Poll: game of thrones the hbo show vs the books

[dudycat1]

i have been a game of thrones/ a song of ice and fire fan for about a year now after i found out about it through a medieval total war 2 mod. i never new about the show and found out about it around when it came out (although i live in England so i had to wait awhile to catch the new shows). i prefer the books as i find them to have more detail in them and they are (surprisingly) a lot more graphic in the blood and the stuff that happens between Jaime and Cercie. So the message of this ramble is what do my fellow escapist prefer the books or the tv show.

 

[ThaBenMan]

The books are waaayyyy better - like you said, they include a lot more detail. I may also be bias because I read the books years ago, before even hearing about the show.

The show IS good - the first season was amazing, actually. The second season I'm not enjoying quite so much, since it seems to deviate from the books quite a lot more. I know, it's an adaptation and the producers should be able to put their own spin on it, but I can't help it - I want it to be as close to the books as possible. The show is still good, though, and I'll continue to watch and enjoy it.

 

[Spoonius]

I think the show is brilliant so far, haven't read the books.

 

[Smithburg]

The books are waaayyyy better - like you said, they include a lot more detail. I may also be bias because I read the books years ago, before even hearing about the show.

The show IS good - the first season was amazing, actually. The second season I'm not enjoying quite so much, since it seems to deviate from the books quite a lot more. I know, it's an adaptation and the producers should be able to put their own spin on it, but I can't help it - I want it to be as close to the books as possible. The show is still good, though, and I'll continue to watch and enjoy it.

I really never liked that excuse, about producers putting their own spin on it. If they want to put their own ideas in then they should make their own show. When they take a book and change it it feels like they are going "This is an ok template to start on, but we are going to change it to fit our view, even though you created it" It's like a fan fiction in a way.

He wrote the books, and they did good enough to get on TV, so make the show the way he wrote the books unless it's something that just can't be done, and in that case consult the author to make sure you don't mess anything up.

I think the absolute worst Book transitions were Jurassic park and the Sword of Truth series. Jurassic park 2 was completely different from the book, and The sword of truth changed so much stuff in the show that it wasn't really recognizable as a series made from that book.

 

[MetalDooley]

I really never liked that excuse, about producers putting their own spin on it. If they want to put their own ideas in then they should make their own show. When they take a book and change it it feels like they are going "This is an ok template to start on, but we are going to change it to fit our view, even though you created it" It's like a fan fiction in a way.

I agree.I think producers should be striving to stay as close to the source material as possible.After all it's fans of the original material that are probably going to make up the majority of your audience

OT:The books are much better simply for the fact that a tv show would never be able to fit in the same level of detail.The show is still good though although the fact that they are deviating more from the books in season 2 is getting slightly annoying.It really feels now like they're just changing stuff for the sake of it

 

[BloatedGuppy]

The books are arguably the most important and influential fantasy series since LOTR. They are likely to be remembered as classics of the genre, assuming he ever finishes the series. The show is fun but flawed, and suffers the most when it deviates heavily from the books. Ergo, books >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> show.

Realistically though, these are almost impossible books to adapt to the screen, so the fact they're giving it the good old college try is commendable. The amount of depth and breadth George crams into his world building is staggering. There's just no room to fit it all in, and the world feels less vibrant and alive and REAL as a result. The books are also incredibly long and feature a vast array of characters, which has left the show with serious pacing problems.

 

[Amethyst Wind]

Plus, there's no way the networks are gonna let the scriptwriters put THAT much incest on tv, especially when it comes from borderline protagonists. The Lannisters get away with it because they're supposed to be unlikeable.

Spoiler: Spoiler for later books

Except Jaime, who doesn't particularly become a good guy, more moves into neutral territory.

Books never really translate well into television/film as they put a lot of emphasis on the thoughts of the characters in a situation as well as what's said, which moving pictures can't duplicate easily.

 

[fireaura08]

Without a doubt the books. Since you read from the characters point of view, you know their thoughts and motivations better. For example, Catelyn is sympathetic in the show, but she's and absolute ***** in the books, especially (ASOS/AFFC spoiler)

Spoiler

After she is revived by Beric three days after the Red Wedding, though her motivations are understandable.

 

[The Funslinger]

They're both awesome. Hopefully the show doesn't deviate too much more from the books, but I'm loving them both.

Sean Bean makes everything awesome, but it's doing well without him.

 

[Sexy Devil]

Without a doubt the books. Since you read from the characters point of view, you know their thoughts and motivations better. For example, Catelyn is sympathetic in the show, but she's and absolute ***** in the books, especially (ASOS/AFFC spoiler)

Spoiler

After she is revived by Beric three days after the Red Wedding, though her motivations are understandable.

She's still an absolute ***** in the show. She imprisoned Tyrion for no reason other than that she had a feeling, she just generally treated Jon like shit, she let Jaime go because she's an idiot. I can go on but you get the point.

Anyway the books are generally better, but Martin really went all out on Blackwater; I felt that episode one-upped the battle of Blackwater in the books. Can't wait until the one he writes next season, hope he gets to do the Red Wedding. The show is still just generally fantastic though.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Because it's much easier to write a good book than it is to make a good movie.

