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shadowkat1. Sci-fi Geek Co-worker is desperately trying to persuade me to watch the new Sy-fy series Defiance which he describes as being a lot like Firefly without the spaceship and Nathan Fillion. (And I'm guessing without Joss Whedon, Alan Tudyk, and Adam Baldwin which were basically the main reasons I watched Firefly, but why quibble?) In short he says it's part horse-opera and part sci-fi. (Co-worker is in his 60s, I feel the need to explain this in case of confusion. And yes, this is the same co-worker who skipped Storm of Swords in order to read Feast of Crows. Not to be confused with co-worker who talked me into giving Breaking Bad another try. I'm not certain these two co-workers have ever had a conversation.) At any rate.. I did DVR it. When and if I get around to it - which if he co-worker keeps pestering me, is going to be sooner than later. (I do question whether co-worker's taste sync well with mine - he's favorite shows after all are the cheesy Star Gates, Lost Girl, Warehouse 13, Eureka, Continnum, & Syfy's Being Human and he liked the Twilight book. OTOH he also liked Farscape and Buffy. BSG was too dark for him.)
2. Dance with Dragons update:
I'm about 20% in and admittedly skimming through a chunk of pointless description. You are wordy bastard, GRRM. I will give you that. One wonders if he is paid by the word?
He also likes to dump a lot of history on top of the reader, some of it seemingly nonsensical, I did read it - because he buries plot points in that history. One plot point - which is sort of dumped in there without any highlighting and off-the-cuff (so off the cuff that the Kindle didn't pick up on it) - is that Rhaegar's son who was just a baby may still be alive. We aren't told whose baby. It's just sort of thrown out there. And it's in yet another seemingly meaningless conversation between Davos and a bunch of islanders or seamen at the Sister Isles. They are also discussing Dany and who she is - although it takes them a while to get her name right. (Which if I didn't know better may be a parody of me attempting to get her name spelled right). Apparently, she's Rhaegar's sister, not daughter? It's admittedly confusing. So...there's a hint here of two things: 1) Rhaegar's son lived and they have no idea what happened to him (Probably is Jon Snow, since Jon Snow was clearly mentioned in the last chapter - and this is a definite pattern to GRRM's writing). 2) Dany is related to Jon Snow as his aunt, not sister, and would most likely not be the heir, Rhaegar's child would be??? Don't ask me, I re-read the thing twice and got a headache - granted to be fair, I was reading it in the doctor's office awaiting my steroid epidermal shot..and in incredible pain. So, there were extenuating factors.
Tyrion's chapter is also about the history of Westeros. This round it is about the Tigers and Elephants - a story being told to a young boy that Tyrion and two other men are teaching. The kid, Young Griff, is the son of the sellsword that Tyrion is journeying with and subordinate to. (Ironic that. Once again Tyrion's fate is in a sellswords hands).
I got a bit lost in this chapter, mainly because I was in pain while attempting to read it and take my mind off said pain. (I have a herniated disc.) Nothing like reading about other's pain...to make your own seem less of an issue. At any rate, near as I can figure - we learn that the battle of the Tigers and Elephants was resolved with dragons - that as Young Griff states: moral of story, if you want to win a war, bring dragons. Dragons seems to be a metaphor for nuclear weapons (not here, here dragons are literal. I meant in regards to our world.) The other two important bits - are 1) The legend of the Great Turtle - which marks the birth of Kings, (not sure what Tyrion meant by this - re-read it twice and still couldn't make sense of it - I obviously missed something), and 2) Tyrion's pain is derived from his guilt at allowing men to gang-rape his wife, because he thought she was just a whore. (This is important - Tyrion really doesn't respect women very much. He sees them as little more than sexual gratification or objects. It's repeated throughout the series. He has almost no relationship with them outside of sexual or confrontational. To Tyrion - almost all women are little more than whores. I catch it in the tv series as well. It's in part a projection of his own insecurities. He feels powerless, so he associates with whores who he sees as less than him, with less power. In this respect Tyrion and Littlefinger are reflections of each other - both manipulators, both have sharp wits, and both frequent whores - they also oddly both at one point or another become Sansa Stark's protector/husband/father. Seeing perhaps in Sansa - an innocent that they can't quite possess, can easily manipulate, and desire to protect as a means of redeeming themselves. The TV writers interestingly enough - only show the whores with Tyrion, Littlefinger and Theon. Three men who have no power, and are incredibly insecure. And the women are beautiful and yet attainable for gold. Deft way of getting across this same idea far quicker.)
Off to bed. Been up since 5:30 am. Am tired. I did write about Elementary but I dropped a tag and I hurt too badly to fix it. So it is gone. Frustrating, doesn't begin to cover my day. Oh well, time to go to bed, but first a hot shower.
2. Dance with Dragons update:
I'm about 20% in and admittedly skimming through a chunk of pointless description. You are wordy bastard, GRRM. I will give you that. One wonders if he is paid by the word?
He also likes to dump a lot of history on top of the reader, some of it seemingly nonsensical, I did read it - because he buries plot points in that history. One plot point - which is sort of dumped in there without any highlighting and off-the-cuff (so off the cuff that the Kindle didn't pick up on it) - is that Rhaegar's son who was just a baby may still be alive. We aren't told whose baby. It's just sort of thrown out there. And it's in yet another seemingly meaningless conversation between Davos and a bunch of islanders or seamen at the Sister Isles. They are also discussing Dany and who she is - although it takes them a while to get her name right. (Which if I didn't know better may be a parody of me attempting to get her name spelled right). Apparently, she's Rhaegar's sister, not daughter? It's admittedly confusing. So...there's a hint here of two things: 1) Rhaegar's son lived and they have no idea what happened to him (Probably is Jon Snow, since Jon Snow was clearly mentioned in the last chapter - and this is a definite pattern to GRRM's writing). 2) Dany is related to Jon Snow as his aunt, not sister, and would most likely not be the heir, Rhaegar's child would be??? Don't ask me, I re-read the thing twice and got a headache - granted to be fair, I was reading it in the doctor's office awaiting my steroid epidermal shot..and in incredible pain. So, there were extenuating factors.
