The post Game of Thrones holiday ornaments are here, because you can’t plan far enough ahead appeared first on Winter is Coming.
Via https://winteriscoming.net/2018/07/31/game-of-thrones-holiday-ornaments-are-here-get-them-while-they-last/
Tuesday, July 31, 2018
Game of Thrones holiday ornaments are here, because you can’t plan far enough ahead
Via https://winteriscoming.net/2018/07/31/game-of-thrones-holiday-ornaments-are-here-get-them-while-they-last/
Monday, July 30, 2018
From the Maester’s Desk – Endgame: The Royal Sidekicks
The night before the Battle of the Bastards, Davos Seaworth and Tormund Giantsbane had a conversation about the people they served, and how it didn’t really pay off. “Maybe that’s our mistake: believing in kings” said the Onion Knight. “Jon Snow is not a king” replied Tormund.
But things have changed since then, on Game of Thrones. Jon Snow is now very much a king, and not only that, but the actual heir to the Iron Throne. The consequences of him bending the knee to Daenerys still remain to be seen.
Point is, Davos is once again following a monarch, albeit a very different one than Stannis Baratheon, and essentially serving as Jon’s adviser. He’s not a fighter, but his mind is sharp and his loyalty can’t be bought.
Ser Jorah Mormont is in a similar position: although Tyrion Lannister was chosen as Dany’s Hand of the Queen, he’s still one of her trusted advisors and a member of her Queensguard. His motives are different than Davos, since he’s following Daenerys because of the (unrequited) love he feels for her, but after a hard fall from grace and narrowly escaping the greyscale disease, he most certainly won’t betray her ever again.
The odd one out in the trio of characters I’ll talk about in this article is Ser Bronn of the fucking Blackwater. He’s not loyal and he doesn’t do things for love, but for the promise of riches and (eventually) a big castle. After leaving Tyrion to his fate, when it seemed like no one would help the disgraced Lannister to fight Gregor Clegane, he ended up as Jaime Lannister’s companion and right-hand man (quite literally). Bronn didn’t follow Jaime to Winterfell at the end of the seventh season, but I think we haven’t seen the last of him just yet.
Two of them follow leaders and one is after the money, but all three will soon have to deal with the undead problem that is coming from the North.
Will they live to see the end of the war and a new beginning for Westeros? Will Bronn finally get his castle? Or is a tragic fate awaiting for some or all of them? As with previous Endgame articles, I’ll be making educated guesses and predictions for what’s going to be the future of these beloved sidekick characters.
SER DAVOS SEAWORTH
When I read A Clash of Kings, Davos quickly turned into one of my favorite characters. I couldn’t help but to pity him in a way, since he wanted to be loyal to Stannis but that meant doing things he didn’t necessarily agree with, especially when Melisandre was involved.
The inspired casting of Liam Cunningham (truly, what would be of this show without Nina Gold?), and the news that Neil Marshall would be the one to tackle “Blackwater” (the ninth episode of Season 2) prompted me to revisit the director’s Centurion from 2010 and get a small taste of what to expect.
The episode was incredible (even more so when having in mind that the scale and the budget of the show were much smaller back in 2012) but alas, as in the books, the Wildfire prevented Davos from seeing much action and tragically took his son’s life.
In the novels, Davos has seven sons (four of whom die during the Battle of the Blackwater Bay) but I assume the number was reduced both to keep things more manageable and so the role of Shireen Baratheon as Davos’s surrogate daughter of sorts would have more of an impact.
His wife, Marya Seaworth, has so far remained “off-screen” in both mediums. She has been mentioned (and not by name) just a couple of times in the screen adaptation, and I have to admit it’s something that bugs me a bit. Sure enough, Davos can’t just tell Jon he’s taking a break and departing to go see his wife, but he’s been away from home for so long you’d have to wonder if Mrs. Seaworth doesn’t deserve an award for being the most patient person in the Seven Kingdoms. Even small moments such as him sending a letter or money (or both) to his wife would go a long way in letting viewers know the relationship is alive and well, and that Davos still has someone he loves and is looking after her.
It’s perhaps unnecessary, but it’d hardly take up a lot of screen time and in a coming final season that all but guarantees there’ll be no short amount of character deaths, it would be another reason to feel worried about a possible grim fate for Davos.
Davos is currently en route to White Harbor, along with Jon and Dany’s forces. The road to Winterfell should be safe enough, it’s when they reach the Stark castle that things will start to go south for everyone involved.
Even though he admits he’s not much of a fighter, Davos is brave and doesn’t hesitate in taking action when necessary. Luckily, he hasn’t been forced to fight his way out of a bad situation just yet, but that may change when the army of the dead attacks Winterfell.
I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if he ends up sacrificing himself to save someone else (maybe Jon, one of the Stark siblings or Daenerys?), and gets later turned into a wight by the Night King for an extra heartbreak. Other than the dragon Viserion, so far no character the audience may care about has been “zombified” (that we know at least, since a wight Hodor may be around, waiting for his appearance). It wouldn’t be a happy ending for the Onion Knight, but it’d be a bold move from the screenwriters and the pulling of our heartstrings would be guaranteed.
