The Wall has been watched, gifts have been given, and Six is coming. This week leads us into the year’s tenth episode, one final occasion to celebrate a dedicated community’s journey through A Storm of Swords.
We have one last batch of Owns to collect before the year reaches its close. Join us in this revisitation of boundless feels, chills, and excitement. This special episode (with a few special guests) records Wednesday night!
Let this collection (of some) of our favorite moments from A Storm of Swords serve as a guide to your submissions. This is but a shallow list. Will you help us fill it?
There and back again
Jon turned his cloak, and lived to tell the tale. Are we numb to the height of tension and drama this story reaches? Climbing the Wall aside, he made a series of seriously bold moves.
Lads, gents, good sers
Thanks to this brotherhood of loyal men for some of GOO’s strongest and longest pauses for laughter and song. But to meet them again at the end with our new friend, it’s almost too perfect.
Hand of the King
From a salty, lonely rock to a dungeon of pitch black, Davos became the One True Hand of the King. Yes.
The new Warden
Roose Bolton lied, cheated, and subverted his King to replace the Starks as the North’s great power. He’s a dirty bastard.
Mance’s vast accomplishments
Mance Rayder united the free folk. HE MARCHED ON THE WALL.
Tyrion and Sansa get married
This really happened.
Arya left it all behind
Beautiful weasel soup. Best friends. Bad dreams. Real adventure, real change. Arya leaves Westeros, an incredibly cruel cliffhanger is born.
The Red Wedding
….
Poor guy
Jon wins again. He is your Lord Commander, Thorne.
Murdered at his own wedding
Tough break, Joff.
The plot thickens
Lysa tells all. Littlefinger is a busy man.
Redemption
With Storm, the podcast experienced a true change in Jaime Lannister. He did it.
The Nightfort
Bran and company crossed into the real North through a magical passage beneath the Wall.
The One True King
Stannis, the One True Mannis, turned his attention from usurpers to the North and the Kingdoms’ great enemy.
We’re saying bye, once and for all, to a book we’ve traveled together for so long — in the final episode of the year. If you’ve read the book (or followed along), tell us your favorite moments from A Storm of Swords!
Thanks for an amazing 2015. It’s been an awesome year with the lot of you.
Hodor !
Yeah !
Another year…. Another 365 days without GRRM publishing book 6. Perhaps 2016 will be the year,
A tremendous read, GOOeys! Enjoyed following along on weekends.
Regarding LSH: Do you think that Nymeria would have “saved” Cat’s body from the river if Arya hadn’t been dream-warging Nymeria at the time of discovery?
My ASoS own goes to Arya for shaking things up in Westeros during the day with the BwB/Hound and during the night while she warg-sleeps! Depending on how you answer the question above, one could think that Arya may have directly contributed to that stunning epilogue. 🙂
[I have a prediction that the LSH-Arya/Nymeria predicament may come full circle at some point…]
I’m thinking that GRRM suffers from the same thing that felled the greats; Issac Asimov, Robert Heinlein – as they age, they fall in love with the process of writing itself, the story is secondary. They write for writing’s sake. I fear we will never see ADOS. We’re actually lucky that D&D will finish the story for us.
I guess I’ll be one of those people that got really into the books from the show and will see the ending take place on the show. Sucks. The books are really well written and constructed and wonderful. I love the show but it really brought me to the books. I was visiting a friend and was hungover on his couch and he made me watch some episodes of season one. I’m not into fantasy so I immediately started complaining about this DandD bullshit. Little did I know. I was sold that day
LOL, that Bran’s pic
It made its first trailer
Thekinginthegreatwhitenorth,
I heard the problem was the opposite, that GRRM doesn’t like writing. Loves the stories and the ideas, but hates applying the mortar that holds the bricks together – and procrastinates as a result.
Rat Kook,
Where did you hear that?
Garilex,
Yeah, indeed! But, maybe, let it… Targaryen?
Guess we’ll see in season 6…
So … without Winds of Winter we don’t know if Mance and Stannis are shaggy dog stories!
Both die in Winds of Winter?
Mance I can sort of see.
Stannis , that’s a puzzle.
Stannis seems, book wise, all set up to do as Melisandre thinks will happen, lead or at least help in the lead, against the Other’s invasion.
Always figured Jon Snow and Dany would be main leaders against the Others.
