game of thrones . . .

. . . is wickedly addicting! I won't give any spoiler alerts, promise. What I will write is that I started by reading the first book and the first HBO season stayed pretty close to the storyline. However, the second book and season are beginning to diverge in some ways. Never get attached to a character! Talk about killing your darlings! George R.R. Martin not only took that leaf from Flannery, he outright stole it: twice. (With a double R in your name, you must expect a pun somewhere.)

So here is where I love the varying mediums of books and film. (Yes, I am lumping HBO into film for simplicity's sake.) Take the character of Tyrion. In the book, I found him to be rather tiring - too many quips for a man so short on conventional charm that it was hard to believe he'd ever make it as far as he had. In the series, I can't get enough. His wit is endlessly fascinating and always on par. I'd like him to be a bit more evil - he's a Lannister after all. But the long and short of it is that the character is enhanced by seeing him in both ways. My appreciation of him is that much greater.

Which brings me to one of my larger adaptional disappointments: Twilight. The books were so open to interpretation - not written in stone the way that Martin held his characters (perhaps a sign of strength of writing or style difference), but the films just fell flat. Only the last one held any true interest and that may have been an accidental stroke of luck. Everything is so layered in the Game series (book and film) whereas the layering the author tried to allud to in the books in Twilight were left totally behind in the need for a "really cool" soundtrack and "spooky" lighting and a ridiculous budget on hairgel. Oh, if only we could have a great big re-do of those movies.

If only!

So what I'll take from this is that there is one more Twilight movie left to enjoy (I figure I may as well, seeing as how Bella's at least going to arm wrestle Emmett now), a few more shows of season two to catch up on for Game of Thrones and at least as many books as Mr. Martin would like to write. Which means a lot to take in, think over, brood over (don't even get me started on casting choices), and ways to procrastinate my own writing. Cheers!