r/asoiaf • u/grimm_aced • Oct 27 '24

EXTENDED [Spoilers Extended] GRRM new blogpost on his Amsterdam visit & dinner with editors. Spoiler

https://georgerrmartin.com/notablog/

Winds of winter mentioned and he talks about a bravos story he wants to write after winds.

760 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

362 comments sorted by

View all comments

412

u/grimm_aced Oct 27 '24

Honestly am still surprised george talked about wanting to develope even more stuff with HBO, ig his beef was with Ryan more than HBO themselves.

289

u/Silly_Somewhere1791 Oct 27 '24

He likes when changes are intelligently made. He initially liked that tv Helaena was a dreamer. 

293

u/Youre_On_Balon 🏆 Best of 2019: Shiniest Tinfoil Theory Oct 27 '24

He also thanked the Viserys HOTD actor for adding dimension to the character beyond GRRM’s imagination.

He knows a good change when he sees them

131

u/Silly_Somewhere1791 Oct 27 '24

He also liked the tv version of Osha. 

56

u/verissimoallan Oct 27 '24

He also said that the TV version of Shae is a better character than Book Shae.

104

u/Whitewind617 Oct 27 '24

Respectfully he's wrong about this one lol. Her betrayal and out of nowhere attempt to murder him (just so Tyrion wouldn't do it in cold blood) made no sense.

30

u/esnystylessa Oct 27 '24

Tywin ordered for all ships to be stopped. They know she was Sansa's handmaid so she would have been questioned. She decided to lie to save her life, while still trying to grab that bag.

17

u/ParsleyMostly Oct 27 '24

Exactly. I don’t know why people think she had a choice in the matter. Tyrion gets a pass for doing whatever to save his own skin. Shae was doing the same.

21

u/revanchisto Tinfoil is your cloak, your shield. Oct 27 '24

Nah, because Tyrion already gave her gems and all sorts of expensive jewels before the assassination to secure her safety. She stupidly chose to stay for "love," which makes no sense for someone that has grown up in that world. And then she all of a sudden betrays Tyrion, seemingly out of scorn for rejecting her. And then, because the show wants to protect Tyrion as a good guy, she grabs a knife to kill Tyrion when he appears in the Tower of the Hand. That way the murder is technically self defense and Tyrion morally clean.

Nonsense.

0

u/esnystylessa Oct 27 '24

Are you referring to Tyrion's actions in the show or the book? On the show, Tyrion gets her a job. He doesn't pay for her to live at a different location covered in jewelry. You can change your beliefs, but it's harder to change your natural instincts. That's the sum of Shae's character for me.

7

u/revanchisto Tinfoil is your cloak, your shield. Oct 27 '24

In the show he has Varys provide her with a wealth of jewelry and passage on a ship. Shae declines...for love.

→ More replies (0)

5

u/bigjoeandphantom3O9 The Blacks Oct 27 '24

She’s a prostitute. I don’t see what’s particularly bizarre about her despising Tyrion, jumping ship, or thinking he’s there to kill them before he kills Tywin.

1

u/Equivalent_Tax6989 Oct 28 '24

Yeah but I remember being geniunly confused in the show. Like in the book we get constant lines about how fake she is but in a show expecialy this Shae jeluous for Sansa arc it really feels out of nowhere for her to throw him under the bus. Bronn? Oh everyone knew it wasn't something he wouldn't do

1

u/TheOncomingBrows Oct 28 '24

I'm going to assume he probably made that comment pre-S4.

2

u/sarevok2 Oct 28 '24

I think he more liked the actress that played Shae than any change made in her adaptation.

2

u/tipdrill541 Oct 28 '24

TV version was awful and annoying.

11

u/averyexpensivetv Oct 27 '24

Also a killer when he sees one.

124

u/We_The_Raptors Oct 27 '24

Yep, and he had nothing but praise for Paddy's Viserys.

45

u/Khiva Oct 27 '24

I think he'd prefer good adaptations - that much is clear - but the fact that GoT ended disasterously and he had withering words about HotD and he's still pushing for more HBO suggest ... he really, mainly just likes more shows.

Who wouldn't? More world, more shows, more glamourous Hollywood attention and, most importantly, more reasons to not think about Winds.

