The King Who CaredLord Seaworth is a man of humble birth, but he reminded me of my duty, when all i could think of was my rights. I had the cart before the horse, Davos said. I was trying to win the throne to save the kingdom, when I should have been trying to save the kingdom to win the throne - Stannis Baratheon, turning the game aroundSo yeah, this is where we book readers gloat in glory and watch you bend the knee to the one true king.
- On a serious note, weeky reminder: book Stannis is grossly different from the abomination which is his show depiction. Differences include: he doesn't burn people for being heretics, he doesn't mindlessly follow Melisandre, he's a declared atheist... although, to be fair, a lot of the humour in his scenes comes from the narration.
- It's not even like all book readers love Stannis - he's rather unlikeable, he's just admirable. He's the guy you want to win because you know he won't make any compromise with the bad guys, but wipe them all out... if he succeeds.
- The show tends to portray him as a somewhat evil character, with the omnious theme music and all those small changes. Example: In "Blackwater", Sansa and all the women are under the threat of getting raped by Stannis's troops, if they were to take King's Landing. Book Stannis is exceptional in that regard: he forbids his troops to rape and castrates all rapists among his soldiers. It's the sum of all those details that make Stanis the most distant character from the book original.
- Did I mention Stannis didn't even need mercenaries from Braavos? All he had was 1000 mounted well-trained soldiers. It's not really unbelievable - concerning elite cavalry, Polish Winged Hussars have managed to win in one crushing charge outnumbered 5-to-1[1] against regular soldiers, while Stannis's men stomped over poorly armoured wildlings.
- Mance's camp consists of many interesting characters, including the leaders of various tribes, Mance's wife and her sister, but I guess we'll get to those in the next season - many characters died so that the new ones could fit on the payroll. This includes Grenn and Pyp, still alive in the books.
- Missing eye candy: Varamyr Sixskins, Mance's warg, possesses Orell's eagle (in the show, the warg guy who died at the end of season 3) to scout the Wall. Melisandre roasts the eagle alive while it's in the air, causing the warg to briefly go insane. I guess the Bran scene exhausted the fireball budget.
- This does NOT conclude Jon's storyline in A Storm of Swords, there about three chapters (one from Samwell's POV) left. Don't hover over ASOS spoilers that refer to the Wall. Or the ones that you don't know what they refer to, actually.
If you want to experience the book presentation of the scene, here's the audiobook excerpt[2] with a proper soundtrack in the background.
Harder, Better, Faster, StrongerYou should know, the process may change him... somewhat - Qyburn, announcing the fourth recast for Gregor Clegane- The Mountain's fate is left ambiguous in ASOS, only to be speculated upon in AFFC. This means that the show has all but confirmed a popular fan theory, that Qyburn took care of him.
- It's easy to lose of so many characters, so for those with worse memory: Qyburn was introduced in season 3, left wounded in Harrenhal, found by the Stark men. In the books, he was a part of a notorious unit of Brave Companions (aka Bloody Mummers), a terrifying band of mercenaries made of murderers, rapists, a paedophile septon and madman. Thos echaracters got cut from the show and replaced by the Bolton party led by Locke, who replaced the leader of the Brave Companions in the role of cutting Jaime's hand and delivering him to Roose Bolton.
- A conversation between Cersei and Tywin cannot occur in the books since none of them is a POV character, at least not until the end of ASOS - the show allows us to see it. There's a actually a long plotline here that is yet to be concluded - it concerns Cersei's bethrothal to Loras Tyrell and the differences with the book Tyrells (book Loras has two older brothers, show Loras is the only heir - this changes the stakes for the Tyrells here).
How To Chain Your Dragon 2The masters will take advantage of this situation - Barristan Selmy, wording politely "Your decisions will have horrible consequences and there's not much you could do"- I've covered the Ghiscari culture in the previous posts, so there's nothing more to add, as we haven't explored anything new in Meereen yet - we're already past ASOS scope on Dany anyway. So just mad props to the shepherd actor and that's it.
- The ADWD material about Meereen will fit more for season 5 followups, we're yet to really get into that city.
- There's a Polish proverb that goes "Smith stole, Gypsy got hanged" - sometimes a scapegoat takes the blame. Drogon is a big black motherfucker and it's not just the looks - he's described as the biggest and the wildest out of the bunch. Meanwhile, the two dragons easier to tame get chained - and that is surely going to turn out well for them...
CarcossaYou're going to help me walk again? - Bran Stark, thinking the whole deal with mind control, skeletal warriors, elf-hobbits and a talking bird was all just a big ruse to get him to climb walls again- Since he's probably written out from the show, now it's the time to write about Coldhands, Bran's guide in ASOS. He's a notoriously unexplained and mysterious character, riding an elk! He appears before Sam and guides him to the secret tunnel below the Wall, and then picks up Brand and guides him to the Three-Eyed Crow.
- Some theories claim that Coldhands was written off because of his identity that the show would reveal too early (theories go even as far as suspecting him to be Benjen Stark, but he seems to be way too old for that), others simply blame the reduction of supernatural elements (Coldhands is most likely undead).
- Both storylines come to common conclusion: Bran arrives under the tree, there's some supernatural help (Coldhands repels the wights in the books, Leaf throws fireballs in the show).
