Author Topic: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO  (Read 5582 times)

guessingo

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Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« on: March 04, 2010, 01:15:10 AM »
http://grrm.livejournal.com/


Notice only 10 episodes? HBO usually does 12. Probably 10 due to the cost of the show. Rome got cancelled after 2 seasons because it was too expensive. I would think it would air Spring/Summer 2011. HBO doesn't rush new shows and only airs 1-2 shows at a time. ]

I think this is good news for all of fantasy. If they do a good job, it could lead to more fantasy books being made into TV shows and movies.


Comfortable Madness

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #1 on: March 04, 2010, 02:57:52 PM »
Yah, I have high hopes for this show. I think they did a great job with the casting. Sean Bean as Eddard Stark is perfect, imo. An HBO series is the best way to bring this series to a visual medium. Making it into a movie you would have to cut out too much and if it wasn't on HBO it wouldn't be as gritty as it needs to be.



On a side note they cancelled Rome way too soon. It was an awesome show.
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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #2 on: March 04, 2010, 05:41:05 PM »
I think that Martin needs to get off his butt and write the rest of the series.  Think about it.  Book 3 was released in 2000.  Since then, we have received half of a novel in A Feast for Crows.  Maybe this series will push Martin to finish the series before his dwindling fans revolt completely. 
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Comfortable Madness

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #3 on: March 04, 2010, 06:17:37 PM »
I agree. Although, I read a blog on how Martin does not owe his fans anything and that he'll get to it when he gets to it. "It" being A Dance with Dragons. He's brings up a couple of good points but in the end if you piss off your fans, regardless if the anger is justified or not, you won't be selling books like you used to be.


I wonder if he really just lost interest in the world he created. How long after A Dance with Dragons, whenever that comes out, will we have to wait for the next one?

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guessingo

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #4 on: March 04, 2010, 06:25:04 PM »
The post you are referring to was a link to a blog post by Neil Gaiman entited "george rr martin is not your bitch". He was getting really obnoxious emails from people.

Martin actually wrote hundreds of pages of the 4th book and then threw it all away and started over. His original plan was to jump ahead 5 years,but he didn't like it and started over. I think he spent 3 years doing this and threw it all away.

He has published other books in the meantime. Keep in mind that Fellowship of the Ring came out 15 years after the hobbit. I think Martin works on his books all the time, he is just a perfectionist and the doors are harder to open.

If you read his blog, he writes a chapter, then re-writes, then re-writes in 10 times more. Don't harrass the guy because he is too slow, just don't buy the next book. I don't see a big deal in waiting for a book. There are alot of other books to read.

Comfortable Madness

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #5 on: March 04, 2010, 06:34:28 PM »
The post you are referring to was a link to a blog post by Neil Gaiman entited "george rr martin is not your bitch". He was getting really obnoxious emails from people.

Martin actually wrote hundreds of pages of the 4th book and then threw it all away and started over. His original plan was to jump ahead 5 years,but he didn't like it and started over. I think he spent 3 years doing this and threw it all away.

He has published other books in the meantime. Keep in mind that Fellowship of the Ring came out 15 years after the hobbit. I think Martin works on his books all the time, he is just a perfectionist and the doors are harder to open.

If you read his blog, he writes a chapter, then re-writes, then re-writes in 10 times more. Don't harrass the guy because he is too slow, just don't buy the next book. I don't see a big deal in waiting for a book. There are alot of other books to read.

I agree he definitely should not be harassed for not writing "quick" enough. I'll definitely be buying the next book. However, I can understand the perfectionist thing but he's done numerous other projects in between Feast and Dance that are unrelated to IaF. I just REALLY want to read the next book as many others do. It's really a credit to the story that many people absolutely can't wait to see what happens next. I'd just like to find out sooner rather than later.


It seems as though it will be a monster of a book whenever it is finished. Per GRRM's "Not a Blog":

On other fronts, I hit page 1311 yesterday. No, not done yet.
« Last Edit: March 04, 2010, 06:37:59 PM by Comfortable Madness »
“I will never serve you, Father of Lies. In a thousand lives, I never have. I know that. I’m sure of it. Come. It is time to die.” Rand al'Thor

"Mourn if you must. But mourn on the march to Tarmon Gai'don." Logain Ablar

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #6 on: March 04, 2010, 06:51:23 PM »
Brandon's Way of Kings is 1500+ pages at the moment (just for comparison's sake), so yeah, Martin's new one will be large.

As for anger/frustration at Martin?  I think it is completely justified to an extent.  We are reviewing an anthology he edited and wrote for, and it bugged both Nick and I.  I personally feel that he lost the drive to finish the series.  Now, saying you are frustrated is one thing (as I am).  I do think it is important to be somewhat careful of how you express those frustrations though.