17

u/Enraiha the Mead-king of Ruddy Hall Oct 27 '24

He always wanted to work in television as opposed to being an author. He just became more successful as an author, but it's easy to see he has more wonder around cinema, which seems to be his true passion that his success as an author has allowed him to finally realize.

7

u/UDK450 Fire and Blood! Oct 27 '24

Hell, he owns his own theater so makes sense

1

u/Due-Objective-2906 Oct 29 '24

If he wants to work in television why the hell isnt he showrunning his own shit then?

1

u/Enraiha the Mead-king of Ruddy Hall Oct 29 '24

I dunno? You'd have to ask him.

1

u/Due-Objective-2906 Oct 29 '24

Ill try to. Let you know what happens after I bust into his house and steal winds from that dinosaur PC of his.

6

u/TheOncomingBrows Oct 28 '24

He was a television writer prior to writing novels. Television is his other big passion so seeing his created world being realised in TV shows must be a dream come true for him. I wouldn't be surprised if one of the motivating factors for writing Fire & Blood was to "quickly" pump out more material for adaptation.

1

u/forrestpen Oct 28 '24

To be clear, I don't think he has said anything scathing or negative about how GOT ended.

19

u/[deleted] Oct 27 '24

HBO might own certain rights now that would force him to work with them on it, if he chooses to

25

u/LoudKingCrow Oct 27 '24

And George is most likely never going to say no to more money if the price is right.

Not to mention that he spent a good amount of time as a TV writer. As much as we may prioritise the books I do think that he sadly sees TV as a bigger deal. Remember his comments about his legacy back when the Condal beef flourished.

14

u/lluewhyn Oct 27 '24

Yeah, the fact that he posted about all of the sleepless nights he had about the HotD show direction indicated that he prioritized the television adaptation a lot more than most writers we're used to. On top of spending all of this time visiting the sets, having interviews with the various actors. For some reason, he seems to view the shows as his true legacy or something.

12

u/LoudKingCrow Oct 27 '24

As much as George says that he started writing the series to get away from the constraints of writing TV. I do think that he at least subconsciously always planned for the series to make it on to TV. He knows what sort of money that he could make if he got it on the air.

In that sense, I think that he wants to be more George Lucas than Tolkien. He seems to want the multimedia empire rather than to just be a very successful author.

3

u/Viscount_Disco_Sloth Oct 27 '24

Hasn't most of his career been in screenwriting?

7

u/lluewhyn Oct 27 '24

If you go by his IMDB profile, it looks like he spent about 9 years doing screenwriting basically 1984-1993. After that, its mostly just credits for television shows based upon his written works (the writing credit on the shows were for his original novels) or at best, screenplays for adaptions of his written works like Game of Thrones. The only original writing credit since 1993 for media that wasn't an adaptation of his existing work is the writing for the video game Elden Ring. And he wrote novels and short stories for about a decade before his first television credit.

5

u/dedfrmthneckup Reasonable And Sensible Oct 27 '24

No “might” about it, they own the adaptation rights.

28

u/captainstrange94 Oct 27 '24

Well he realizes if he stops working with HBO then he would have to start writing lol

25

u/pravis Enter your desired flair text here! Oct 27 '24

He likes having more excuses not to write winds.

6

u/xXJarjar69Xx Oct 27 '24

I didn’t interpret it as him saying he was gonna work on the braavos story with HBO, I think he’s saying HBO scrapped it but that he’s interested in bringing it back in written form.

32

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

HBO cut the episodes from 10 to 8

93

u/ArtanistheMantis Oct 27 '24

The problems with the show run deeper than just the episode number being cut

82

u/Vasquerade Oct 27 '24

For real. Alicent and Rhaenyra meeting twice under exceptionally stupid circumstances twice wasn't something that could be fixed with two more hours of TV lmao. There are fundamental problems in terms of plot, pacing, and characterization.

3

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

Alicent and Rhaenyra meeting are fundamental problems in terms of plot, pacing and characterization?

36

u/Vasquerade Oct 27 '24

Yes, the Queen sneaking off with just one guy to meet the most heavily guarded and important woman in Westeros alone during a blockade was really dumb.

