I was just thinking the other day that Robert's Rebellion would make a great YA trilogy. You've got the love triangle, most of the characters are actual teenagers at the time, Aerys is a top-of-the-line mad villain, and there's plenty of close calls and massive battles to keep everything purring along.

Eh, I'm pretty sure they'll have the Night's King show up, lift his arms, and the wall comes down. For show-only fans, it'll still be pretty epic.

It would, but I still prefer the idea that Cersei is very much a young Tywin. Only, being a woman, she didn't get the political education needed to be any good at it.

That's meant to be ironic. Both Robb with Jeyne and Jon with Ygritte make their relationship decisions based around trying not to repeat Ned's "mistake". Of course, that mistake is him trying to safeguard the life of his nephew.

Not only is Tyrion Targaryen wrong thematically, it also doesn't work at all with the given timelines. His mother wasn't anywhere near Aerys during his conception.

"She also essentially sent him to the wall"

This is the London Underground. Schedules are for wimps and foreigners. Dammit, I'm getting all misty, King's Cross was my neighborhood for a year.

Yeah, the key to understanding a lot of characters' decisions in ASOIAF is to remember that feudal politics is this weird mix of strict legalism and naked violence.

I don't like to read too intently.

Uhmm, the Tyrion was framed info doesn't really come out until long after his arrest and release, and further, even Tyrion doesn't do anything with it (it's actually a a bit of plot hole since he gets the info while he's Hand of the King and has no love or use for Littlefinger, so there's no reason not to…

Certainly don't agree about her being clueless. The whole point of the arrest is that she knows shit's going to be going down now that Ned and she have compared notes, and so she takes a calculated risk in Tyrion's arrest. As for the vindictiveness, well, her son's in a coma (and she almost got a knife to the…

Not with respect to Robb, no. Anyway, not what we were arguing about.

Oh man, I assumed he was younger than that. That makes it even more pathetic.

That's not an argument against her being a good adviser. Also worth remembering that Robb Stark literally won every battle he fought, often against much more experienced commanders. That doesn't really qualify as 'total disaster' IMO.

No no no. Sure, Catelyn Stark frees Jaime, which is dumb. Then again, holding him prisoner wasn't exactly doing Robb any favours either. But:
-Son gets injured, falls into a coma, she takes point on his care.
-Husband gets called away to important government job, takes half her kids with him. She wishes him luck and…

The 'Bro' fucking slays me.

So what you're saying is at least it's an ethos?

Could it be an age thing? I was certainly not too old/not too young during their heyday. I can certainly see a 10 year old me seeing the premiere and rolling my eyes.

Which makes no fucking sense. On TV, directors are basically hired technicians, and subordinate to the showrunner. Either some of the other producers were fucking with him, or he was shitty showrunner.

That got an actual chuckle from me.