This was strategic. He saw what happened to game of thrones and doesn't want to have it happen again. However he isn't an executive and so used the one tool at his disposal which could get this fixed. He took his writer's pen, wrote what was wrong, to the public, and now has effectively put the writers in the equivalent of what will become a vicegrip by the fandom to either fix it, or face MASSIVE backlash.
@@thatoneblackdude3333They didn't though. Arya never met Tywin, Talisa Maegar doesn't excist and Robb never married for love, everyone trusts Littlefinger because he makes imself extremly useful, they cut out several POV characters, Catelyn gets brought back as Lady Stoneheart in the books, Dorne is completly different, Yara is Asha, Aeron and Victarion Greyjoy combined, Sansa is nowhere near the Boltons, Jeyne Pool gets married to Ramsay Bolton, Tryion becomes a terrible person, Jaime cuts off Cersei way earlier, Brienne did never run into Arya etc. I could go on. But they had 4 good season, the first being a decent adaptation but tjey started with dumb changes in season 2 and by season 5 they just didn't bother adapting anymore. They didn't adapt huge parts of the last two books at all or changed them so far they can't be called an adaptation anymore.
@@TemariNaraannaschatz I said mostly I never said they didn't change a bunch of shit they did and I'm not denying that but at least there version of asoiaf at least up till season 4 still resembles the books story unlike hotd were they changed a lot of shit just in the first episode let alone both it's entire seasons to the point they look like different stories.
@@thatoneblackdude3333 You mean the first scene of the show where they changed a very important canon event by having the Great Council from 101 from Laenor to Viserys.
@@PoutingScoutprobably forced to by HBO. They surely have him all wrapped up in contracts enough that they could pull strings to make him take it down
@@Grace-er9ep The damage is done so he might as well have doubled down. He announced the post days earlier, I'm almost certain HBO has tried to negotiate with him by now, futilely, it seems. If they threaten him with legal repercussions, he in turn could threaten to be publicly critical of all upcoming ASoIaF productions.
And holy shit did the post live up to the prophecy, GRRM may not finish ASOIAF until the sun rises in the west and sets in the east but he remains an absolute icon
This isn’t the main post, this is just his post about “maelor the missing” and blood and cheese. He has another about “what went wrong”. I hope that he stills write that but hbo may have prevented him from criticising the show since it appears the blog has been removed.
I felt George's sass throughout this blog post. Ryan and his show are screwed, as is HBO's money😂 should have just fronted the extra cash for more episodes as they keep using the "budget" excuse for every decision.
Notice how GRRM was able to make the distinction that Rhaenrya was not this all beloved figure and was actually disliked by the common folk of kings landing who actually loved Heleana
Meanwhile the smallfolks "LONG LIVE QUEEN RHAENYRA' while attacking the shit out of Haelaena and Alicent who was also said to be loved by the smallfolks in the books.
@@fayedunaway8just the showrunners obviously showing a bias. "Oh Rhaenrya is the one responsible for the blockade? Eh...just let her send some boats of food into Kingslanding so that the smallfolk love her instead"
@@dominiqueodom3099 I would be happier if Ryan just admits to this version of the story being 'black' propaganda and instead of calling it the 'true events' while also cutting characters like Maelor and Nettles. While also cutting events like Aegon flying around King's Landing on Sunfyre as his own victory but instead putting a scene where Rhaenys (sworn to the other side) and gives her a victory and makes Aegon look weak instead of his victory lap.
@@fayedunaway8 no no no. That would be showing an even handed interpretation of these events where both sides were capable of great evils and heroic Deeds. And this show is just about "two women trying to figure it out" Quote by Sara hess the producer
Bro if someone butchered the ending to by magnum opus, the series I will be remembered for forever, I wouldn’t hold back. Most people wouldn’t either. That’s why this is all very strange.
@@alphabah49 I'm pretty damn sure HBO has some kind of clause or NDA where George can't publicly criticize the show too much because it would lead to loss of sales. Currently I assume he doesn't criticize it because people would point it its his fault for not finishing it in the first place, plus HBO may cancel other shows in development.
I think he held his tongue on GOT because he knew he was partially to blame. He had a decade to get ahead but didn't, D&D asked for details about the future books but he hadn't settled on a lot so couldn't provide them much help. He hated what they did, but they only did it because they had nothing left to adapt. Here is different. He gave them the full story, beginning, middle and end before the show even started production. They had a complete story for a full 4 seasons. But they still decided to meddle. So he's pissed.
Based on GRRM's recent talk about visiting Tolkiens grave, thinking about his legacy, etc, this seems like it stems from stress about his own legacy, which he knows will be tied so strongly to the shows based on his work. He must realistically know that there is a good chance he never finishes the books, and after seeing the end of GOT tarnish the legacy of the story, I can see how he would have a lot of fear at the moment about getting at least one show really right in his lifetime.
If he is indeed concerned with his legacy then perhaps he should not have sold the rights to adapt his stories. He was paid for it, I do not doubt. Certainly, he is allowed to be frustrated or even angry about changes made, but to air them so publicly only tarnishes his legacy further. Now he not only seems like a lazy writer, but a whiner, too.
@@zacharymartin4683 How else can he now go about expressing his grievances, especially if he allowed the production after hearing an outline that is nothing like what hes seeing play out on screen now
@@harrisonroberts4115 he shouldn’t go and air his grievances publicly. What he does privately is his business, of course, but once you’ve been paid millions of dollars for others to adapt your work you keep your mouth shut.
@@zacharymartin4683 So he should let those writers add nonsense to the story and ruin it? The showrunners are clearly trying to wash out Rhaenyra and making excuses about Green propaganda I am so happy that George R.R. Martin shows Rhaenyra was not as good as she's portrayed in the show. And who knows those characters better: the showrunners or the person who actually created them?
"I have no idea what Ryan has planned if he has indeed planned anything." Same energy; "I am not questioning your honor Ser Janos, I'm denying it's existence."
He's seriously jaded about how HBO writers are continually bastardizing his opus. The writers gotta learn to put more respect on his opinion, or the shows are doomed to fall flat
It's so disgustingly arrogant seeing these people who really should be working on cw shows or something think they have the competencies needed to surpass an actual literary genius. It's pure ego and vanity from people who absolutely have not 'earned it'
The man has constantly said "book is book, show is show, they're fictional, chill people", you can imagine how mad and hurt he is when he finally goes "actually in the books..."
@@acs7167even more than that. GRRM is a very down to earth guy. I would guess he is less bothered by his made up history and more for the shitstorm another s8 will bring everyone involved, including him and the very writters.
I also believe he’s thinking about his legacy now. Tolkien of course is remembered through his books, but what really cemented his legacy I believe, were the crazy and amazing movie adaptions that came out long after his death. He definitely wouldn’t be a household name if not for those movies. And now whenever GRRM is brought up, there will always be the taste of yeah, but the adaptions were ass. Or even, yeah, but the series was never finished 😅
@edd4131 the adaption being ass is really nothing because they are gonna be remade by competent people eventually but not finishing his magnum opus would actually inpact his legacy in huge way
I think he's more pissed that about the fact that they lied to him ("we'll include Maegor don't worry) than about the changes themselves. I know I would.
I think the reason Martin is giving less slack to the hotd writers is because he blamed the game of thrones writers being tried for the drop in quality, and also there being no more book material for them to work with at the end of the show, excuses that he doesn’t believe he can give to the hotd writers
I agree. He can see the same thing happening with HotD and wants to nip it in the bud. He may well have realised that the showrunners and writers are just going to go ahead with whatever they want to do regardless of his objections.
I think a lot of us have yearned for Martin to be more assertive with how his works are adapted. Like others in comments have noted, while he took the GoT abominations in silence, it broke his heart inside. No one would want to repeat such a painful experience even if it meant confronting people (which Martin also seems to hate doing) so we should all be supportive of GRRM standing up for his work a bit
Agreed. If I remember correctly, after they outran the book material D&D asked Martin about his plans, but because Martin was still less than mis-way through WoW he couldn't give them much. He was still planning, things were changing, Dream of Spring wasn't even close to being started. He apparently only could give them three concrete pieces of information about the future and the ending, we still don't know what bits those three were. So although he might've been angry at the way GOT he might've felt like he didn't have a leg to stand on. He had nearly a decade to get ahead but failed. He left them high and dry with nothing to adapt and they had to make do. He wasn't happy, but it was his own fault there was nothing left to adapt. Plus, for the other changes the show made earlier he could understand, ASOIAF was so vast and grand in its stories things needed to be cut, simplified or amalgamated to work in a television format. As well as budget. But for HOTD the entire story was done. The ending was concrete. There was no reason to start diverting. The story is also a lot more focussed than ASOIAF, and with the limited text available what he had needed to be *expanded* not condensed or cut. D&D had excuses, Martin was partially at fault, but here he knows his ands are fully clean. He did all he could, gave them everything, and they're still meddling and ruining it with no reason.
@@GenGaara I wish people could get over their egos and accept that some people are better at certain things than other people, who are good at their own things. For example, Grrm is a good writer but not great at pacing. D&D were bad at writing but good at assuming they were geniuses. Malignant ego has caused a lot of embarrassing failures and it's illogical to not acknowledge that
Yeah the HotD story, whilst SOMEWHAT open to historical interpretation, is still a finished piece of the ASOIAF lore that has an “end”. These writers have no excuse for all the blatant changes and poor writing choices.
This is why GOT should be animated. Lesser budget problems and you can have as many characters as you want. We can have one person do a different voice for diffent characters like we see on South Park, Family guy, and the Simpsons. It would be cheaper to animate a scene rather than having to built it.
That would be amazing. Recently shows like Arcane and Blue Eye Samurai really made it clear that you can tell very sophisticated stories this way. A high qualitu GOT animated show would be amazing.
I mean, the lore videos are great. They should just make those better. I actually prefer the Lore video re-telling of Blood and Cheese to how it was adapted. Even the art shown would've been amazing references for actual camera shots
He has nothing to lose. Hbo needs him more than he needs them Streaming services like netflix or amazon will gladly pay george BILLIONS to adapt his work into shows.
@@singstreetcar5881 you're damn right. Also, if I were a writer or the showrunner, I would feel shame after reading how much the original author disapproves.
The final point he made is that he has not discussed what Ryan is offering in place of these “butterflies”, not that they haven’t discussed this at all. Seems to me their discussions went nowhere and George is just really upset that his work is being adapted with so many changes again.
I read the book and never actually realize the impact of Maelor existence. I see it clear now. One thing led to another. Maelor death-Haelena death- Shepard rising- Rhaenyra downfall.
no you dont see it, you just want to soy out against the creators over the show. Its really an utterly pointless character and their death happens like 40 chapters before she kills herself, george saying it was the reason is kind of him misremembering his own work. Also telling the 2 year old their mother wanted them dead is such a dumb fuck thing to write, its a 2 year old, they barely understand basic english, they wont remember shit, theyre 2
@@WookieWarriorz I don't hate show. I actually enjoy it so far. I'm just saying as a guy who reads the book, I see what GRRM tries to point out and it makes sense. I'm being positive for season 3 so far.
