Reviews
What happened to the dire wolves? The producers said there would be less visits from the Stark wolves in Season Three so more money could be spent on developing the story. Was that when they hired the fourth porn star to wiggle across the screen? Fond as I am of naked women I think dire wolves are cool too. There’s not much time to save the train wreck Season Three has become. The show has all the things that make the Song of Ice and Fire strong; an incredibly detailed world, complex narrative with plenty of twists and memorable characters engaged in the all too human struggle for power. It also has the weaknesses; endless repetition, bizarre idioms, and sex scenes that border on the same quality as Billy the Pizza Guy porn. How many clues and red herrings can we talk about before breaking down and demanding more than George R.R. Martin’s “pink mast” and the “Myrish swamp”?
Book Loras: When the sun has set, no candle can replace it.
Show Loras: lol lets f**k and I’ll tell you a super guarded secret while we’re at it
If you’re wondering why George R.R. Martin isn’t working on the next novels of Song of Ice and Fire it’s because he’s writing for the TV show instead. Martin himself wrote this episode so he must have felt some need to work out plot points but increasingly I feel like I’m in some warped version of the game show Survivor. I won’t say I’m bored yet. Let’s call it confused as to why so many of this season’s scenes are feeling wrong. It’s almost like when George Lucas lost track of what Star Wars is actually about and the secondary projects he was farming out became so much better because they were faithful to the concept.
In the novels: Sansa has an inner monologue demonstrating she’s not just a silly twit. Samwell is on the Fist of the First Men during the White Walker attack and does release the ravens. Tywin Lannister visits Tyrion many times when he’s unconscious Melisandre never goes to the Riverlands, never meets Thoros and doesn’t take Gendry captive. Loras is already in the Kingsguard so he can’t marry anyone. Tyrion never makes nice with his sister or confronts her about Mandon Moore (it is in fact still unknown who sent Mandon Moore). Neither Catelyn or Robb Stark ever go to Harrenhal. Sandor Clegane doesn’t laugh like a maniac when burned but regresses to a child of six. Above all, Orell can’t cut the rope to which Jon and Ygritte are clinging because Jon already killed him in A Clash of Kings. There are pages and pages devoted to differences between the books and TV. I love it since it’s a book geek heaven, but George R.R. Martin wants you to know that he wrote the story so he gets to decide who plays in the Westeros sandbox.
“I remember reading [Dany planning to give up Drogon to the slaver] and thinking, ‘Oh, this is kind of disappointing.’ When the real plan was revealed I think I even called [Weiss]. This was before we had met with George, when we were still trying to figure out if this show was possible. The culmination of that scene was one of those moments when we were like, ‘We got to make this f–king show.’ It was very gratifying seeing that wish fulfilled … I think it will be one of the most staggering things ever put on television.”
I imagine a little ceremony with a dagger and bloodied fingers dripping on a skull when George whispered the secrets of Ice and Fire to writer-producers David Benioff and Dan Weiss. Martin is very protective of his creative copyright, he’s a strong opponent of fan fiction, but Benioff and Weiss are part of the omertà now. The truth is, George is an experienced TV writer and producer. After his fourth book (Armageddon Rag) tanked he worked on the Twilight Zone revival, Max Headroom, and Beauty and the Beast. Part of his decision to impart super secret plot points to Benioff and Weiss was based on how he felt the ending of Lost was bungled. He likes the HBO producers of Game of Thrones and is constantly defending them on his “Not a blog.” Even with all the fame and subsequent pressure on him, he has a working process and adamantly refuses to work exclusively on Game of Thrones. The result is, with six year gaps between novels, another whole group of fans is going to be eventually posting “Well that’s different than the TV version” meaning the show has more authority. George won’t care, others may come and go, but only the Longshoreman’s Son has ever completely ruled the Iron Throne.
It has always been my opinion that one of the hardest challenges an actor will ever face is to soliloquize while naked in a bath. Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jaime) had his opportunity in this episode. He was so good with the delerious revelation of why he had to kill Mad King Aerys that I forgot the NPM count and you all know I’m a big fan of Gwen Christie (Brienne)
“The traitors want my city…. but I’ll give them naught but ashes. Let Robert be king over charred bones and cooked meat”. – Aerys the Mad
Aerys, the last Targaryen to sit on the Iron Throne, went all Howard Hughes with foot long fingernails, long scraggly hair and deluxe version paranoia. His faithful Mormon bodyguards…excuse me the Kingsguard, enabled the insanity. They tolerated a king that couldn’t get sexually aroused except when someone was burning and incidents like when Aerys ripped out Ser Ilyn Payne’s tongue with hot pincers for suggesting that Tywin Lanister truely ruled the Kingdom. It fell to the last remaining honorable Kingsguard, Jaime Lannister, to save half a million people from the funeral pyre of a madman. Von Stauffenberg should have done as well Jaime.
