See Game of Thrones for the First Time Again: Through My Eyes

[chf]

I really like all three parts of the Dorne storyline in the books (I think those were some of the best parts of A Dance with Dragons) -- Young Griff's invasion of Westeros, Quentyn's quest in Essos, and the Doran/Arianne conspiracies -- so the TV show cutting all three parts out (and eliminating both Griff characters and Quentyn entirely, so that they don't even exist in the TV continuity) and instead substituting this idiotic rescue-Myrcella / Sand-coup storyline is just incredibly disappointing to me.

In the books, Doran Martell is a patient mastermind/chessmaster approaching Littlefinger levels in how he's been planning across multiple continents for decades and is aware of and five steps ahead of every conspiracy in Dorne. On the TV show, he gets ambushed and dispatched by Ellaria in two minutes? In the books, Areo Hotah is a legendary fighter and always on guard and mindful of his surroundings. On the TV show, he goes down without resistance from being surprised by a single stab with a tiny blade? WTF, TV writers? On top of everything else, it's a complete waste of Alexander Siddig, who's a tremendous dramatic actor.

They had so much amazing, complex source material for Dorne, and instead we get get this drek... it's such a colossal waste. Basically, because they cut out the book Dorne storyline, they had to fill out season 6 with moronic filler (don't worry, OP, I'm being careful so that nothing significant is spoiled here) like the 10-minute scene of Missandei and Grey Worm telling jokes, extended play reenactments in Braavos, and the whole ep about a throwaway character and punishing Riverlands outlaws with little or no relevance to the overarching plot.

But that's another entire season's worth of episodes, so how do you fit that in? They had to cut something.

10 minutes isn't going to cover it.

 

[Payton]

...And I realize this deserves it's own post now... Really, I think its bullshit that I'm all set for Yara to take over the Iron Borne and then this Euron guy swoops in from outta nowhere... I mean, c'mon now!!!

 

[BusSport]

But that's another entire season's worth of episodes, so how do you fit that in? They had to cut something.

10 minutes isn't going to cover it.

TV Dorne storyline (which diverged from the books in season 5), Missandei jokes, play reenactments, Riverlands outlaws is altogether a lot more than 10 minutes.

The point is to not have the book Dorne storyline be replaced by the TV Dorne storyline. And not all three threads of book Dorne storyline would be covered to completion in this season. They would be ongoing into future seasons, just like non-Dorne storylines.

 

[chf]

TV Dorne storyline (which diverged from the books in season 5), Missandei jokes, play reenactments, Riverlands outlaws is altogether a lot more than 10 minutes.

The point is to not have the book Dorne storyline be replaced by the TV Dorne storyline. And not all three threads of book Dorne storyline would be covered to completion in this season. They would be ongoing into future seasons, just like non-Dorne storylines.

No, it's not really a lot more than 10 minutes, it wouldn't even fill a half episode.

Besides that, they have to get all the OTHER content into the coming up season(s), and finish it all up.

Again, it's simple math. Each book is 800 to 1000 pages. The rule for script writing is a minute per finished page. So they have to cut a literal shit ton of content. Content all over the place.

Dorne got cut for time.

I'm sad about parts of that too, but it is what it is. Show GOT and book GOT are very very different animals. Unless they're going to do 30 episode seasons, which they're simply not going to do. They'd have to be in production 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Not to mention that according to Benioff and Weiss, they're REDUCING their episode count moving forward to the finish. Episodes might be longer, but there's going to be less of them.

Pretty much they had two choices, they could cut Dorne to the bone, or cut the Greyjoys to the bone (they already cut them a LOT). I figure their choice boiled down to the amount they'd already invested in Theon and his sister.

 

[BusSport]

No, it's not really a lot more than 10 minutes, it wouldn't even fill a half episode.

Besides that, they have to get all the OTHER content into the coming up season(s), and finish it all up.

Again, it's simple math. Each book is 800 to 1000 pages. The rule for script writing is a minute per finished page. So they have to cut a literal shit ton of content. Content all over the place.

Dorne got cut for time.