Davos could also die later in the season, during the battle at King’s Landing. It wouldn’t be any less tragic, but it’d be also ironic in a way since he doesn’t feel any love whatsoever for the city, despite it’s the place where he was born. Twice he has eluded death in there during the show’s run, not counting all the times he had to avoid the Royal Fleet during his years as a smuggler, so third time could be the charm, so to speak.
If this happens, Salladhor Saan’s joke could turn prophetic in the sense he could turn up to gather Davos’s bones and deliver them to Marya. Salladhor is such a minor character he has only appeared (briefly) in three episodes, but I trust most people will remember about him.
The best outcome for him is not only to survive the war, but also to be on the winning side by the time everything is said and done. If Daenerys becomes sole queen or marries Jon, then it’s to be expected that Tyrion remains the Hand of the King and Davos won’t hold that position, but he could remain as an adviser or be given the command of either the Royal Fleet or the Master of Coin position. After all, he did help to find the coin for Stannis’s campaign and has more than enough political savvy, not to mention he’d be relatively safe, not having to deal with weapons or find himself in a battlefield anymore.
Should he choose instead to go back home to his wife, I would expect him to receive a fair reward for his service, at least enough coin to retire and live peacefully, or even a new house. It’s a fate Ser Barristan would’ve derided, since he wanted to die as a knight, but I doubt the Onion Knight would reject that kind of gift.
SER JORAH MORMONT
The story of the former lord of Bear Island has been full of ups and downs. You just have to give him this much: no matter how hard life punches him down, he always finds a way to get up and keep going.
I was very happy to see Iain Glen during the first season of the show (and in the following seasons since then) since I’m rather fond of his performances in the Resident Evil films. In those he’s a big ham and he chews up the scenery like it’s nobody’s business, but it’s the total opposite when it comes to playing Jorah. Certainly, to embody different characters is literally his job as an actor, but many performers out there are rather one-note or struggle when trying to convey certain emotions.
When Barristan finds out about Jorah’s betrayal and Dany banishes him from Meereen, you can feel his hurt and regret. The second time he’s expelled from the city is even worse, he doesn’t even argue about it, the look in his eyes say everything.
Any less than that, and the moment he finally returns to Daenerys’s service in Season 7 wouldn’t have felt as important, despite lasting for less than a minute. Glen sells it, and I couldn’t help but to cheer when Jorah and Dany share a hug.
You wouldn’t expect such a performance from someone who attacks people with his tentacle fingers in a zombie movie, is what I’m saying.
Like Davos, Jorah had a handful of close calls during the show’s run, but luck has been on his side. Most recently, Sam cured him of a disease that otherwise would’ve consumed him, and he also managed to survive the wight hunt beyond the Wall. To come this far in a story that has no shortage of violent deaths is quite an achievement, so if Jorah’s destined to die in the final season, he deserves to go out with a bang.
After fighting the army of the dead, he knows what to expect from the wights and won’t be taken by surprise when the White Walkers arrive to attack Winterfell. I would bet he’s going to survive the first major battle of Season 8, so Team Dany is mostly intact for the showdown at King’s Landing (if anything, I don’t think poor Grey Worm will survive, but I could be wrong. A happy ending for him and Missandei would be nice, but then again, this is GoT). And not only that, but I’m guessing he’s going to have a one-on-one fight against one of the Walkers. He already fought a Dothraki and won, so offing a White Walker too would be quite the addition to his record, and he would join the small group of people who have managed to kill one of such creatures (currently Sam, Jon and Meera).
If the Walker either beats Jorah or manages to gravely injure him before dying, then that’s one hell of a way to go out. Not succumbing to a disease or getting killed in a fighting pit by a nameless slave, but facing a creature that was commonly believed to exist only in stories for children.
Assuming the Bear Knight makes it out alive from Winterfell, King’s Landing could be the place where his story wraps for good. My main problem with this scenario is that I don’t think there’s a clear opponent for Jorah here. The Mountain will surely fight either Sandor (because GET HYPE) or Arya, so that leaves us with Bronn (!) or Jaime, if the latter decides to ditch his honor for love and go back to Cersei’s side.
I favor the Bronn option, because even if Jaime changing his mind yet again is believable, I feel it would negate the growth of his character, being finally free of Cersei’s influence that is. The conversation with Olenna showed he’s aware of the horrible deeds he has done for love, and that it may be too late to change his ways, but then the finale set us up for some change in his character. He’s following Brienne’s advice (fuck loyalty!) and is doing the right thing for once. It would be a shame if that is reversed.
Fighting the former sellsword makes sense in my opinion. They’re both Season 1 veterans and beloved characters, so the audience will be once again divided in who they are going to root for. Bronn fights dirty but Jorah has years of experience and has fought against a wide variety of enemies, both alive and undead, so some cheap tactics aren’t going to faze him. And yet, I think Bronn could win the fight for dramatic purposes. We’re in for some big losses and not all the heroes are bound to keep their plot armor. The final season’s gotta have one nasty bite so the final victory doesn’t come off as easily earned.
