After having finished A Feast For Crows a few days ago I cant but feel a little bit underwhelmed by the season that just ended. Which made me want to create some sort of discussion here with those that have finished both!

I am currently reading A Dance With Dragons so I would very much like for there to be no spoilers from that book! This is purely for A Feast For Crows. When I finish ADWD I might be inclined to create a new thread for that ;)

I do feel like they rushed an awful lot of things and left out a lot of perfectly good material. I am going to split this up depending on characters / areas.

Cersei / Kings Landing

The good:
The Faith / High Sparrow was better done in the show than in the book I think, they felt more of a threat and Jonathan Pryce was very good as the High Sparrow. I feel like they tackled the whole arrest of Cersei well with using Lancel over Kettleback (someone who they have chosen to leave out, not many objections there from me). Cant say I have many objections to that.

Loras being taken by the faith over injured at Dragonstone isnt a huge deal I think, a nice twist by using the homosexuality to imprison him. No objections there.

The bad:
I would have spent more time on Cersei´s craze for power and her utter mismanagement of the city. I felt like that was a big part of the story. I do understand that hiring actors for all the small characters she put on the small council (Rosby, Waters, Swyft etc) might have been too much for those not reading the books but you could still have executed her trying to control everything with Pycelle, Mace Tyrell, Qyburn and others.

Kevan was criminally under used in the series. There could have been some very good Kevan scenes with Cersei / Jamie.

I didnt get the feeling that there was war in the kingdoms. They could probably have put that in somewhere in Kings Landing/ Riverlands. You got a sense of the dispair that the war had brought, but that was hardly touched upon in the series.

Jamie

The good:
Including Bronn more. A good decision as he is a great character and the actor does him well.

The bad:
Deciding to take him to Dorne instead of the Riverlands. Ill come back to Dorne later but I do feel like a few scenes with Edmure and the Blackfish could have been good. Since they are pretty much in limbo now in the show it would have been nice to possibly close their arcs (depending how their involvement in the series in the future). Would have been nice to see Jamie abandon Cersei by throwing the letter in the fire after learning she slept with Lancel, I feel like that will be important in the future.

Jamie in Dorne felt a bit blah. Didnt seem to have much purpose or direction.

Might also have been nice to include some scene(s) with Jamie as an honor guard for Tywin but not that important.

Dorne

The good:
Nothing?

The bad:
Feel like they completely butchered Dorne. Leaving the whole Arienna ordeal out is perplexing. That was a very enjoyable part of the book and completely executable. The series also made Doran look pretty stupid, why the hell would he trust the sand snakes? They should have sticked with Doran from the books, the calculated player who doesnt play unless he wins! Bah! Quentyn to bring back FIRE AND BLOOD was a very cool last like and might also be very interesting, but they seem to be leaving that out (is Quentyn suppose to be in the series? I feel like its a no but I am not sure). I dont remember Ellaria being in AFFC at all but maybe something in ADWD since I hear they changed her a lot.

Brienne

The good:

Was probably the right decision to not include her very long and pointless travels throughout the Riverlands.

The bad:
I felt like including a scene with the Brotherhood without banner might have been a nice addition and close Beric Dondarrions arc. Although I understand that a resurrected Caitlyn might be a bit confusing (maybe just drop that and have Thoros lead them? Explain Beric´s death with something like that resurrection took too much of a toll?). Might also set up a Brienne vs Jamie encounter later on, depends on how GRRM is planning on executing this. Randyll Tarly might also have been a nice addition, but it might depend on his involvement later in the series, having Samwell´s father might be interesting.

Not entirely sure that it was the right decision to have her trek north to visit Stannis. Depends on where they take it next season and how ADWD did Stannis. Cant really say much about that"

Sansa

The good:
Would be crazy of them to try and explain Littlefingers plan ( I think it took like 2-3 pages of talking about family trees), thus it was probably best to have her try to claim the north (that feels like the point of the plan, Vale+North united!) but weird that she is fleeing with Theon now. Theon is suppose to be in ADWD so I have no idea how the North is portrayed in the books. Guess we will just have to see where the series is taking this before commenting further.

The bad:
Kinda depends on where they are taking this. I didnt feel like any of it was badly done, leaving out the Vale so completely might be a bad move later on if they are going to be a force in the future.

Greyjoys

The bad:
Not being included! I hope to death they will be done justice in the next season. Criminal.

