Game of Thrones

As many people know, I've been a huge fan of the George R. R. Martin books in the A Song of Ice and Fire series. I carried out an official re-read portion on the alt.fan.grrm newsgroup back in the mid 2000s, I was so into it! So I was pretty damned excited when he announced that there would be a television show made from it!

Anyway, it's been going for 5 weeks now, and it's just fabulous. I'd just like to write up a few points about what I like and don't like so much about the television version of it.

• Loving all the casting. Everyone has been perfect. Of course, some people look a little different from how I pictured them (Sansa's the big one here, also Lysa and little Robert) but I'm coming around ;) Best fits with my mind's eye I've seen are Ned, Arya, Joffrey, Jon, and Cersei. And, of course, Peter Dinklage as Tyrion. Joffrey's casting as the prince is perfect. He so looks like a little shit.
• The scenery is fabulous. Real castles that look just the part. Love the differences between the Dothraki lands and the mainland too. Since so much of the book is about weather, it's great to see the differences in climes throughout the land so well reflected in the scenery jobs.
• I understand that with TV you have to cut out various scenes or add things to make up for the fact you're not running around in lots of peoples' heads. I think they've done a sterling job of that. There's been a couple of little scenes that weren't in the book but which fleshed out the characters extremely well (Varys/Littlefinger's discussions in the last episode, for example).
• I don't like the opening theme song. I think it was poorly mixed. It could be a lot more inspiring, but it seems to whimper along. There was a metal version running around on YouTube last week that was far far better. Needs more oomph to it.
• It irks me a little that they say some of the names differently from how I'd pronounce them. Yes, this is pretty petty in the scheme of things, but it's Cate-lyn, not "Cat-lyn". Grr.
• It's interesting about the Renly/Loras relationship - in the books it was just alluded to, especially at the beginning (it got more obvious as time went on); here it's extremely blatant, straight up. I think it's kinda cool (also Renly's hot), but it's a reminder that the written word can definitely smooth over a few things that, if you were a fly on the wall, would be perfectly obvious.
• I hate knowing what's going to happen. The Ned scene last episode just reminded me that really, it's all been pretty smooth sailing up until now. Now it's going to get extremely bad.

Anyway if you had no idea this existed, you should go check it out! It's on HBO in the US and Sky something or other here in the UK. Very highly recommended.