Maybe my favourite book series! Intelligent dialogue dealing with consequences of even minor decisions. The hierarchy is criticised constantly, shown for being trivial, hypocritical and based almost entirely in violence and threats based on strength in numbers (implied and real).
I can’t choose a favourite character or arc, but I really love ADWD for really elaborating on and setting up new goals for stories that had more or else finished their first act.
I also enjoy that while GRRM indulges in ‘pure evil’ characters such as Joffrey, The Mountain, Ramsay and Euron (Read that TWOW preview chapter- it’s Godly!) he still establishes that most people commit horrific acts while being actual complex people in a shit system (Theon, Jamie, Stannis).
Main two characters also should be noted are a staunch abolitionist (Dany) and a man who sacrifices himself for refugees who he successfully migrated (Jon). Considering the ramifications they both faced for their decisions they both managed to be awesome, intelligent and compassionate, despite the consistently horrific implications and threats.
What are your favourite characters, arcs, worldbuilding or quotes? Any real life political figures you’d like to compare to ASOIAF characters?
Hello, friend! I also love ASOIAF. I really enjoy Brienne’s chapters because in many cases she acts as a camera for the smallfolk of Westeros in a way that no other character does. We get to learn a lot more about the world from the perspective of people who aren’t royalty or children of lords or otherwise people with supposedly great destinies. I find Bran’s chapters to be interesting, too, especially if you interpret some of his arc in the botched TV show in a darker way, with the hopes that George will give him more of a role in the actual plotline of the novels. I really hope that the Others have a goal besides “complete eradication of humans”, we eventually get a hint at some of their motivations, and Bran will be involved in whatever action is taken to negotiate or defeat them.
A lot of people dislike all the Meereen politics, but I like it. Dany has to rapidly grow up from a pure idealist into someone who has to make actual policy and attempt to balance her desires and ultimate goals with the reality of being thrust into a position of great power. She’s attempting to mend relations between factions that have never been allied, even after all her upheaval and attempts to eradicate slavery, and she is also struggling to manage the equivalent of three nukes gradually growing larger. It’s a pretty chaotic situation.
A lot of people dislike all the Meereen politics, but I like it. Dany has to rapidly grow up from a pure idealist into someone who has to make actual policy and attempt to balance her desires and ultimate goals with the reality of being thrust into a position of great power.
Her difficulty in banning slavery was such hamfisted liberal propaganda. “We all agree slavery is bad, but we cant ban it because it’s just not realistic”. Its the same lie they tell themselves for why Obama cant stop bombing weddings or why we cant have healthcare.
I see it more like “Radically restructuring society will come with consequences”. That’s not a libby argument of “Guess those slavers should have stayed in power!” or “The Meereenese can have little a slavery, as a treat”, but rather just a natural consequence of extreme action. Dany didn’t want to outright slaughter everyone in support of slavery, but leaving behind the sympathizers has its issues, and simply removing the slavers without providing safety nets means that some of the slaves are either desperate or deluded enough to wish things were back to the way they were used to. You’re being naive if you think it could have gone anywhere else with Dany being who she is - a fucking fourteen year old girl with a handful of advisors, not a hardened strategist and revolutionary architect.
No revolution is going to come without struggle. No revolution is going to come without consequences. That doesn’t mean the takeaway message is “We should leave things as they are.”
I’m kind of glad Winds of Winter is taking forever, I don’t think I would have the energy to pick it up yet, after the TV show fiasco.
It’s so amazing for such an enormous cultural thing to be destroyed and dissapear completely overnight. Like, it’s like it never happened! But three stupid space slavers movies from the 1970 still haunt us todsy with shitton of ramifications and bullshit.
that whole mythos is so fucking dead to me
I will never forget that midnight showing of Phantom Menace on opening day in 1999 and the way everyone cheered at the beginning and the crowd slowly got quieter during the film until at the end everyone filed out depressed and making excuses
three stupid space slavers movies from the 1970
Sorry, what’s this a reference to?
Howland reed will come back and drop an absolute fire mixtape
Pretty cool that George is still getting better as a writer. People seem to like to complain that Feast and Dance have meandering, inconsequential stories therefore showing George has fallen off as a writer. They are not bad books, and his quality as a writer has not diminished. For me both had higher quality prose than the previous 3 books, and as you mentioned the Euron chapter is Godly and possibly the best thing he’s written in this series.
im trying to read the books but it seems the only thing that rly gets me interested these days are cli-fi or postapocalyptic fiction (i recently finished parable of the sower by octavia butler). However I watched some of altshiftx’s videos and I rly do appreciate the worldbuilding. I love how there are so many theories and mysteries (like who is the knight of the laughing tree, who wrote the pink letter, is aegon actually faegon). I also appreciate GRRM’s LGBTQ representation, such a rare thing in fantasy.