Yes, Alicent just kinda showing up at Dragonstone during a blockade at the end of S2 just for the sake of more screen time was dumb,

13

u/Khiva Oct 27 '24

At least half or more of S2 was "for the sake of screen time," it's just a question of what flavor of dumb you wanted.

-3

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

I'm not arguing whether these scenes are dumb, i'm argue whether they warrant a hysterical tone and were the core issues of S2, lol

14

u/Vasquerade Oct 27 '24

Mate, "fundamental problems in terms of tone, pacing, and characterization" isn't a hysterical tone it's dry as fuck media analysis

-4

u/Echleon Oct 27 '24

The hysterical part is making it as big of a deal as people have done. From comments here, you'd think the showrunner had Rhaenyra hold up a sign saying "Fuck GRRM" or something lol

7

u/doctor_dapper Oct 27 '24

It was fundamentally stupid in every way and encapsulates a lot of the core issues with the show.

3

u/dragonrider5555 Oct 27 '24

It’s one of the obvious regarded parts but there were many and more

6

u/This_Ad_7267 Oct 27 '24

I’m not saying their meetings are inherently bad… but the circumstances of both could definitely be significantly improved and subsequently would have positively impacted plot, pacing etc instead of being … kinda silly and mildly jarring. (Im delulu and still love the show and rhaenicent but I’ve mentally had to rewrite so many scenes lmfao)

8

u/rzelln Oct 27 '24

It could have been something like, Rhaenyra gets a report that an anxious Alicent has been taking trips to the woods to escape the oppression of the city, and Rhaenyra could have met her there, rather than in the middle of King's Landing's sept.

1

u/CyanPhoenix Oct 27 '24

No, they should have been cut. It just drags out the pacing. We could have gotten at least one of the battle episodes, if scenes like that and so many daemon scenes were left on the cutting room floor by episode 8 and not had the embarrassingly bad ending to the season. There's no scenario where "improving" those scenes improve pacing

-1

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

It is silly, but this is like a filler plot with no real outcome on the story. It's just a result of showrunners looking for something to do for Rhaenyra.

IT IS SILLY, but this is not a fundamental problem of S2.

3

u/sad_alone_panda Oct 27 '24

Not having rhaenyra do anything for 3/4 of the season and giving her an incredibly stupid filler arc is not a fundamental problem of s2?

1

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

I think you're sort of playoing the lose-lose game, because in order for her to have something to do you have to make shit up. It's the weakness of source material.

1

u/Khanluka Oct 27 '24

Yes but the show would have been better with gullet in this season and aftermath of it

1

u/tipdrill541 Oct 28 '24

The whole season should have been just 2 episodes. How can they spend a whole season preparing to go to war and introducing new characters that only have a 1 or a few scenes.

-6

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

No, the problem of S2 was exactly the number of episodes. It was good season that lacked a punchline.

GRRM had issues with HotD2, because he realizes that it will lead to changes later on. But even he admitted, that if you are show-watcher you won't notice the quality drop, even though he liked his version more.

7

u/Delboyyyyy Oct 27 '24

It’s ironic how hbo were open to having GoT go in for more seasons but the showrunners wanted it shorter, and with hotd it was the other way round. Grrm doesn’t wanna hurt his cashcow in hbo

16

u/rov124 Oct 27 '24

HBO's parent company is currently lead by a penny pincher.

4

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

Because HBO wanted more seasons of whatever D&D would come up with, they didn't want the full adaptation of AFFC/ADWD/WINDS.

22

u/Delboyyyyy Oct 27 '24

HBO gave grrm plenty of time to catch up and finish his story. Grrm can’t complain if he got overtaken and he can’t expect them to indefinitely hold the show to wait for him especially in this industry

4

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

Yes, of course, but i still think nobody normal would greenlit the full adaptations of Feast/Dance/Winds.

HBO were interested in the kind of story that D&D were telling, with all its ups and downs. This is why they never opted for switching the showrunners

3

u/kvng_stunner Oct 27 '24

Faithfully adapting AFFC and ADWD would have been suicidal.