I'm sad about parts of that too, but it is what it is. Show GOT and book GOT are very very different animals. Unless they're going to do 30 episode seasons, which they're simply not going to do. They'd have to be in production 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Not to mention that according to Benioff and Weiss, they're REDUCING their episode count moving forward to the finish. Episodes might be longer, but there's going to be less of them.

Pretty much they had two choices, they could cut Dorne to the bone, or cut the Greyjoys to the bone (they already cut them a LOT). I figure their choice boiled down to the amount they'd already invested in Theon and his sister.

That argument pretends like there was no Dorne storyline to replace on the TV show. There was, and it was terrible. The TV show did not simply remove the book Dorne storyline; they replaced the book Dorne storyline with another Dorne storyline. That is the problem, that they should have used the book storyline instead of the newly-invented and much-worse Dorne storyline they used on the show.

And the planned shortened seasons of the upcoming last 2 seasons actually proves the point that there is plenty of space to tell the book Dorne storyline. They shortened the seasons because they don't enough material due to unnecessarily cutting out stuff like the book Dorne storylines. If they retained those storylines, they wouldn't have needed to shorten the last 2 seasons and could actually be consistent in length with the previous seasons.

 

[Cave_Johnson]

That argument pretends like there was no Dorne storyline to replace on the TV show. There was, and it was terrible. The TV show did not simply remove the book Dorne storyline; they replaced the book Dorne storyline with another Dorne storyline. That is the problem, that they should have used the book storyline instead of the newly-invented and much-worse Dorne storyline they used on the show.

And the planned shortened seasons of the upcoming last 2 seasons actually proves the point that there is plenty of space to tell the book Dorne storyline. They shortened the seasons because they don't enough material due to unnecessarily cutting out stuff like the book Dorne storylines. If they retained those storylines, they wouldn't have needed to shorten the last 2 seasons and could actually be consistent in length with the previous seasons.

I think it was a combination of "needing" to cut the season short and "wanting" to cut the season short. On one hand the showrunners have discussed originally wanting to get the whole thing done in 70-75 hours. With 13 episodes left they'd be at 73. On the other hand these last episodes are going to have a lot more going on visually (more battles, special effects, etc.). They've stated that it's going to take them just as long to do 7 this year as it normally would for them to do 10.

I do agree with you on to an extent on the Dorne story line. Probably should have seen that cluster coming as soon as the casting came out and it was revealed that they cut the two interesting Martell children and left in the one that basically does nothing.

I'd think that cutting out everything in Dorne or involving Dorne up to this point gives you more than a full episode right away. Then like you said toss out the Grey Worm/Missandei filler, a good portion of the Sam and Gilly stuff, a few other filler scenes here and there and you've got more time to do something....really anything other than what we got. Hell, just cutting Dorne completely would have almost made more sense that what we got.

 

[juliansteed]

I'm okay with what they cut from the books. I mean some of it disappoints me but I like some of the changes too. I wasn't a big fan of Book 4 anyway. I'm more concerned with what they put on the show (whether it be taken from the books or not) than what gets left out. And the Dorne storyline that we got on the show was complete and utter garbage. Probably the worst storyline of the entire series by far. As stated, cutting it out completely would have been better than what we got, except that Myrcella was there so they had to address that which is no doubt why we got Trystane Martell.

The thing about Dorne in the books is that we are introduced to a lot of new characters all at once without the presence of any well-known characters. Myrcella and Ellaria Sand don't really count as well-known characters, at least not before Season 5. I can see why the show's producers might have wanted to avoid that scenario and decided to cut a few characters and bring in Jaime and Bronn but surely they could have come up with something better than what they did!

Edited out a minor spoiler. Hopefully Payton did not see it before I edited it.

 

[chf]

That argument pretends like there was no Dorne storyline to replace on the TV show. There was, and it was terrible. The TV show did not simply remove the book Dorne storyline; they replaced the book Dorne storyline with another Dorne storyline. That is the problem, that they should have used the book storyline instead of the newly-invented and much-worse Dorne storyline they used on the show.

And the planned shortened seasons of the upcoming last 2 seasons actually proves the point that there is plenty of space to tell the book Dorne storyline. They shortened the seasons because they don't enough material due to unnecessarily cutting out stuff like the book Dorne storylines. If they retained those storylines, they wouldn't have needed to shorten the last 2 seasons and could actually be consistent in length with the previous seasons.

