A GAME OF THRONES (HBO) -- POSSIBLE SPOILERS

Was interested to read that GRRM didn't know about the rape scene.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2014/04/21/george-r-r-martin-thrones-rape/

Bit underwhelmed by this episode, but then I'm not very happy whenever they go that far off book. On the other hand, it leaves me with no firm idea of what the next crow move is, so that's somewhat interesting.

Sooooo, without getting too spoilery, can someone tell me if there's another rape/sexual violence scene happening in this one? I always watch them OnDemand afterwards, but I stumbled across a spoiler by accident last week and I'd appreciate the early warning. (Dany's wedding night put me off the show entirely for like two years; I'd rather not have that happen again.)

Rhoda Nightingale said:

Sooooo, without getting too spoilery, can someone tell me if there's another rape/sexual violence scene happening in this one? I always watch them OnDemand afterwards, but I stumbled across a spoiler by accident last week and I'd appreciate the early warning. (Dany's wedding night put me off the show entirely for like two years; I'd rather not have that happen again.)

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Sent you a rep point comment.

Rhoda Nightingale said:

Sooooo, without getting too spoilery, can someone tell me if there's another rape/sexual violence scene happening in this one?

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Yes - scenes, plural.

Rewatching the scene (after reading the director's comments), I'm seeing his side of things. But, I think there's too much room for interpretation here. To one, what looks like heated groping and worry for being caught... will come across as rape to another.

And I'm not sure where we might see more rape, unless we see it in Mereen where Dany is (with the slaves). They haven't even introduced Victarion yet (which I remember as being a bit on the "line" when it came to how he treated women). I don't know of any, "Oh my God" moments--other than mentioned in passing such as the Night's Watch talking about rapers being brought in.

thothguard51 said:

Rapes are a constant in AGOT...

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As is murder and physical abuse. Yep.

The article didn't mention the one instance of a young man being raped -- Arya's friend/Robert's bastard, who was taken by the Red Woman and kept for her to rape for her magic, until Ser Davos freed him.

Rape is horrific. And I think the showrunners are counting on the viewers' sense of horror when they witness such scenes to remind them that this is a brutal world -- one that is dark and full of terrors.

regdog said:

I turned last night's episode off. That scene at Craster's was just too much. Made me sick to my stomach.

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Apparently they filmed an extremely graphic and disturbing scene for either this week's episode or next week's episode that had to be cut very heavily even for HBO - I wonder if it was the Craster's Keep storyline that got cut.

...and we thought Craster's wives had it bad with Craster .

It reminds me of a current meme:

Lord of the Rings fan: I wish I were in Middle-Earth!
C. S. Lewis fan: I wish I were in Narnia!
Game of Thrones fan: ...no, I'm okay here.

DreamWeaver said:

...and we thought Craster's wives had it bad with Craster .

It reminds me of a current meme:

Lord of the Rings fan: I wish I were in Middle-Earth!
C. S. Lewis fan: I wish I were in Narnia!
Game of Thrones fan: ...no, I'm okay here.

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Love it, hehe.

And with regard to the scene next to Joffrey's coffin, let's have as much concern/disgust over scenes of decapitation, torture, genital mutilation, cannibalism and telling a little boy you're going to eat his dead mum and dad. The series is filled with horrific images and scenes.

So, as for the show's limits ... hmm, there aren't many.

But I find myself (find myself?) looking forward to every episode.

Yuck! That scene at Craster's Keep made me think that it wouldn't be such a bad thing to be north of The Wall with The Others...

They didn't need to show anything, because the viewer already knew exactly what was happening to Craster's wives.
Other atrocities were already provided, but the show went for explicit raping. And for what? A plot that I guess will be to no more than 'look at how evil these mutineers are, nobody really cares about them, but we'll enjoy the killing once Jon arrives with the cavalry'.

While the rape scene was terrible I'm surprised that nobody is mentioning the MAJOR MAJOR MAJOR spoiler that HBO dropped on book readers. Show watchers aren't likely to notice but there was something people have been discussing since book 1 was released so many years ago.
Spoiler for Winds of Winter/Dream of Spring that was in this episode: The Night's King/Great Other is real and HBO confirmed it.

Ha. And my sister (who has read the books, btw) told me that she thought the Viper was the one who poisoned Joffery (that's a spoiler for an episode, not the books) after we watched the purple wedding.
I'm not going to say I told her so, but...

And Hendo, did HBO really confirm it officially? As it says in this article discussing that particular spoiler, they might have just made a mistake with assigning the name (not saying that's what happened... I'd love it if they did confirm officially).

lastlittlebird said:

Ha. And my sister (who has read the books, btw) told me that she thought the Viper was the one who poisoned Joffery (that's a spoiler for an episode, not the books) after we watched the purple wedding.
I'm not going to say I told her so, but...

And Hendo, did HBO really confirm it officially? As it says in this article discussing that particular spoiler, they might have just made a mistake with assigning the name (not saying that's what happened... I'd love it if they did confirm officially).

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I'll cover this up as well as I'm going to be discussing spoilers: They didn't officially confirm it and I doubt they will because I can imagine that Martin is pretty pissed off.
The writers and head honchos at HBO know the entire plot all the way through the end of book 7 since Martin told them everything in case he dies before finishing(please don't!) I think it's far more likely that it slipped out because they didn't realize what a big secret it is. Some of them still haven't read the books. I mean look at him... spikey crown like head, actually dressed in black, he has a more "solid" look than all of the other white walkers and he's able to change the babies. Not to mention he's clearly the one in charge. Ok, maybe they wrote it accidentally once while writing the HBO GO! synopsis... BUT take a look at this: http://www.glacialart.com/game-of-thrones-call-on-glacial-art/ It was written and posted on April 25th, two days before the episode aired. If the people who did the ice sculptures were referring to him as the King of the White Walkers before the episode even aired it sounds more like something that was being thrown around a lot on set. These ice sculpture people heard the name/reference somewhere. They didn't pull it from the yet to be released synopsis.

Thanks for the link... that is pretty compelling evidence!
(and also amazing that they went to that much trouble to get the ice right.... I didn't really think about it, but if I had I would have assumed it was some kind of plastic prop rather than real ice!)

It didn't even occur to me that was a spoiler, because

a) they'd been going off-book the entire episode, and
b) I always assumed something like that was happening anyway, so it just made sense.

DreamWeaver said:

b) I always assumed something like that was happening anyway, so it just made sense.

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At first, that was my attitude, as well. I figured it was yet another moment of HBO outright stating or explicitly showing something that was just strongly implied in the books (like Renly and Loras' relationship, Stannis and Melisandre doing the dirty, and (show spoiler) Olenna poisoning Joffrey).

But there's a biiiiig difference between (show spoiler) showing a king/leader figure among the white walkers and outright calling him the Night's King on the HBO Go app. The Night's King is a specific figure in the lore with an important background. (book spoiler) He's a former Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, for instance. And according to Old Nan, he's a Stark. You can read more about him here.

Thanks, that was very interesting! I am starting on a re-read of the books, so I will watch for the bits of information that make up this particular pie .

Wtb army of white walkers to rule the world! Yay for funny/freaky walker dude at the end! He made that baby's eyes so icy blue....

jaksen said:

And with regard to the scene next to Joffrey's coffin, let's have as much concern/disgust over scenes of decapitation, torture, genital mutilation, cannibalism and telling a little boy you're going to eat his dead mum and dad. The series is filled with horrific images and scenes.

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That was just harrowing. I don't know the last time I felt so icky and awful after watching a scene. I mean, holy cow.