@@WookieWarriorz ah yes George's doesn't know anything about the story he wrote, you are the one who trully knows about it and came to enlight us about it. And what he says to Maelor is meant to impact Helaena (the adult who can understand what is going on) and plays into what she feels afterwards.
I feel like George sees the signs of HotD walking the same way GoT did before it eventually crashed and burned. They are making thoughtless, weird changes and inserting too much of their own storytelling into a story that already has meat and bones. I think he is worried about how the conclusion of HotD will effect his legacy, and he knows that it is going somewhere it shouldn't go, and that a lot of fans of the source material don't want it to go. He is making it clear to everyone that this is not his work and not his story, so they shouldn't equate it with him, and shouldn't expect the level of quality he offers.
I agree with his criticism of the Blood and Cheese scene. It would have been stronger as written, although Phia Saban still gave a great performance in the version that made it onto the show.
Yeah. I actually really like how Helaena is given a bit more personality through Phia's performance. The show scene wasn't quite as good as the books scene but it was still good.
@@zlg1388 In the books, Blood and Cheese forced Helaena to choose between Jaehaerys and a son the show cut - Maelor. So the horror part is Helaena had to choose which son would die. In the show, they removed that choice aspect by having there be only one boy.
11:10 - You have to imagine that George tried to bring these concerns to Condal and he was ignored. So now he's throwing it out there to try to create some public pressure.
I don’t blame GRRM. The show changed characters & left out Nettles which had a huge impact on Damon. GRRM is right all these changes will have a massive impact on the story going forward
I love it. GRRM didn't have a leg to stand on in criticizing D&D because he doesn't have complete material for S5-8. With F&B Ryan has full material that he's scrapping, and clearly private meetings were not enough to stop him. So GRRM went public with his outrage.
GRRM might not think he has enough power/sway in the writers room to make the writers change their decision after game of thrones, it’s sad but this could be what he considers the only way to have them reversed
Meanwhile I was over here fixated on why the heck the younger 3 kids of team back were de-aged by like 5 years each which is going to completely fudge the gullette. How is Aegon III going to escape on Stormcloud, if Stormcloud is a muppet?!
Surely the most concerning changes are the supposed death of Sunfyre and replacing Nettles with Baela? How tf do they replicate Nettles' storyline with Baela? They need a way to keep Baela but get rid of sheep stealer how tf are they gonna do that? It can't be even remotely like the book
@@alexjames7144they're replacing Nettles with Rhaena, not Baela. And no, it's not as bad as freaking Aegon III being way too young to be traumatized by what happens to his mother later on. The kid doesn't even look old enough to understand what's going on.
@@Male_Ficent replacing Nettles with Rhaena is terrible because her plot won't make sense, they will have to completely remove Nettle's plot and write one to Rhaena from scratch and whenever these guys write anything for themselves it is usually a disaster as we have seen in this season.
2:23 If you think Cheese was not so bad, read it again, he threatens Halaena with what Blood will do to Jaehaerya if Halaena doesn’t make her choice quickly. Bad guy.
This sounds like the writers are simply not respecting the source material and have shut the creator out of the development process so he's rightfully upset that his life's work is being mistreated.
They may try and keep some characters alive like they did with Laenor in S1. I think GRRM is basically saying "it's a tragedy because everyone dies. They need to die"
Cutting Nettles is a big one. I'm betting Martin liked the idea of having a character who challenged preconceived notions of who could ride a dragon. Plus she drives a wedge between Daemon and Rhaenyra at a key point in the story, which leads into Daemon's climatic fight with Aemond. Replacing Nettles with another black character who has nothing in common with her outside of skin color, on the assumption book readers won't know the difference, almost seems kind of racist.
That "Helaena killing herself for no reason" plot point just confirms everything I need to know about the future of the show, and validates that my biggest criticism of the show isn't a figment of my imagination. Poor writing choices from the showrunners are the problem; not a writer's strike or the episode count. No amount of live re-writes to a line or two in random scenes would ever make abysmal plot points like that good. Given that Condal is still going to be in charge going forward and these are the types of ideas he's generating (instead of using George's from the books), there's no hope. I'm not waiting four years to see the conclusion of this claptrap. I'm done with HOTD. PS- maybe George has tried to talk to Condal about things in the past but didn't get anywhere; or maybe Condal misled George when they did speak, so George is throwing his hands up and saying "ok; if that's how it's going to be I'm not gonna hold back". The pregnant Helaena plot Condal told George about, then no trace of it in season 2, could suggest George felt lied to or misled. My bet is, there were probably other things Condal told George were coming down the pyke to ease his apprehension about the changes being made, and those things never materialized or got an ounce of set up; so George felt duped. At that point it would've been incumbent on Condal to contact George and explain (which he likely didn't do); not the other way around. But I digress. Helaena's pregnancy was probably the tip of the iceberg, and George was pi--ed and trying to clue us in without divulging everything. So ultimately, while this is more than George has ever said before, he's still in line with his typical style of dropping thinly veiled clues. In my opinion.
@@ashleyofnaath in your opinion,what is your feelings on GRRM's interpretation of Heleanas arc and Death ? Because they way he layed out all of the dominoes makes sense to me with the Blood and Cheese event mentally breaking Heleana,to the death of Maelor at Bitterbridge pushing her to her death and that spiraling into Rhaenrya losing Kings Landing due GRRM making the amazing distinction that the Commonfolk in the books never loved Rhaenrya and instead loved Gentle Heleana and were absolutely horrified at the announcement and rumors of her death at Rhaenryas orders. It's all about how the Pieces line up and Ryan Removed such a vital piece by removing Heleana's "Sophie's choice"
@@ExSpoonman The thing is though, that actually could've been brilliant if Condal were better at his job, or had more talented writers to bring that idea to life. Also, I think the books set up that Jaehaera is autistic; and autism can be genetic; so I don't mind the change to make Helaena neuro-divergent as well. Condal was just the wrong guy to do it.
@@ashleyofnaath idk about Neuro divergent but I wasn't personally opposed to Heleana being the Cassandra of Troy of this Story. But they've abandoned the tragic fact that no one was supposed to believe in her visions and they've gone ahead and had her just spoil Aemonds ending to his face and everyone taking her visions way too seriously
@@dominiqueodom3099 Another channel, the dragon demands, did a video about this topic a while back. In it he said he tweeted Linda and Elio, asking specifically about this, and Elio actually responded and confirmed that yes, Helaena and Jaehaera are what would be considered autistic by today's standards; it's just there's no in-universe term for it. This would be seperate from her dragon dreams or whatever the he-l magical capabilities the show has given her.
I have NO sympathy for Ryan Condel, he is the one who claims to LOVE ASOIAF but he's also the one actively and consistently getting things wrong. Looking at you, "Valyrian steel armor from Aegon's time in Valyria". Could George have talked about this privately with him? Sure. Would that have had actual effects on the writing going forward? Questionable. HBO's ASOIAF team needs to figure itself out and have an open line of communication between themselves and George. As is seems every issue that occurs when HBO adapts something is due to "lack of communication".
I am still pissed on GRRMs behalf for saying show Lohar "almost feels like one of those colorful characters from GRRMs world" when they just took everything from Racallio Ryndoon and slapped it on Lohar. The audacity of mashing two characters from the book and then to pretend you invented it.
"And there are larger and more toxic butterflies to come, if HOUSE OF THE DRAGON goes ahead with some of the changes being contemplated for seasons 3 and 4… " 🍿
Yep. The craziest part are the delusional fans who are taking the blog post and surmising that B&C and Maelor are the only issues he has with the show. It isn't. The rest simply hasn't been adapted yet.
Is there a possibility that maybe he didn’t openly criticize GoT because he contractually couldn’t? And maybe this time around when he agreed to the HotD show he signed a contract in which he could speak freely.
@ChezzyKnytt thats false. Grrm gave them all the info. He gave them info for a lot more seasons. They *chose* to ignore it because they wanted to go work on star wars. D&D are 1000 times worse than HotD writers
@@im2arrogant118 Yeah, he gave them info such as bran is king, daenerys will burn Kings landing, hold the door etc. They did those things. He didn't give them the details that lead to those conclusions so that they made sense. Or he did but he did so badly, which makes sense since hes still figuring out those details himself.
I think GRRM feels betrayed by Condal not sticking to having Maelor in the show later. He was probably "tricked" like that a lot during GoT & no longer is able to give the benefit of the doubt in the way he used to. I think he's talked to Condal about this recently when hearing the S3 stuff & feels like "well, if they won't listen to me, maybe they'll listen to others when I outline what is happening & why it's important." It feels to me like a desperate attempt to right the show as it goes down the same path GoT did.
yea and it wont really work sure they will change and maybe add maelor now but george wrote this hoping they probably wont make any more dumb changes but its a losing battle as long as these "writers" still lead the show. i fear they are simply going to postpone the changes they are planning but still do it in a different way
George nailed every decision Condal has made for the worse especially Maelor. Maelor being cut from the show is gonna ruin so many events even though he himself doesn't do much and I think George isn't done yet because he didn't mention Alicent and Rhaenyra.
I'm surprised Maelor did not exist yet we saw Ser Rickard Thorne accompany Alicent during her picnic in the woods. Their storyline was connected and was also tied to Daeron.
Think about the impact the one bastard baby of Roberts in Littlefingers brothel had in Game of Thrones? His death ordered by either Cersei or Joffery had more impact over the series than the goddamn Night King Did if we're being honest
It's simple to see why he's so direct and unprecedented with his commentary. He despises the changes, and might be hoping if he publicly skews it, Condal and the team can course correct before it's too late.
I think Martin might be playing it smart here. If he was really unhappy with the changes you’d expect him to handle it behind the scenes with Ryan Condal. And maybe he did, but maybe Ryan wasn’t taking his feedback seriously enough. By calling it out publicly, Martin could be trying to pressure the showrunners to stick closer to his books. It’s like he’s using fan support to force their hand and keep them from making changes that he thinks could mess up the story.
I think he should dig more at HBO honestly, his creative work is saving their platform so they should give them the largest budget possible. I think the last update I saw said they have at least 5 ASOIAF shows in some stage of planning or even production
@@Grace-er9ep They will all be so bad as long as HBO still hires nepo writers and does not undergo a massive change they really screwed the pooch with season 2 if george himself does not have faith with the planned changes
My take on it is George, as a creator is being defined by the television shows which aren’t his actual written word of how he’s wanting to tell his story. I think that is creating this anger or frustration in what he perceives as a slight on his work.
it is tho this is marketted as his work yet it is simply another story with the same characters the only thing the show needed to add was compelling dialogues and establish relationships yet they still make changes and every single significant change is just for the worse
It really feels like the writers for these shows are loyal to George's vision right up until the point he's no longer looking over their shoulder, at which point they bust out the fanfic scripts.