C'mon now. Work with me here, I didn't want to write a GRRM chapter. Of COURSE they didn't cut Dorne OUT entirely, they cut Dorne to where it was a few noodles on the dinner plate. You know exactly what I mean.

And your math STILL doesn't work. They needed to still follow the pattern they'd established, one season per book. Hell as a book reader I thought for SURE that they were going to end up doing 2 seasons per book, but that's not what they decided. And when it wasn't, something had to go.

That's the editor's art, and sometimes it's painful as fuck (also happens to be what I do). Sometimes it's some of the best stuff that hits the cutting room floor, but due to constraints beyond your control, you have to make a tough decision.

You could go back, and do another whole fucking SHOW of all the characters they wrote out of the existing program.

And look, some of the Dorne characters were great, but don't kid yourself. GRRM has been involved with the TV show from jump, and he knows better than anybody that some of the Dorne chapters were the ones that readers skim read. Go hang out at westeros.org for a week, and read some of the threads. Dorne isn't universally beloved.

Some people lose their shit every time GRRM goes all poetic describing the horrors of gout. Perhaps George is a sufferer? I suspect that Martin was every much involved in the decision as to what family was going to get the biggest metaphorical eraser as were Benioff and Weiss.

Anyway, they had to end last season where they did.

So something had to go.

As a reader who actually LIKED the whiny sand-snakes, that made me a bit sad. But what are you gonna' do? The math is the math. One TV/Movie page per minute of script. You can't beat it. Something is going to get eras... er... EDITed.

 

[chf]

Then like you said toss out the Grey Worm/Missandei filler, a good portion of the Sam and Gilly stuff, a few other filler scenes here and there and you've got more time to do something....really anything other than what we got. Hell, just cutting Dorne completely would have almost made more sense that what we got.

And again, the sexual tension between GW and Miss was 10 minutes tops. Sam is obviously central to what ends up happening, and you can't cut Dorne out completely because then you lose

One of the signature moments of the show. Not gonna' happen.

 

[chf]

I'll give you guys another example, the Sparrows are woefully under explained/written in the TV show. That's a HUGE part of the social commentary that Martin makes in the books, and it doesn't get a peep in the TV show. Most of the 'action' happens off screen. We see some good dialogue scenes of their leader, but get zilch as to WHY they're running around saying 'shame, shame!' We get woefully little of the political machinations that lead to them coming back to power, (one of the great 'oh fuck' moments of one of the main character's lives)

Something (a fuck of a lot of somethings) gotta' go.

Do the math.

 

[BusSport]

And your math STILL doesn't work. They needed to still follow the pattern they'd established, one season per book. Hell as a book reader I thought for SURE that they were going to end up doing 2 seasons per book, but that's not what they decided. And when it wasn't, something had to go.

That's the editor's art, and sometimes it's painful as fuck (also happens to be what I do). Sometimes it's some of the best stuff that hits the cutting room floor, but due to constraints beyond your control, you have to make a tough decision.

They already departed from one season per book. The books are planned as a 7-volume series, while the TV show is planned as an 8-season series. That's mainly because the producers decided to split the very long Book 3 across seasons 3 and 4, which was a pretty good decision.

You keep going on about there not being space for the Dorne storyline, but there is. Again, as you first brought up yourself, they shortened the upcoming last 2 seasons. With the Dorne storyline intact, they wouldn't have needed to, and the last 2 seasons would have corresponded to the last 2 books.

 

[Cave_Johnson]

And again, the sexual tension between GW and Miss was 10 minutes tops. Sam is obviously central to what ends up happening, and you can't cut Dorne out completely because then you lose

One of the signature moments of the show. Not gonna' happen.

I'm referring to the part of the story that actually takes place in Dorne. The part that far and away is considered the most mishandled story in the show. I don't think anybody is arguing that Oberyn should have been cut.

Spoiler: Oops, might need to spoiler this.

I'm saying you have Oberyn die, maybe the threatening message still comes, and then you just have Dany land in Dorne and fuck everybody up off screen. Like start this season with her already having taken Dorne.