Stannis involved? Forget it! So what the hell was that about?
Melisandre, what the hell there too? Even if Jon is the right savior how could she go so wrong? Her powers of prophecy seem punk now.
I really want to see the story in WoW.
I think season 6 on HBO we will finally see both Ayra and jon, Warging into different animals. I would also like to see what happened to Rickon and Asha and Shaggy Dog
Maybe I’m missing something, but wasn’t the Red Viper in A Storm of Swords? If so, that is by far, the BEST part of the whole thing…
Rat Kook,
GRRM actually loves writing, just not on the things you´d expect/wish from him.
He drinks readers’ tears. It is known.
Boojam,
Stannis was and always will be a B+character,only his fanboys got it in their head that he is actually going to matter in the endgame that’s why they’re mad now,lol !
SlayerNina,
More like he bores them to death,that’s what he did to me with the last two books .
Hey, the biggest news site in Israel has reported that actor Yousef Sweid has been cast in a small roll for season 6 and already filmed his parts (obviously). They also say that another (unnamed) actress has cast, and 2 more (Neta Gerti and Yuval Sharf) has auditioned without mentioning the outcome.
Now, Israeli media have very bad track record when it comes to these sort of news, but since they announce his casting and not speculation it might be more reliable. The guy is from Arab ethnicity so I’m guessing he will be a Dothraki, if he’s really in.
links to the article and his imdb page-
http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-4746498,00.html
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1798233/
edit: They just edited the page and said they actress is Ania Bukstein (good actress, but might be for a fanservice role). I’d still take the entire thing with a pinch of salt
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0119804/
Yan,
Yah – I’ll believe it when I see it
Shy Lady Dragon,
Stark/Targaryen. 😉 We’ll see about that in season 6, but for sure we’ll learn the truth. I’m not sure he’ll learn it too.
Yan,
Hi Yan. I’m being dense today, because I didnt get the “fanservice” reference. I looked at pictures of Ania… she might make a good Ashara Dayne. Is that what you were alluding to?
Ser Gerold,
No, it’s likely a small part and she’s done nude/sexy scenes in the past. of course Ill be happy if she’s Ashara but I don’t think that’s the case.
Yan,
We’ll see, but she would make a great spearwife.
Shy Lady Dragon,
He’s a bastard raised in the North. Hence he is a Snow.
FreeParking,
Hahaha, after having tried to find it again, I think it was GRRM quoting an essay from a different writer altogether; not something he said about himself.
I should just stop commenting on stuff I haven’t properly fact-checked. Not that long ago someone asked me for a source on something I’d said and it turned out I’d just dreamed it.
Rat Kook,
Actually it was GRRM himself when he pitched aSoIaF to his publisher back in 1993. He expressed it differently, though, more like he gets bored when he has to to tie plot/arcs down to bring a story to its conclusion.
Everyday I thank the gods for having the TV series. Look, I really, really love this story and I REALLY need an ending. Obviously I would rather read it first, but with each passing year my fears grow on the books will never be finished. Now I know that in the worst case scenario, at least D&D will give us an ending to the series.
Brienne the Beauty!!! Just meeting her is lovely, but to see some of her full potential as a warrior, for the role she played in Jaime’s transformation, and knowing that she goes forward carrying Valyrian steel. Gee, I hope we get to see more of her…
Also, the Hound’s road to redemption with the little weasel wolf by his side. Even if it ends with his death, it is one of the best-crafted & most beloved relationships in the saga.
I still remember that book and it’s affect on me. I watched season 1 on HBO then went out and read the books.
So many times while reading Storm of Swords I had to put that book down and just cheer, or pace around my room thinking wtf just happened? Or cry…
One of the best books I ever read.
Arthur,
What’s your opinion of AFFC,i would really like to hear your take on that book .
Tyrion the myrion,
AFFC wasn’t nearly as good as ASOS.
However, I believe it was because GRRM made a huge mistake to separate and leave out half the character’s storylines. It also made the 5th book ADOD suffer as well because of the same reason and we all had to rewind ourselves back in the timeline to the start of that book.
If somehow, HBO and the publication company and rerelease AFFC and ADOD to include all character’s storylines in chronological order, in both books, IMO everyone would like them more.
I think whether people want to admit it or now, consciously or subconsciously, reading an entire book knowing that many of your favorite characters will not be included already puts you in a negative mood.
