# Lost interest in Game of Thrones...



## Zackery Arbela (Jan 31, 2011)

I'm a hardcore fantasy geek. Have been since I was a teen. And as one of that rather odd tribe, I have a confession to make: I've completely lost interest in Game of Thrones. I want to like it, I know I should. But the show feels more like punishment than entertainment. For me the attraction of the genre has been the sense of wonder it brings, the idea of strangeness of...well, fantasy. This show doesn't have any of it. It's Breaking Bad in chain mail, the Wire with swords. And what goes for the show goes for the books...if the Winds of Winter were to come out tomorrow, I don't think I'd could stomach another helping of Martin-esque grimdark. At least Robert E. Howard was willing to let the good (ish) guy win...more or less.

Anyone else feel this way?


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## Daniel Harvell (Jun 21, 2013)

I'm actually more excited about GoT than ever - enough to consider starting the books. But I do agree that it is very fantasy-lite. Many people are calling it medieval fiction, rather than fantasy. I'm a huge fantasy fan, so I would love to see more of those elements (dragons, supernatural threats, paranormal abilities) ... but I'm happy for now.


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

Haven't seen the TV show, believe it or not.

Started the first book, but gave up around 30% into it when I felt I'd met most of the main characters (there are a lot) and found that I didn't give a rat's @$$ what happened to any of them. For me there was just nothing to spark my interest, so I decided to move on to something else.

Like the OP said, there was no sense of wonder for me, just a sense of wondering why I should care about these characters.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

I agree with Zackery and NogDog. I actually read the WHOLE of the first book, but haven't seen any episodes. Like Nog, I didn't really care much about any of the characters, and the couple I had minor interest in seemed to not get much page time. THEN, after the major character 'kill off' at the end of the first book, I just had no interest in going on. Didn't make the book _bad_, just the straw that made me say, "this series is definitely not for me."

So I haven't watched the TV series at all. (Also haven't watched "Breaking Bad" or "The Wire".  ) BUT when there was a great hue and cry the other week about "oh no, look what happened at the end of the season" with people unfamiliar with the book shocked, _shocked_ I say -- well, I hadn't read that far in the series but I could guess what happened. . . .more major characters killed off. Probably gruesomely. 

My son, otoh, is really enjoying it. . . and reading the books as the show goes, more or less.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

I've enjoyed the books that I've read so far...though I'm waiting to read the rest of them, as I like to see the TV show without knowing what happened, so I've stopped.

Betsy


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## jabeard (Apr 22, 2011)

I've had several friends who don't normally read/watch fantasy say they like SoFI and say, "It's fantasy for people who don't like fantasy."

Well, what about fantasy for people who like fantasy?

I quit reading the books after _Feast of Crows_.

For all the praise heaped upon Martin for "tweaking" conventions, it really just feels like at this point we've traded certain tropes and conventions in conventional more heroic-driven fantasy or whatever for another set of overall predictable conventions in Martin's "no one's a hero and anyone can die" grimdark fantasy. The thematic treatments aren't exactly subtle and nuanced. I just became kind of weary and bored.

Something like Thomas Convenant is a bit more actively subversive against epic fantasy tropes (granted, I positively despised the one book I read in that series, whereas I liked, the first few GoT books at least).

I just found it hard to really care enough to invest anymore by FoC. The actual world of the books isn't really all that interesting as a fantasy world, which could have saved it for me given my disconnection with the characters by FoC and my disinterest in the meandering nature of the series.

Between the tendency to multiply POVs, kill people off, or just sideline them, I found it difficult to care much about the characters after a while.

Power politics can be interesting, but without caring about the characters, I'm left thinking, "Well, if I want to read all about brutal power politics in a world where open magic is generally not a major factor*, why not just read historical fiction then? At least then, the politics will have some historical resonance."