Jaime being the opponent would be an interesting juxtaposition of lovers fighting for their queens, though one has been apparently discarded and the other’s love wasn’t meant to be. While I give the Bronn scenario a 50/50 possibility for each fighter, in this one I think the balance would tip in Jaime’s favor, since he’s one of the main characters (whereas Jorah is supporting one) and because such an action would definitely confirm that he’s irredeemable. Of course, when we take into account that Jaime lacks his right hand and his fighting skills are poorer as a result, he’d need a lot of luck or the unexpected help of someone else to win the round.
Jorah making it to the very end isn’t very likely, I feel it in my bones, but I would definitely be glad if it happens. If this turns out to be the case, I sense that Jorah could become the commander of Dany’s Queensguard, and follow Selmy’s footsteps in a way, remaining a fierce and skilled knight despite his old age. His entry in the White Book (if it still exists after the war) could be perhaps unmatchable, considering all his deeds in the name of his queen.
BRONN
Keeping Bronn around has been one of the best decisions the showrunners have made. He went MIA in the novels (and it remains to be seen if he’s ever coming back, considering he’s settled down and is currently living large in his own castle) but the promises of riches and a fancy place to live haven’t materialized yet in the adaptation, so he has gone nowhere.
I’ve praised both Cunningham and Glen’s acting chops, and Flynn’s not getting any less. From the moment he showed up in the first season of Game of Thrones, he turned into a fan favorite. Bronn’s not afraid to speak his mind and has such a big sense of humor that it’s no surprise he became one of Tyrion’s best friends at the time. Jerome radiates charisma and has some killer comedic timing, but also knows how to turn his character into a serious threat. Despite his clownish attitude, we shouldn’t forget Bronn isn’t a good person but someone who would kill a baby for the right price, no questions asked.
Keeping it true to the nature of sellswords, Bronn’s loyalty doesn’t lie with people but with the money. He was Tyrion’s friend up to the moment the so-called “Imp” found himself in some deep shit, and Bronn had to choose between fighting the Mountain or marrying Lollys. Although he made some good points (“Aye, I’m your friend…and when have you ever risked your life for me?”), still the sellsword preferred to not risk it, even if it meant that Tyrion would die.
Then he trained and followed Jaime, facing even greater dangers than during his time with Tyrion. Just surviving the battle against Dany and saving Jaime from drowning should make him eligible for one of the biggest castles available. And yet, when Jaime departed to Winterfell, Bronn didn’t follow him. We don’t know if Jaime asked him to, but I’m assuming the son of “you wouldn’t know him” chose to end their partnership, as he said after Daenerys roasted them quite literally: “Dragons are where our partnership ends. I’m not gonna be around when those things start spitting fire on King’s Landing.”
Either that, or he decided to stay in the queen’s good graces, rather than go to the north to freeze, fight zombies and possibly part with the chance of ever getting a reward for his services. As we saw in the Season 7 finale (“The Dragon and the Wolf”), he was still in King’s Landing, helping Jaime to prepare everything for the political summit, debating about cocks and telling Tyrion that he’s just fine, looking after himself (hard to say if jokingly or not).
To me it’s clear that he doesn’t intend to follow Jaime, or we would have seen two horses riding to Winterfell instead of only one.
Despite not ever interacting with Cersei on-screen (and I’m not expecting that to change in the final season since Jerome Flynn and Lena Headey avoid each other on set for personal reasons), I think Bronn will be involved in preparing the defense of the city and will possibly fight alongside his fellow sellswords of the Golden Company when the time comes.
One of my predictions is that he’s going to fight (and possibly kill) Jorah Mormont, but there are other possible candidates, including Grey Worm, Beric Dondarrion and Tormund Giantsbane. Each one of them would probably give the sellsword a hard time, and any death would be really sad for the fans (especially if it’s Tormund), but there’s another fight that I think would be rather dramatic, and that is against Brienne and Pod.
Bronn doesn’t have a history with Brienne, so I don’t think he’d care much about fighting her, but Pod is one of his friends from the Tyrion days, and the squire’s loyalties lie with the Maid of Tarth.
As it happened with the fight against the Hound, this could be a rather epic combat, a “what if” situation that I don’t think would happen in the novels, but wouldn’t feel out of place in the screen adaptation. Honestly, I don’t think Brienne would lose the match, but Pod could very well bite it: Bronn could put his feelings aside and kill him to provoke Brienne or Podrick could suddenly intervene to take a hit meant for her. If the latter happens, Bronn could feel surprised or stunned, and an enraged Brienne could off him while he’s distracted.
A fight with Jaime is also possible, should he choose to remain in Dany’s side, but wouldn’t be much of a match. Bronn easily disarmed Jaime when they were training, so a fight using swords with an edge could easily go really bad for the Kingslayer. As Bronn himself said “If you fight with an edge blade, I’ll have to. And if I fight with an edge blade, I’ll have no one left to pay me.” (Season 4, Episode 2 “The Lion and the Rose”).
That said, Jaime could be lucky, or he could manage to whack his former partner’s face with his golden hand.
