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Azure_Horizon posted:"Nothing happened" is by far the worst and least factual criticism levied at the book. Compared to the first 3 books, nothing happened. Taking something as literally as you do is by far the least intelligent argument to defend the gurm.
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Oct 26, 2011 20:12
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Azure_Horizon posted:I don't think Westeros is in a state where such payoffs would be possible. The War of the Five Kings is settling down and, really, splintering. So many different groups are rising up that it's less a war and more total societal downfall. I don't see much in the way of big payoffs until the Others get past the Wall and the dragons come to Westeros. The thing is that at least one of those things should have happened in ADWD. Instead we are basically no closer to either thing happening except we've been told the Others are getting restless and Dany's dragons grew a bit and Tyrion took a slow boat to Danyville. These are the things that Gurm felt couldn't happen off camera in his planned 5 year timeskip? Come on.
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Oct 26, 2011 20:16
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IRQ posted:The thing is that at least one of those things should have happened in ADWD. I'm not arguing with you there, I think these things should have happened as well. But I can see why there needs to be more time for the pieces to be set in place for it to all come crashing down in TWOW. Fog Tripper: My least intelligent argument is infinitely better than your constant antagonism.
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Oct 26, 2011 20:24
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Azure_Horizon posted:Fog Tripper: My least intelligent argument is infinitely better than your constant antagonism. Give us a break.
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Oct 26, 2011 20:26
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IRQ posted:The thing is that at least one of those things should have happened in ADWD. No fewer than three groups of people spend the entire book on slow boats to Danyville.
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Oct 26, 2011 20:29
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I don't even much care about the timeskip, I just can't help thinking how there's allegedly two books left to go and there's no end game in sight. Keep up on the Potter comparison; by book Meanwhile, we're coming into what should be the home stretch of this series, and... what? Where's it going? People's positions have been torn down so thoroughly, the entire next book will have to be about their miraculous returns to glory so the final novel can be humanity somehow uniting to drive off the Others. It would be a waste of his time and ours for the Others to actually win. Lenin Stimpy posted:If that's only what you're looking for, you might want to consider reading some other Fantasy novels by a different author Please, tell me more about what I am solely looking for in a novel. 
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Oct 26, 2011 20:41
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Azure_Horizon posted:I don't think Westeros is in a state where such payoffs would be possible. The War of the Five Kings is settling down and, really, splintering. So many different groups are rising up that it's less a war and more total societal downfall. I don't see much in the way of big payoffs until the Others get past the Wall and the dragons come to Westeros. Westeros isn't a real world, there can be payoffs if GRRM wants to write a payoff. It doesn't have to be a Malazan-style convergence where every character in the book meets up to shoot lasers and toss grenades at gods as demons explode in the background. A payoff could have been the aforementioned siege at Winterfell being shown, or the siege of Meereen being resolved. The way it is now is like a story about a man who is having some marital problems but is otherwise having a normal day at work, maybe some talk of big changes in the company and he may get fired/promoted, then goes to get some coffee and his wife is in the coffeeshop making out with a scruffy artist-type but the man doesn't see them in his rush to get to the bathroom where he looses a torrent of runny diarrhea and some of it spashes off the bowl and gets on his dick. Disgusted he tries to clean off his dick and then gets a coffee, but his wife has already gone home with the artist to have rough kinky sex where neither can tell who is in who. That night the man and his wife lay awake in bed, then have emotionally disconnected sex which because of the improperly cleaned shitdick leads to a mutual pair of UTIs. The story ends with the scruffy artist-type, who is a writer, writing about his sexual encounter on his LiveJournal and beating off weakly into a handkerchief.
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Oct 26, 2011 20:54
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bigmcgaffney posted:Westeros isn't a real world, there can be payoffs if GRRM wants to write a payoff. It doesn't have to be a Malazan-style convergence where every character in the book meets up to shoot lasers and toss grenades at gods as demons explode in the background. A payoff could have been the aforementioned siege at Winterfell being shown, or the siege of Meereen being resolved. The book really should have ended with a Jon Connington chapter where he takes Storms End in a awesome way and Aegon ends up sitting on the ancient throne/seat of House Baratheon Jaime Lannister style right before we get the Kevan Lannister chapter.