Arya

The good:
Having Jaqen as the Kindly Man. Not needed to add another character I feel.

The bad:
Might have been fun to see her talk to Samwell in Bravos when she was Cat. Not a huge thing though.


Samwell

Didnt tackle this yet in the series but a lot of things have been changed. Does Mance have a son in the series? I felt it was a very nice touch to have Lord Snow make Gilly swap children to save the king from the fires. Shows what kind of decision a Lord has to make.


I think that about covers it? I probably missed something but that is all I remember for now!

They could have easily added a lot of scenes and stretched this on for another season (AFFC + ADWD) which would give GRRM more time to put some shit together and publish the next book!

Anyone have any idea why HBO would rush this so much? Age of younger actors? Lack of money (lol)? Just feels a bit weird they would dump so much good and easily executable content in favor of catching up with the books.

I think it's both the age of the child/teenage actors and a money thing tbh. I mean GOT makes a ton of money for them, but it's also the most expensive show on TV. Plus a lot of the actors are getting big movie roles now, and when it's time to renegotiate their contracts they're gonna shoot way up

But yeah, I'm not really sure I liked the show version better for any of those storylines you mentioned. Cersei's especially. That was such an amazing trainwreck to see play out in the books and in the show it's just Cersei gives High Sparrow a ton of power out of nowhere -> Loras/Margaery immediately get arrested -> Cersei gets arrested soon after. There was almost none of the plotting or intrigue that made the book version so much fun. Osmund Kettleblack's confession, High Sparrow's "No", Margaery bitching out Cersei (at least they kept that) were so immensely satisfying after all that build-up where you're just waiting and hoping for Cersei's house of cards to finally collapse

And that kind of thing is basically my core complaint with the season. Like Jaime's Riverlands travels honestly bored me half the time, but I'd still prefer that over the rushed, sloppy Dorne storyline any day. Same case with Brienne really (although I do think The Hound vs Brienne fight is one of the best alterations the show has made)

I think Arya is one of the few storylines that they did justice to and didn't feel rushed (I don't think it's a coincidence that it's one of the few that's still behind the books). I do think the Sam/Arya meet-up is very much in play for next season. Although I'm not sure if Sam took a boat in the show? I just have a hard time believing they'd throw away one of the very few book character overlaps when they've made a concerted effort to have MORE overlap

Boc @ 29/7/2015 1:04

I think it's both the age of the child/teenage actors and a money thing tbh. I mean GOT makes a ton of money for them, but it's also the most expensive show on TV. Plus a lot of the actors are getting big movie roles now, and when it's time to renegotiate their contracts they're gonna shoot way up But yeah, I'm not really sure I liked the show version better for any of those storylines you mentioned. Cersei's especially. That was such an amazing trainwreck to see play out in the books and in the show it's just Cersei gives High Sparrow a ton of power out of nowhere -> Loras/Margaery immediately get arrested -> Cersei gets arrested soon after. There was almost none of the plotting or intrigue that made the book version so much fun. Osmund Kettleblack's confession, High Sparrow's "No", Margaery bitching out Cersei (at least they kept that) were so immensely satisfying after all that build-up where you're just waiting and hoping for Cersei's house of cards to finally collapse And that kind of thing is basically my core complaint with the season. Like Jaime's Riverlands travels honestly bored me half the time, but I'd still prefer that over the rushed, sloppy Dorne storyline any day. Same case with Brienne really (although I do think The Hound vs Brienne fight is one of the best alterations the show has made) I think Arya is one of the few storylines that they did justice to and didn't feel rushed (I don't think it's a coincidence that it's one of the few that's still behind the books). I do think the Sam/Arya meet-up is very much in play for next season. Although I'm not sure if Sam took a boat in the show? I just have a hard time believing they'd throw away one of the very few book character overlaps when they've made a concerted effort to have MORE overlap

I liked Jamie going from loving Cersei, to doubting her when Tyrion accusing her of sleeping with Lancel / Osmund / Moonboy, to despising her when Lancel confessed and then to ignoring her when he got the letter at the end :)

The Hound vs Brienne was pretty well done I agree, brutal scene.

Yeah, I was baffled by a lot of the decision making this season.

I appreciate that adapting this series must be really difficult, and that AFFC + DWD must be the most difficult entries of said series to adapt, but imo they made some silly mistakes.