The boring (of sorts) but crowd-pleasing alternative to all the possible violent ends is that Bronn makes good on his promise of staying away, doesn’t get into any important conflict and makes it to the end unscathed, but that’s a bit doubtful in my opinion. He’s already been involved in some major battles, and he’s skipping the biggest one yet?
Bronn could also decide to help Tyrion and his friends, to make up for abandoning him to his fate in Season 3, though it would feel somewhat out of character for the sellsword to do something out of the kindness of his heart, if there’s any. Tyrion would have to make good on his promise of topping whatever Cersei’s offer is.
Nonetheless, if he lives to see the end of the Great War, I do hope he finally gets his long-desired castle. He may be an evil bastard with no conscience and no heart, but I’ll be damned if he isn’t one of the most memorable characters to come from the imagination of George R.R. Martin and brought to life so perfectly by the screenwriters and the performance of Jerome Flynn.
The way I see it, none of these three characters have a clear path ahead, and there’s a lot we can speculate about. They may be secondary players in the Game of Thrones, but all three have their share of passionate fans who no doubt are expecting a satisfying conclusion to their stories. If it depended on me, I would probably go easy on all of them, since I am a big softy and a part of me doesn’t want to see these characters meeting a cruel end. I certainly don’t envy the writers’ position of having to slay some of their darlings.
With only six episodes to go and a lot of ground to cover, it’s going to be hard for the writers to give each character a worthy sendoff. Osha and Jojen Reed, and even the Waif spring to mind when I think in disappointing deaths, and there are really divisive ones like Barristan or Stannis (which were very well made in my opinion), but the show hits the target more often than it misses.
And so we finish with another round of predictions, and we inch ever closer to the final season of Game of Thrones. It’s still months away from us, but time moves faster than it seems and soon we’ll see for ourselves how right (or how wrong!) we were in all of our theories.
The post From the Maester’s Desk – Endgame: The Royal Sidekicks appeared first on Watchers on the Wall.
Via http://watchersonthewall.com
Sunday, July 29, 2018
WiC Weekly: July 21-27
The post WiC Weekly: July 21-27 appeared first on Winter is Coming.
Via https://winteriscoming.net/2018/07/29/wic-weekly-july-21-27/
Saturday, July 28, 2018
Friday, July 27, 2018
Exclusive Interview with Game of Thrones’ Ramin Djawadi: the Music, the North American Tour and season 8!
Photo: Andres Jimenez
Watchers on the Wall was lucky enough to score an exclusive interview with Ramin Djawadi, the composer of all seven (soon to be eight) seasons of Game of Thrones. During our chat, I asked Djawadi about his second and upcoming North American tour of the Game of Thrones Live Concert Experience which launches in September (complete tour info here!). He describes his composing process, how the tour has changed from year to year, what it’s like to write for different characters, and oh yeah- what he knows about season 8!
Hi Ramin, how are you?
Ramin: Good, thanks, how are you?
I write for WatchersontheWall.com and I was actually lucky enough to be able to see you in concert last year. I live in New York City, so I saw the performance at Madison Square Garden which was incredible.
Ramin: Awesome!
So, I’m very excited to hear that you’re all going out again in the fall and it looks really cool and I hope I can come see it again! First and foremost, one of the big things I was really curious [about] is, obviously last year was super successful, [and] looked really cool. Are there any major changes that you know of for this year or how is that process going?
Ramin: Yeah – we’ve done some major changes actually. We just came back from our European tour so we actually, just with all the logistics of bringing a stage over to Europe, we had to change some things so, obviously, it’s like remodeling a house, so, once you start – oh! Why’d we do the kitchen, we might as well do the bathroom, and so what happens is that we ended up completely redesigning the stage. This new concert now is a completely redesigned stage. We took a lot of the things from last year that we thought were really well received by the audience and we actually did even more fun things, like organic elements, for example, we added more pyro, people really love when we get the pyro going, so we have more of that, and we re-modified it. Without revealing too much, for example, there was the ‘Goodbye Brother’ piece, where our violinist is under the Weirwood Tree and this year we did something that I think is even cooler where our violinist becomes the Weirwood Tree and will actually go 35 feet up into the air and play our theme. It’s absolutely stunning. So, we did a lot of reworking, and now the big thing is, now that season 7 is behind us, I updated the show and added material from season 7, so it’s now current with the show itself and the storytelling we have.
How much does the change come from audience reaction vs. your favorite portions – you have seven seasons worth of work, so what’s that balance between you really want to do, trying out something different, vs. ‘the audience loved this – we should keep this.’
Ramin: Yeah, exactly, it’s a little bit of both. There are certain pieces that we definitely kept in the show, like ‘Light of the Seven,’ ‘Battle of the Bastards,’ these are definitely things that we didn’t wanna touch. Also, because I added season 7, there were definitely some things I had to move around or list, and it wasn’t easy, because if it was up to me, I would probably do a 6 hour concert. I have so much more I want to perform and I want to play and the show has just so many great moments and it’s just touch to condense it down to a 2 ½ hour show. But I guess what’s fun about it is we did one version last year and now automatically with updating the stage, and updating the music, it kind of has become business – there is a lot of familiar stuff from last year but there are a lot of new things in there, and I think it’s good.
