Game of Thrones is featured in TV Guide’s “Cheers and Jeers” of 2014. (It’s a Cheer!) The show is considered by the magazine as one of the best on TV this year.
TV Guide put together a video of their Cheers and Jeers and it’s available on youtube. Game of Thrones pops up around 2:06, with comments from the cast at Comic Con this year on the TV Guide yacht, and two quick shots of Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) and Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau).
Critic Matt Roush of TV Guide compiled his own 10 best TV shows of the year list and Game of Thrones also makes an appearance here, clocking in at number four:
How satisfying it can be to watch a few of the bad guys finally bite the Westeros dust. The dragons are bigger and more unruly than ever, and so is the bloody and sprawling plotting as HBO’s epic fantasy vividly dramatizes pivotal events in the finest volume (A Storm of Swords) of George R.R. Martin’s enthralling saga.
Hodorlicious.
I wonder if the dragons are gonna get bigger this year, I mean Drogon was pretty fucking huge last year
Nik and Lena look gorgeous as usual in those shots. I imagine that’s Cersei’s mourning dress for Tywin?
Mormont,
I hope so.
Judging by how much they’ve grown between each season, I think we should expect Drogon (which was already a lot bigger than Rhaegal and Viserion) to be 2-3 times bigger. Since R&V are caged, I don’t expect them to have grown a lot, I think they’ll be a litle bigger than season 4 Drogon
Gonna miss Rose & Rory. Great that the clip they used had them and Pedro. Also a woopwoop for Outlander (sorry my other epic read now tv addiction)
It is still the same mourning gown she has been wearing during season 4 for Joff
So are Nikolaj and Lena promoting Season 5 or is this just footage from Season 4 promotion that TV Guide is releasing now? But if I recall correctly, Kit Harington was the only one who did promotion for Season 4 in TV Guide last year.
Balerion The Cat,
Definitely!
Yep, same old mourning dress. I don’t recall Nikolaj wearing exactly that outfit but it is similar to one he wore in S4.
Sue the Fury,
so do you think this is just season 4 promo footage that they’ve been hoarding or season 5 promotion? because to be fair they do repeat outfits quite a lot.
I dont think the season 5 promotion has really begun for the actors.
Too early for that, I think interviews will start droping around february.
Arkash,
magazine promotions starts earlier than february
Rygar Returns,
i just wanna know if we can expect more season 5 news soon lol
Off topic but I was just blown away by finding out about Varys original plan.
Makes it clear why Illyrio sold Dany to Khal Drogo in the first place.
Just stumbled upon this piece of information from reading a history of Westeros podcast Q&A on reddit.
Here’s the text
Great question. It’s hard to be sure, because Varys is very complex, but I think there are a few different reasons that influence his lack of action in this area. It’s notable that Tyrion never really did anything to LF either, despite knowing it was him who screwed him over re: the dagger lie.
Varys may like the fact that Littlefinger’s schemes distract from his own. The chaos LF is good at generating may also be something Varys is good at making use of, though clearly not always… as in the case of Ned’s execution, which Varys didn’t want, at least not so soon.
Since a key part of Varys’ endgame is fAegon on the throne, and part of that plan is fAegon being a “savior” (original plan was for him to save the realm from Khal Drogo), whatever Littlefinger stirs up could actually help.
Finally, Varys may actually see Littlefinger as useful in the new regime. he knows that LF isn’t trying to set himself up as king, so in that sense he’s probably not a threat to fAegon. He may expect that LF will see the writing on the wall and join fAegon’s cause, which would make him an ally. Not a very trustworthy ally, but perhaps a useful one, of sorts.
A dangerous game, but Varys is no stranger to that.
aurane waters,
If I were you I wouldn’t expect something interesting within the next 15 days
It’s holidays time 🙂
Turncloak,
I get the LF stuff but the Khal Drogo scheming? That is exceptionally long-term, improbable and highly-dangerous thinking, indeed!
Hodor’s Bastard,
improbable which is why it didn’t work out as they planned :-). I can’t think of a better reason why
Turncloak,
Plans A thru E(gg)…I wouldn’t be surprised if Illyrio/Varys had backup plans for their backup plans!
Lol
Why was my comment deleted?
I believe that was an accident, I confused you with someone else. Sorry about that. I will restore it.
Dame Pasty,
Thanks. That was me at my most profound and I’m grateful its restored. 🙂
Hodor’s Bastard,
Turncloak,
The model also is inconsistent with what is in the books. There, we read that
Now, Varys obviously is playing a tricky game: but it seems to be one where
This just seems like too convoluted a plan to have been a long-term one. Instead, it looks like they were trying to take advantage of presented opportunities.
Wimsey,
I’m amused that Varys has all these backup plans.
I simply like the GC because of their association with the various past Blackfyre rebellions and that they are all associated with well-known exiles. They fit well with fAegon’s story (and Dany’s story for that matter). I knew nothing of this original (almost desperate) Khal Drogo plot outlined by Varys & Illyrio (that Turncloak distributed). Can you imagine letting the seasick khalasar somehow get to Westeros, doing their raiding thing, then killing off the khal after supposedly taking KL? Who would think of that (and how is this known)? 🙂
Btw, where has Varys hidden all the “lost” dragon eggs?
