was it then who had two swords?
Howland Reed?
Someone did?

 

The sword in his right hand certainly looks like it could be Dawn (white blade, though covered with alot of blood). I guess he could have picked up the second sword during the fight. My point is about the armor.

 

At least the armor is white like it's supposed to be

 

Silver is not white.

 

Sorry, I worded that poorly. The Aug date was just to illustrate it could still be faster than Feast.

 

i did this GoT tattoo on my son today...

 

With the way the show has adapted the books I'm thankful if we get silver. It's close enough.

 

I think everyone's picking that brief shot apart to an extent that isn't required. It could be the 'legendary fighter' that casting calls referred to months ago, and which was assumed to be Ser Arthur Dayne - but they might have just wanted some badass swordfighter for a brief flashback scene, with no name mentioned.
Or the warrior in the shot could be some random Targ soldier outside, before the serious fight occurs inside, with Dayne saying "And now it begins", and Ned saying sadly, "No, now it ends."

Looking at the passage in the book itself, the fight between Ned & co. vs the Kingsguard does occur outside the TOJ - but there's no mention of anyone wielding two swords, let alone Arthur Dayne. Anything's possible, and I'm inclined to think that what's in the trailer is just a bit of random action.

Spoiler

In all honesty, that really just looks like some soldier who happens to be bearing the Targaryen insignia upon his breastplate - as any Targ soldier would in that era. His outfit looks like standard issue - no robe or cape, and TBH, helmet or not, he looks like a standard grunt.
He might be the best fighter in his unit, and puts up a vicious fight against Ned and his crew, but I don't believe he's a member of the Kingsguard. If we see that conflict in S6, it won't be in a trailer, and I think they'll have moved it inside (which, IIRC, they did with the comic book).

There's another detail to question - one which the show would happily walk over, but - did the armour of the Kingsguard itself bear the sigil of House Targaryen? According to the ASOIAF wiki, it didn't:

Yes, the show has changed the armour, ditching the white enamelled armour in favour of specifying them solely with white cloaks, but they still don't have house sigils - not Targaryen, not Baratheon. Just a predictable (and perfectly acceptable) crown.

 

Yeah. Okay then the two sword thing must have come from somewhere? Maybe it was from pre book history something I picked up in the World Of book?

 

Hahaha, I doubt anyone at the show bothered with TWOIAF. The two-sword thing is because their 12-year-old minds think that everything must be kewl. Their only use for the source material is when they need a crutch. They couldn't possibly rely on their originality-- maybe then the audience and most critics would realize that they're no-talent hacks. God forbid.

 

Well, pretty much. In Attack of the Clones, Anakin Skywalker briefly uses two lightsabers, as Obi-Wan's incapacitated, and his lightsaber is lying there. Opportunity for a bit of visual badassery, but it didn't become a signature move or anything like that, Anakin was back to one lightsaber in ROTS. Ditto LOTR - Aragorn is shown to fight with two daggers, but once he's got Anduril, he solely fights with that.

So yeah, all we're seeing in the trailer is some Targ-affiliated warrior being all awesome and keww - either by using two swords as standard, or picking up a dropped one and using it for an advantage. It might be Arthur Dayne, but I hope not, I'd rather this respected figure isn't portrayed as all ninja or anything like that - also given that he's known for wielding a sword (Dawn) forged out of the metal from a meteorite.

 

Aside from it being a flashback to Nederland at the time of the Rebellion, who knows what the specifics of the scene are. I think what resonates do strongly here is that for most book readers, we've just come to assume the worst of the show.

 

I do see that - and joking aside, at what point did that happen? Like many fans of ASOIAF, I did come to it via the show - we downloaded the first episode of GoT, then tore through S1&2 on Blu-Ray in about five days, watched up to where S3 was at, finished that, and then went to the books.
For me, my griping began at the end of S4 when they utterly botched Tyrion's murder of Tywin (largely by ignoring the main motivation for Tyrion's complete hatred of his father), but did the full-blown "books vs show" issue begin in earnest much earlier - and at what point? For me, S1-S3 seemed pretty faithful to the books, but I was doing it the other way around.