That’s very good – I’m very excited to see it, and how it’s developed!
Ramin: I think if you’ve seen it last year, I think you will definitely be excited to see it the second time because it is so different, I mean the lighting, everything, is completely redesigned – the stage is actually not in the center anymore, it’s pushed to one side now. That enabled us to bring even more focus to the musicians. WE still have a massive screen behind us where we show the montages and scenes from the show, but that was something I really wanted to change from last year to put even more emphasis on the musicians and the lighting – so, a lot of things have changed.
I don’t know if you’ve begun to score season 8 – Does any of that material go into the show or is that not at all a part of this?
Ramin: To be honest I haven’t even started yet. I don’t know when I will start. I don’t have a schedule for it yet, or anything. I haven’t seen anything yet, I don’t know anything, I’m just as excited and curious as everybody else.
You’re as in the dark as I am, then!
Ramin: Absolutely, I mean this being the last season, I’m dying to know what’s happening and what it needs from me musically, and what am I gonna write for this final season – I can’t wait.
I’m glad to hear you are as enthusiastic as we are! How much of the rough cut do you need to see in order to make the score as much your own as you can, as opposed to being given a storyboard?
Ramin: I generally like to see as much story as possible, so I can really get a good idea. Sometimes, in the past, I’ve started writing based on a conversation with David [Benioff] and Dan [Weiss]. But overall, I really like to see things in front of me and have a clear understanding of the full storyline. In this particular case, people keep asking me ‘How would you…?’ ‘Musically, what are you planning to do…?’ And it’s hard for me to say anything, especially, with Game of Thrones, it’s a show that’s known for its surprises and for things that happen, and for me musically, I just literally have to sit and wait and see what comes my way.
Hopefully you get a preview into that soon – we’re all really excited.
Ramin: I hope so too!
Since the show is so expansive, and any episode can have 5 minutes of one character, and 5 minutes of another character, I wonder, you know, the score for me has always been one of the things that ties the show together. So, what is your approach to character progression from one season to the next? A major character like Jon Snow or Daenerys has a very specific through line from season 1 through season 7, so how do their scenes develop as the show goes on? How do you approach that?
Ramin: Season 1 really paid close attention to that, and really taking it one step at a time, because there are so many characters and we spend so much time with them, so sometimes we’ve decided, let’s just stay with all the Starks – they just get the Stark theme – and then ok, [for example] Arya is going on her own, maybe she can get her own theme. Oh – now Jon Snow is doing something? See, we kind of take it season by season, and see where the character develops and it’s been really exciting for me to either take an existing theme or take the Stark theme, and- so like, with Daenerys for example, I take her theme and combine it with the dragons theme as the dragons get more powerful. I get to expand that thematically, and then sometimes we get to a point where we go, you know what? We need a new theme, so for example last year, for Jon and Daenerys, we have that big ‘love’ scene, and then we establish a new theme, so it’s a little bit of both. It’s continuing existing themes and then adding new things on top. Same with the White Walkers last year. It was such a big part of it, so we actually created a new theme. For the Night King, with the whole Wall coming down, we just felt like there needed to be more there than the preexisting White Walker music.
That sort of goes into my next thought – When you get Jon and Daenerys come together, each of them has a very distinct theme or motif that’s always played alongside their storylines. When you’re merging them together, do you mix and match, do you create something new, do you pull bits and pieces of each of them? ‘Cause I’m sure with season 8 there will be a ton of characters we haven’t seen in the same scene together suddenly come together.
Ramin: It’s a big math game. For an example of a lot of themes coming together, at the end of season 6, when Daenerys is crossing the sea, and we have several characters coming together, and there are 4 or 5 pieces that I combined. We have the main title theme, we have Daenerys’ theme, we have the Unsullied theme, we have the Greyjoy theme, so it’s, the only way I can explain it is it becomes a big math thing of trying to make the harmonies work and the scenes and how to overlay them and it gets quite complex.
You do a phenomenal job of it. Just incredible. One thing that I always find interesting – I’ve always been a champion of the season 4 finale ‘The Children,’ in no short part due to your work. One thing I absolutely love was Arya setting sail from Westeros, which, is the main theme, but it’s called ‘The Children,’ and you have kids suddenly singing, and I wonder if you create the themes first, and then want voices in the background? You have kids singing in the background of ‘Light of the Seven’ as well. What’s the inspiration behind that? Is it before you start? Or is it, afterwards, you add it in?
Ramin: It’s a little bit of both. Many times before I start writing, I have sort of an instrumentation already in mind, and in both of the examples you’ve mentioned, I definitely, for the finale of season 4, I knew I was going to have a children’s choir, and that I was going to have my Valyrian-inspired lyrics as I’d rather have lyrics than having them go ‘Ahhh-oooh.’ The same with ‘Light of the Seven.’ Just because in the scene we had these kids running around on the ground, I thought it would be quite eerie to have, not quite a choir, but actually less, so we just decided on two – so those are decisions I make before. I write, and there are 2 of them, and then sometimes, as I start to arrange, I’ll change directions, but generally, same with the decision of using the piano, we actively made that choice – I wanted to try the piano and actually write with it.
