SPOILERS ADWD was not very good and I agree with most of what you said here. The only chapters worse than Dany were Tyrion. Jon Snow took the whole book to invite wildings into the wall and now we'll have to wait 7 years to find out that he didn't die *GASP*. With all the story that is left to tell I will bet someone money right now that if he lives long enough, GRRM will not finish this series in two books. My wife, who hasn't read the books, has already figured it out, GRRM will write two more books to finish the series, but he will have to split both of them into 2 books. Once the count is at 9, why not make it an even 10. I'm sure GRRM can find another country he hasn't talked about yet who wants to get involved with the "Game of Thrones". /rant
Just watched the series. First 2 episodes weren't that good, made it a little hard to get into it, but there are so many characters. I'm definitely going to have to re-watch it. You have to pay close attention to this show (like The Wire) or you'll miss some stuff and have no clue what's going on. That said, the show is epic, Khal Drogo was the fucking man, and once you got to learn some of the characters, it became a great mix of wonderful writing, good characters, realistic twists, titties, and drama.
I'm in a bit of a quandary at the moment. I loved the first season of Game of Thrones on TV, but a friend recently gave me the first two books in the series. I read the first one while on holiday last week and loved it - it's obviously quite a bit deeper than the TV show, but the adaptation was extremely faithful. Normally this wouldn't even be a question for me - books are superior to TV adaptations in general, but in this case I'm not sure. The TV show was just so good, from the music to the script to the acting. I honestly am reluctant to start on the second book, knowing that it will be great, but will spoil the next season of the TV show to some extent - the death of Ned would not have been so shocking if I'd read the book beforehand, for instance. On the other hand, it's torture to wait for the next season when the book is right there staring up at me, and if it's as good as the first book it will be cracker as well.
I understand what you mean, although I think I probably had more of a reaction to the twists in the books than I would have to the show. Reading the third book I felt like that stupid kid in Neverending Story yelling at the book. Like, who yells at a book?
If you watched the show then read the book and enjoyed it I don't see why doing the reverse would be any different. But seriously, the 3rd book is amazing and I wouldn't want to wait 3-4 years or however long it takes them to get through it on the show.
I'm about 3/4th of the way through a Clash of Kings and man is this series awesome. Tyrion Lannister is probably one of my favorite characters EVER in any book that I have read. I actually find all of the Lannisters to be intriguing characters (save for maybe Joff). I'm so pumped to have 3 books to go, should keep me busy for a while.
This may clinch it, actually. I just can't imagine waiting years to find out what happens when it's all there on the shelves of my local bookshop!
Im about to start reading book 5...Saw it has 3 stars on the amazon site though. Well, I assume its going to be as average as AFFC. Ruining my high expectations. Btw, anyone else read The Wheel of Time series? Is it worth it? How about The Way of Kings? The guy who continued the Robert Jordan novels with his first own 10 arc book Stormlight Archive series
If you already read Martin I don't think Wheel of Time is going to compare too favorably. I tapped out on it after the 4th or 5th book and that was when I was a teenager reading and enjoying shitty D&D books. It's tough to come up with series that are "similar" to this one but Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy and Daniel Abraham's Long Price series are probably pretty safe bets. R Scott Bakker's Prince of Nothing/Aspect Emperor books have surpassed Martin's IMO but that one seems to much more polarizing, I've recommended it to people and they've hated it.
The first few books are great. It gets kind of slow in the middle of the series. Then the writer dies before finishing the last book and someone else does it. I still think it would make a great movie or series. Rand is a great character. They even had a fun multiplayer game years ago.
Gratz to Tyrion for getting the Emmy for "Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series 2011" Tyrion was born in Morristown, New Jersey!
Atta boi, Dink! I can't recall a more captivating character portrayal in recent TV shows, or films for that matter. I know that roles for him are going to be limited, but his talent level is so fucking enormous -- he deserves an oscar someday for the right part.