Speaking of Leaf: the elf-hobbit thingy is one of the last Children of the Forest, an ancient race inhabiting Westeros before the First Men came. The Children are the ones who grew weirwood trees. The First Men were at war with the Children until the Pact between the two races, after which some of the First Men have adopted the Old Gods. The Pact was when the weirwood trees got the carved faces (the term in the books is "heart trees", by the way).
- Jojen isn't actually stated to be dead by the end of ADWD (!) but it's speculated upon that he might as well be. This really confirms the theory that Jojen is dead.
- This is spoilery gray area, but the better codename from the books for Three-Eyed Crow is ADWD
It points out to his historical identity, but there is no other mention of the name in the show.
- Slight inconsequence: the quote goes "with a thousand eyes and one", since the book Three-Eyed Crow is missing one eye, but the show Three-Eyed Raven seems to have them both.
DogfightThere is no safety, you dumb bitch - The Hound, insulting a female representative of his species- Why wouldn't Arya check in in the Eyrie for some people that might have known her or something? Well, time for me to play the IT WASN'T IN THE BOOKS card. But really - Sandor gets wounded in that inn fight and the infection takes him down. The outcome is the same - Arya leaves him dying and goes to the Saltpans. The prolonged buddy comedy was a season-long strecht that in the end worked out well for the show.
- This means that Brienne never met them, yeah, but a) in the books she fights Rorge, who's in Hound's helmet, so it kinda counts, and

the fight scene was fucking badass. It was just very convenient to make those two pairs meet and the AFFC Brienne storyline is still open.
- The scene at Saltpans is pretty much word for word from the book and this is where Arya's POV in ASOS ends. There is no specification of what the iron coin means exactly. Valar morghulis means "all men must die", valar dohaeris means "all men must serve". With Faceless Men being possibly involved in the founding of the Free City of Braavos (even disregardig the whole face-changing badass assasin thing), it's understandable that the Bravosi people instinctively help out anyone connected to the organization.
- The last chapter of ASOS, as I've mentioned previously, is Littlefinger's "Only Cat" (Lysa mentions everything she did before Sansa in the same scene). Arya's departure is great, but left some die-hard book fans unsatisfied - especially since the ASOS epilogue would turn this episode up from 10/10 to 11/10.
Shit HappensTywin Lannister did not, in the end, shit gold.
A Storm of Swords- /u/GRVrush2112 has already covered the whole context of this scene in his post. I don't want to be redundant, but I'll just recap this story without going into such extensive detail.
- Tyrion's escape has a lot more to it in the books as he comes to face the harsh truth about his first failed marriage to Tysha. As you may recall from his story in season 1, Tyrion at first thought he and Jaime saved a girl, and after a while he married Tysha in secret. When Tywin found out, he was furious - he revealed that it was a ruse made by Jaime to get Tyrion laid, and the girl was paid to do so. Then he made Tyrion watch his whole garrison rape Tysha and pay her in silver, and made Tyrion do it as well, paying in gold.
- Now here comes the turn: when escaping, Jaime reveals to Tyrion that Tysha wasn't a whore, the "ruse" was a lie made up by Tywin to break up the scandalous marriage. Tyrion, mad at Jaime, "confesses" to Jaime that he killed Joffrey and outs Cersei for fucking their cousin Lancel, Osmund Kettleback (book character, Kingsguard), "and Moon Boy for all I know" (a jester).
- This gives a different tone to the brother's goodbye and more fuel for Tyrion's revenge. As far as Tyrion's characteristics go, there's a bit more to be said - he's not as perfect as the show makes him look like. When a minstrel threatens to reveal his secret with Shae, Tyrion has the bard killed and thrown into stew in Flea Bottom (slums). That's at least morally gray.
- Book Shae does not love Tyrion - she's a simple-minded golddigger. This makes the murder more cold-blooded, the line "I'm sorry" would have no place in the books. Tyrion's commitment to Shae is a replacement for the Tysha story.
- Finding Shae in Tywin's bed allows to connect some dots: Tyrion has been using the tunnels below the King's Landing when he was acting Hand of the King to organize the defense of the city and visit Shae (who wasn't in the Red Keep). From his dialogue with Varys it seems that the tunnels have been built and used in the past by Hand of the King - which is peculiar, since the tunnel leads to a brothel (not the Littlefinger's one). Everything indicates that it was Tywin who was sneaking around to brothels, but keeping it a secret, when he was the Hand to Aerys "Mad King" Targaryen.
- Some theories go as far as indicating someone might have dosed Tywin (craziest guesses claim it was to ensure he spends the night in the privy), but there's no hard evidence to support that theory.
- This concludes Tyrion's POV for ASOS.
The Small LetdownsDon't get me wrong, the episode was 10/10, but we readers have overhyped it, expecting 11/10. Things we expected and didn't get to see are:
- Riders shouting "Stannis! Stannis! Stannis!" and a glorified, not omnious atmosphere (it was still better than the worst 4chan predictions, so there's that)
- Tysha reveal and Tyrion being much less whitewashed
- The ASOS epilogue
Only three things, but those are one of the few most powerful parts of the ending of ASOS, together with "Only Cat" and the conclusion to the Wall plot.
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