And comparing the next book in a series of ASoIaF to the time between the Hobbit and LotR is like apples and oranges.  The Hobbit is an entirely different animal from LotR.  A lot of people almost treat them like they were written by different authors.  The tone, complexity, pacing, and everything is different.  This isn't the case with Martin's stuff, and we are in a completely different era of writing.

But yeah, my personal opinion is he lost momentum, and decided he'd rather work on 87 bajillion side-projects.  And saying he doesn't owe the fans anything is false, and borderline Goodkind-ish.
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Shivertongue

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #7 on: March 04, 2010, 07:42:04 PM »
Quote
But yeah, my personal opinion is he lost momentum, and decided he'd rather work on 87 bajillion side-projects.  And saying he doesn't owe the fans anything is false, and borderline Goodkind-ish.

Yeah, he owes the fans a finished series. Writing is about promises, and when he started A Song of Ice and Fire he made several promises to his readers. Some have been fulfilled, but many, as of yet, have not - including the all-important promise of an ending. Taking as long as a he has and working on so many other projects says, to me at least, 'I consider this more important than the promises I've made to my readers'. It doesn't matter if I'm wrong on that, it's the message I'm receiving.

Honestly, I'd be a bit more lenient on his other projects if he was able to show some kind of progress on the novels. Five years is a long wait, and even if he were to finish the book tomorrow, the wait before it hit the shelves would be around another year at the very least.
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Peter Ahlstrom

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #8 on: March 04, 2010, 08:17:25 PM »
I don't doubt Bantam will rush it to shelves once they get a final draft. It's not usual, and it puts a strain on production and marketing, but it can be done. Tor did it numerous times for Wheel of Time books. THE WAY OF KINGS is also going to have a very short production schedule. It might go to copyediting in April and still come out in August. That is no time at all, in the publishing world.
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guessingo

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #9 on: March 04, 2010, 09:03:09 PM »
@Peter: Is Way of Kings mainly in editing and small change phases or is Brandon still finishing chapters and re-writing major plot points? I thought the publication date on this was July/August? So it is not set. 1500 manuscript pages is what 1000 pages in a novel?

Brandon gets to production fast because he has a New York times #1 bestseller. He gets priority. Your buddy is now in the big time...


To be more fair to Martin... As I stated he spent 3 years writing the 4th book and threw the whole thing away because he didn't like it. He could have published inferior quality and still made alot of money due to sales of the start of the series. He probably makes more money on his Song of Ice and Fire books than all of his other books combined. I doubt his anthologies get him since they have to be divided between so many authors. I know he has 2 books of short stories out that he wrote, but I doubt those sell all that well.

I can respect someone who will not release something until he is happy with it. Sometimes you also need to step away from a project to let knew ideas flow into your head. The bottom line is, the only thing that gets hurt by a slow release cycle is George's pocketbook.

Peter Ahlstrom

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #10 on: March 04, 2010, 09:53:05 PM »
The next draft of Way of Kings will be to clear up minor issues and cut the word count by 10% or so by tightening up the language. After that it will go to copyediting. The final book should be somewhere around 784 pages.
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Comatose

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #11 on: May 11, 2010, 12:16:10 AM »
I think the main problem Martin is experiencing is the "Meerenese knot" he keeps talking about on his blog.  He has a lot of different and complex plotlines going on that are all due to come together sometime soon in Meeren, (either in Dance with Dragons, or future books).  As a new writer, i'm finding even merging two simple plot lines together to be awkward, I can't imagine what he's gonna need to do to make as smooth as the rest of his prose is.  I actually can't even imagine how it's all going to come together.

When fire and ice mix, you get slush, which is messy, but can be made into something great, like snow cones.

Considering getting HBO just to watch the series...  I'm really excited for it.
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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #12 on: May 17, 2010, 03:43:10 PM »
It's not even finished and even HBO wouldn't be able to do it justice.  It needs a Peter Jackson or Spielberg to really bring out the grit without skimping on the scale and pageantry.
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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #13 on: June 04, 2010, 04:55:07 PM »
I think it would have to be a series though, not a movie.   There's just way too much in every book to do even two movies a book.  Series is the way to go.
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guessingo

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Re: Song of Ice and Fire coming to HBO
« Reply #14 on: June 14, 2010, 02:26:54 AM »
HBO just had the first trailer before the True Blood premier. They didn't give much (since they don't have much yet). Interestingly they did not mention Song of Ice and Fire. They did flash Winter is Coming and Game of Thrones.

If I recall correctly for things they think are going to be big, they start dropping trailers a year in advance.