Cant believe they had the budget to do that stupid bloodraven whitewalker sequence but not enough to hire a small kid as a background character. These are excuses they just want to write their lesbian fanfic
He hit all the points on the head: 1) HBO cutting budget 2) First couple of episodes being done well, save for B&C. The changes to Helaena's character and her children are ... Not great Because they affect the rest of the story. 3) He will get to the rest of the season perhaps in another blog post. It think we can all agree that we were not happy with D&D's handling of George's characters in later seasons. The question which you posed is one, I think, you have the answer to. Remember how George Lucas was treated by Disney for his outline of episode 7? Yeah.
The whole "Wanting to avoid traumatizing a young actor" bit is so dumb. Do the people trying to make that point not understand that the children know it's all make believe? They're aren't ACTUALLY killing one of them, their mother actual mother isn't actually choosing a child to have killed. There are tons of examples of child actors absolutely having a blast acting out their characters death scene, or interacting with sculpts of the fake body parts that the prop department made. It really seems like whoever wrote the scene just assumed they could write it better than George, and it flopped hard.
@@northerner3340 has anyone seen the goddamn movie Childs Play? That kid Andy was hunted by a killer doll and he legitimately had no problems with it because he knew " it doesnt scare me because when the cameras stop rolling he stops moving and I know it's not real."
This omission of a Maelor also stunts Daeron’s future character. Daeron was the one to initiate Bitterbridge’s sack, and if filmed correctly, could’ve been a great opportunity to give the viewers a decision on if to flip and side with the Greens.
"to flip and side with the Greens" that is exactly why those idiots did what they did. No no no can't have people siding against ThE QueEn, tHE RiGhtFul hEir
I think he was planning on writing more posts criticizing the changes that were made, but he might be changing his mind after he was probably forced to delete his post.
@@alexjames7144 ig he is going to write blog about everything that happened in season 2 & he starts with the first event of B&C. He also shows how a small change can affect future events, for example now as their no maelor Halena has no reason to suicide. So if everything goes well more blogs are going to come
long time book fan here : real talk I've got my critiques of GRRM but he's a goddamn LEGEND for this, one man standing up to the frauds that are the hbo writers
It's not like the source material is too long to adapt to screen. It's basically a short story. They should have just adapted the entire thing verbatim.
@@blaubeer8039 It would be very funny if the fans give us their own *faithful* adaptation, like Stephen King's anti - Kubrick adaptation of The Shining.
@@blaubeer8039Honestly the show being narrated by Gyldayn with occasional flash-forwards to him parsing the narrative together like 150 years after the Dance is not the worst idea I’ve ever heard.
The source material isnt even really a story. Its the bullet points of one. Its good for hte outline of a tv show, but there is no meat on the bones. Geroge knew this when approving an adaption for it. If they adapted verbatim literrally nothing in the show would make any sense.
5:42 i submit that Rick Thorne is important in a broader sense in that we see his descendent, the infamous Alliser being such a rotten guy in the 'main series.' It's a subtle but important touch to depict a brave, loyal Thorne
I don't particularly let the writers strike excuse slide. The source material should have been enough, also just the absolute brain rot decisions don't seem to be from a lack of writers but the choice of writers.
aptly put but we cant point out the obvious of what these nepo writers do and changing the entire narrative of rhaenerya and alicent being the same age wasnt to tell a more interesting story but so the lesbian writer gets to make her own fanfiction while selling it as being GoT
@@alanpennie8013 You're a bit daft, I can tell. You're out here trying to pretend HotD is good and that the criticisms of *the literal author and creator of the entire world* are somehow bad or invalid.
@@darthJ9 eh if you follow the whole years of drama about stuff like this, it makes total sense he would have some long-simmering issues with how they adapt his works
george hasn't been listened to or respected by any of these show runners since like season 3 of got. they've butchered 2 of his works now and if they plan to continue adapting HIS works he will make them listen. well done george. way to stand up for yourself and your fans.
His criticism and how he wrote it proofs, that George really loves his story and his characters and all the other things of this world he created. I think we won't see the baby scene in season 3 - I mean, it would make Rhaenyra look bad and we all know the show tries everything to make Rhaenyra the best queen ever...
I wish you people would stop pretending rhenyrea is the only character who's been white washed and didn't ignore the changes they made to other characters, they didn't remove maelor to make rhenyrea look good they removed him because they were lazy .
@@thatoneblackdude3333amen. These people that "picked sides" are annoying bc Alicent is the most white washed character and the only character that's close to her..is Aegon. Their book counterparts are waaaaaaaayyyyyy worse than their show versions. But. Yes. It's only Rhanerya. Lol. Smh.
@@thisguy8106They made Alicent a hypocritical mess who has inverted many of her core characteristics since in season 1. They still also clearly hold her chiefy culpable, while we are being fed the new crap of Rhaenyra and Viserys never wanting the crown. Aegon is still out of all the historical recollections, Mushroom centric(the outlandish side of things) , well many of his opinions on the more outlandish stuff about Rhaenyra is considered just to be propaganda. What bad things outside of episode 7 of Season 2 has Rhaenyra really done? Aegon is still a ra*** and fathers children in child fighting pits, essentially squashing any level of deeper sympathy for his character. Sure, other characters were changed, but not retroactively to come of solely better and not multiple times. Legit, if Daemon was not on team black, there wouldn't be anymore morally jaded characters.
The show isn't afraid to make Rhaenyra look bad. They had her kill a servant on Driftmark and then trap 30 people in a cave with Vermithor to be picked off one by one while she justified it by saying its the will of the gods. I really don't think the writers are trying to whitewash Rhaenyra. I think they're just trying to make her decline more gradual.
I'm 100% on GRRM side here. Imagine your life's work being shit on yet a again by high horse show runners. This court of public opinion was likely the best way to move this show back into line. A private meeting would have been ignored. This won't be
I feel like they have had these talks about what they shouldn't change and he's just fed up with the writers room so hes airing out his anger or frustrations that they are doing exactly what DnD did, when he was probably promised by Ryan that he wouldnt shut him out like they apparently did. Theres a reason George said at the beginning of the season he wasnt coming back for S3 just like he did for S4 of GoT.
Even if he took the post down potentially because of spoilers maybe? I'm glad to see an author protecting his source material and discussing that in details, writers need to be reminded that they can't just disregard the source material authors and issue changes without their approval.
My hypothesis on GRRM is going nuclear becuase he did already have these conversations with the show writers... and they didnt listen. He knows he cant convince them, so he is making his opinion public. He is betting that others feel the same and that the resulting public backlash will force the showwriters to take steps to more faithfully follow the source material.
tbh Ryan can be mad about this, but he has no right to be. he's adapting another person's work. it's his responsibility to inform George of any changes big or small and hear George out in his entirety. is George unprofessional for airing the dirty laundry like this? yes, to a degree. but I think given how much diplomacy he gave the GOT writers, it's pretty clear that his line of communication with the HOTD writers has failed and he sees no other ways to force them back to the table and listen to him. let's also not forget that people blamed him for "approving" the later seasons of GOT. people are still saying the HOTD scripts were approved by him because he's a producer and how the writers kept saying they got approvals from him (apparently not).
GRRM isn't going behind their backs. They DID talk about it, they DIDN'T listen to him. So he's going to us. Good for George. He needs this. We need this.
Facts. I can’t stand the normies that expect the creative genius that made the effing universe to just shut up. They really think hbo knows better bc reasons. Clowns
I genuinely think the reason George is doing this in public is that he thinks it’s the only way he can bring change to season 3 and 4, he doesn’t want to see the same thing happen to this as that which happened to GoT. If he just talked to Ryan he probably thinks nothing would change, same with D&D. Like you said he’s not done something like this before, it might be the only way to save it.
George like the rest of us are tired of needless changes to HIS story. Maelor missing has huge story implications, removing Nettles has huge dragon lore implications. Turning Alicent and Rhae into BFFs also has massive implications. All of these changes the story drastically and make it more disjointed and inconsistent. HBO thinks they know Westeros better than George. Legally though, George might be apologizing soon. He took their money, so he has to play their game. 😢
Honestly from season 1 I believed they could have pulled off Rhaenyra Alicent friendship, it adds another layer of tragedy to the Dance instead of sterotypical evil stepmom Alicent. And it would have been so easy to actually break them with Luke and Jaehaerys but they just didn't and now we have to suffer. Also there isno way they can write themselves out of Aegon being currently 5 when he should be 10.
HBO won’t do eff all to George. They can make threats but what can they actually do. Their whole future is based around doing a bunch of ice and fire spin offs. If they want to start a war w the creator or the Martin estate that will only b to their detriment. George also has enough bread now to engage them in as much litigation as they wish, and he will likely win.
2:10 George is not saying that Blood is innately cruel. He is saying that he is a FORMER [operative word here] gold cloak, who lost his cloak for beat*ng a woman to d+*th, hinting at bitterness alongside his cruelty stemming from issues with self control and anger issues. That is very different from innate.
Honestly the whole thing feels more like a reflection of his current state more than anything. He’s not been doing great over the last few years, he’s lost a lot of friends and the pressure to get those books out is definitely affecting him. I feel this combined with the recent stuff about legacy he’s been talking about shows he’s realized it’s very unlikely he finishes the series and that ultimately the shows are going to end up being his legacy. We never saw this type of stuff for GoT despite it having far more disastrous changes. Him posting something like this is pretty much unprecedented. It’s just strange and in my eyes probably only really served to fuel the flames of further toxic discourse about the season and potentially hinder further asoiaf adaptations, which he probably realized hence the deletion lol.
agreed, especially with the last bit. the discourse around hotd has been unbearable lately, and this only fuelled it (especially considering that a lot of people seemingly didn't read the blog properly at all, and just went straight for "LOL EVEN GRRM HATES THE SHOW ITS SUCH A DUMPSTER FIRE STOP THE COPE")
@@juiceyborger yeah it’s been very insufferable, so I really don’t understand why he stoked the flames like this. Especially considering back in the winter he made a post lamenting about anti-fans and the overall toxicity of discussions of shows and movies on social media lol. Most people don’t read his blog, aside from this one particular post so they don’t really realize that in July he made an entire post about the very episode in question here episode 2 and also episode 3 where he was praising them both to the moon, calling it a great start to the season & talking up the shows creative vision when it comes to characters. Like even in that post he had brought up “Maelor the Missing” and eluded to eventually making a post about him. There was just a massive tonal shift between the two post, it like almost gives you whiplash if you read them back to back, which is kinda concerning.
