HBO: Game of Thrones

[Bright Eyes]

I thought this was kind of neat, except for the Bran hate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6KLzjXAV3s#aid=P-82d2LQSrM

Edited April 20, 2014 by Bright Eyes

[ThePrinceOfSunspear]

That one vid about Cersei/Brienne is hilarious but again it was a totally made up scene which utterly destroyed an ongoing debate regarding the Brienne/Jaime relationship....

Its definitely not decided that Brienne is in love with Jaime at all. I def don't get that impression at all from reading the books but umm okay. Excited for tonight's episode if only to see the aftermath and how the show handles certain things....

[DRW50]

I've seen a lot of fan debate over that,

Bran hate - bleh. Sometimes it probably seems like trying to be contrary if you say you're a fan of Bran or Sansa when it's so cool for fans to hate them. But I am.

[Vee]

Books aside, it's not that up for debate on the show. I don't know if she's in love with him, but she definitely has strong feelings for him. The books and the show are different creatures.

I don't see much Bran hate around, I never have. Sansa used to get it pretty bad, but these days, especially since Season 3 when her role got built up, I think she has a lot more support, as she should.

Edited April 20, 2014 by Vee

[DRW50]

Oh I've seen it, but then, any characters who cry or show emotion or don't go around waving swords will get hate. At least fans apparently don't go up to him and insult him as they did with Sophie Turner a few years back. I don't think that's happened as much lately though, which is good.

[ThePrinceOfSunspear]

But even in the show I don't know if they've shown enough to even justify the "love" claim. She might have admiration for him and feel gratitude for him saving her life but there's been nothing to even suggest that...

I just feel like its another gigantic leap on the part of the writers....no development at all.

[Vee]

I don't.

[DRW50]

I'd say that it may not be so much about Brienne loves Jaime forever as Brienne has some type of feelings for him. Even if it's not necessarily love, it is something. And Cersei throwing that in her face made her realize that she does feel something for him, something she hadn't processed.

Then again, I didn't realize she was supposed to be in love with Renly until several fans talked about it. I just didn't get any of that onscreen in those season 2 episodes.

[Vee]

I got that she was definitely very attached to Renly from the moment he spoke to her. I don't know if it was love, but it was a definite infatuation of sorts. It was all over her face and in her voice. Her whole life was in service to that guy.

What Brienne feels for Jaime she hasn't really begun to vocalize to herself or anyone, and it's very complicated. I wouldn't call it as simple as just love, but there is that. What Jaime feels for Brienne he is lightyears from understanding.

Edited April 21, 2014 by Vee

[ThePrinceOfSunspear]

True I can buy complicated....I guess the word choice is what bothers me. Its like the writers are writing for the lowest common denominator. So they had to explicitly say "love" rather than acknowledge or try to deliver hte message somehow that its "complicated"

[DRW50]

I can see what you mean. I think they may have worded it that way because Cersei was trying to hit her weak spot, trying to humiliate her.

[DRW50]

This has some book spoilers.

Geez, I haven't seen it yet, so I can't say, but

[ThePrinceOfSunspear]

<spoiler>Yeah these writers are pardon my french completely ret&&&&ded. The way they did that scene even I thought it was rape. It was VERY disturbing and totally didn't hit the mark in terms of the books meaning.

This is just ridiculous....<spoiler>

And DRW50 do you mind PM'ing me about how to use the spoiler tags....

Edited April 21, 2014 by ThePrinceOfSunspear

[DRW50]

Pretty disgusted with this from the director. It's something I would expect from Ron Carlivati:

http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/review-game-of-thrones-breaker-of-chains-uncle-deadly#sPmwO6jxGxJzm76a.99

No no no no.

I'm still going to watch the show but I can't deal with Jaime after this. He's dead to me. I would be a huge hypocrite and I would feel unclean.

Way to ruin one of your most interesting, complex characters.

Edited April 21, 2014 by DRW50

[Vee]

I've seen scenes like that play out before and I know what he's talking about. It's ugly, but it's not the same thing as how soaps romanticize rape and rapists. It also has a lot more to do with how Cersei and Jaime are, IMO.

Jaime is not a good man - he's been carrying on an incestuous affair with his sister for years and he opened the series by pushing a little boy out a window to his intended death. Almost every 'protagonist' left alive on GOT is compromised, Jaime especially so. I hated how he took glee in bringing down Ned. I could barely look at him or care about him at all until Season 2, when they begin dissecting who he really is. But for all the goodness in him, both he and his sister are still deeply toxic people. Whether or not he chooses to move out of that cycle of poisonous filth is another story. But the scene they had together - the dysfunction, the vague consent (which I don't think was that vague by the end of the scene), the violence, all of it in front of their dead son - I think it's part and parcel of who they are and how they work and how they treat each other, how they see power and control and how their sexuality is so bound up with twisted ideas about that stuff as well as about each other.

IMO, it's supposed to be about his (and their) relapse into the sick muck of who they are together. The Lannisters are terrible for each other, and Cersei and Jaime are terrible for each other. The only way Jaime knows how to feel like a man is by being the swordsman and the man Cersei desires - they've fucked anywhere and everywhere, he made light of knocking Bran out a window mid-tryst. He wants desperately be that man again but he's not anymore, because of the loss of his hand as well as because of his time away, his self-reflection, his friendship with Brienne, etc. He thinks he can reverse it all and go back to being the man of the hour by 'seducing' Cersei again, in such a repulsive context. But nothing about it is supposed to paint him as a good man, or them as a good couple - they're horrible together. It's not supposed to be alright, it's supposed to be awful. The scene wasn't romanticized and he wasn't; he took advantage of her vulnerability, he victimized her, and they fell back into their old sick pattern. It just goes back to how they and their family are ruinous to who they are as human beings.

I willl say my biggest complaint about the scene was that it was, IMO, very abrupt, too abrupt. I'm interested in why they made the change to the original scene, which was apparently a lot more bodice-ripping with her begging for it or something. That would've highlighted the sickness in them just as much, but maybe they felt the show had made Jaime's character too safe and 'woobie' in Season 3, and that's a valid concern - he's not just misunderstood and lonely.

Edited April 21, 2014 by Vee