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Oct 26, 2011 21:16
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I was totally ready to complain about there not being a big boom at the end of ADWD but Varys' bit about Aegon being raised to be a decent king was good enough for me. After so many many drat words of horrible people being pieces of poo poo it's like a slim glimmer of hope that maybe someone with a touch of Ned will start beating people up....which means he's probably going to die soon.
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Oct 26, 2011 22:29
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Actually with all his "subversion of tropes" I'd kind of like to see the Others overwhelming the world. Just four or five hundred pages of people fighting and running and being torn apart.
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Oct 27, 2011 00:15
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The biggest problem with Dance is that the entire book demands that the dragons go on a proper rampage and burn the whole loving city, but Martin pussied out.
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Oct 27, 2011 00:24
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Intel&Sebastian posted:I was totally ready to complain about there not being a big boom at the end of ADWD but Varys' bit about Aegon being raised to be a decent king was good enough for me. After so many many drat words of horrible people being pieces of poo poo it's like a slim glimmer of hope that maybe someone with a touch of Ned will start beating people up....which means he's probably going to die soon. My problem is whether or Not Aegon will actually turn out to be a good, noble, for-the-people-by-the-people kind of ruler or whether he'll turn out to be Joffrey Barannister once that heady crown fits his head. I don't know if even GRRM's decided on that at this point; I just think the oppurtunity to do yet another bait and switch by turning Aegon into a vicious, entitled son of a bitch is too much for him to resist. That is if he doesn't kill him off before ADoS ends. Let's not forget we're going on Varys' word that he is all these wonderful things and not simply a figurehead for an invading army of exiled knights. All this needless wondering would've been happily eliminated if like MisterM says we got a big, blow-out chapter or three of the siege of Storm's End, allowing us to peer into the mind of this new game-changer. But no, Jon gets stabbed, and then Kevan gets stabbed. Those were cool chapters but they definitely left a lot to an end of a big book.
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Oct 27, 2011 00:36
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In my head Dance ended with a massive battle outside Meereen involving shitloads of dragonfire, Aegon landing as it was written, and the Others swarming the Wall, or attacking it in some manner, as the Nights Watch descends into chaos following the death of Snow, and of course Varys killing Kevin. With a cut down of the Tyrion material. It's not that the story there is bad, I think the general character-driven theme is right on target, but it could have been done in a better, more concise way. MisterM posted:The book really should have ended with a Jon Connington chapter where he takes Storms End in a awesome way and Aegon ends up sitting on the ancient throne/seat of House Baratheon Jaime Lannister style right before we get the Kevan Lannister chapter. This would also be a solid option.
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Oct 27, 2011 00:37
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The best way for him to subvert fantasy tropes would be for the Others to simply sit outside the wall impotently for the rest of the series, because zombies can't climb 500 foot high walls and they're also pretty bad at walking through the ocean. It would also improve the quality of the books. Well, assuming he miraculously starts writing interesting human characters again anyway.
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Oct 27, 2011 00:38
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The biggest problem I had with ADWD is that there was no step-chart included right after the maps.
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Oct 27, 2011 00:40
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One of the biggest problems with Jon's last chaper is that the huge catalyst event before he gets stabbed up is the medieval equivalent of a sending someone a threatening email.
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Oct 27, 2011 00:50
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Maytag posted:Actually with all his "subversion of tropes" I'd kind of like to see the Others overwhelming the world. Just four or five hundred pages of people fighting and running and being torn apart. But what would be the point of that? That's fine for a movie, having everyone dead at the end, because you've invested maybe two hours in it. But a book series that's been in publication since 1996? Seven novels culminating in "everybody dies"? Holy gently caress, imagine the poo poo storm over that monumental waste of time people had been reading for 20+ years. I don't need a moment where the surviving cast all sit down to dinner in the great hall at King's Landing and share a laugh over the wacky hijinx they all suffered the past couple of years. But to have all those pages amount to gently caress all? That's Dark Tower-level asshattery.