Makes just as much sense as what they did only saves you 1+ hours of wasted time. I mean, that would have sucked too but it's a quick slap in the dick instead of a slow repeated group of punches to the testicles nawut I'm sayin'?

And yeah, 10 minutes of filler here and 10 minutes there. It adds up. Time is for sure a factor in what they have to cut, but I think they shoot themselves in the foot a lot adding stuff that has no significance which just leads to more shit to cut. You do it more efficiently and I think you can get a decent condensed version of the Dorne Story in there.

 

[juliansteed]

I think that the show's producers could make as many or as few episodes as they want. I mean they likely wouldn't want to drag it out for 15 seasons because then you'd have actors aging far too fast in relation to their characters but they could add a couple of seasons at least. Considering it's their most popular show and they are already looking to do a spinoff, I doubt HBO would have a problem with more episodes. Even if those extra episodes don't come via more seasons, they could always do more episodes per season. At the very least there would be no need to shorten the last 2 seasons if they actually had more story that they wanted to tell.

 

[Cave_Johnson]

I will also say this with Dorne, I think cutting Quentyn was essential given the route they're going. I have no problem with that. Trystane instead of Arianne I don't understand though. Trystane has to be there because that's who Myrcella was betrothed to, but they could have done something with Arianne especially considering they kind of merged her with Ellaria. Kinda.

 

[chf]

They already departed from one season per book. The books are planned as a 7-volume series, while the TV show is planned as an 8-season series. That's mainly because the producers decided to split the very long Book 3 across seasons 3 and 4, which was a pretty good decision.

You keep going on about there not being space for the Dorne storyline, but there is. Again, as you first brought up yourself, they shortened the upcoming last 2 seasons. With the Dorne storyline intact, they wouldn't have needed to, and the last 2 seasons would have corresponded to the last 2 books.

Agree to disagree. It's the most expensive TV show in history. They've pulled it off, but the show BARELY got greenlit in the first place.

They've so far (imo) done an admirable job of staying as true to the spirit of the novels as possible. GRRM certainly thinks so. Is it perfect for everybody? No, of course not. As I've already said, there's plenty of characters from the books I wanted to see in the show and was disappointed.

Overall however, it's a top-notch show.

 

[chf]

I'm referring to the part of the story that actually takes place in Dorne. The part that far and away is considered the most mishandled story in the show. I don't think anybody is arguing that Oberyn should have been cut.

Spoiler: Oops, might need to spoiler this.

I'm saying you have Oberyn die, maybe the threatening message still comes, and then you just have Dany land in Dorne and fuck everybody up off screen. Like start this season with her already having taken Dorne.

Makes just as much sense as what they did only saves you 1+ hours of wasted time. I mean, that would have sucked too but it's a quick slap in the dick instead of a slow repeated group of punches to the testicles nawut I'm sayin'?

And yeah, 10 minutes of filler here and 10 minutes there. It adds up. Time is for sure a factor in what they have to cut, but I think they shoot themselves in the foot a lot adding stuff that has no significance which just leads to more shit to cut. You do it more efficiently and I think you can get a decent condensed version of the Dorne Story in there.

Agree to disagree. A LOT of what they added was to cater to female viewers, believe it or not there's LOTS of wimmenz who watch the show.

And again, everything usually boils down to cost. Things TV producers avoid like the plague? Kids, animals and multiple locations. GOT has got all three of those in spades, plus a hefty GCI budget. Again, most expensive TV show in history.

Watch some of the 'extra feature' stuff on what they had to go through to shoot the few scenes they did at the stand in for the 'water garden,' Dorne was going to be expensive. Gotta' cut something. If they'd added Dorne, they'd have to have cut something significant out.

A few scenes here and there to add depth do add up in terms of their entirety, but then the show suffers too, because it has no character building. Meh. The show HAS to do the relationships between Brienne and Jamie fornistance, between the Hound and Arya. Some of those scenes are the best in the program.

You going to cut those because we have to add some more of Doran Martel sitting around complaining about Gout while his daughters misinterpret his motives?