The thing is, most of the major magical elements feel like they could be easily excised or replaced without seriously harming the narrative. There are tons of historical examples of mysterious powerful enemies beyond the limits of civilization and threatening all landed folk (the Huns vs. Rome et al., the initial appearances of the Mongols in the Middle East and Europe), that I could easily envision The Others being just a large horde of more brutal tribes than the wildlings. Even Dani's pets seem more about symbolic value than anything (yeah, I imagine by the end they'll be a 'bigger' deal), and I could easily see a version of this story where it's more her symbolic value than actual supernatural pets that results in people initially valuing her (indeed, at least as far as I read, it was more the symbolic value of her pets than their actual usefulness that was granting her cred). Indeed, our history is replete with rulers using all sorts of symbols and trappings, even when rather alien and foreign to their ruled populations, to establish cred.

Contrast that with something like Wheel of Time (which, admittedly, I never finished because I got bored around book 10 or so). Say what you will about that series positive or negative, but you remove the channeling, and it's fundamentally a very different story.

As with most things, though, it's all about what your seeking from it, I suppose. For me, like I said, if I want a fantasy-lite medieval world with power politics, I'd rather go straight to HF (though I'd totally read a book that was set in a quasi-fantsy medieval Germany like the one depicted in the old game DarkLands).


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## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

I read the first book ages ago and never bothered with the others, since it wasn't really my thing. Though to my infinite surprise, I have found that I really enjoy the TV show - and I don't like _The Wire_ or _Breaking Bad_ or most other HBO type shows.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Zackery Arbela said:


> I'm a hardcore fantasy geek. Have been since I was a teen. And as one of that rather odd tribe, I have a confession to make: *I've completely lost interest in Game of Thrones. I want to like it, I know I should.* But the show feels more like punishment than entertainment. For me the attraction of the genre has been the sense of wonder it brings, the idea of strangeness of...well, fantasy. This show doesn't have any of it. It's Breaking Bad in chain mail, the Wire with swords. And what goes for the show goes for the books...if the Winds of Winter were to come out tomorrow, I don't think I'd could stomach another helping of Martin-esque grimdark. At least Robert E. Howard was willing to let the good (ish) guy win...more or less.
> 
> Anyone else feel this way?


Hi! What I have bolded totally confused me. Why should you know you should like it? Just because it is a certain genre you have to like everything ever written in that genre? If you don't like it, don't read it. You do not have to like every thing in a certain genre. I like murder mysteries but that does not mean I like every murder mystery ever written. Heck I like some authors J A Konrath comes to mind but I thought one of his books was just so wrong on many different levels. I did manage to get through it but I was glad it was a fairly short book. I think that one was Fuzzy Navel. I know it was the next to the last in the series.
That would also be like apples, my mother likes apples but do not make her an apple pie. She would not like apples like that.


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## Karen Mead (Jul 2, 2012)

cinisajoy said:


> Hi! What I have bolded totally confused me. Why should you know you should like it? Just because it is a certain genre you have to like everything ever written in that genre? If you don't like it, don't read it. You do not have to like every thing in a certain genre.


I have a similar feeling to the OP. I haven't read any of the books yet or watched the TV series, but people are bugging me to read it and I feel like I should at least try to like it. It's not about wanting to like everything in a particular genre, it's about wanting to be part of the conversation, at least to me.

I realize I am kind of talking out of my butt since I haven't actually read the books yet, but from what I've heard, I'm just not that interested in a grim-and-gritty fantasy world with constant rape/murder/darkness. I understand the excitement and novelty value of a world where anyone can die, but with GoT it sounds like the GOAL of the series is to make you like a character, then kill them off horribly, while millions of raging assholes succeed. I just...why would I want to spend my leisure time in a world like that?


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

Karen Mead said:


> I realize I am kind of talking out of my butt since I haven't actually read the books yet, but from what I've heard, I'm just not that interested in a grim-and-gritty fantasy world with constant rape/murder/darkness. I understand the excitement and novelty value of a world where anyone can die, but with GoT it sounds like the GOAL of the series is to make you like a character, then kill them off horribly, while millions of raging [expletive] succeed. I just...why would I want to spend my leisure time in a world like that?


Based on having read the first book, I think you've nailed it.  And I agree: why would I want to spend my leisure time in a world like that? Answer: I wouldn't.


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## Geoffrey (Jun 20, 2009)

I got halfway through the 3rd book before I gave up on the series.  The violence and gore and rapes and such didn't bother me much; it was really just that I read thousands of pages and felt like the story wasn't really progressing all that much at all.


