I'm a little man and I'm also evil, also into cats

So, an edited version of a textmessage log between me and nextian:


me: I think another big GoT TV vs. books difference is that for predictable but understandable business reasons the show promotes an Everyone is Gray Pick Your Team Who Will Win??? relativism whereas the books are actually very sharply colored by authorial morality with very sharply virtuous and nasty decisions and it is never unclear who are you Meant to Root For, though it changes.  The books have a lot more of the feel of Epic Tragedy Melodrama with Tragic Flaws: readers think they’re morally relativistic because they’re violent but they are really not—however, more of an evenhanded ensemble is suited to TV than a clear set of authorial messages.

Which I agree with—it’s quite possible the book Lannisters would have made tedious and painful TV.  You don’t have to spend a ton of serialized time with them in the same way reading.  TV has to give you a lot of character options to invest in—books have to pick a team, and these are no exception.  This means GoT viewers express a degree of uncertainty/belief that a team will “win” which puzzles me until I realize the show doesn’t underline the same heavyhanded anti-LotR All Power Corrupts message.

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ritchandfamous:

I had a dream I was Jon Snow, Ned Stark’s bastard, but I was vegan, and no one else at the Stark dinner table offered me anything to eat except toast.  So I hid under a blanket until dad came over and gave me a bunch of paper and pens and stuff and told me he wanted me to write out the perfect vegan meal plan so he could always feed me properly.  

 me:  …

THE WEIRD PART ABOUT THAT

IS IT SEEMS IN CHARACTER

 lifecrystals:  YES

 me:  JON THE PRETENTIOUS BABBY VEGAN

THEON LOLS AT HIM, EATS BACON CONSTANTLY

NED TRYING TO BE NICE ABOUT IT

 lifecrystals:  THEON —

LOL SAME REACTION

 me:  CAT EXASPERATED WITH ACCOMMODATING THE BRAT’S NEW EATING PHASE

ROBB TRYING TO SUPPORTIVELY EAT VEGETARIAN IN FRONT OF HIM, GIVING THEON THE “NO I DON’T LIKE IT EITHER BUT MUST YOU” LOOK

thegoodlannister:

Tyrion is not whiny. He does not have daddy issues. He is damaged by a lifetime of parental abuse, learn the difference jfc.

Yeah, I don’t think anyone is obliged to like or forgive a character (or to hate a character) (generally I just don’t think anyone is obliged to have a particular emotional reaction to a character), but I generally think it is creepy and telling how much the dismissive term “daddy issues” or “daddy didn’t love me enough” is applied to brush off abused characters?

It’s one thing to say “parental abuse is kind of an overused plot device in media and not always well deployed and a lazy trope in many circumstances,” but it is very indicative of suck-it-up-and-deal-with-it victim-blaming culture that “whining that mommy/daddy didn’t love you enough” is a pathetic thing.  Like… if not that, what ARE people allowed to be upset about?

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH *___*

Hahaha, Stannis can be Madame Armfeldt here, minus all the youthful escapades.  Ordinary brothers, which mine, I fear, is NOT.

at first I misread “bookverse” somehow as “bookshop AU” and….that would be really cool, actually

I have kind of a fondness for war-less ASoIaF AUs in general actually.  Like sometimes I think the War of the Five Kings (though I enjoy it deeply on a fun politics level) is a distraction from the story of all these families—some of which are functional, like the Tyrells, or unhappy but feasible, like arguably the Starks, or pathetic wrecks, like the Lannisters—and how fucked they are.  Life in House Tyrell is probably kind of controlling and cult-of-nice in some ways!  The Lannisters are actually about as united and bonded as wet wonderbread!  In conclusion: yes bookshops.

… now the idea of an aging AU!Renly (bookverse, natch) kind of appeals to me, especially as he loses his charm (or at least the prettiness and youth he leans on) and everything he holds up as his value to other people.  I feel he would get kind of Desiree Armfeldt eventually, especially having destroyed so many of his personal relationships with his own vanity and fickleness, which he would probably realize too late.  Isn’t it rich, isn’t it queer, losing his timing this late in his career?