(edit) Just read your spoiler. Sure, good discussions can be had how they could have cut out Dorne differently. Absolutely. But it had to still be largely cut.

 

[chf]

I think that the show's producers could make as many or as few episodes as they want. I mean they likely wouldn't want to drag it out for 15 seasons because then you'd have actors aging far too fast in relation to their characters but they could add a couple of seasons at least. Considering it's their most popular show and they are already looking to do a spinoff, I doubt HBO would have a problem with more episodes. Even if those extra episodes don't come via more seasons, they could always do more episodes per season. At the very least there would be no need to shorten the last 2 seasons if they actually had more story that they wanted to tell.

Except right from day 1, the show was committed to staying as true as possible to the books. GRRM wasn't going to be on board if they were going to change everything around for 15 seasons. And the show barely got made even with him ON BOARD.

And again, YOU love Dorne in the books. Nothing wrong with that. But there's LOTS of readers who think Dorne was boring as hell, and even GRRM admits he fucked up when he split the books and left all kinds of main POV's out while he wrote Dorne.

 

[Cave_Johnson]

Agree to disagree. A LOT of what they added was to cater to female viewers, believe it or not there's LOTS of wimmenz who watch the show.

And again, everything usually boils down to cost. Things TV producers avoid like the plague? Kids, animals and multiple locations. GOT has got all three of those in spades, plus a hefty GCI budget. Again, most expensive TV show in history.

Watch some of the 'extra feature' stuff on what they had to go through to shoot the few scenes they did at the stand in for the 'water garden,' Dorne was going to be expensive. Gotta' cut something. If they'd added Dorne, they'd have to have cut something significant out.

A few scenes here and there to add depth do add up in terms of their entirety, but then the show suffers too, because it has no character building. Meh. The show HAS to do the relationships between Brienne and Jamie fornistance, between the Hound and Arya. Some of those scenes are the best in the program.

You going to cut those because we have to add some more of Doran Martel sitting around complaining about Gout while his daughters misinterpret his motives?

(edit) Just read your spoiler. Sure, good discussions can be had how they could have cut out Dorne differently. Absolutely. But it had to still be largely cut.

Totally agree on the Hound and Arya/Brienne and Jamie although I consider relationships between POV characters pretty key. I wasn't suggesting cuts to that level. And yeah, there is definitely a lot of stuff added for people in certain demographics.

You know, I actually would like to see more Doran Martell sitting around talking to Arianne and his nieces. Lots of good theories going around regarding Doran's plan, but they all involve a shit ton of detail and more time than the show could spare.

You make a good point about the cost of Dorne vs. the how relevant it was going to be going forward. I suppose in that case Dorne was the story that had to go. But the way they let it go....yikes. Rough.

 

[chf]

You know, I actually would like to see more Doran Martell sitting around talking to Arianne and his nieces. Lots of good theories going around regarding Doran's plan, but they all involve a shit ton of detail and more time than the show could spare.

You make a good point about the cost of Dorne vs. the how relevant it was going to be going forward. I suppose in that case Dorne was the story that had to go. But the way they let it go....yikes. Rough.

I like Dorne because Martell was a very different political animal than the others in the show. Playing the long game, trickery over brute force, biding time. Kind of like a Le Carre novel in medieval times.

But a very different flow than the rest of the POV's too. The Sand snakes frustration was kinda mirrored in a lot of reader's frustrations, ironically.

So yeah, I enjoyed the Dorne stuff, but I could totally see why B+W cut it before anything else.

 

[juliansteed]

Except right from day 1, the show was committed to staying as true as possible to the books. GRRM wasn't going to be on board if they were going to change everything around for 15 seasons. And the show barely got made even with him ON BOARD.

And again, YOU love Dorne in the books. Nothing wrong with that. But there's LOTS of readers who think Dorne was boring as hell, and even GRRM admits he fucked up when he split the books and left all kinds of main POV's out while he wrote Dorne.

Not sure if you read my post in its entirety or not but at no point did I suggest they could change everything around to make 15 seasons. Also I never said I loved Dorne in the books. In fact I made absolutely no reference to Dorne in the post you quoted but in other posts have stated that I have no problem with what they left out. I just think that what we got in its stead was terrible.