Archive for the ‘TV’ Category

Season 5 Game of Thrones Trailer Analysis (Non Spoilery)

Posted: February 2, 2015 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, TV
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Over the weekend, my wife and I saw the Game of Thrones IMAX presentation, which included the Season 5 trailer. I’m in full-on Game of Thrones blogging mode now (if putting out one article a week can be considered full-on) and I have a Jaime Lannister article to release in a day or so, but I needed to write up a breakdown of the trailer and post it.

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NOOOO SPOOOOIIIIILLLLERRRRSSSS!!!!!!!

Oh yeah, this post is just going to present screenshots of the trailer, without any spoilery analysis or speculation. (I will certainly link to my backup blog, where I will spoil and speculate all over the trailer.)

Here, I’ll just be posting (most of) the images from the trailer, and describing what I see. Yes, riveting, I know.

Obviously, if you don’t want to see the images from the trailer (like, you know, you’re totally avoiding the trailer and any hints of what’s to come in the season) then I understand if you skip this post. We’re good.

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Littlefinger and the Lies of Power

Posted: January 27, 2015 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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This post will be talking about plot elements for HBO’s Game of Thrones, the excellent adaptation of the A Song of Ice and Fire series by George RR Martin. Specifically, I’ll be talking about Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish.

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Everyone Likes Me! I’m So Charming!

Spoiler Alert: I don’t like him.

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Sandor Clegane: Surly When Called “Ser”

Posted: January 20, 2015 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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This post will contain spoilers for Game of Thrones, HBO’s excellent adaptation of the A Song of Ice and Fire book series.

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Can’t it be A Song of Ice? Just Ice? Must there be Fire?

Season Four of Game of Thrones left a broken and bleeding Sandor “the Hound” Clegane in a pretty bad state. Having prevented Arya Stark from falling into the hands of Lannister-stooge Brienne of Tarth (I’m thinking like the Hound, here) the badly wounded Clegane begged Arya to grant him the mercy of a swift, clean death.

Arya coldly refused and left the Hound to die alone.

It’s a shame, since the Hound’s journey had gotten interesting. Well, some people might argue that his literal journey of walking around the Riverlands wasn’t super-compelling, but I’m talking about the Hound as a character, his narrative journey.

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A is for Arya, B is for Brienne

Posted: January 13, 2015 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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This post will be talking about two outstanding characters on Game of Thrones. Therefore there will be spoilers if you are not up to date on the show (or have not read the books, but mostly this will be related to the show.)

Fair warning.

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The Orcish Perspective on Game of Thrones

Posted: January 6, 2015 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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I’m not going to mince words. This post is going to talk about plot details of every season of HBO’s Game of Thrones and the three movies of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. (I’m quite shocked that Peter Jackson made the trilogy with only three movies.) So, if you’re allergic to spoilers, you should probably stay away.

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Spoils? We Orcs Love Spoils! “To the Victor Go the Spoils!” Or So We’ve been Told. We wouldn’t Really Know…

I think it’s a popular thing to compare either JRR Tolkien and George RR Martin as writers or their respective works, Lord of the Rings and A Song of Ice and Fire, as fantasy epics. Usually by someone who has an axe to grind.

Full disclosure: this is going to be one of those posts but I hope it’ll be slightly different. I’m not trying to prove one is better than the other but I plan on doing some comparisons. Trust me, Ned.

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Arya Sure That’s How It’s Pronounced?

Posted: January 1, 2015 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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This post will be talking about HBO’s Game of Thrones, but I’m pretty sure this won’t be spoilery. Unless you want to try come up with your own way to pronounce the names in the books. There are so many names.

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After He Read that Huge Genealogy Book, Ned’s Head Felt Like it was Going to Fall Off.

So. Many. Names.

I usually talk about the television show Game of Thrones, rather than the A Song of Ice and Fire series that it’s based on. I think I do that because I’d like to engage with the Unsullied show watchers who are experiencing the story as presented by HBO.

I try not to be a smug book reader, but it’s hard. Today, I will not hold back my smugness. But fear not. I’m not going to aim my smug focus on the innocent show watchers. I’ll be hitting on the book readers.

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Where are the Others? Are they LOST?

Posted: December 23, 2014 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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Although the Others were the mysterious antagonists on the great television show LOST, this post will be talking about the White Walkers on HBO’s Game of Thrones. It’s probably best if you’re up to date on that television show if you want to read this post and not be spoiled.

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Meet Up at the Glacier, the Night’s King Said. As if there’s Only One!

The winter solstice was a few days ago, ushering in the calendar’s recognition of the winter season (everyone who dealt with snow in November knows that winter’s already been here.) And we’re at that time (depending on your cultural affiliation) that children are being told that way up in the arctic, an old wizened figure is directing his fey minions in preparation for a magical trip away from the pole and into the warmer southern lands.

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Snows, Love Them or Hate Them

Posted: December 9, 2014 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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This post will be discussing plot points from the first four seasons of Game of Thrones. This is your usual spoiler warning. But this is just boilerplate, because everyone’s up-to-date on Game of Thrones. Or at least all the cool kids are.

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Hey! FIRE and ICE!

It’s now December, and Winter, you know, is HERE! (It would have been depressing to say Winter is merely Coming when last month I was walking my dogs in the pre-dawn sub-freezing temperatures. But you guys don’t need to hear all this.)

Anyway, I’m expecting we’ll be seeing more snowfall soon, and that made me want to write about my two favorite Snows in HBO’s Game of Thrones: Jon Snow and Ramsay Snow.

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Game of Thrones: Thanks? Thanks!

Posted: November 25, 2014 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, Opinion, TV
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This post will be discussing some of the major plot points of HBO’s excellent series Game of Thrones, a solid adaptation of George RR Martin’s unfinished book series A Song of Ice and Fire. If you’re not caught up, don’t be reading this! Go read those books, or watch the show. You’ll thank me. Or not.

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When Someone Asks GRRM When the Next Book will be Out, He Kills a Stark

George RR Martin, the author of the A Song of Ice and Fire series which is the blueprint for HBO’s adaptation Game of Thrones, has been described as a serial killer of fictional characters. It’s also been said that he survives solely on the tears of Game of Thrones fans (according to some meme I tripped over, researching for this article.)

Those statements are probably not 100% correct. I think he probably supplements his diet of tears with liberal helpings of lemoncakes as well, but I’ll concede the point. Certainly, there are two demographics that GRRM doesn’t mind messing with, and those would be his characters and his audience.

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Fence Sitting: The Hazardous Neutrality of the Night’s Watch

Posted: November 11, 2014 by patricksponaugle in Game of Thrones, TV
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It’s November, and here in the States we just had mid-term elections, so I thought it’d be the right time to talk politics. Relax, I’m not going to blather on about American politics, I’m going to talk about politics in the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros, as shown on HBO’s excellent television show, Game of Thrones.

Specifically, I’ll be talking about that independent political entity, the Night’s Watch.

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This will include some plot spoilers for people who have not seen the final episode of Season Four Game of Thrones, or haven’t read A Storm of Swords (aka Book Three of A Song of Ice and Fire.)

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