Game of Thrones

Accidentally posted the same thing twice. Never mind.

My husband had read the books, but Daughter and I hadn't, so when shit started to go down the two of us were literally gasping and saying "Oh my GOD!"

(At last. We bookspoilt can unclench our sore jaws. You're welcome.)

Heh. Thank you.

I haven't read the books, but I've been spoiled for this since the first season, when some TWoP dimwit posted something in the ep thread after Ned was killed about people are freaking out about this? Wait 'til the red wedding! Asshole.

So sad. All the senior Starks dead, the next generation cut down, two of the direwolves dead, two more separated from their people. None of the children with family. Arya witnessing her father's death and the extended carnage from the murder of her mother and brother. Amazing if she doesn't become a sociopath. Poor girl. I just want her to find her direwolf and have exciting adventures with original Jaqen.

And now I'll never seen pretty, defiant Dany-Robb children....

"George R.R. Martin and Joss Whedon walk into a bar. Someone you love dies." -David Gerrold

I'm really impressed that there are enough people unspoiled for this shocker that the Internets can still be up in outrage the day after. Also thankful that all of us long-traumatized book readers no longer have to be constantly worried that we'll accidentally spill the beans. There's major shockers in most of the books, it's just that the second half of book 3 seems like one jaw-dropper after another. Prepare for next season!

Eris, you found that joke so nice you posted it twice. :)

I loved how Entertainment Weekly had like, 6 articles up about the episode basically as soon as it was done. It's like this was the Oscars or something. I also have to say, I'm impressed that the secret was kept so well even after the Ned Stark thing was such a huge deal. Of course now Alan Sepinwall has had to close down comments on his review because people are just posting book spoilers to be assholes. (ETA: we had the same thought, wenchsenior.)

Sunday, Bloody Sunday! Holy crap, I was spoiled for it and hate that I didn't go in blind, but even with that I still needed a hug after that went down. Rob and Caitlyn killed me. The song use was brilliant and haunting and I kept thinking is The Rains of Castamere a Nick Cave Song or should it be a Nick Cave song? and I was kind of taken out of the moment for a minute and then taken right back in when Rob gets up and instead of fighting lays down. At least Caitlyn went out swinging...er killing. I get why he was ready but damn it was tough to watch the clear "hero" bite it and not knowing who will come around to take care of all the damn turncoats! Arya and the wolf were the worst scene for me, even more than the baby killing scene. She was just so close and the wolf's eyes basically telling her it's all over, rest was the hardest for me. I want to rewatch but I think I'd need alcohol or cookies or something.

Best response video yet: Arya is a little less upset than you would think.

Finally had a chance to watch the episode (seriously, that's the last time we don't watch a penultimate GoT episode of the season in realtime -- we're deliberately not reading the books, but my FB feed was instantly full of oblique spoilers like "I guess love doesn't save you" and "Running out of Starks" and a bunch of general "OMGWTFBBQ." Yeesh.)

So at the GoT Comic-Con panel two years ago (in which Jason Momoa showed up in Khal Drogo eye makeup and stole the show), the producers said that they wanted to make it to "R.W.", and mentioned that even the name of the event was a spoiler. I accidentally found out it stood for "Red Wedding" when someone tweeted about it from the audience, but we managed to avoid figuring out any other details -- and of course there was no way to google for *when* it might take place without being spoiled out the wazoo. So every wedding or discussion of a wedding in the last two years has been "ZOMG is this going to be what they were talking about?"

From my FB feed I was half expecting Robb to die but Catelyn was a surprise. (And I suppose it's impressive not being more spoiled than that for something that's existed for 13 years.)

I am really bad at recognizing instrumental music so I didn't realize the song was the Lannister anthem.

From this day forward the ultimate dick move at a wedding will be getting the band to play The Rains of Castamere.

Eris Rising wrote:Six minutes of people reacting to the Red Wedding.

That actually was kind of sad, as well as funny as hell. It took me right back to reading it for the first time. You'd think fans wouldn't have any innocence left intact after the end of season 1/book 1, but I still managed to shriek with horror or shock at least 10 more times over the course of the book series.

punkysdilemma wrote:I am really bad at recognizing instrumental music so I didn't realize the song was the Lannister anthem.

I cheated because I was watching with subtitles, and it said something like "Music: 'The Rains of Castamere.'" I wouldn't have recognized it either, but I remembered the meaning of it from the title. (Not that it mattered anyway because I was spoiled.) I don't think it's the Lannister anthem exactly, so much as being about a prominent family who was slaughtered at a wedding. Wah-waaaahhh.