Lmao are u a rep if the hbo legal team? The creator of the source material and universe should just shut his mouth as another one of his works is going to be destroyed again? U realize George can disagree w the nepo writing staff, piggybacking off his creative genius, desperately validating their egos w alterations to the narrative that make it worse. S1 was great, s2 was mid af from pacing to changes, esp if u know what all has to happen before the end. Maybe ur happy with mediocre ice and fire spin offs, but a lot of us don’t care if it has a chilling effect if they’re gonna keep giving them the Disney treatment. Not everyone can distinguish quality from mediocrity i suppose. How DARE George speak his mind and the truth. No. He’s held his tongue for too long and now he must speak his mind.
I’m legit shocked at all of these huge, multi year productions that seemingly don’t lock down a full series outline before they start shooting. The Star Wars sequels come to mind. It just feels like bad project management to not know where you’re going. Laying the tracks in front of the train.
I think George held back on this type of reaction during GOT because perhaps he partially blamed himself for not finishing the books. HOTD is different, though. George actually did finish F&B. The producers and writers of the show are simply ignoring his input and rewriting the story he has worked so hard to create.
In the last episode Alicent gave Helaena a cup of tea, told her "drink this". She held it but didn't drink it. then they got interrupted by Aemond. It gave me the vibe that it was abortion-tea but I'm not sure. So Helaena could be pregnant.
How is she even pregnant when they clearly show no interaction between aegon and helaena? Stop the cope that the writers are actually planning to take all these small things we notice to mean anything. GOT was the same
Not to mention the lord of bitterbridge, Lady Caswell, then takes Maelor’s head and sends it to Rhaenyra and when she receives the head she reportedly smiled. And then the bitterbridge lord sends Maelor’s body to his Daeron, who we still haven’t seen yet, who’s army in camped nearby and he responds by burning bitterbridge down to the ground on top of his dragon while his army sacks the town and then goes to the Caswell’s castle where Lady Caswell begs for her life and the lives of her family and Daeron responds by saying he will show her the same mercy she showed his nephew and she then hangs herself from the castle walls in hope of saving her children’s lives.
Something most people don’t understand when reading this blog is that George isn’t just focusing on Blood and Cheese, while dismissing the numerous other faults. He’s trying to say how a small detail like Maelor being absent, is akin to a butterfly in the butterfly effect. Maelor’s removal will be the catalyst for the show going down in flames.
if you find it so 'strange' and out of character that George is bringing this to the public instead of Ryan, why are you struggling to put the obvious two-and-two together? do you think that he isn't experiencing the same level of disregard that George Lucas got from Bob Iger and Disney, that Sapkowski got from Netflix Witcher, or that GRRM himself got from D&D when he wished for more time to do a proper ending for GoT? the man is seeing history repeat itself and he's determined not to stay silent and play nice this time around, and i fully support it. i want more authors to burn it all down around these egotistical hack showrunners who think they're the best thing since sliced bread for taking butchering someone else's art and taking all the credit.
All the people siding w the show runners and hbo are the br@indead normies that think “oooo me like rhanyra, hbo so good, hbo do my favorite dragon show too, got s1-8 all equally good” type sht. I’m glad Martin is FINALLY speaking his mind. These hacks think they can do it better than a proven creative genius. S1 of hotd was solid, s2 was a disaster if u know how the story is SUPPOSED to develop. And hbo is apparently broke af now? How are u gonna throttle the budget of ur biggest property? Honestly eff these streaming platforms as production companies. Martin should have just collabed w a Japanese or Korean studio, done it animated, and theyd make it faithful af
I just feel like George is very stressed out lately, from that one rumored conversation about fearing for his legacy and how people will remember him when he's gone, to seeing how fans responded to the later seasons of Game of Thrones, now watching fans start to lose faith in the second major adaptation of his work, and of course with the ever-present sword of Damocles that is Winds hanging over his head, I feel for him. I imagine this blog post was coming from a place of not wanting his magnum opus to be remembered as that thing everyone loved but later just fizzled out. I also imagine it was somewhat cathartic for him to just admit that he's not entirely happy with how his works are being treated.
yea the shows undeniably love of Rhaenyra basically means they gutted any plot that doesn't make her look amazing, this conflict is supposed to be about 2 morally grey sides, not the blacks being perfect and root-able at every turn
Bruh he fully went NUCLEAR here... he fully snapped. Kinda crazy he said nothing like this about GoT s7 or 8? Maybe because he doesnt wanna spoil his unreleased books by talking about what is supposed to happen at that point in the story?
when you say Condal would be mad because Martin should have reached out first it seems like Martin already did and his criticism/suggestions were not heeded. This seems like a last attempt to change course of the show by creating public outcry.
I think people should stop saying s8 was bad because of changes made in that season. If one wants to understand why s8 is so bad, it is because of changes made in PREVIOUS seasons. And that's what gets me. Many people still love the Battle of the Bastards, accept the whole Sansa/Littlefinger plot, Talissa Maegyr's existance and Stoneheart's removal... tldr; s8 is bad because changes made in s3 onwards broke the story. It's easy to bash the widely unpopular season but forget we all loved and accepted the bad shit before
people tend to always have short memories. Everyone hoped and coped that every small thing would lead to something yet it didnt because the show had no ending but HOTD does and they are doing the exact opposite of whatever d&d did right and wrong
Not really, s8 is nonsensical on its own, while all things you mentioned were fundamental in the declining quality of season 5,6 and 7. While HotD s2 had problems dating back to s1
@@cipher48 yes, but there was also a drop from s7, which wasn’t necessary, for example the plot of the Others was totally destroyed but could have come up with something
@@ciii4361 what about Quaithe? What about Stoneheart? What about Aegon? These characters are instrumental for the development of others. All of the above interfere with the Long Night. Why the hell did Jaime return to Cersei? Did he learn something in the riverlands? Then why all of a sudden he would care about what's happening North and the coming of the Others?
11:00 Maybe GRRM knows, after everything that's happened between him and HBO, that polite professional conversations with people like Condal don't work. Shifting public opinion will work, because people like GRRM more than they like HBO or Condal, and he has every reason and every right to use that fact to achieve a worthy end - a faithful adaptation, and finally someone putting their foot down in regards to what corporate studios like Disney and HBO can and cannot do to beloved franchises.
Honestly I love him for this post even though they made him take it down. He's making shit public to make waves and considering how HBO has massacred his work in the past I support him
For once, I'm siding with George on this one. This is the only play he has. Revealing the dumbassery while there's still time to course correct. It's a desperate play, but I get it.
I have a few thoughts on this, I do find it a bit odd that George RR is doing this, but I find it more odd he seems privy to the script and isn't under a NDA, or seems to not care about it if he is. But, I think I get why he would speak out, and on his blog specifically. For one thing, this show got a lot of premature good will based on George's involvement and backing it and even supporting the "this is what the history book was trying to portray" telling of the show; so I understand why if the show has begun doing things that he fundamentally disagrees with that he would feel compelled to have his disagreement be known. Second, while I won't say his blog isn't exactly unpopular or anything, the chances of even half of the major TV audience that watched House of the Dragon reading his blog is very small, I feel like he is okay saying this somewhere with a relatively smaller audience. Finally, I think he's playing a hand that maybe he felt he should've during Game of Thrones but didn't, trying to see if he can get the show to change course somewhat.
The reasons he’s publicly airing out his dirty laundry could be that Condal simply doesn’t listen when GRRM advises him why not to make certain changes. I think us book readers have also foreseen all these butterfly effect changes for awhile. From what GRRM is saying, it’s likely that he voiced his concern before, and given the disaster we got this season, it’s apparent that he a was ignored.
Go off, George. Also Ryan Condal and Sara Hess did more damage to HotD than the cutting of the last 2 episodes. I'm tired of having writing rooms full of people who refuse to respect the source material.
Ryan and Sara weren’t responsible for cutting the last two episodes! They had 10 episodes planned initially! HBO executives are the ones who came in and cut both the episode count and budget!
3:17. It doesn't have to traumatized young actors. They just have to explain what is happening to said kids, run it through a couple times and perhaps gotten a slightly older kid who looked younger. That's what they do for horror moves and plenty of kids love to "play pretend".
i dont think it's weird at all, he chose diplomacy 10 years ago and he saw that it got worse and worse leading to a universally hated final season. This time, he thinks there's still time to steer the ship so he's chosen violence
UPDATE: he took the post down??
Nope its still there.
Edit: shit he actually took it down
@@MA-rf6buNot there for me.
It looks like there is an issue with entire site.
@@MA-rf6buIts very gone
This was strategic. He saw what happened to game of thrones and doesn't want to have it happen again. However he isn't an executive and so used the one tool at his disposal which could get this fixed. He took his writer's pen, wrote what was wrong, to the public, and now has effectively put the writers in the equivalent of what will become a vicegrip by the fandom to either fix it, or face MASSIVE backlash.
“Helaena kills herself for no reason”
Somehow David and Dan returned…
At least d&d mostly stuck to source material when they still had it and didn't change the entire story drastically for no reason.
“Dany just sort of forgot about Helaena’s motivation for suicide”
@@thatoneblackdude3333They didn't though.
Arya never met Tywin, Talisa Maegar doesn't excist and Robb never married for love, everyone trusts Littlefinger because he makes imself extremly useful, they cut out several POV characters, Catelyn gets brought back as Lady Stoneheart in the books, Dorne is completly different, Yara is Asha, Aeron and Victarion Greyjoy combined, Sansa is nowhere near the Boltons, Jeyne Pool gets married to Ramsay Bolton, Tryion becomes a terrible person, Jaime cuts off Cersei way earlier, Brienne did never run into Arya etc.
I could go on. But they had 4 good season, the first being a decent adaptation but tjey started with dumb changes in season 2 and by season 5 they just didn't bother adapting anymore. They didn't adapt huge parts of the last two books at all or changed them so far they can't be called an adaptation anymore.
@@TemariNaraannaschatz I said mostly I never said they didn't change a bunch of shit they did and I'm not denying that but at least there version of asoiaf at least up till season 4 still resembles the books story unlike hotd were they changed a lot of shit just in the first episode let alone both it's entire seasons to the point they look like different stories.
@@thatoneblackdude3333 You mean the first scene of the show where they changed a very important canon event by having the Great Council from 101 from Laenor to Viserys.
GRRM casually took a hammer and smashed the writers harder than Robert Smashed Rhaegar
GODS HE WAS STRONG NOW
@@QuinnTheGMGRRMS SEED IS STRONG
The second current of the Ruby Ford
@@QuinnTheGMI was coming to say that 😂😂
@@QuinnTheGM LMAO
you know he’s mad when he actually finishes something he promised to write
😢...😂😂
💀🤣🤣🤣🤣
💀 💀
😂😂😂
So now we just need to find a way to get him upset about Winds 😂😂🙏🏽🙏🏽
"I have no idea what Ryan has planned - if he has indeed planned anything" this part got me like Dyummm
@@fayedunaway8
Maybe he's planning a suitable revenge on you GRRM.
Yeah can't believe the video skipped over that.
And honestly I hate that part
Dude is trying to anger about a show he doesn't really want to get involved and doesn't even know he knows what happens
@@kestrel5895what?
yeah George went full brutal lmao holy shit
"The Post That Was Promised"
It’s already gone now. I’m wondering why he took it down.