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Oct 27, 2011 02:15
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bigmcgaffney posted:Westeros isn't a real world, there can be payoffs if GRRM wants to write a payoff. It doesn't have to be a Malazan-style convergence where every character in the book meets up to shoot lasers and toss grenades at gods as demons explode in the background. A payoff could have been the aforementioned siege at Winterfell being shown, or the siege of Meereen being resolved. Thank god this series is nothing like Malazan. Though I wouldn't mind Rh'llor coming down and just loving poo poo up.
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Oct 27, 2011 03:08
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savinhill posted:One of the biggest problems with Jon's last chaper is that the huge catalyst event before he gets stabbed up is the medieval equivalent of a sending someone a threatening email. Don't worry, he's obviously not dead.
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Oct 27, 2011 03:36
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Blade_of_tyshalle posted:That's Dark Tower-level asshattery. You're not one of those "journey over the destination" people eh?
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Oct 27, 2011 04:01
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savinhill posted:One of the biggest problems with Jon's last chaper is that the huge catalyst event before he gets stabbed up is the medieval equivalent of a sending someone a threatening email. Hmm a threatening email you say, I wonder where GRRM got the idea for that...
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Oct 27, 2011 04:16
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Brannock posted:You're not one of those "journey over the destination" people eh? The last chapter of the last book (everything where Roland enters the tower) was perfect, but the "journey" of book 6 and 7 sucked a fat one. The ultimate evil is the dude from Insomnia hucking bombs and shrieking like a Super Mario sub-boss, great. And he's drawn out of existence, super. I mean I could go on for pages about the other plotting flaws with those last two books, but that was the worst.
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Oct 27, 2011 04:18
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Brannock posted:You're not one of those "journey over the destination" people eh? It's all in the execution. Maybe GRRM could write a really satisfying ending to ASoIaF where everyone dies and winter rules for eternity. I mean, I seriously doubt it, but it could happen. I like stories to be both, frankly. A fun journey which ends well. I don't mean well as in kittens and rainbows, I mean "not making me want to pitch the book at a wall because it's a slap in the face". Salem's Lot ends with, effectively, everyone dying, and that's a great book. Cabin Fever ends with pretty much everyone dead or dying, and it's a great movie. Dark Tower had a fun journey which went totally off the rails (  ) the longer it went on and ended really loving poorly. The first three books are still rad as hell, and the lovely ending isn't going to detract from Eddie gunfighting naked in a bar, but I still can't help feeling disrespected by how awful the series became.
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Oct 27, 2011 04:32
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I love the Dark Tower even though I recognize its flaws, but I also love Neon Genesis Evangelion so maybe I like masochistic stories where the author rams my rear end with their fat greasy metaphorical cock. If this were Malazan, Rhllor would get taken out by a stray rock thrown by the autistic-savant child of Lollys and the masses, representing the symbolic triumph of society over religion. Also, postmodern contextual bullshit.
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Oct 27, 2011 05:22
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bigmcgaffney posted:I love the Dark Tower even though I recognize its flaws, but I also love Neon Genesis Evangelion so maybe I like masochistic stories where the author rams my rear end with their fat greasy metaphorical cock. But the postmodern contextual bullshit is the best part!
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Oct 27, 2011 07:47
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I got into Songs only 1 year ago so I had the luxury of just reading the books without having to wait for them. I would have hated to have waited 5 years for Dance With Dragons. What a disappointing piece of book. Boring and not much happens. Even Tyrion was boring in this one.... However, I do look forward for the next installment of the series, crossing my fingers that the last two books will be as good as the first 3.
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Oct 27, 2011 08:55
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Tolli posted:I got into Songs only 1 year ago so I had the luxury of just reading the books without having to wait for them. I would have hated to have waited 5 years for Dance With Dragons. What a disappointing piece of book. Your bright and cheerful optimism is.. mildly amusing to me. 
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Oct 27, 2011 08:59
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The next book definitely needs more scenes with characters making GBS threads themselves. Pretty Pig and Dany just weren't enough for me
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Oct 27, 2011 09:00
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Wizard's First Rule is only 2.99 or so in Amazon until the end of the month. Is it worth it, even as a laugh?