From this day forward the ultimate dick move at a wedding will be getting the band to play The Rains of Castamere.

This is a tangent, but: Some years ago I was at a family wedding (an uncle), and my mom and sisters and I were all having a fun time goofing around and requesting oldies from the DJ and what have you (there was a whole setup for doing requests). My mom loves that song "If You Want to Be Happy" (I think that's what it's called) (here you go) and one of us went to request it so we could dance to it. And then while we were waiting for it to come on I started thinking about it, and the lyrics, which go "If you want to be happy for the rest of your life/Never make a pretty woman your wife/So from my personal point of view/Get an ugly girl to marry you." And I had this like dawning-horror NOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooo moment. Like, what kind of dickbag requests that at a wedding?? Complicating matters: the bride in question was something of a pretty princess, and really into makeup etc., and also emotionally fragile/an alcoholic (they ended up getting divorced partly due to her substance-abuse problems). My mom had been working overtime as she does (bless her) to bring this woman into the family, make her feel welcome etc. So I suddenly was like "OMG OMG WE CAN'T PLAY THAT SONG MAKE IT STOP NOOOOOO." We went back to the DJ and un-requested it (hopefully he would have had the sense not to play it anyway) and it was fine. But it was a close one. I can just imagine this poor woman being like "who requested that? WHO AT THIS WEDDING HATES ME OMG SOB" It was not a good thing. MAYBE not as bad as "The Rains of Castamere" though.

That's hilarious, Instant Monkeys!

My husband found an article about all the outraged fans basically tweeting "F*** you, HBO!" and "I'm gonna find George R. R. Martin and beat him to death with a baseball bat", and both of us are shaking our heads. I guess there's something to be said for creating characters that fans love so much, but GEEZ, people, keep it together.

The thing is, I don't get the surprise, I mean I get the surprise of the specific events but not that people die like a lot! I have never read the books and don't know any specific spoilers but still I know the body count of these characters is crazy high.

Well, I think part of it is just that sort of TV Rules that Main Characters Don't Die. Books don't necessarily have that rule, because actors aren't under contract there, and most shows aren't following the plot of a book. I said the same thing about a certain character death in Serenity: people were still thinking TV Rules, when in Movie Rules death is always an option.

Exactly. And even in shows where bodycounts are high its generally not the main character that is killed. And if it is you hear about it beforehand in this day and age via contract issues and deadline announcing they are leaving. For example, everyone knew Mark Sloane was dying on Greys Anatomy before that season even started.

Having read the books I knew what was going to happen, but they have managed to keep all major deaths pretty close to the vest for non book readers. Add in that Robb, Catelyn and Talisa were major characters this season. And it was abrupt. So I can see how people who had no idea are shocked. I mean Boone's death season one got similar what the fuck, as I recall because of the same thing. People were not expecting the show to kill of its goodlooking, young lead character that early on.

It's not tv, it's HBO! But seriously, I still don't get that at all because given the nature of the fans of the books, I have to imagine that if they don't keep close to the books there would even be more of an uproar. And with so many characters that each have their moments this show has nothing but expendable characters. I am much more surprised when a character doesn't die.

And if it is you hear about it beforehand in this day and age via contract issues and deadline announcing they are leaving

This is actually how I was spoiled for Ned Stark's death because that year there were tons of stories about second position casting (it was the year both Damon Wayans Jr. and Adam Pally were cast in sitcoms that got picked up and than Happy Endings got renewed and there were a few other examples as well) but Sean was cast in Ashley Judd's show and there was no mention of it.

Eh I just think it's easy to forget how many people do not read anything about TV ever, even if they are "online", in fact please go read the OLTL/AMC facebooks to realize how many people can be on line and not realize they are on line.

If you don't consume a lot of entertainment news than you can be fairly spoilerfree. I do agree though that after Ned Stark and the show being on for three years you should get that it's a fairly brutal universe and death for these characters is around every turn. And on that note here's my favorite SPOILER-rific video about that It Gets Better!

I do agree you probably should catch on but I think the way it happened was so abrupt and brutal. I think if I was a GoT viewer who never read the books at all and was not part of any internet type fandom, I'd probably assume that yes there is a good chance more main characters will die, but I would expect it to be more...like with Robb putting myself in that situation I would probably have assumed had he died it would have been a battlefield.

More Internet reactions to the Red Wedding. Some are the same as the 21 Best Tumblr Reactions but many are different.

Troy Barnes coming in with the pizza is of course my favorite.

I'm surprised the Arrested Westeros people didn't go the "And that's why you always leave a note!" route.

I bet it'll come by the end of the week. Their Facebook page said this week will be Red Wedding-themed.