@@PoutingScoutprobably forced to by HBO. They surely have him all wrapped up in contracts enough that they could pull strings to make him take it down
@@Grace-er9ep The damage is done so he might as well have doubled down. He announced the post days earlier, I'm almost certain HBO has tried to negotiate with him by now, futilely, it seems. If they threaten him with legal repercussions, he in turn could threaten to be publicly critical of all upcoming ASoIaF productions.
And holy shit did the post live up to the prophecy, GRRM may not finish ASOIAF until the sun rises in the west and sets in the east but he remains an absolute icon
This isn’t the main post, this is just his post about “maelor the missing” and blood and cheese. He has another about “what went wrong”. I hope that he stills write that but hbo may have prevented him from criticising the show since it appears the blog has been removed.
George casually leaking season 3 is so funny to me😭
He is not holding back lol
Bro is ruthless lmao
I felt George's sass throughout this blog post. Ryan and his show are screwed, as is HBO's money😂 should have just fronted the extra cash for more episodes as they keep using the "budget" excuse for every decision.
@@bobskywalker2707 some say he has embraced his Maegor side LOL
Lmaoo
Notice how GRRM was able to make the distinction that Rhaenrya was not this all beloved figure and was actually disliked by the common folk of kings landing who actually loved Heleana
Meanwhile the smallfolks "LONG LIVE QUEEN RHAENYRA' while attacking the shit out of Haelaena and Alicent who was also said to be loved by the smallfolks in the books.
@@fayedunaway8just the showrunners obviously showing a bias.
"Oh Rhaenrya is the one responsible for the blockade?
Eh...just let her send some boats of food into Kingslanding so that the smallfolk love her instead"
@@dominiqueodom3099 I would be happier if Ryan just admits to this version of the story being 'black' propaganda and instead of calling it the 'true events' while also cutting characters like Maelor and Nettles. While also cutting events like Aegon flying around King's Landing on Sunfyre as his own victory but instead putting a scene where Rhaenys (sworn to the other side) and gives her a victory and makes Aegon look weak instead of his victory lap.
@@fayedunaway8 no no no.
That would be showing an even handed interpretation of these events where both sides were capable of great evils and heroic Deeds. And this show is just about "two women trying to figure it out"
Quote by Sara hess the producer
No doubt they’ll riot in the show because they hate women, not because they think Rhaenyra “killed” their queen 😂
I feel like George forced himself to hold back in GoT and is now so tired that he just does care and is speaking is mind about things.
Fool me once....Strike 1.
Fool me twice....STRIKE 3.
Bro if someone butchered the ending to by magnum opus, the series I will be remembered for forever, I wouldn’t hold back. Most people wouldn’t either. That’s why this is all very strange.
He’s like 1000 years old, you really stop giving af at a certain point lol
@@alphabah49
I'm pretty damn sure HBO has some kind of clause or NDA where George can't publicly criticize the show too much because it would lead to loss of sales. Currently I assume he doesn't criticize it because people would point it its his fault for not finishing it in the first place, plus HBO may cancel other shows in development.
I think he held his tongue on GOT because he knew he was partially to blame. He had a decade to get ahead but didn't, D&D asked for details about the future books but he hadn't settled on a lot so couldn't provide them much help. He hated what they did, but they only did it because they had nothing left to adapt.
Here is different. He gave them the full story, beginning, middle and end before the show even started production. They had a complete story for a full 4 seasons. But they still decided to meddle. So he's pissed.
Based on GRRM's recent talk about visiting Tolkiens grave, thinking about his legacy, etc, this seems like it stems from stress about his own legacy, which he knows will be tied so strongly to the shows based on his work. He must realistically know that there is a good chance he never finishes the books, and after seeing the end of GOT tarnish the legacy of the story, I can see how he would have a lot of fear at the moment about getting at least one show really right in his lifetime.
If he is indeed concerned with his legacy then perhaps he should not have sold the rights to adapt his stories. He was paid for it, I do not doubt. Certainly, he is allowed to be frustrated or even angry about changes made, but to air them so publicly only tarnishes his legacy further. Now he not only seems like a lazy writer, but a whiner, too.
@@zacharymartin4683 How else can he now go about expressing his grievances, especially if he allowed the production after hearing an outline that is nothing like what hes seeing play out on screen now
@@harrisonroberts4115 he shouldn’t go and air his grievances publicly. What he does privately is his business, of course, but once you’ve been paid millions of dollars for others to adapt your work you keep your mouth shut.
@@zacharymartin4683 So he should let those writers add nonsense to the story and ruin it? The showrunners are clearly trying to wash out Rhaenyra and making excuses about Green propaganda
I am so happy that George R.R. Martin shows Rhaenyra was not as good as she's portrayed in the show. And who knows those characters better: the showrunners or the person who actually created them?
@@zacharymartin4683 he should be as public as possible. We all enjoy it
"I have no idea what Ryan has planned if he has indeed planned anything."
Same energy;
"I am not questioning your honor Ser Janos, I'm denying it's existence."
Condal does seem like Janos Slynt lol
@@acs7167 You will refer to him as Lord Slynt, bastard.
He's seriously jaded about how HBO writers are continually bastardizing his opus. The writers gotta learn to put more respect on his opinion, or the shows are doomed to fall flat
Imagine if Tolkien or his son were still around to see the rings of power. They probably feel the same way as George.
It's so disgustingly arrogant seeing these people who really should be working on cw shows or something think they have the competencies needed to surpass an actual literary genius. It's pure ego and vanity from people who absolutely have not 'earned it'
@@NRV0A huge industrial, greedy company like Amazon taking the reigns of Tolkien's IP would never ever happen of he was alive.
@@MaxIronsThird Not really true
There's a solution to that and it isn't writing blog posts.
The man has constantly said "book is book, show is show, they're fictional, chill people", you can imagine how mad and hurt he is when he finally goes "actually in the books..."
I suppose he realises as well now that the story he wants to tell wont be told and the show is going in a path he does not like
@@acs7167even more than that. GRRM is a very down to earth guy.
I would guess he is less bothered by his made up history and more for the shitstorm another s8 will bring everyone involved, including him and the very writters.
I also believe he’s thinking about his legacy now. Tolkien of course is remembered through his books, but what really cemented his legacy I believe, were the crazy and amazing movie adaptions that came out long after his death. He definitely wouldn’t be a household name if not for those movies. And now whenever GRRM is brought up, there will always be the taste of yeah, but the adaptions were ass. Or even, yeah, but the series was never finished 😅
@edd4131 the adaption being ass is really nothing because they are gonna be remade by competent people eventually but not finishing his magnum opus would actually inpact his legacy in huge way
I think he's more pissed that about the fact that they lied to him ("we'll include Maegor don't worry) than about the changes themselves. I know I would.
I think the reason Martin is giving less slack to the hotd writers is because he blamed the game of thrones writers being tried for the drop in quality, and also there being no more book material for them to work with at the end of the show, excuses that he doesn’t believe he can give to the hotd writers
I agree. He can see the same thing happening with HotD and wants to nip it in the bud.
He may well have realised that the showrunners and writers are just going to go ahead with whatever they want to do regardless of his objections.
I think a lot of us have yearned for Martin to be more assertive with how his works are adapted. Like others in comments have noted, while he took the GoT abominations in silence, it broke his heart inside. No one would want to repeat such a painful experience even if it meant confronting people (which Martin also seems to hate doing) so we should all be supportive of GRRM standing up for his work a bit
Agreed. If I remember correctly, after they outran the book material D&D asked Martin about his plans, but because Martin was still less than mis-way through WoW he couldn't give them much. He was still planning, things were changing, Dream of Spring wasn't even close to being started. He apparently only could give them three concrete pieces of information about the future and the ending, we still don't know what bits those three were.
So although he might've been angry at the way GOT he might've felt like he didn't have a leg to stand on. He had nearly a decade to get ahead but failed. He left them high and dry with nothing to adapt and they had to make do. He wasn't happy, but it was his own fault there was nothing left to adapt. Plus, for the other changes the show made earlier he could understand, ASOIAF was so vast and grand in its stories things needed to be cut, simplified or amalgamated to work in a television format. As well as budget.
But for HOTD the entire story was done. The ending was concrete. There was no reason to start diverting. The story is also a lot more focussed than ASOIAF, and with the limited text available what he had needed to be *expanded* not condensed or cut. D&D had excuses, Martin was partially at fault, but here he knows his ands are fully clean. He did all he could, gave them everything, and they're still meddling and ruining it with no reason.
@@GenGaara I wish people could get over their egos and accept that some people are better at certain things than other people, who are good at their own things. For example, Grrm is a good writer but not great at pacing. D&D were bad at writing but good at assuming they were geniuses.
Malignant ego has caused a lot of embarrassing failures and it's illogical to not acknowledge that
Yeah the HotD story, whilst SOMEWHAT open to historical interpretation, is still a finished piece of the ASOIAF lore that has an “end”. These writers have no excuse for all the blatant changes and poor writing choices.
George is so casually unfiltered about this
He probably regrets not voicing his grievances on season 4-5 publicly and saw where that led the show
@@rampantrambling he truly learns on his mistakes
It's so messy, I love it
@@sauromatae9728 he should learn that it was ultimately his fault for not writing the books
@@sama2086partly yes and I think that one of the reasons why he didn’t criticise later seasons so much but HOTD doesn’t have such excuse
This is why GOT should be animated. Lesser budget problems and you can have as many characters as you want. We can have one person do a different voice for diffent characters like we see on South Park, Family guy, and the Simpsons. It would be cheaper to animate a scene rather than having to built it.
That would be amazing. Recently shows like Arcane and Blue Eye Samurai really made it clear that you can tell very sophisticated stories this way. A high qualitu GOT animated show would be amazing.
I mean, the lore videos are great. They should just make those better. I actually prefer the Lore video re-telling of Blood and Cheese to how it was adapted. Even the art shown would've been amazing references for actual camera shots
Wait until Sora AI comes about and character consistency becomes a thing, you’ll start seeing stuff pop up on RUclips by the fans.
@@Tropical_Toucan Arcane made a single season like 4 years ago. It's not a tenable model for something of this scale whatsoever.
Animated GoT would have been flames no pun intended
I love when people get famous/rich enough to just not care about repercussions or giving platitudes and just go at it unfiltered
He's very old
@@bananaforscale1283 oh yeah, that too!
Hey they need him, he's irreplaceable.
He has nothing to lose.
Hbo needs him more than he needs them
Streaming services like netflix or amazon will gladly pay george BILLIONS to adapt his work into shows.
@@singstreetcar5881 you're damn right. Also, if I were a writer or the showrunner, I would feel shame after reading how much the original author disapproves.
The final point he made is that he has not discussed what Ryan is offering in place of these “butterflies”, not that they haven’t discussed this at all. Seems to me their discussions went nowhere and George is just really upset that his work is being adapted with so many changes again.