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## cagnes (Oct 13, 2009)

No way! I devoured the books & I love the tv series!


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Karen Mead said:


> I have a similar feeling to the OP. I haven't read any of the books yet or watched the TV series, but people are bugging me to read it and I feel like I should at least try to like it. It's not about wanting to like everything in a particular genre, it's about wanting to be part of the conversation, at least to me.
> 
> I realize I am kind of talking out of my butt since I haven't actually read the books yet, but from what I've heard, I'm just not that interested in a grim-and-gritty fantasy world with constant rape/murder/darkness. I understand the excitement and novelty value of a world where anyone can die, but with GoT it sounds like the GOAL of the series is to make you like a character, then kill them off horribly, while millions of raging [expletive] succeed. I just...why would I want to spend my leisure time in a world like that?


Thank you for unconfusing me. I do not understand why other people think that because they love "Dancing with the Stars" that everyone must love and watch "Dancing with the Stars". To me that would be an even worse waste of an hour or two a week then say watching "Survivor." For several years we had a big satellite dish and no antenna so we couldn't get the local channels. I never felt left out of conversations because I didn't watch whatever everyone else was hooked on. Now about Game of Thrones do your friends not realize that not everyone gets the movie channels. I have watched a couple of episodes and was totally turned off of the show in episode 1. (Not into incest and attempted murder.)

Though I have to say people would look funny when I told them we don't get the networks.

Oh and for the record I did give in to peer pressure one time not over a show but over alcohol. I basically quit drinking when my husband and I got together. I do not know why the people got insulted when I told them this is cheap booze. (I had ordered a tequila sunrise, I don't know what I got because it tasted like sour grapefruit.) But they have never bugged me again about not drinking. And yes the bartender was making all the non-specified drinks from the lower end booze.


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## Julia444 (Feb 24, 2011)

Encouraged by my sons, I read all the way up to Book Five, but Martin lost me halfway through that because he seemed to be describing a long journey in REAL TIME.  

I can't say I'm super-excited by the series (I think the books are better), but I think the casting was quite good and I do enjoy watching it, except for the ridiculously pornographic scenes that HBO inserts that were NOT in the book.  It's embarrassing to watch those with my teenage sons, who also like the series. (Hopefully not for the endless parade of naked women--but that has to at least be a plus to them).  :0

My sons were just complaining, though, that certain characters on the series (Varys, for example) have long, long boring speeches on the tv show that they did not have in the book.  I have to agree.  We're all pretty much over Varys and a few other characters.

Have you all seen the clip on YouTube which highlights all the people who have been killed off so far?  It's a crazy number.  

Julia


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## EvilTwinBrian (Jun 20, 2013)

Julia444 said:


> ...Have you all seen the clip on YouTube which highlights all the people who have been killed off so far? It's a crazy number.
> 
> Julia


Is that the one where they played Boyz II Men? I just watched it, and was laughing at first. But as soon as they go to all the main characters, I got really upset. I just watched all three seasons recently, so it brought back a lot of fresh reactions.

I would like to start reading the books, because of the show, though.


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## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

NogDog said:


> Haven't seen the TV show, believe it or not.
> 
> Started the first book, but gave up around 30% into it when I felt I'd met most of the main characters (there are a lot) and found that I didn't give a rat's @$$ what happened to any of them. For me there was just nothing to spark my interest, so I decided to move on to something else.
> 
> Like the OP said, there was no sense of wonder for me, just a sense of wondering why I should care about these characters.


You got further into it than I did. 

Mike


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## Benjamin (Dec 26, 2008)

Im into dark fantasy, so GoT is exactly the genre I read a lot. The first two books were great, but the series fell off big time after that. Too much writing about nothing, and Martin is killing off characters just for shock value (I have no prob with the killing off of characters, even beloved ones,(Im a huge fan of the Malazan Books of the Fallen series where just about everyone dies at one point or another)), and the whole story seems to have lost its way. Martin is suffering the same problem that Robert Jordan did, he doesn't seem to know where hes going with his story so he just meanders this way and that with no point or end goal. I doubt I'm even going to bother to read the final book in the series.