Tyrion's chapter is also about the history of Westeros. This round it is about the Tigers and Elephants - a story being told to a young boy that Tyrion and two other men are teaching. The kid, Young Griff, is the son of the sellsword that Tyrion is journeying with and subordinate to. (Ironic that. Once again Tyrion's fate is in a sellswords hands).
I got a bit lost in this chapter, mainly because I was in pain while attempting to read it and take my mind off said pain. (I have a herniated disc.) Nothing like reading about other's pain...to make your own seem less of an issue. At any rate, near as I can figure - we learn that the battle of the Tigers and Elephants was resolved with dragons - that as Young Griff states: moral of story, if you want to win a war, bring dragons. Dragons seems to be a metaphor for nuclear weapons (not here, here dragons are literal. I meant in regards to our world.) The other two important bits - are 1) The legend of the Great Turtle - which marks the birth of Kings, (not sure what Tyrion meant by this - re-read it twice and still couldn't make sense of it - I obviously missed something), and 2) Tyrion's pain is derived from his guilt at allowing men to gang-rape his wife, because he thought she was just a whore. (This is important - Tyrion really doesn't respect women very much. He sees them as little more than sexual gratification or objects. It's repeated throughout the series. He has almost no relationship with them outside of sexual or confrontational. To Tyrion - almost all women are little more than whores. I catch it in the tv series as well. It's in part a projection of his own insecurities. He feels powerless, so he associates with whores who he sees as less than him, with less power. In this respect Tyrion and Littlefinger are reflections of each other - both manipulators, both have sharp wits, and both frequent whores - they also oddly both at one point or another become Sansa Stark's protector/husband/father. Seeing perhaps in Sansa - an innocent that they can't quite possess, can easily manipulate, and desire to protect as a means of redeeming themselves. The TV writers interestingly enough - only show the whores with Tyrion, Littlefinger and Theon. Three men who have no power, and are incredibly insecure. And the women are beautiful and yet attainable for gold. Deft way of getting across this same idea far quicker.)
Off to bed. Been up since 5:30 am. Am tired. I did write about Elementary but I dropped a tag and I hurt too badly to fix it. So it is gone. Frustrating, doesn't begin to cover my day. Oh well, time to go to bed, but first a hot shower.
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no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 12:38 am (UTC)But fans will debate it to death.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-20 03:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-20 03:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-20 03:53 am (UTC)Oh, wait - Jon Snow looks just like Eddard (more so than Robb), and Arya also looks like Eddard (and his sister Lyanna). I think there is Stark blood in Snow - and that would be Lyanna. And, aren't the Dornish darker in coloring?
no subject
Date: 2013-04-20 01:41 pm (UTC)What I know so far from Dance, and keep in mind I'm only 28-29% of the way through:
* There's a possibility that someone switched the babies before the Mountain or the Lannisters showed up to kill them, so that Aegon survived. (It's mentioned in both Davos's chapter (with Lord Wyman Manderly - where someone mentions off hand that Aegon, Rhaegar's baby son may have survived - they aren't sure and if he did they don't know what happened to him) and Tyrion's chapter (Tyrion believes he's with a YA version of Aegon - who looks a great deal like the Tarragyn's - with the almost purple eyes and his hair is "dyed").
* There's a possibility that Jon Snow is a Tarragyn - but right now everyone in Dance believes he's Eddard Stark's kid by a fishwife, a woman who saved Stark when he was on the Sister Isles and from Lord Manderly. So no real evidence popping up outside of tiny hints in Catelynn, Eddard, Jamie and Cersei's points of view. But they are slight and nothing definite as far as I can tell. I admittedly skimmed most of Catelynn and Eddard and Cersei - because I found those characters pov's incredibly boring. So it's possible I missed stuff.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-20 11:05 pm (UTC)In fact, since he's known about it forever he might well go with an alternative.
They have done so much with the tournament - Howland Reed, and the incredible knight who is dead and whose name I forget. Yes - that is what started the war.....but I am still convinced because of the promise made on the bed of blood and roses, and by the fact that Rhaegar left his guard to watch over Lyanna.
Time will tell. And Martin takes time. I started waiting for Feast/Crows about 15 years ago. As I'm sure you know, it was all meant to be one book.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-21 02:10 am (UTC)And you can really tell - he writes it as if it is one book. Several of the points of view in Dance should have been in Feast - they take place at the start of Feast. It's like reading a story told out of chronological order - as if there wasn't enough to keep track of already.
Did GRRM get bored and decided to spice things up a bit for himself?
They have done so much with the tournament - Howland Reed, and the incredible knight who is dead and whose name I forget. Yes - that is what started the war.....but I am still convinced because of the promise made on the bed of blood and roses, and by the fact that Rhaegar left his guard to watch over Lyanna.
Okay, I admittedly managed to miss that bit of information...or forgot it. I thought the war was started by Rhaegar's alleged kidnapping of Lysanna who was a bit of a warrior in her own right? (OR at least that's what I remember Robert and Eddard stating.) Well that and Aegon Tarragyn requesting that Jamie kill his own father (if only he had - life would have been better for oh so many people) while Aeagon was busy having his alchemists burn people alive with the magical fire.