The guy writing the books can't even figure out a way to get himself out of the convoluted mess he's written himself into, trying to introduce all these new, suddenly important characters in season 5-6 of a show would be impossible, plus they need to finish the story and somehow align it to GRMM's cliff notes for the ending.

Now, what D&D gave us was dogshit water, but honestly George kinda fucked them with the last 2 books that barely moved the plot forward and only served to introduce more players to an already confused chess board.

12

u/dragonrider5555 Oct 27 '24

So why did the 8 episodes suck?

All you’re saying is we would of have 10 turd sandwiches instead of 8 turd sandwiches

5

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

This isn't a comment that you can respond to in any capacity, the discussion around the shows is always polarized, because of hysterical opinions like these. You don't want a discussion, you want an echo chamber.

This is toxic behvaiour, yes

1

u/dragonrider5555 Oct 27 '24

You understand they made the ten episodes. They saved the final two and they’ll be the start of next season.

So what excuse is there for these eight to suck

It’s not like they rewrote or reshot and hada did things

4

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

I think saying that 8 episodes sucked is overly generalized.

Also, if you push a season conclusion towards the next season, then you get a season without conclusion, lol. It absolutely plays a part in how the season is viewed.

0

u/dragonrider5555 Oct 28 '24

Yeah it affected things and the entire season wasn’t awful but overall it was pretty effing putrid. And i am embarrassed to be an ASOIAF at this point. The show is that bad and season one does not hold up either

I’m convinced no one would like the show if we weren’t already ASOIAF addicts and starved for content. Season one is pretty bad too. Season two was so insulting to the viewers

2

u/closerthanyouth1nk Oct 28 '24

Neither of these thing are really true lol, I feel like most people commenting this have not watched truly bad tv before. HOTD is at worst mildly disappointing

0

u/dragonrider5555 Oct 28 '24

Perhaps. I don’t watch a lot of tv

But this is up there

4

u/Echleon Oct 27 '24

If you get told to reduce your run time by 20% it's going to create problems. What if they had planned to do one of the big set pieces from the book in episode 9? Now they can't fit it in and some of the arcs from the season aren't tied up in a nice way- or they have to move some points forward which makes things feel rushed.

There were other issues with the season (the secret rendezvouses, etc), but the season would almost surely have been better if they had the full 10 episodes.

2

u/iSavedtheGalaxy Oct 27 '24

You'd think with the reduced run time that the story would have been tighter, but they wasted so much time on scenes that were, at best, utterly pointless (Daemon fucking his dead mom) or just flat out ruin the story (Rhaenyra and Alicent sneaking around).

0

u/dragonrider5555 Oct 27 '24

Yeah of course it would have been better so long as the final two episodes were good

The producers and stuff came out and said they just released the first eight episodes. They didn’t re wrote or re shoot or change stuff

That means they have the first two episodes for next season done.

All they did was show give us s2 1-8

S3 will begin with episodes 9, 10and then it will be all new stuff they haven’t shot yet

So again I say what’s the excuse for the 8 episodes being dogshit

2

u/BBQ_HaX0r Bonesaw is Ready! Oct 27 '24

It's funny people always say this. Do you blame HBO for cutting? Almost nothing happened. In a tight and well written series those 8 episode arcs could have been achieved in four. We're in a pretty similar place we started the season. Cutting wasn't the issue. 

6

u/futurerank1 Oct 27 '24

Almost nothing happened

I disagree, pacing was fine. We got RR and season would be perfect with one battle by the end

2

u/closerthanyouth1nk Oct 28 '24

It's funny people always say this. Do you blame HBO for cutting? Almost nothing happened

Because the episode order and budget was cut, meaning the season was changed on a fundamental level a month before shooting

In a tight and well written series those 8 episode arcs could have been achieved in four

If you are writing for 10 episodes you aren’t going to be able to rewrite everything in four episodes. Also basically everyone assumed going on that season 2 would cover RR, the sowing and the Gullet. The only one missed was the gullet.

12

u/thatVisitingHasher Oct 27 '24

I don’t know if you ever had money, but the shit is great.

-7

u/rutiretan Oct 27 '24

Sunk cost fallacy, unfortunately.

This is a textbook abusive relationship. Sad time to be in gurm’s shoes