Wimsey,
…trying to take advantage of presented opportunities.
Ha, now that I agree with, every plan in a storm (of swords) you can get!
Erinyes,
Warning! The testosterone fueled may skip the following:
Double woopwoop! Love Outlander! I re-read all of the books after watching (original read was soooo long ago) and am looking forward to another season of screen-sizzling hot Scots! I need to get the hubby a kilt.
Now back to regular programming…
Yes!! I love my Outlander books & now the show too!! That’s all I’ll say about that.
Re a seasick invading khalasar: their weakness means they’d likely do less damage than usual before fAgeon & GC subdue them. Is it plausible that the GC would hang back & “rescue” Westeros from the Dothraki, with fAgeon leading them?
Hodor’s Bastard,
Ah, but what evidence is there that
(Full disclosure: I am one of those people who was posting “YES” on the old “is Aegon still alive?” thread in the 1990’s; I’ve been expecting him back for a while, and my jaded view is that the whole “fake Aegon” thing is just sour grapes from the people who guessed wrong!)
(Second full disclosure: I also was one of the ones predicting that he’d turn up in Swords…. 🙁 )
That’s my problem with this model:
In short, I simply do not think that this was Varys’ plan.
Wimsey,
Indirect response:
The GC was created by a Blackfyre (Aegor) to support the Blackfyre cause. Perhaps Bittersteel saw the desperate end coming for the Blackfyres and created this international option for their cause? They successfully asserted themselves in Qohor and their mission is fairly clear….BUT…Dany and Viserys (Targs!) were both held in Qohor for a while during their formative years. Coincidence? Was a general shift in GC priorities in the works or does the GC not distinguish between Targ/Blackfyre blood anymore? Is this an intentional GRRM misdirection?
To me, a hidden Blackfyre (surviving Targ bastard/descendant) is just as probable as Aegon being saved and the secrets behind all those missing dragon eggs, Benjen=NK, BR’s lingering existence, etc… But I do agree that Aegon alive is the obvious path, in order to align with prophesy and keep the dance of dragons going!
Hodor’s Bastard,
1. Aegon Targaryen existed (Yes).
2. Aegon Targaryen’s body never has been positively identified (yes).
3. Varys needs the means and inside information to do what was necessary (very possible).
4. He probably should look like one of Aegon Targeryen’s parents (Yes)
Now, consider what needs to be true for him to be Aegon Blackfyre
A. The Blackfyre line must still be around.
B. The unknown Blackfyre line must have had a son around the same time that Aegon, Daeny, Jon, etc., were born.
C. Varys had to get that child away from his real parents so early that Connington et al. wouldn’t know about this.
D. The progeny from the unknown Blackfyre line has to look so much like Rhaegar that it’s hard to make him not look like Rhaegar.
Now, 1 & 2 are true: we’ve read both repeatedly. 3 is true, although this does not guarantee that Varys actually did it. 4 is true. So, we are relying on three true events and one for which the requirements are true. (We can add to this that Martin has followed appropriate story-telling techniques, reminding us about once per book that the baby’s head was too crushed for anyone to identify, and letting us know that Varys is working for Targaryens in some capacity.)
A supposedly is false. That does not make it necessarily false, but given that the Targaryens were very vigilant about the Blackfyres (much like Robert was about Daeny & Viserys), and given that Blackfyres cannot go long without rebelling, it is improbable that it’s true. (We can add to this that Martin should have given us some indication in the text that it was true, too, if we want to use story-telling criteria as well as what is in the text.) B and D are very improbable: what are the odds that a Blackfyre progney would be born at just the right time AND look much like Rhaegar that he can even fool people like Connington never mind Tyrion. C would be improbable, too. (We never read that the Blackfyres married sister-to-brother, and as mercenaries, it is not like they could even have had Valyrian wives from Volantis or Lys, as they wouldn’t easily marry into the upper classes; moreover, had they done so, then it would have attracted the attention of the Targaryens and Baratheons.)
So, the latter means that we are relying on four improbable events for one scenario versus three known events and one fairly probable one. P[1&2&3&4] therefore is much, much greater than P[A&B&C&D]
From a purely story telling perspective,
(That doesn’t mean that Martin cannot pull off something that is in keeping with his theory of story-telling: it is just much less obvious to me how he could do it. Maybe he’ll surprise me! In some ways, I almost hope he does: I like figuring things out in advance, but I love it when people can fool me.)
Wimsey,
We shall see. Enjoyed the ideas, Wimsey. Happy holidays!
——–
OT: Direct quote from from a blurb in this week’s Time magazine (2015 Preview, pg. 104):
A Song of Ice and Fire: The Winds of Winter
George RR Martin is almost done with the long-awaited sixth novel in the series that inspired HBO’s Game of Thrones.
We can dream!
Hodor’s Bastard,
And to you! May your (and everyone else’s) egg nog have some dragon’s breath to it!
Actually, that’s the next book: until we learn that it’s divided into 2 parts! 🙂
And on a geological time scale, he must be nearly done. That is the one scale where a glacial pace is pretty quick, after all.