Dorne...nobody can defend that shit. It was absolutely awful. What did we learn about these new characters? We spent an entire season with them, and it doesn't feel like we made it past the introductions. I also feel the writers had no confidence in them, so they decided to have Jamie and Bronn go there too. They should have let that story stand on its own.

The other big fuckup this season was Stannis. The way that was handled, oh my god. I am not certain how the Battle for Winterfell is going to go down on the page, but I'm pretty certain these things won't be happening:

- Ramsay Bolton turning into Rambo and storming Stannis' camp with "20 good men."
- Stannis burning his daughter and sole heir alive because his men don't have enough food.
- Stannis marching on Winterfell with no plan and no army, and quickly getting butchered.

I'd be amazed if that's how it happens.

There are so many other things wrong with this season. Cersei's story, as Boc says, is so much better in the books. You know she is digging her own grave, and that's what makes it so great. One of the themes in FfC and DwD is seeing how effective these characters are at ruling. Season 5 never explores that in depth. It isn't demonstrated enough in the show that Cersei's downfall is her own making.

FfC also explores the aftermath of the war of the five kings. It's a running theme, made clear by Septon Meribald's speech (one of my fav parts of any of the books). Season 5 never explored any of the after effects of the war, which was disappointing. You would think this would have been the perfect time to bring back the Brotherhood Without Banners. But...nope.

I always try to keep in mind that there are only 10 episodes a season, and they have to do the best they can with the time they have. But that doesn't really cut it for me when we get things like the superfluous 20 minute battle scene at Hardhome.

By the way, I'm not saying the Hardhome sequence wasn't entertaining, it was. But those 20 minutes could have been used better.

lol Hardhome was the best part about the season tho. I wouldn't call it superfluous at all. That to me felt like the pay-off to the looong build-up that's been happening since the series' opening scene. I mean this was only a taste of what the REAL battle will be like, but I think it was necessary to give us a glimpse of just how incredibly powerful the White Walkers' army really is, and how insignificant all the political squabbling down South is in comparison

Also I didn't have much of a problem with Stannis' last march, I think the point was that he WAS defeated and he knew it, so he went out with one last act of defiance. Agree with the rest of your points though, because how he got to that point is another matter entirely. I can't believe they basically had everything crumble down in ONE episode

on shireen, speculation spoiler for future books:

Spoiler	+
in the talking portion after the episode aired, D&D said something like "when george told us this was going to happen..." so the shireen thing probably WILL happen in the book, but maybe with different circumstances.

Boc @ 28/7/2015 20:58

lol Hardhome was the best part about the season tho. I wouldn't call it superfluous at all. That to me felt like the pay-off to the looong build-up that's been happening since the series' opening scene. I mean this was only a taste of what the REAL battle will be like, but I think it was necessary to give us a glimpse of just how incredibly powerful the White Walkers' army really is, and how insignificant all the political squabbling down South is in comparison

I see your point here, calling it superfluous was harsh.

I guess my main problem is that there was time to spare for a 20 minute battle, whilst there wasn't even a few minutes available to introduce the Martells beyond their names, or to clarify their motivations.

Perhaps these problems wouldn't have arisen in a 12 episode season with longer episodes (I'm thinking Wire length).

The story would have had some much needed room to breathe. It's a testament to how good the adaptation has been so far that a lack of time has only become a real hurdle this year.

The last Dorne chapter in AFFC seen from Arienne´s perspective was one of my favorite ones. She had been painting a picture of Doran as purely a thinker and not a doer. That he never does anything but think, even when he has complete control over one of the stronger kingdoms and both his siblings are "murdered". That he secretly is a misogynist and doesnt want a woman following in his footsteps.

Then having him explain everything. Arienne was never suppose to inherit Dorne, she was meant for greater things. He gave her to men she knew she would refuse, so down the line he could offer her to a king, who unfortunately got a golden crown. Talking about how Dorne is the least populous kingdom and not as much of a force than what they lead the others to believe. Talking about cyvasse and how Doran only plays a game when he knows he is going to win. Talking about Quentyn going east to bring back Vengeance, Justice, Fire and Blood.

So disappointed

I loved that in the books, all the Lannisters were all obsessing over something, Tyrion: "Where do whores go?" Jaime: "...even Moonboy", Cersei's genaral paranoia of everyone around her and Tyrion, in the show there was nothing of that, not even a homage.