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## DYB (Aug 8, 2009)

I also devoured these books.  The last one was dull (especially Dany chapters), but there was still much there I liked.  The first 4 books I love.  I complain about all the (major) characters Martin has killed off and yet, their deaths make perfect sense for the story he is telling.  It's not like he's gotten bored with them, but the story develops in a direction that their deaths are necessary.  I'm always puzzled by people who say they aren't rooting for anyone.  There are quite a few characters I root for.  I guess I'm puzzled by what puzzles others.  But there it is.


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## Lisa J. Yarde (Jul 15, 2010)

To the OP; you're not alone. The show and books still intrigue me, but the last book bugged me a lot (character assassination of Dany for one) and I started to wonder if Martin had used a ghostwriter. While I'm also too well aware that Martin isn't my b.... as Neil Gaiman aptly put it, I do have to wonder about this guy who spends time working on other books, the HBO series, potentially developing another show for HBO, instead of forging ahead with The Winds of Winter. At the rate he's going, either we will find out how the books end based on the show, or the show will go on hiatus for a loooooooooooooooooong time so Martin can play catch up. Neither of which sounds great. Maybe Martin can miss out on X number of readers / viewers who give up waiting so long, but it doesn't seem a smart approach.


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## TiffanyMonroe (Jul 7, 2012)

Yeah, I just couldn't get into that series.


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## DYB (Aug 8, 2009)

Lisa J. Yarde said:


> To the OP; you're not alone. The show and books still intrigue me, but the last book bugged me a lot (character assassination of Dany for one) and I started to wonder if Martin had used a ghostwriter. While I'm also too well aware that Martin isn't my b.... as Neil Gaiman aptly put it, I do have to wonder about this guy who spends time working on other books, the HBO series, potentially developing another show for HBO, instead of forging ahead with The Winds of Winter. At the rate he's going, either we will find out how the books end based on the show, or the show will go on hiatus for a loooooooooooooooooong time so Martin can play catch up. Neither of which sounds great. Maybe Martin can miss out on X number of readers / viewers who give up waiting so long, but it doesn't seem a smart approach.


Martin told the showrunners how he intends to end the series, so they can always forge ahead of him with his own story. Or just change the ending to how they want it!

I agree with you on the last book in general; it was tedious and Dany chapters were interminable. But I have a theory that Dany could


Spoiler



turn out to be the Voldemort of Westeros.


 And perhaps Martin always set her up for that turn! There's already a lot of set-up for that if Martin chooses that path.


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## Sean Sweeney (Apr 17, 2010)

Zackery Arbela said:


> I'm a hardcore fantasy geek. Have been since I was a teen. And as one of that rather odd tribe, I have a confession to make: I've completely lost interest in Game of Thrones. I want to like it, I know I should. But the show feels more like punishment than entertainment. For me the attraction of the genre has been the sense of wonder it brings, the idea of strangeness of...well, fantasy. This show doesn't have any of it. It's Breaking Bad in chain mail, the Wire with swords. And what goes for the show goes for the books...if the Winds of Winter were to come out tomorrow, I don't think I'd could stomach another helping of Martin-esque grimdark. At least Robert E. Howard was willing to let the good (ish) guy win...more or less.
> 
> Anyone else feel this way?


Nope. Just finished _A Dance With Dragons_ last night, and even though I want to strangle GRRM for


Spoiler



assaulting Jon Snow and throwing Varys back in at the end and making me wonder just exactly who is allegiance is to


, I can't wait for book six.


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## Clark Magnan (May 23, 2013)

I've read all the books and watched every episode. At this point, the show is better. This is not escapism fantasy (i.e. I don't daydream about living in Westeros), but I find it compelling. The forced brevity of the episodes really cleans up some of the greatest weaknesses in the books.

I waited to check the last book out of the library and I'll likely do the same in about ten years when book 6 comes out.


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## Nebula (May 29, 2013)

I cannot comprehend any kind of loss of interest in this series. I've devoured the books, seen all the major episodes of the show... read all the Dunk and Egg books and lurked on ASOIAF threads without ever having my interest diminish even by a small degree. Whenever I hear a whisper of The Winds of Winter... or even hear the soundtrack of the HBO show, my heart actually starts to race.