While I'm not a fan of the rather snobbish attitude taken by many readers of ASOIAF towards fans of the show that haven't read the books yet, it's a thousand times better than this strange take upon the issue that's even made its way into the Thronecast TV show - that by reading the books, you're ruining the vastly superior experience of watching the show, and anyone who's happened to have read storylines in advance of their being included in an episode is a ****er. After all, the format of an HBO TV series renders its content, by definition, superior to the same content expressed solely by the written word.

 

I came to it by the books first. I picked up a copy of the first book, just on a lark as somebody left it on the freebie table at work. I knew of it, from all the hype but had never read it or watched it. I read thru the first book in a less than a week, and was quite hooked. I started watching the show about half way thru the book, and was totally hooked on both. I managed to read all of them in less than a month, as well as binge watch the first three seasons online, before catching up with the current seasons (then season 4) by means best not stated on this forum.

In the beginning they were very close and faithful to the written word, but they started getting farther and farther away. I can understand some changes as what works on the page doesn't always work on the screen and vise versa, but some of the changes were a bit much, like leaving out Tyesha and killing people that are still alive in the book to quote two examples. Don't even get me started on Jayne Pool and Ramsey and that whole mess.


I would probably like the show better if I hadn't read the books, which are much better. That said, I don't hate the show and am eager for it to return. I simply look at it as a different version of the same story, with the same eventual outcome even if they take a different path to get there.

I am more eager to read Winter however.

 

I got caught up in the Season 3 hype, saw the trailers and thought it looked good. Read up in it, was impressed with the comments so went about watching it. I managed to watch Season One in a week, I mentioned this to my SWTOR guild who instantly told me to read the books because they were better.
By the weekend I had the first three books because they were 3 for £10. I stopped watching the show at around S2 E2. (I always get bored at that point). I then read the books (1 and 2) slowly over the next few months till April when Season 4 was released.
I got the Season 1-3 boxset for my birthday and sped through them before Season 4.

I remember watching the "Honest Trailers" for the show and being dismayed at the 'starring ' section and them being unable to recall the characters whilst I could because they looked close to how they were described in the books.

Season 4 was when it fell apart for me. It just seemed bad, I hate the Vale. I try and skip those scenes in season 1 because they aren't fun to rewatch. The big battle at the end was good but the rest was just silly.
One of my friends also jumped on here and his dad filled him in with a breif overview. We tried not to laugh about that.

Season 5, I just enjoyed what they gave us. Dorne was stupid and I don't like Sansa so all that sort of stuff is boring.

My show friends though struggled to remember who the characters were which is worrying.

The biggest crime the show has done, is the Battle of the Blackwater.
No three Wh***s /Trebuchets or boat crash with Chain mail.


I'm still not finished reading the books because really there is no rush. The show is not really spoiling it and if it is it is done badly.

I think my approach to it was the best approach, and I recommend people to watch the First Season because it gives a good introduction and world building setting. Then read the books.

 

Yea, I found Dorne a bit of a let down. Book Sandsnakes were much cooler. But at least Tyrion is cool in both, thanks to the amazing Peter Dinklage.

I like Sansa, but her arc in the books is better, the whole Ramsey, Theon thing started out good, but the farther it got from the books the less I liked it.

I understand that even HBO has a budget and they can't do ten episodes a year while still keeping all 5 zillion characters and their arcs intact, but some of the choices they made were wrong.

Arya is my favorite character and Masie does a great job, but book Arya is much more three dimensional and has a lot more to her story.

I'll leave Bran and company for another discussion, too much missing from that arc..

I must say the FX are impressive though. I loved the White Walkers from last season. Especially the one with the "bring it on, bro" pose..

 

I'd been thinking about reading the books for a while. After the hype went through the roof after the Red Wedding I finally caved and started books and show simultaneously. I saw the the RW in the show before reading, so Robbins changed wife didn't strike me at first. Like Nub, it was the botched Tyrion-Tywin scene that first really left me questioning the show. I stopped watching during the Sansa wedding scene and don't plan on starting up again.