I remember you saying that the first time you used the piano [in Game of Thrones] was in ‘Light of the Seven.’
Ramin: Absolutely. Until then, it was not part of the language of the score. Maybe we had some piano ‘effects’ I can say we had, but not really part where the piano played an active, dominant role.
With that said, I know you don’t know anything about season 8 but is there an instrument you’ve not gotten to use that you’re hopeful to use before the series is over?
Ramin: (laughs) We have so many! We laugh every season, and we go ‘What instrument haven’t we used? I’m sure there’s still something.’ Nothing really comes to mind right now that I could specifically say I would really love to use ‘this or that’ but I’m sure there’s something if I could figure out. I just have to wait, because maybe there’s nothing new to do, or maybe there’s lots of new things to do. In terms of instrumentation, I think, what it is is, because I love the show so much, and after having worked on this now for so long, I’m super excited about the finale, seeing how it’s all gonna end, but I’m at the same time I’m also sad because it’s been wonderful working with David and Dan and I just want to prolong this last season.
I can’t wait to see how the finale shakes out and how it all ties together, and I think it’s gonna just be incredible to watch and hear, and I can’t wait to see what you and your team do. Thank you so much, and I really appreciate the time that you took today.
Ramin: My pleasure! I hope I get to see you in New York!
I’ll tweet you!
The concert runs September 5th, 2018 – October 14th 2018 and you can buy tickets here!
The post Exclusive Interview with Game of Thrones’ Ramin Djawadi: the Music, the North American Tour and season 8! appeared first on Watchers on the Wall.
Via http://watchersonthewall.com
Thursday, July 26, 2018
Luke Cage’s Mike Colter Comes to Baltimore Comic-Con 2018
The 2018 Baltimore Comic-Con takes place this September 28-38, 2018 at the Baltimore Convention Center in the Inner Harbor. The Baltimore Comic-Con is pleased to announce the addition of Mike Colter as a guest of the show both Saturday and Sunday.
Mike Colter began playing Marvel’s Luke Cage in the Netflix series Jessica Jones, starring Krysten Ritter, in 2015. Positively received in the role, the series led into a solo Luke Cage series in 2016 followed by a Marvel team-up with Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Iron Fist as The Defenders in 2017. Season 2 of Luke Cage premiered in June, 2018.
Prior to his time in the Marvel television universe, Colter was a cast member of the popular FX anthology series American Horror Story in 2013, appearing in three episodes of the Coven storyline. Following his turn on the horror series, Colter appeared as Agent Locke in the Xbox One series Halo: Nightfall and Halo 5: Guardians.
Colter’s earliest screen work was in the long-running NBC series ER, as well as The Parkers in 2002. Colter was a featured player in the Academy Award-winning Clint Eastwood production, Million Dollar Baby. He returned to television in Law & Order: Trial by Jury and Law & Order: Criminal Intent, before being cast in the film And Then Came Love.
Colter’s work on both the small and big screens eventually led to a recurring role on the Sarah Michelle series Ringer from 2011-2012, and in 2012, he appeared in both Men In Black 3 and Kathryn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty.
Born and raised in South Carolina, Colter trained to be an actor from an early age. After earning a bachelor’s degree from the University of South Carolina, Colter attended Rutgers University’s Mason Gross School of the Arts where he received a MFA in acting.
from Baltimore Comic-Con http://baltimorecomiccon.com/2018/07/luke-cages-mike-colter-comes-to-baltimore-comic-con-2018/
Wednesday, July 25, 2018
Game of Thrones to air in first half of 2019; Prequel to be filmed around the same time!
![508_promo_stills_600158499[1]](http://watchersonthewall.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/508_promo_stills_6001584991.jpg)
Game of Thrones news have been scarce since production wrapped for season eight. The incoming prequel is still a long ways off (longer than you may think!), and the last season isn’t going to air in some time. But how much? Some hoped for early into next year, while others were less optimistic, but the only official word was “2019”… until today!
EW just reported on this revelation by HBO’s programming president Casey Bloys, made today at the Television Critics Association’s press tour in Beverly Hills. There, Bloys said season eight will air in the “first half” of next year, which jives with the popular prediction of HBO returning Game of Thrones to its original March/April premiere slot.
As for Jane Goldman’s prequel, supposedly set during the Long Night, Bloys dismissed the report (which did seem a tad strange) that the pilot would be filmed this October, claiming he doesn’t “know where [that] came from”, and that they’re still “searching for a director, let alone cast.” Apparently, the pilot will instead enter production around the same time season eight will be airing: HBO is “hoping to go into production in early ’19”.
Even if the prequel pilot had been filmed this year, that wasn’t going to make it air any sooner, so as “bad news” go these aren’t really that bad. As for the last season air date, it’s the best news we could have given that we knew it wouldn’t be before 2019. So, what do you guys think? Is Game of Thrones returning to its original slot for its last hurrah?