I read the book and never actually realize the impact of Maelor existence. I see it clear now. One thing led to another. Maelor death-Haelena death- Shepard rising- Rhaenyra downfall.
Maelor's death also lead to a dark turn to the Reach's plot at Bitterbridge and a turning point in Daeron's character.
no you dont see it, you just want to soy out against the creators over the show. Its really an utterly pointless character and their death happens like 40 chapters before she kills herself, george saying it was the reason is kind of him misremembering his own work. Also telling the 2 year old their mother wanted them dead is such a dumb fuck thing to write, its a 2 year old, they barely understand basic english, they wont remember shit, theyre 2
@@WookieWarriorz I don't hate show. I actually enjoy it so far. I'm just saying as a guy who reads the book, I see what GRRM tries to point out and it makes sense. I'm being positive for season 3 so far.
@@WookieWarriorz ah yes George's doesn't know anything about the story he wrote, you are the one who trully knows about it and came to enlight us about it. And what he says to Maelor is meant to impact Helaena (the adult who can understand what is going on) and plays into what she feels afterwards.
@@WookieWarriorz TL;DR you’re mad the show is getting called out as a trash adaptation, because it is. Cope and seethe.
I feel like George sees the signs of HotD walking the same way GoT did before it eventually crashed and burned. They are making thoughtless, weird changes and inserting too much of their own storytelling into a story that already has meat and bones. I think he is worried about how the conclusion of HotD will effect his legacy, and he knows that it is going somewhere it shouldn't go, and that a lot of fans of the source material don't want it to go.
He is making it clear to everyone that this is not his work and not his story, so they shouldn't equate it with him, and shouldn't expect the level of quality he offers.
Well said, bro!
I agree with his criticism of the Blood and Cheese scene. It would have been stronger as written, although Phia Saban still gave a great performance in the version that made it onto the show.
What performance? running back to her mum bouncing on her Boy Toy?
Yeah. I actually really like how Helaena is given a bit more personality through Phia's performance. The show scene wasn't quite as good as the books scene but it was still good.
That moment wasn't a blip on my radar after it happened and that is the writers fault.
@@datguy3581 What was different on the books?
@@zlg1388 In the books, Blood and Cheese forced Helaena to choose between Jaehaerys and a son the show cut - Maelor. So the horror part is Helaena had to choose which son would die. In the show, they removed that choice aspect by having there be only one boy.
11:10 - You have to imagine that George tried to bring these concerns to Condal and he was ignored. So now he's throwing it out there to try to create some public pressure.
I don’t blame GRRM. The show changed characters & left out Nettles which had a huge impact on Damon. GRRM is right all these changes will have a massive impact on the story going forward
Adatational changes are NOT a reason to do this in public. That was extremly inapprpoiate by him, even if he is correct in most of his criticisms.
@@Alexander-kc8oqfuck it, we ball
@@Alexander-kc8oq He knows at this rate, the storylines moving forward will derail significantly from the books. He wants to set things right.
@@Alexander-kc8oqit was not inappropriate in any way whatsoever
I love it. GRRM didn't have a leg to stand on in criticizing D&D because he doesn't have complete material for S5-8. With F&B Ryan has full material that he's scrapping, and clearly private meetings were not enough to stop him. So GRRM went public with his outrage.
As he should!
GRRM might not think he has enough power/sway in the writers room to make the writers change their decision after game of thrones, it’s sad but this could be what he considers the only way to have them reversed
Meanwhile I was over here fixated on why the heck the younger 3 kids of team back were de-aged by like 5 years each which is going to completely fudge the gullette. How is Aegon III going to escape on Stormcloud, if Stormcloud is a muppet?!
Also Rhaenyras death and Aegons coronation are a big issue now.
Surely the most concerning changes are the supposed death of Sunfyre and replacing Nettles with Baela?
How tf do they replicate Nettles' storyline with Baela? They need a way to keep Baela but get rid of sheep stealer how tf are they gonna do that? It can't be even remotely like the book
More importantly, how is Little Viserys going to father Aegon IV at the age of six?
@@alexjames7144they're replacing Nettles with Rhaena, not Baela. And no, it's not as bad as freaking Aegon III being way too young to be traumatized by what happens to his mother later on. The kid doesn't even look old enough to understand what's going on.
@@Male_Ficent replacing Nettles with Rhaena is terrible because her plot won't make sense, they will have to completely remove Nettle's plot and write one to Rhaena from scratch and whenever these guys write anything for themselves it is usually a disaster as we have seen in this season.
He's entirely right to be mad. Hopefully the gigantic community cope that he thought it was great can now finally be put to sleep.
....but he did thoroughly enjoy the first half of the show lol
@@hez859OP is obviously referring to Season 2 dingus
Yea but now we are gonna get the opposite cope saying that he hates everything when that’s definitely not it
@@hez859 he didn't
@@shadow6024
He should keep his mouth shut.
2:23 If you think Cheese was not so bad, read it again, he threatens Halaena with what Blood will do to Jaehaerya if Halaena doesn’t make her choice quickly. Bad guy.
Very bad guy.
The more I hear of this cheese guy, the less I care for him.
@@kidnamedfinger2840 he's a yellow bastard, that's for sure.
This sounds like the writers are simply not respecting the source material and have shut the creator out of the development process so he's rightfully upset that his life's work is being mistreated.
His last words are warning to the screenwriters, I think. Apparently, they are planning some big changes that Martin considers pretty bad.
dont tell me you're realising this now?
They may try and keep some characters alive like they did with Laenor in S1. I think GRRM is basically saying "it's a tragedy because everyone dies. They need to die"
Cutting Nettles is a big one. I'm betting Martin liked the idea of having a character who challenged preconceived notions of who could ride a dragon. Plus she drives a wedge between Daemon and Rhaenyra at a key point in the story, which leads into Daemon's climatic fight with Aemond. Replacing Nettles with another black character who has nothing in common with her outside of skin color, on the assumption book readers won't know the difference, almost seems kind of racist.
Yeah lol obviously it will get worse as things go on. They never improve
Boom butterfly effect 🤯
That "Helaena killing herself for no reason" plot point just confirms everything I need to know about the future of the show, and validates that my biggest criticism of the show isn't a figment of my imagination. Poor writing choices from the showrunners are the problem; not a writer's strike or the episode count. No amount of live re-writes to a line or two in random scenes would ever make abysmal plot points like that good. Given that Condal is still going to be in charge going forward and these are the types of ideas he's generating (instead of using George's from the books), there's no hope. I'm not waiting four years to see the conclusion of this claptrap. I'm done with HOTD.
PS- maybe George has tried to talk to Condal about things in the past but didn't get anywhere; or maybe Condal misled George when they did speak, so George is throwing his hands up and saying "ok; if that's how it's going to be I'm not gonna hold back". The pregnant Helaena plot Condal told George about, then no trace of it in season 2, could suggest George felt lied to or misled. My bet is, there were probably other things Condal told George were coming down the pyke to ease his apprehension about the changes being made, and those things never materialized or got an ounce of set up; so George felt duped. At that point it would've been incumbent on Condal to contact George and explain (which he likely didn't do); not the other way around. But I digress. Helaena's pregnancy was probably the tip of the iceberg, and George was pi--ed and trying to clue us in without divulging everything. So ultimately, while this is more than George has ever said before, he's still in line with his typical style of dropping thinly veiled clues. In my opinion.
@@ashleyofnaath in your opinion,what is your feelings on GRRM's interpretation of Heleanas arc and Death ? Because they way he layed out all of the dominoes makes sense to me with the Blood and Cheese event mentally breaking Heleana,to the death of Maelor at Bitterbridge pushing her to her death and that spiraling into Rhaenrya losing Kings Landing due GRRM making the amazing distinction that the Commonfolk in the books never loved Rhaenrya and instead loved Gentle Heleana and were absolutely horrified at the announcement and rumors of her death at Rhaenryas orders.
It's all about how the Pieces line up and Ryan Removed such a vital piece by removing Heleana's "Sophie's choice"
Condal forcing spectrum-Helaena on us is proving to be a complete shit show of an idea
@@ExSpoonman The thing is though, that actually could've been brilliant if Condal were better at his job, or had more talented writers to bring that idea to life. Also, I think the books set up that Jaehaera is autistic; and autism can be genetic; so I don't mind the change to make Helaena neuro-divergent as well. Condal was just the wrong guy to do it.
@@ashleyofnaath idk about Neuro divergent but I wasn't personally opposed to Heleana being the Cassandra of Troy of this Story.
But they've abandoned the tragic fact that no one was supposed to believe in her visions and they've gone ahead and had her just spoil Aemonds ending to his face and everyone taking her visions way too seriously
@@dominiqueodom3099 Another channel, the dragon demands, did a video about this topic a while back. In it he said he tweeted Linda and Elio, asking specifically about this, and Elio actually responded and confirmed that yes, Helaena and Jaehaera are what would be considered autistic by today's standards; it's just there's no in-universe term for it. This would be seperate from her dragon dreams or whatever the he-l magical capabilities the show has given her.
I have NO sympathy for Ryan Condel, he is the one who claims to LOVE ASOIAF but he's also the one actively and consistently getting things wrong. Looking at you, "Valyrian steel armor from Aegon's time in Valyria". Could George have talked about this privately with him? Sure. Would that have had actual effects on the writing going forward? Questionable. HBO's ASOIAF team needs to figure itself out and have an open line of communication between themselves and George. As is seems every issue that occurs when HBO adapts something is due to "lack of communication".
I am still pissed on GRRMs behalf for saying show Lohar "almost feels like one of those colorful characters from GRRMs world" when they just took everything from Racallio Ryndoon and slapped it on Lohar. The audacity of mashing two characters from the book and then to pretend you invented it.
For me the biggest issue is easily that they turned the dance into alicent and rhaenyra fan fic
"And there are larger and more toxic butterflies to come, if HOUSE OF THE DRAGON goes ahead with some of the changes being contemplated for seasons 3 and 4… "
🍿
Yep. The craziest part are the delusional fans who are taking the blog post and surmising that B&C and Maelor are the only issues he has with the show. It isn't. The rest simply hasn't been adapted yet.
GRRM chose violence.
Is there a possibility that maybe he didn’t openly criticize GoT because he contractually couldn’t? And maybe this time around when he agreed to the HotD show he signed a contract in which he could speak freely.
Bingo, finally found the answer. It's always about the money
100%
Also the GOT writers didn't have his books to lean on (at the end). For HOTD they do, which makes it even more egregious to go off script
@ChezzyKnytt thats false. Grrm gave them all the info. He gave them info for a lot more seasons. They *chose* to ignore it because they wanted to go work on star wars. D&D are 1000 times worse than HotD writers
@@im2arrogant118 Yeah, he gave them info such as bran is king, daenerys will burn Kings landing, hold the door etc. They did those things. He didn't give them the details that lead to those conclusions so that they made sense. Or he did but he did so badly, which makes sense since hes still figuring out those details himself.