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Oct 27, 2011 12:07
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bigmcgaffney posted:Wizard's First Rule is only 2.99 or so in Amazon until the end of the month. Is it worth it, even as a laugh? NO Really, no. Don't do it. Just read the parodies of Goodkind, which are far more worthwhile than anything he has ever written.
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Oct 27, 2011 13:13
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I maintain that Wizard's First Rule is okay on its own. It's a fine enough fairy tale, even if it's padded with some bullshit. Just don't go beyond the first book. Or, skip all that and just watch Legend of the Seeker. It's like the Sword of Truth series, but without the propaganda and rape! 
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Oct 27, 2011 13:31
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Why do fantasy novels contain so much rape?
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Oct 27, 2011 14:03
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Dietrich posted:Why do fantasy novels contain so much rape? It's what the authors dream about.
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Oct 27, 2011 15:46
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OperaMouse posted:It's what the authors dream about. Raping cheese-burgers maybe.
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Oct 27, 2011 15:50
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Elindale posted:The next book definitely needs more scenes with characters making GBS threads themselves. Pretty Pig and Dany just weren't enough for me Maester Pycelle had an off screen pantaloon making GBS threads in the last chapter.
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Oct 27, 2011 16:38
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IMO Dance should have ended with the Others coming down and massacring every one and thing north of Winterfell.
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Oct 27, 2011 17:41
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Ross posted:IMO Dance should have ended with the Others coming down and massacring every one and thing north of Winterfell. That will happen off-screen between Dance and the next book.
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Oct 27, 2011 17:47
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bigmcgaffney posted:Wizard's First Rule is only 2.99 or so in Amazon until the end of the month. Is it worth it, even as a laugh? For three bucks as a laugh, probably. You can figure out how much of it precisely is given over to the extended rape sequence with the red-leather-wearing-dominatrix-with-a-magic-pain-causing-dildo!
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Oct 27, 2011 17:55
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I just finished ADWD last night (I know, I'm late), and I've been avoiding internet discussion of the series, and especially this thread, while I was reading it. So now thankfully, I get to come back to this thread now. Overall, I liked it more than AFFC (which really isn't saying much). It was enjoyable to read, and nice to see some of the characters I care about again. Here are my most prominent thoughts about it though. 1) Introducing Aegon in book 5 is rather late in the series. It's kind of a stretch to think that readers would get at all invested in him or Jon Connington at this point. Aegon feels like a disposable character right now, so I hope GRRM either kills him spectacularly or develops him enough that I want to see him succeed. 2) The book felt like it was all build-up with no pay off. Yes, some interesting stuff happened and I'm glad the story advanced somewhat, but I would have liked to have seen a showdown at Meereen or even at Storms End. There was nothing that happened near the end of the book that felt like the climax he was building up to. 3) Totally a minor nitpick, but does anyone else feel like some of his characters mannerisms have become less distinctive? I found myself getting annoyed when he would reuse the same phrases and verbal cues on multiple characters. Does everyone in his world really say "elsewise" and "you are not wrong" all the time? I don't know maybe this has been the case throughout the books, and I just didn't remember... It has been years since I read the previous books. 3) Arya's chapters were the best part of the book as far as I'm concerned. Proof that GRRM can still write really awesome story with tension and momentum in just a couple of chapters. 4) The cliffhanger with Jon being stabbed kind of lacks cliffhanger-ness. It's obvious that GRRM would like there to be some tension around "Oh my god, is Jon dead!?", but everyone I've talked to is extremely skeptical. I'm extremely skeptical. It just seems like a catalyst to get Jon out of the Night's Watch and doing something else. shady anachronism fucked around with this message at 18:07 on Oct 27, 2011 |
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Oct 27, 2011 18:04
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Junkenstein posted:As a book, Dance really needs a Winterfell siege pay-off. It has to be the big event that the publisher made GRRM drop from the book. You're saying you weren't riveted by Daenerys making GBS threads all over herself? That easily tops the siege of Winterfell or Tyrion killing Tywin. Or whatever happened at the end of Feast.
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Oct 27, 2011 18:08
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