The post Game of Thrones to air in first half of 2019; Prequel to be filmed around the same time! appeared first on Watchers on the Wall.
Via http://watchersonthewall.com
Tuesday, July 24, 2018
Monday, July 23, 2018
Game of Thrones Fandom-Wide Survey, Part 4: Episode Ratings!
By Chris Wright, aka James Rivers, with Petra
We’ve reached the thrilling conclusion of our survey results! In Part 4, we’ll learn how respondents rated each of Game of Thrones‘ 67 episodes. We’ll also take a final look at differences in how men and women (and other groups) see the show.
If you want to have some fun, the 15 top-rated episodes are represented above, emoji style. They may involve the episode’s name, an episode plot point, or both. Some require more interpretation than others. A couple may require too much interpretation entirely. (David Rosenblatt successfully vetoed the very confusing original image for No.1.)
As for earlier survey articles: You can find Part 1, which reviews survey basics, season rankings, plot ratings and more, here. Part 2, focused on the morality of characters, is here. And Part 3, focused on the morality of various murders, is here. Parts of each were presented at Con of Thrones back in May.
Onward!
Rating the 67 Episodes
At the very end of the survey, respondents could rate episodes on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being best. They could give as many episodes a 10 (or a 9, or…) as they wanted. The episodes were set off by season (so Season 1’s ten episodes were listed together) but the seasons were presented in a random order. Brief synopsis, kindly curated by Patrick Sponaugle, were provided to refresh respondents’ memories. Around 1,000 of the survey’s 2,500 respondents chose to rate episodes.
Note this is “rating” episodes as opposed to “ranking” them — the rankings below come from the average rating. Got that?
There are many other “1 to 67” rankings out there; many are based on the opinion of the writer or of a small group of people. At the other extreme is IMDB, where thousands and thousands have rated episodes. However, there’s no way of knowing if someone has voted multiple times, or when the votes occurred (Right after someone watched? Months after, when they happened upon the IMDB site?), or how a respondent chose which episodes to vote for.
Which is not to say other lists are better or worse than the below. They were just largely compiled in a different manner.
So, let’s get started. These are listed in reverse order, and the charts show the overall rank; season, episode and title; average rating on the 1 to 10 scale; and the episode’s rank among the 10 (or seven) in its season. Each season has a different background color.
OK, bottoms up! Here’s No. 67 — which is looking pretty bowed, bent and broken, and by a wide margin — through No. 51.
So yes, that’s seven episodes from Season 5 in the bottom section alone.
Petra: It’s no surprise which episode is No. 67. But it’s interesting how many episodes including crowd-pleasing moments are listed here. Arya poisoning the Freys in “Dragonstone” was received well, as I remember.
Here are the next 15 episodes, including the bottom-rated episode from what we learned in Part 1 was the top-ranked season (Season 1):
We’ve blown through eight of the 10 episodes from Season 2 now. It’ll be a bit before we see the remaining two.
Petra: I expected “The Broken Man” to rank higher, given that the Hound’s return was so well-received.
We’ve reached the mid-to-upper tier of the episode list…
Petra: I’m always interested in whether people rank episodes by individual favorite scenes or by the episode as a whole. Going by this list, it seems to be the latter (which I suppose is fairer). The fact that “The Bear and the Maiden Fair,” which contains the fan-favorite rescue scene, ranks in the middle surprises me.
We’re up to the top 20! Should we take a commercial break? No? Okay…
Yeah, half of Season 1 made the Top 20. But four from Season 4 made the Top 12.
And drumroll…
Is “The Mountain and the Viper” a relative outlier in this ranking, versus other Top 67 lists? I feel like it’s often seen as a second-tier big-time episode, not an all-timer along the lines of “The Door.”
Petra: There’s a fair balance of different seasons (sans Season 7) in the top 10. No surprise that “The Winds of Winter” is at No. 1.
Show-Onlys Like Winds, Book-Firsts Prefer Rains
Views on the top episodes differ based on if the person read the books or not — to a point. Interestingly, “book first,” “show then book” and “show only” respondents all had the same top 11 episodes, but the order differed. Here’s a look at that.
Petra: It makes sense that, since “Rains of Castamere” brings one of the most famous scenes from the books to life, book readers would favor it — while show-only viewers prefer the Season 6 finale that delivers so much wish fulfillment.
Looking at the series as a whole, the per-episode viewpoints of “book first” and “show-only” viewers diverge over time. The chart below shows that the groups had nearly identical average ratings (8.41 and 8.37 out of 10) for Season 1’s episodes. But the most recent three seasons see a much larger gap, with consistently higher episode ratings from show-onlys.
Our respondents were consistent. Remember those season rankings from Part 1? They went 1-4-6-3-2-7-5. If you instead rank the seasons based on their average episode rating (the yellow bars above), you get the same order.
Looking at individual episodes, the 10 below had the biggest difference in ratings among the three groups. No surprise that all are from the past three seasons:
These results are a bit skewed since overall, show-only viewers gave out higher ratings. So we can also look at how far apart episodes were ranked, based on those ratings. For instance, “The Kingsroad,” Season 1 Episode 2, was ranked 26th by book-firsts and 38th by show-onlys despite having virtually identical ratings from the two groups (8.01 and 7.98).