Cheaper, maybe.

I don't know about easier. A little respect for authors, yo.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Another thing, it's a lot easier with an exposition-dump in a book while in a movie you more have to weave it in, which is why some scenes in such an exposition-heavy series as ASoIaF can get quite jarring.

I think it's fair to say they're not terribly compatible mediums. They have different strengths, and there's not always fantastic overlap between those strengths. A film or show can show tremendous amount of detail and context in just a few seconds. One expression from an actor can be a paragraph in a book. But a show can't show internal processes, nor can a show easily dredge up historical errata, which is something ASoIaF leans heavily on.

I've always maintained trying to bring these particular books to the screen was a fools errand because they're borderline unfilmable, so I'm impressed at how well they're doing, even though I'm frequently enraged by how much they deviate from the source material.

 

[Morthello]

The show is good and im enjoying it, but the books are light-years better imo. There's just too many details that they're leaving out that make the books so good. As others have said GRRM is a very detailed writer and meticulous worldbuilder. Its been awhile since ive read the books, but i remember having to read something like 2 to 4 pages of nothing but the descriptions of the scenery at the beginning of each pov chapter in the books. The budget would have to be ridiculous to match some of the descriptions of places in the books.

And then you have the many interesting characters that they cut out and the internal monologues that help you understand what drives the main characters etc. Also there are alot of taboo topics that are touched on in the books and violent acts that even HBO wouldn't try to put on screen. Writers just have much more freedom. Yous imagination is the limit not the budget.

 

[weirdsoup]

Trouble is, you can't really compare the book to the tv show. There's things in books that work on the page, but are really hard to achieve on screen. There's also a finite time you've got for a tv show which is why there are characters removed from the story or merged into other characters.

 

[Mayhaps]

Trouble is, you can't really compare the book to the tv show. There's things in books that work on the page, but are really hard to achieve on screen. There's also a finite time you've got for a tv show which is why there are characters removed from the story or merged into other characters.

They probably put a page limit on his first book(s?) as well. (I don't know when they took off, I never heard of it before it came to HBO).

I sort of agree with you, books and movies are different mediums, but that doesn't mean they can't be compared. They have different strengths, you weigh them against each-other and see who does the most of their medium, then deciding which you like better.
I, for example enjoyed seeing more of Tyrion in the first season, compared to the book but disliked the way he was portrayed in the battles, especially the last one which aired two days ago.

 

[Hoplon]

I would go with the tv show being better for the simple fact it gets the fuck on with the story rather than waffling for three books work about irrelevant rubbish "detail" that is just so much padding while the author figures out where the fuck the books are going, since actual progression has been almost none existent for 3 books.

 

[Kargathia]

I really never liked that excuse, about producers putting their own spin on it. If they want to put their own ideas in then they should make their own show. When they take a book and change it it feels like they are going "This is an ok template to start on, but we are going to change it to fit our view, even though you created it" It's like a fan fiction in a way.

He wrote the books, and they did good enough to get on TV, so make the show the way he wrote the books unless it's something that just can't be done, and in that case consult the author to make sure you don't mess anything up.

I think the absolute worst Book transitions were Jurassic park and the Sword of Truth series. Jurassic park 2 was completely different from the book, and The sword of truth changed so much stuff in the show that it wasn't really recognizable as a series made from that book.

On the other hand would slavishly following the book lead to a very boring movie / tv series.

"But the book does it that way" is no better an excuse than "it happened that way". If it causes your movie to suck, then your movie sucks. No excuses are going to help with that.

Personally I enjoy both. The books are well-written books, the tv-series is - quite independently - a good watch. They even quite nicely complement eachother, leading to a sum that's greater than the parts.

 

[The_Waspman]

I read book one like, twelve years ago, and there were only two things I could really remember from the book, after watching the show. I have just read the book again after watching the show, and I honestly do not remember any of it being the way it is. I mean the tone and the feel are nothing like I remember.

I couldn't say which I find better. Usually, I think whichever medium I encounter first is superior. Thats why I think the film fight club is better than the book, and why Captain Corelli's Mandolin is a better book than the movie (though I doubt I'd think the other way around in that circumstance)

I was very surprised with just how faithful the first season was to the book, for 90% of it anyway. Yes, some of it was comressed for budget/time reasons, but even so. And the stuff they added I thought was fantastic (The two scenes between Varys and Littlefinger for example, and pretty much any scene with Doreah in it. God damn does she play that role well)

Since I'm in the UK and dont watch TV, I'll have to wait for the season 2 bluray next year, so it'll be a while, but the changes they made towards the end of season one were kinda major (surrounding the battle at the end) and that deviation is going to have a massive knock on effect, from what I've read of the second book already.

So I think I'm going to say that they are equally good at what they do. The show is one of the highest quality productions I've ever seen on TV (but then again, so was the first season of Carnivale, and look how badly that went) and the books are - considering their size and density - extremely easy reading.