Sure, ASOS wins outright with just the emotional journey it takes you on with so many of the characters, but AFFC and ADOD really aren’t bad books once you get over the bad choice of GRRM to split the storylines and characters in half.
And I think if you were to merge all the characters and put the storylines in a chronological order, like how GRRM should have done it, that would have changed a lot of the mental energy of the reader and made the read much more enjoyable and there wouldn’t have been so many people saying they weren’t good.
Just my thoughts on the matter.
Bottom line for me, they were good books, not as good as ASOS but mostly because GRRM fucked up and made a stupid choice to split characters/storyline and timelines up.
Could she be our flashback Lyanna? If Arya is suppose to look sort of like Lyanna, this actress and Maisie do have a resemblance. Big green eyes, prominent brows, wider nose. I am probably 1 of 1 that doesn’t care about seeing a ToJ flashback (yeah, it tells potential parentage but the whole Rhaegar/Lyanna thing is meh) but she would fit the bill pretty hard in my opinion.
flintstonewielder,
He said that when he knows the ending he loses interest in writing it, which is not very reassuring.
Arthur,
All Leather Must Be Boiled combines the two in readable form. Looks interesting but I never tried it – http://boiledleather.com/post/25902554148/a-new-readerfriendly-combined-reading-order-for-a
FreeParking,
Exactly.
In that sense, it is much safer to expect more dissertations on Sad Puppies than a surprise release of tWoW in the near future, as part of the book fandom keeps deluding itself about.
Don’t forget all the NFL updates, that must be of massive interest to all his non US based fans 😉
We don’t need show Lyanna to look like Maisie. We need her to look more like Kit if the theory is true.
Wyrlane Dervish,
I like the Arya/Hound relationship a lot, too. I’m referring to the show’s depiction of it. By not letting us see The Hound’s actual death, the show can always bring back that valuable character. I mean, how on earth can they throw away a character so deathly afraid of fire in a story where fire figures so prominently?
I want to see The Hound overcome his fear for a greater good. He’s already explored his tender side by caring for the Stark girls…something the audience did not expect of him.
Anon,
He sort of did when fighting Beric.
Wyrlane Dervish,
Brienne’s got to stop fighting the wrong people if she’s ever to realize any potential. It would’ve been better if she’d cut off Jaime’s head, but left The Hound alone.
FreeParking,
Yes, he did face his fear a little bit against Beric. I want to see him do it on a grander scale…related to the final events. The Hound demonstrates the qualities of a true knight in a world where knights aren’t chivalrous, as it’s claimed. But, he keeps saying he’s no knight.
This compilation is a much better way of reading the 2 books imo. I read them separately at first and didn’t hate either of book 4 or 5 but found myself losing interest in the middle of chapters or when I finished a chapter and turned the page to find the title “The Wayward Bride” or “The Watcher” I was confused because they weren’t the usual names of characters I was used to seeing. But when it’s one cohesive story in chronological order it makes more sense and is more enjoyable. It also helps now that most of that material has been covered in the show for comparison or reference.
Just wanted to say happy new year folks! Cheers! 🙂
This. Totally agree.
ASOS – such an amazing book, a brilliant ending to the first arc of the story.
My view on AFFC/ADWD is thst they are transitional books, setting up the next phase of the story toward the climax of the series. They show the reader how the events of books 1-3 effect the wider population of Westeros via Brienne’s chapters – Septon Meribald’s broken man speech is one of the best pieces of writing in the series IMO, and I hope it appears in the show; and how other Houses of Westeros such as the Martell’s/Greyjoy’s seize upon the chaos to further their own ambitions.
However, I agree with people who think that the splitting of the story geographically was an error, and definitely effects the reader negatively on a first read. I have found with subsequent re-reads, especially the Boiled Leather order, I appreciated all the new characters and what GRRM was trying to fo with this phase of the story, so much more.
A vote from me for the boiled leather combo of affc and adwd. The story flows much better in this form. I did it on my second reading of the books. I liked affc and adwd much better afterwards. I recommend it to anyone who didn’t like the separation of the storylines. This form solves that problem.
Angela,
Really, Angela ? I mean…really ? Reshuffling the double-turd makes it good ?
