Game of Thrones

Watched Game of Thrones tonight, am caught up now. It was better than I expected. I confess that I'm not a fan of war scenes either in movies or books, they tend to bore me. And I find them hard to follow for various reasons. This one wasn't that bad - and I was rather relieved that the only monsters we saw were the mammoths and giants - I remember there being giant ice spiders in the books. (I remember because when they revealed that this was being turned into a television series - the first thing that came to mind is - please don't do the giant spiders, I don't think they are necessary. Mammoths yes, spiders no.)

Can't remember how it played out in the books exactly...except ( spoilers )