This past week the United States Ambassador to Australia felt the need to threaten the citizens of that nation after it was revealed that they pirate Game of Thrones more than anyone else. Ambassador Bleich should get a subscription to Superficial Gallery since we’ve already explained why HBO forces people into becoming pirates and we also have Cersei (Queen Marmalade) in a bikini. Author George R.R. Martin is also on record this week advocating sending the General Manager of the Jets to the Night’s Watch for trading Darelle Revis to the Buccaneers. In a twist on Rule 34 I decided to look if anyone had compared the Boston bombings to Game of Thrones. Wired answered with a well thought out article comparing the interrogation of the bombing suspect with that of Theon Greyjoy.
Varys the Spider would undoubtedly smile knowingly at the CIA prevarication “mechanism of abuse.” I doubt he spends any time worrying about whether his manipulations are “clean” but real interrogators very much like him will soon be unleashed on Dzokhar Tsarnaev. Those of us who are howling for knives under his fingernails would be well schooled by the breaking of Theon Greyjoy. Even the sadistic Bolton clan with their bloody little hobbies know that it’s not the “dirty” interrogation but the psychological methods that are the most effective.
According to Sally Kempton, the socialite turned swami: “Women are natural guerrillas. Scheming we nestle into the enemy’s bed, avoiding open warfare, watching the options, playing the odds.” Sally has a lot more to say about the limitations of traditional feminine mystique, but we’re talking about a show that Saturday Night Live has parodied by claiming there is a fourteen year old creative consultant who knows any scene can be improved by adding boobs.
According to director Neil Marshall, there is actually a real-life figure very similar to the fictional “Adam Friedberg”. There is a single, specific HBO executive (although Marshall declined to name who) who actively urged him to add in as much full-frontal nudity as possible.
Arguments about feminism aside, this second episode of season three entitled Dark Wings, Dark Words is all about the women of Westeros. Well the women that manage to keep their dresses on that is. The HBO boob consultant must have been on vacation during the filming of this episode for we get more Lion in Winter than Porky’s Roadhouse. Dame Dianna Rigg doesn’t even have to take her top off to captivate us with her portrayal of the Queen of Thorns, Lady Olenna, matriarch of the House Tyrell.
Contestant Eric Fox looks like someone who just went through the thing that would eventually make him a super villain.
You hear they had to call off the lepers’ hockey game? THERE WAS A FACE OFF IN THE CORNER! *writes apology to American Lepers League*. So I am willing to bet that since most of you goobers can’t stop blabbering about Dr. Who and Firefly long enough for me to catch you and give you a decent wedgie, you probably don’t have time to watch shows on SyFy. And that would include Face Off. This is the one that is like Top Chef for makeup people. SyFy has kept this one going for four seasons now. They tried one with set design but it was awful and hopefully won’t come back. But there is more to milk out of the idea so soon there will probably be one about costumes and eventually one for the guys that hold the boom mic. Fuzz Stick is a good name for that one.
This one, though, features people whose big dream is to be replaced by CGI in the near future by choosing to do physical makeup. Now I don’t pretend to be an expert on things like this but generally when you see someone wearing makeup it looks stupid. Not always, but generally, so these guys have a tough job to start with. Throw in hokey theme challenges and the fact that they let the judges get right up in the faces of the makeups to see how crappy they are and you have a recipe for some pretty substantial stress farts.
They get three days to do the makeup. Every week they explain that they have to sculpt it, then…mold it. Or make a mold or a cast or something. I don’t know. They don’t explain it well. BUT! They do all usually end up dicking around so they are doing really important things like “attaching the mandibles” with like, five minutes left. So the extra time really doesn’t seem to help much. And to make sure I’m not the crazy one, I’m going to post all the final creations from last week (It’s on Tuesday nights) and you can try to tell me which one lost and which one won. It will be difficult I assure you!