Here the project of one of the biggest aSoIaF-apologists around:
The project:
http://slynt.blogspot.no/2015/02/announcing-feast-with-dragons.html#more
The outcome, 10 months later:
http://slynt.blogspot.no/2015/11/boohiss.html
So, Angela, keep up the good job of deluding yourself.
To all the others that keep riffing on this *change the order of the content, it´ll turn good*, I´ll paraphrase from Berke Breathed: No matter how you slice it, it´s still baloney !
I’m sorry that I liked the last 2 books a little more when reading them combined. It is fine that you didn’t like them. To each it’s own.
Angela,
*a little more* ?
Wow, what does that even mean…exactly ?
Instead of *crap* they´re just a *little less crappy*?
Confused,
fsw
“one of the biggest aSoIaF-apologists around”? Really?
I used to like the re-read posts from Slynt’s blog, but he’s always been incredibly toxic about the last two books and GRRM’s writing speed, and the moment he reached AFFC with his re-read his blog went to shit for good. Of course nobody’s obligated to like the last books, but all he does is whine about GRRM not writing what he’d like to and as fast as he’d like to.
(And I say that as someone who absolutely sees how especially ADWD has a lot of problems and plain bad parts, although it also contains some of my favorite parts of the series)
Angela,
Do yourself a favor and learn to ignore the ignorant blowhards that enter this site on occasion to decree their opinions are fact.
They are usually rude and unpleasant like this one here, and lack the ability or understanding that it’s possible two people can read the same books and both come out with a totally different experience.
They suffer from a delusion that their own personal opinions are the only valid ones and anyone who thinks any differently then them is “wrong” so don’t waste your time debating them or even acknowledging them because they are pretty much just here to try to impose their opinions on everyone else as facts.
I learned this a lonnnng time ago.
I won’t anymore. It is just so negative.
Onto the article’s topic, ASOS is such a good book.
Arthur,
Yep, Arthur, keep spreading your abject apologism here.
Poor Angela…
Angela,
I agree, Angela !
Incredible how crappy aFfC/aDwD are in comparison.
From what I gather, you agree on that one.
Because if not, why read them in a different order ?
Isn´t it ?
happy new Years peasants, Here’s Hoping Season 6 is the Best Season of game of thrones yet, Best of wishes to the cast and crew of Thrones In the Year 2016.
I always say that for a first read, AFFC and ADWD should be read as separate books because that was how they were written, as separate books. For rereads, do whatever you want. If you want to mimic the experience people had when reading the books, which is what I think you guys are doing here, AFFC should be read and finished before you go into ADWD.
Angela,
I totally agree with you. And ya know, anything that helps you appreciate a work is all good. Happy new year
That first image of the Hound and Arya, I just can’t handle it.
That was the moment where you knew the Hound felt for the girl and was going to defend her.
I’ll never forget the look on his face when he sees Robb Stark’s body with Grey Wind’s head sewn on top.
ash,
Personally I think the best order is A Ball of Beasts, and I can’t stop recommending it to even first time readers. It really does make the experience much better than separate readings, but I didn’t think AFFC and ADWD were bad by any means, just less focused, a little long and tangential, and not as good as ASOS. Without that third book being so amazing, these are pretty on par for ACOK, I think (when read combined).
As for the article/show:
Is it just me or has the depth of the series with all it’s plotting and intricacies been reduced to a pretty basic surface-level tension? It’s still enjoyable for the most part, and the production quality is great, but I can’t help but think the last season lost a lot of that sense of political drama – not that it wasn’t there, but the focus certainly wasn’t (and even scenes that had it were more interested in dealing with character quirks than the world at large). It makes me miss the early seasons, but here’s to hoping the new season will blow us all away.
Why can’t I find this recording anywhere? Presumed the “recording Wednesday Night” meant the 30th Dec – can’t find it on GOO website. To be honest, not even sure that anyone will reply to me, seeing as this post is a week old. Help! Anyone!
They actually weren’t written that way, they were written as one book, and then George separated them as it got too big.
I favor the boiled leather version, having read them separate and together. I hope GOO goes with booked leather and combines the books. It’s a much more cohesive story that way.
Davyth Stark,
I don’t think they’ve posted it yet unfortunately. Came here to see if there was some reason in the comments but guess not.
Lorilooellen,
A man is disappointed,,,
Thanks anyway 🙂