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## kks3321 (Mar 11, 2013)

I started reading book 3 because of the TV show. It took me a long time to plow through it. Martin LOVES to write, and write and write. Often I had to skim pages because it was lists of names of characters who would possibly never appear. I started reading book 4, but eventually had to stop because I wasn't reading anything else -- these books were taking up all my reading time. 

I think he is a great storyteller (and I want to get back to the books) but he just needed an editor with a large knife.


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## AngryGames (Jul 28, 2013)

I'm on book #3 at the moment, and I love it. I love the TV show as well even though it seems to be diverging from the books (don't spoiler me bro!). 

As I grew up, I got tired of the same old fantasy plots and themes where there was this kid who was prophesied at birth to be this great leader or wizard or taxi driver, whatever, and magic and spells and monsters and creatures blah blah blah. Then I found GoT and realized that this was the dark, gritty, ugly side of fantasy...which is I guess what my tastes have evolved into. 

I want GoT-style fantasy, not Harry Potter. Just like I want Salem's Lot vampires, not Twilight. Everyone is different in what they like, and as an old man, I can say for sure that tastes change as people get older. Except when it comes to music. Whatever these kids are listening to nowadays is rubbish that makes me wonder if everyone was born and then dropped on their heads.


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## Nicholas Andrews (Sep 8, 2011)

There is a sizable contingent of people who don't enjoy A Song of Ice and Fire. I think they were expecting this:






And got this: (SPOILERS)


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## Gone To Croatan (Jun 24, 2011)

AngryGames said:


> I want GoT-style fantasy, not Harry Potter.


We watched the first season on DVD, and I certainly found it more interesting than many of the 'boy finds magic sword and must collect plot points to defeat the evil whatsit because the prophecy says so' fantasy stories I've read.

But, at the same time, I couldn't really find any reason to borrow the second season and sit through it, because I didn't much care about what happened to anyone. The whole thing felt like it was setting up to be a fantasy soap opera, which isn't bad per se, but isn't really my kind of thing.

In fact, a year or so later, I can only remember fragments of about three scenes from the entire first season. So I couldn't even pick up from where I left off if I did get the DVDs.


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## Vivienne Mathews (May 7, 2013)

NogDog said:


> Haven't seen the TV show, believe it or not.
> 
> Started the first book, but gave up around 30% into it when I felt I'd met most of the main characters (there are a lot) and found that I didn't give a rat's @$$ what happened to any of them... Like the OP said, there was no sense of wonder for me, just a sense of wondering why I should care about these characters.


Same here. I _tried _-- man, did I try! But too much of my reading enjoyment comes from finding someone to root for, so I couldn't get through it. Nothing against the writing, the books, or the show. It just isn't my thing.


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## gljones (Nov 6, 2012)

I've had the books sitting on my TBR pile since christmas last year.  I've heard a lot of similar comments about the books so I haven't worked up the nerve/energy to crack one open.


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## Seleya (Feb 25, 2011)

I liked the first four books and waited an eternity for the fifth and then...struggled to finish it. I like what Martin did with


Spoiler



Theon Greyjoy


 I have my theories about


Spoiler



Jon Snow: if he died he's free of the Night Guard oath, and there is a red priestess conveniently on hand, after all. We know they can resurrect people.


 but I hate how horrorish (in the 'gore and disgusting things' version of horror) the book was. 'Gritty' to me doesn't mean that I have to be told in detail the effect of some poisoned arrow on the victim's body. I don't mind to be scared but I do mind being disgusted.

I hope the next book won't go the same way, since I'll have to read it anyway for research purposes.


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## A. S. Warwick (Jan 14, 2011)

I'm in agreement with this.  I don't like ASoIaF.  I started reading the series and gave up about halfway through the second book.  Never watched the TV series either.

I have nothing against gritty fantasy or cahracters dying, but Martin just doesnt work for me.  He kills characters simply to show he can kill them.  My preferred reading is not high fantasy, but low, heroic fantasy - Howard, Gemmel, Leiber, Moorcock - those types.  There are no real good guys, bad thngs happen, characters die, but they aren't depressingly bleak, morbid and perverse as Martin's work.


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