Recently in Game of Thrones Category

Still taking a break. Nonetheless, this was too on-the-nose not to share, for election 2012 is dark and full of terrors. Enjoy.

"My brother left no true-born heirs. By right and birth and blood, I do this day lay claim to the Iron Throne of Westeros. Let all true men declare their loyalty: The Iron Throne is mine by right. They will bend the knee or I will destroy them." Well, Stannis talks a big game at least...(and note the three horn blasts from Storm of Swords.) From ten days ago, the Game of Thrones Season 2 trailer. The cold winds are rising, April 2012.

"The debate about the parentage of the bastard Jon Snow has been one of the biggest concerning the series. In SSM #159, George R. R. Martin admitted that Jon's parents will eventually be revealed in later volumes of the series. Thus, the reader can assume that the secret of his parentage will play some important point in the plot, and that there has been some sort of foreshadowing leading up to this. Currently, there are three pairs of parents that seem likely."

With the first book under my belt, I'm now fighting a losing war to stick to my original plan of not getting ahead of the TV show before Season 2. And, while A Clash of Kings remains unbought so far, I did read this extensively-evidenced and seemingly definitive essay on the parentage of Jon Snow. (It draws on the first three books, but mostly on Game of Thrones.) After reading this, I'd be very surprised if this wasn't the truth of it.

This can mean only one thing -- invasion. Game of Thrones Season 2 reloads with Liam Cunningham (Clash of the Titans) as Davos, the Onion Knight, Natalie Dormer (The Tudors) as Margaery Tyrell, Gwendoline Christie (The Imagnarium of Dr. Parnassus) as Brienne of Tarth, Carice Van Houten (Valkryie, Black Book) as Melisandre, Stephen Dillane (44 Inch Chest, John Adams's Jefferson) as Stannis Baratheon, and Oliver Ford Davies (The Phantom Menace's Sio Bibble) as Maester Cressen.

For now, I'm keeping with my plan to not read ahead of the show, so the only characters I'm even a little familiar with are Stannis and Margaery, and that's only via foreshadowing in the first book. But I'm willing to bet Dillane is a great fit, just because, as far as I've seen, Dillane is a great fit in just about anything.

I've been remiss here in posting anything here about HBO's Game of Thrones, which I've been greatly enjoying over the past few months. (AMC's The Killing...less so. What a disaster that turned out to be.) So to remedy that, here's Arrested Westeros, i.e. what happens you add House Bluth to the Lannister-Stark-Baratheon-Targaryen mix. I particularly like the one above and this one, and you can't go wrong with any variation of "I've made a huge mistake."

In related Game of Thrones fun, see also: Stupid Ned Stark and One and a Half Man, the buddy-movie version of the story. As an aside, I think I'm going to continue into Season 2 without reading the books (or without reading past the first book, at any rate.) As someone who's usually entering into these sorts of genre properties with full knowledge of the backstory and reams of preconceived expectations, it feels mighty strange to be on the other side of the fanboy/general audience divide for once, and I think I kinda like it.