Here are the 10 episodes with the biggest gaps in ranking, as opposed to rating. On the left are those ranked more highly by show-only viewers; on the right are those favored by book-firsts.
If the episodes on the right seem somewhat random, that may be because they are from early seasons.
All right. Time to take a deep breath and venture into one final look at overall results…
Older! Wiser! And…Fonder of the Night’s Watch?
Game of Thrones is viewed by people of every age, race, gender identity and political orientation out there. And it’s worth pondering if different groups of people absorb and consume the show differently. (Hint: They do.) But before proceeding, let us recall this nugget from Part 2.
“It’s easy to overinterpret demographic results such as these. Most will fall into one of three categories:”
- “That makes a lot of sense.”
- “Huh. That’s interesting but not what I expected.”
- “WTF??”
The same certainly applies here. But let’s take a cautious look at the starkest differences across demographic groups when it came to survey responses.
Nearly nine in ten LGBTQA+ respondents saw the arrest of Loras as unjustified. They appear to have an affinity for Shae — look at that 19-point difference regarding her murder — but the Hound not so much. There are also potentially “WTF?” results regarding Jon Snow and the Night’s Watch.
There was a consistent gender-based response to the death of Renly. Note that men were also more pleased by Stannis’ defeat of the Wildling army. (By the way, “Nonbinary” or a blank to fill in were also options for the gender question; not enough did so to attempt using in this breakdown.)
The three age categories let us look at the most significant trends. Younger respondents appeared to find violent acts more justified across the board. The only statistically significant exceptions, which aren’t listed above due to the smaller margins, were Dany burning the Khals and Brienne killing Stannis. In both cases age 50+ respondents found the acts more justified than those age 34 and under, by 9 and 7 percentage points respectively.
This was a difficult question to parse, since respondents could of course check more than one box, and a large majority selected white, with other racial or ethnic groups individually getting relatively little representation. African/African-American/Black respondents had more big differences, and most of those focused specifically on Dany, whose actions they consistently found more justified than others. The nearly 25-point difference on the burning of the Tarlys is the third-widest demographic difference in the entire survey.
Right-leaning respondents were more approving of certain executions that took place according to the system of justice depicted on the show. They also were less likely to see Loras’ arrest as unjustified than left-leaning respondents.
North Americans appear to be bigger fans of Brienne than those elsewhere in the world, and Europeans are a bit more fond of House Lannister and seem to be less enthused by Dany. What say you, Luka Nieto?
Wrapping Up: Viewing in a Vacuum
We’ve looked a lot at how the survey has illustrated differences in viewpoints between book readers and show only-viewers. Part 1 reviewed how the groups see the show’s seasons and plotlines, for instance. You can refresh your memory on that with the chart linked here.
The survey also asked how often respondents talked to others (online or in “real life”) or read about the show, both in season and when it’s not airing. From those responses, I created three groups, from little interaction to high interaction. By looking at survey results across those three groups, we can see how groupthink might play a role in how people perceive the show:
The act of discussing and reading about Game of Thrones appeared to affect perceptions of four of the 10 plotlines we measured (see Part 1 for full results on those questions). Those who spent, say, an hour or less a week interacting regarding the show had more positive views of the Dorne plot and Season 7’s wight hunt and Winterfell scheming. On the other hand, they were less positive about the “Theon as Reek plot,” which those with high participation in Game of Thrones discussion liked more.
Petra: I’ve found from my own involvement in the fandom that a lot of fans warm up to Theon’s story by learning of the varied opinions other people have of the character. Those who don’t discuss him with others tend to have a more straightforward “rat bastard” opinion of him. So, I appreciate that the stats support my own anecdotal evidence.
We can go one step further, and look at the smallish group of respondents who A) have not read the books and B) interact very little with others about the show. This is as close as we can come to some sort of laboratory environment where there’s no outside bias seeping in. Here are the biggest differences we saw with “isolated” viewers. Look to bottom right for some true chasms:
The Season 5 Dorne plot, by far the most maligned overall, was nonetheless seen as ineffective by only 41 percent of these viewers in a relative vacuum, compared with 70 percent of other respondents. And we see differences of more than 20 points for three other measured plots.
That’s it! Special thanks to Petra, for assisting with the survey questions and co-hosting the Con of Thrones panel on the results, plus of course offering her thoughts for these posts. And thanks to Sue the Fury for her patience, as I waded through mountains of data (plus Watchers Patrick and David for QA’ing some things).
Further exploration of how those who haven’t read the books and don’t participate in online discussions see Game of Thrones differently may be in order … but that can be someone else’s endeavor!
The post Game of Thrones Fandom-Wide Survey, Part 4: Episode Ratings! appeared first on Watchers on the Wall.
Via http://watchersonthewall.com
Sunday, July 22, 2018
WiC Weekly: July 14-20
The post WiC Weekly: July 14-20 appeared first on Winter is Coming.
Via https://winteriscoming.net/2018/07/22/wic-weekly-july-14-20/