The behind the scenes drama between George, HBO and the series producers and writers is a better drama than the actual show
I think GRRM feels betrayed by Condal not sticking to having Maelor in the show later. He was probably "tricked" like that a lot during GoT & no longer is able to give the benefit of the doubt in the way he used to. I think he's talked to Condal about this recently when hearing the S3 stuff & feels like "well, if they won't listen to me, maybe they'll listen to others when I outline what is happening & why it's important." It feels to me like a desperate attempt to right the show as it goes down the same path GoT did.
yea and it wont really work sure they will change and maybe add maelor now but george wrote this hoping they probably wont make any more dumb changes but its a losing battle as long as these "writers" still lead the show. i fear they are simply going to postpone the changes they are planning but still do it in a different way
10:48 maybe GRRM already tried talking to the writers/hbo or whoever and they didn’t care or wouldn’t budge on stuff so he is coming to us for help
George nailed every decision Condal has made for the worse especially Maelor. Maelor being cut from the show is gonna ruin so many events even though he himself doesn't do much and I think George isn't done yet because he didn't mention Alicent and Rhaenyra.
Condal is just as much of a hack as D&D were, people simply haven't realised it yet.
I'm surprised Maelor did not exist yet we saw Ser Rickard Thorne accompany Alicent during her picnic in the woods. Their storyline was connected and was also tied to Daeron.
Also Aegon the younger being currently 5 years old screws up so much.
Think about the impact the one bastard baby of Roberts in Littlefingers brothel had in Game of Thrones? His death ordered by either Cersei or Joffery had more impact over the series than the goddamn Night King Did if we're being honest
No, Maelor is quite expandable. Still Martin has all rights to bash the incompetence of Condal
It's simple to see why he's so direct and unprecedented with his commentary. He despises the changes, and might be hoping if he publicly skews it, Condal and the team can course correct before it's too late.
They can't write themselves out of making Aegon the younger 4.
I think Martin might be playing it smart here. If he was really unhappy with the changes you’d expect him to handle it behind the scenes with Ryan Condal. And maybe he did, but maybe Ryan wasn’t taking his feedback seriously enough. By calling it out publicly, Martin could be trying to pressure the showrunners to stick closer to his books. It’s like he’s using fan support to force their hand and keep them from making changes that he thinks could mess up the story.
I think he should dig more at HBO honestly, his creative work is saving their platform so they should give them the largest budget possible. I think the last update I saw said they have at least 5 ASOIAF shows in some stage of planning or even production
@@Grace-er9ep They will all be so bad as long as HBO still hires nepo writers and does not undergo a massive change they really screwed the pooch with season 2 if george himself does not have faith with the planned changes
@@acs7167 sadly I agree
My take on it is George, as a creator is being defined by the television shows which aren’t his actual written word of how he’s wanting to tell his story. I think that is creating this anger or frustration in what he perceives as a slight on his work.
it is tho this is marketted as his work yet it is simply another story with the same characters the only thing the show needed to add was compelling dialogues and establish relationships yet they still make changes and every single significant change is just for the worse
It really feels like the writers for these shows are loyal to George's vision right up until the point he's no longer looking over their shoulder, at which point they bust out the fanfic scripts.
Cant believe they had the budget to do that stupid bloodraven whitewalker sequence but not enough to hire a small kid as a background character. These are excuses they just want to write their lesbian fanfic
He hit all the points on the head:
1) HBO cutting budget
2) First couple of episodes being done well, save for B&C. The changes to Helaena's character and her children are ... Not great Because they affect the rest of the story.
3) He will get to the rest of the season perhaps in another blog post.
It think we can all agree that we were not happy with D&D's handling of George's characters in later seasons.
The question which you posed is one, I think, you have the answer to.
Remember how George Lucas was treated by Disney for his outline of episode 7?
Yeah.
The whole "Wanting to avoid traumatizing a young actor" bit is so dumb. Do the people trying to make that point not understand that the children know it's all make believe? They're aren't ACTUALLY killing one of them, their mother actual mother isn't actually choosing a child to have killed. There are tons of examples of child actors absolutely having a blast acting out their characters death scene, or interacting with sculpts of the fake body parts that the prop department made. It really seems like whoever wrote the scene just assumed they could write it better than George, and it flopped hard.
@@northerner3340 has anyone seen the goddamn movie Childs Play? That kid Andy was hunted by a killer doll and he legitimately had no problems with it because he knew " it doesnt scare me because when the cameras stop rolling he stops moving and I know it's not real."
This omission of a Maelor also stunts Daeron’s future character. Daeron was the one to initiate Bitterbridge’s sack, and if filmed correctly, could’ve been a great opportunity to give the viewers a decision on if to flip and side with the Greens.
"to flip and side with the Greens" that is exactly why those idiots did what they did. No no no can't have people siding against ThE QueEn, tHE RiGhtFul hEir
@@docmitchell4658 I genuinely think we’re never gonna see Daeron. He’s just gonna remain off screen, and we’ll keep hearing about him.
With how much he deeply focuses on B&C and Maelor being cut, i have a feeling George will drown us in the ocean of blogs. Anyone else feel the same?
god, i wish
Yeah this was a weird amount of focus on just blood and cheese considering it's not even the biggest and more ridiculous change in season 2.
I think he was planning on writing more posts criticizing the changes that were made, but he might be changing his mind after he was probably forced to delete his post.
@@alexjames7144 ig he is going to write blog about everything that happened in season 2 & he starts with the first event of B&C.
He also shows how a small change can affect future events, for example now as their no maelor Halena has no reason to suicide.
So if everything goes well more blogs are going to come
long time book fan here : real talk I've got my critiques of GRRM but he's a goddamn LEGEND for this, one man standing up to the frauds that are the hbo writers
It's not like the source material is too long to adapt to screen. It's basically a short story.
They should have just adapted the entire thing verbatim.
@@richtea615
You really can read the most unhinged nonsense on here.
I think these 8 episode seasons are messing with the writers plans. They wanted 22 more episodes and are only getting 16.
@@blaubeer8039
It would be very funny if the fans give us their own *faithful* adaptation, like Stephen King's anti - Kubrick adaptation of The Shining.
@@blaubeer8039Honestly the show being narrated by Gyldayn with occasional flash-forwards to him parsing the narrative together like 150 years after the Dance is not the worst idea I’ve ever heard.
The source material isnt even really a story. Its the bullet points of one. Its good for hte outline of a tv show, but there is no meat on the bones. Geroge knew this when approving an adaption for it. If they adapted verbatim literrally nothing in the show would make any sense.
Martin must've had a falling out with the showrunner for him to go so scorched earth like this in public
5:42 i submit that Rick Thorne is important in a broader sense in that we see his descendent, the infamous Alliser being such a rotten guy in the 'main series.' It's a subtle but important touch to depict a brave, loyal Thorne
"Helaena dies for no reason" well yeah... She kind of forgot about the love for her children.
I don't particularly let the writers strike excuse slide. The source material should have been enough, also just the absolute brain rot decisions don't seem to be from a lack of writers but the choice of writers.
aptly put but we cant point out the obvious of what these nepo writers do and changing the entire narrative of rhaenerya and alicent being the same age wasnt to tell a more interesting story but so the lesbian writer gets to make her own fanfiction while selling it as being GoT
“The post that was promised”
@@foukyng
Heavens!
It was so much worse than I feared.
Casual spoilers for next season.
Absolutely dreadful.
@@alanpennie8013 facts
"Why is Reynes of Castamere playing?" - HBO once this was posted
George just went fully unhinged 💀
@@alanpennie8013 You're a bit daft, I can tell. You're out here trying to pretend HotD is good and that the criticisms of *the literal author and creator of the entire world* are somehow bad or invalid.
@@alanpennie8013 They brought it on themselves with their trash adaptation.
@@Al-ji4gd
Real pity I can't block stupid comments like this.
George said Dracarys
@@darthJ9 eh if you follow the whole years of drama about stuff like this, it makes total sense he would have some long-simmering issues with how they adapt his works
i'm so grateful you captured this before the post was taken down! it's refreshing to hear GRRMs more candid thoughts on the changes with the show.
george hasn't been listened to or respected by any of these show runners since like season 3 of got. they've butchered 2 of his works now and if they plan to continue adapting HIS works he will make them listen. well done george. way to stand up for yourself and your fans.
His criticism and how he wrote it proofs, that George really loves his story and his characters and all the other things of this world he created.
I think we won't see the baby scene in season 3 - I mean, it would make Rhaenyra look bad and we all know the show tries everything to make Rhaenyra the best queen ever...
I wish you people would stop pretending rhenyrea is the only character who's been white washed and didn't ignore the changes they made to other characters, they didn't remove maelor to make rhenyrea look good they removed him because they were lazy .
@@thatoneblackdude3333amen. These people that "picked sides" are annoying bc Alicent is the most white washed character and the only character that's close to her..is Aegon. Their book counterparts are waaaaaaaayyyyyy worse than their show versions.
But. Yes. It's only Rhanerya. Lol. Smh.
@@thisguy8106They made Alicent a hypocritical mess who has inverted many of her core characteristics since in season 1. They still also clearly hold her chiefy culpable, while we are being fed the new crap of Rhaenyra and Viserys never wanting the crown. Aegon is still out of all the historical recollections, Mushroom centric(the outlandish side of things) , well many of his opinions on the more outlandish stuff about Rhaenyra is considered just to be propaganda. What bad things outside of episode 7 of Season 2 has Rhaenyra really done? Aegon is still a ra*** and fathers children in child fighting pits, essentially squashing any level of deeper sympathy for his character. Sure, other characters were changed, but not retroactively to come of solely better and not multiple times. Legit, if Daemon was not on team black, there wouldn't be anymore morally jaded characters.
@@thisguy8106how is hating bastards worse than killing your own son?
The show isn't afraid to make Rhaenyra look bad. They had her kill a servant on Driftmark and then trap 30 people in a cave with Vermithor to be picked off one by one while she justified it by saying its the will of the gods. I really don't think the writers are trying to whitewash Rhaenyra. I think they're just trying to make her decline more gradual.
They changed blood and cheese because “they didn’t have the budget” for a 3rd child actor? Floored.
But had the funds to film a mud fighting scene that added nothing lulz for certain fans.
Who said that?!
i appreciate the quickness
I'm 100% on GRRM side here. Imagine your life's work being shit on yet a again by high horse show runners. This court of public opinion was likely the best way to move this show back into line. A private meeting would have been ignored. This won't be
I feel like they have had these talks about what they shouldn't change and he's just fed up with the writers room so hes airing out his anger or frustrations that they are doing exactly what DnD did, when he was probably promised by Ryan that he wouldnt shut him out like they apparently did.
Theres a reason George said at the beginning of the season he wasnt coming back for S3 just like he did for S4 of GoT.
Even if he took the post down potentially because of spoilers maybe? I'm glad to see an author protecting his source material and discussing that in details, writers need to be reminded that they can't just disregard the source material authors and issue changes without their approval.
He's finally voicing his opinions, he was quiet about the GoT show but not this time. Beautiful.
Because this was infinitely worse than GOT. At least I could follow GOT, on HoTD it's very hard to because of the inconsistency.
My hypothesis on GRRM is going nuclear becuase he did already have these conversations with the show writers... and they didnt listen. He knows he cant convince them, so he is making his opinion public. He is betting that others feel the same and that the resulting public backlash will force the showwriters to take steps to more faithfully follow the source material.
tbh Ryan can be mad about this, but he has no right to be. he's adapting another person's work. it's his responsibility to inform George of any changes big or small and hear George out in his entirety. is George unprofessional for airing the dirty laundry like this? yes, to a degree. but I think given how much diplomacy he gave the GOT writers, it's pretty clear that his line of communication with the HOTD writers has failed and he sees no other ways to force them back to the table and listen to him. let's also not forget that people blamed him for "approving" the later seasons of GOT. people are still saying the HOTD scripts were approved by him because he's a producer and how the writers kept saying they got approvals from him (apparently not).
GRRM isn't going behind their backs. They DID talk about it, they DIDN'T listen to him. So he's going to us. Good for George. He needs this. We need this.
Facts. I can’t stand the normies that expect the creative genius that made the effing universe to just shut up. They really think hbo knows better bc reasons. Clowns
I genuinely think the reason George is doing this in public is that he thinks it’s the only way he can bring change to season 3 and 4, he doesn’t want to see the same thing happen to this as that which happened to GoT. If he just talked to Ryan he probably thinks nothing would change, same with D&D. Like you said he’s not done something like this before, it might be the only way to save it.
He's right and he should be allowed to say it much louder
George like the rest of us are tired of needless changes to HIS story. Maelor missing has huge story implications, removing Nettles has huge dragon lore implications. Turning Alicent and Rhae into BFFs also has massive implications. All of these changes the story drastically and make it more disjointed and inconsistent.
HBO thinks they know Westeros better than George. Legally though, George might be apologizing soon. He took their money, so he has to play their game. 😢
Honestly from season 1 I believed they could have pulled off Rhaenyra Alicent friendship, it adds another layer of tragedy to the Dance instead of sterotypical evil stepmom Alicent. And it would have been so easy to actually break them with Luke and Jaehaerys but they just didn't and now we have to suffer.
Also there isno way they can write themselves out of Aegon being currently 5 when he should be 10.
HBO won’t do eff all to George. They can make threats but what can they actually do. Their whole future is based around doing a bunch of ice and fire spin offs. If they want to start a war w the creator or the Martin estate that will only b to their detriment. George also has enough bread now to engage them in as much litigation as they wish, and he will likely win.
2:10 George is not saying that Blood is innately cruel. He is saying that he is a FORMER [operative word here] gold cloak, who lost his cloak for beat*ng a woman to d+*th, hinting at bitterness alongside his cruelty stemming from issues with self control and anger issues. That is very different from innate.
Honestly the whole thing feels more like a reflection of his current state more than anything. He’s not been doing great over the last few years, he’s lost a lot of friends and the pressure to get those books out is definitely affecting him.
I feel this combined with the recent stuff about legacy he’s been talking about shows he’s realized it’s very unlikely he finishes the series and that ultimately the shows are going to end up being his legacy.
We never saw this type of stuff for GoT despite it having far more disastrous changes. Him posting something like this is pretty much unprecedented.
It’s just strange and in my eyes probably only really served to fuel the flames of further toxic discourse about the season and potentially hinder further asoiaf adaptations, which he probably realized hence the deletion lol.
agreed, especially with the last bit. the discourse around hotd has been unbearable lately, and this only fuelled it (especially considering that a lot of people seemingly didn't read the blog properly at all, and just went straight for "LOL EVEN GRRM HATES THE SHOW ITS SUCH A DUMPSTER FIRE STOP THE COPE")
@@juiceyborger yeah it’s been very insufferable, so I really don’t understand why he stoked the flames like this. Especially considering back in the winter he made a post lamenting about anti-fans and the overall toxicity of discussions of shows and movies on social media lol.
Most people don’t read his blog, aside from this one particular post so they don’t really realize that in July he made an entire post about the very episode in question here episode 2 and also episode 3 where he was praising them both to the moon, calling it a great start to the season & talking up the shows creative vision when it comes to characters. Like even in that post he had brought up “Maelor the Missing” and eluded to eventually making a post about him.
There was just a massive tonal shift between the two post, it like almost gives you whiplash if you read them back to back, which is kinda concerning.
Lmao are u a rep if the hbo legal team? The creator of the source material and universe should just shut his mouth as another one of his works is going to be destroyed again? U realize George can disagree w the nepo writing staff, piggybacking off his creative genius, desperately validating their egos w alterations to the narrative that make it worse. S1 was great, s2 was mid af from pacing to changes, esp if u know what all has to happen before the end. Maybe ur happy with mediocre ice and fire spin offs, but a lot of us don’t care if it has a chilling effect if they’re gonna keep giving them the Disney treatment. Not everyone can distinguish quality from mediocrity i suppose. How DARE George speak his mind and the truth. No. He’s held his tongue for too long and now he must speak his mind.
I’m legit shocked at all of these huge, multi year productions that seemingly don’t lock down a full series outline before they start shooting. The Star Wars sequels come to mind. It just feels like bad project management to not know where you’re going. Laying the tracks in front of the train.
I think George held back on this type of reaction during GOT because perhaps he partially blamed himself for not finishing the books. HOTD is different, though. George actually did finish F&B. The producers and writers of the show are simply ignoring his input and rewriting the story he has worked so hard to create.
The fact about Dan and Dave is George can't criticize it because a lot of the blame should be directed at George and his snails pace writing speed.
In the last episode Alicent gave Helaena a cup of tea, told her "drink this". She held it but didn't drink it. then they got interrupted by Aemond. It gave me the vibe that it was abortion-tea but I'm not sure. So Helaena could be pregnant.
How is she even pregnant when they clearly show no interaction between aegon and helaena? Stop the cope that the writers are actually planning to take all these small things we notice to mean anything. GOT was the same
Also, thank you for showing the whole text on screen. I havent seen anyone else do that yet. It was helpful to me to read what he said verbatim.
Not to mention the lord of bitterbridge, Lady Caswell, then takes Maelor’s head and sends it to Rhaenyra and when she receives the head she reportedly smiled. And then the bitterbridge lord sends Maelor’s body to his Daeron, who we still haven’t seen yet, who’s army in camped nearby and he responds by burning bitterbridge down to the ground on top of his dragon while his army sacks the town and then goes to the Caswell’s castle where Lady Caswell begs for her life and the lives of her family and Daeron responds by saying he will show her the same mercy she showed his nephew and she then hangs herself from the castle walls in hope of saving her children’s lives.
Something most people don’t understand when reading this blog is that George isn’t just focusing on Blood and Cheese, while dismissing the numerous other faults. He’s trying to say how a small detail like Maelor being absent, is akin to a butterfly in the butterfly effect. Maelor’s removal will be the catalyst for the show going down in flames.
8:40 Well my presumption with Helaena in the show is she offs herself because her dragon dreams says she does. And thus it must be.
if you find it so 'strange' and out of character that George is bringing this to the public instead of Ryan, why are you struggling to put the obvious two-and-two together? do you think that he isn't experiencing the same level of disregard that George Lucas got from Bob Iger and Disney, that Sapkowski got from Netflix Witcher, or that GRRM himself got from D&D when he wished for more time to do a proper ending for GoT?
the man is seeing history repeat itself and he's determined not to stay silent and play nice this time around, and i fully support it. i want more authors to burn it all down around these egotistical hack showrunners who think they're the best thing since sliced bread for taking butchering someone else's art and taking all the credit.
All the people siding w the show runners and hbo are the br@indead normies that think “oooo me like rhanyra, hbo so good, hbo do my favorite dragon show too, got s1-8 all equally good” type sht. I’m glad Martin is FINALLY speaking his mind. These hacks think they can do it better than a proven creative genius. S1 of hotd was solid, s2 was a disaster if u know how the story is SUPPOSED to develop. And hbo is apparently broke af now? How are u gonna throttle the budget of ur biggest property? Honestly eff these streaming platforms as production companies. Martin should have just collabed w a Japanese or Korean studio, done it animated, and theyd make it faithful af
I just feel like George is very stressed out lately, from that one rumored conversation about fearing for his legacy and how people will remember him when he's gone, to seeing how fans responded to the later seasons of Game of Thrones, now watching fans start to lose faith in the second major adaptation of his work, and of course with the ever-present sword of Damocles that is Winds hanging over his head, I feel for him. I imagine this blog post was coming from a place of not wanting his magnum opus to be remembered as that thing everyone loved but later just fizzled out. I also imagine it was somewhat cathartic for him to just admit that he's not entirely happy with how his works are being treated.
yea the shows undeniably love of Rhaenyra basically means they gutted any plot that doesn't make her look amazing, this conflict is supposed to be about 2 morally grey sides, not the blacks being perfect and root-able at every turn
Bruh he fully went NUCLEAR here... he fully snapped. Kinda crazy he said nothing like this about GoT s7 or 8? Maybe because he doesnt wanna spoil his unreleased books by talking about what is supposed to happen at that point in the story?
when you say Condal would be mad because Martin should have reached out first it seems like Martin already did and his criticism/suggestions were not heeded. This seems like a last attempt to change course of the show by creating public outcry.
It seems like George sees HotD going down the same road as late game of thrones and is just frustrated with being mislead
Honestly it’s kinda nice to see him care so much
I think people should stop saying s8 was bad because of changes made in that season. If one wants to understand why s8 is so bad, it is because of changes made in PREVIOUS seasons. And that's what gets me. Many people still love the Battle of the Bastards, accept the whole Sansa/Littlefinger plot, Talissa Maegyr's existance and Stoneheart's removal...
tldr; s8 is bad because changes made in s3 onwards broke the story. It's easy to bash the widely unpopular season but forget we all loved and accepted the bad shit before
people tend to always have short memories. Everyone hoped and coped that every small thing would lead to something yet it didnt because the show had no ending but HOTD does and they are doing the exact opposite of whatever d&d did right and wrong
Not really, s8 is nonsensical on its own, while all things you mentioned were fundamental in the declining quality of season 5,6 and 7.
While HotD s2 had problems dating back to s1
@@ciii4361 you saying the problems that arose in prior seasons, like the decisions of abandoning plotlines, didn't affect the quality of season 8?
@@cipher48 yes, but there was also a drop from s7, which wasn’t necessary, for example the plot of the Others was totally destroyed but could have come up with something
@@ciii4361 what about Quaithe? What about Stoneheart? What about Aegon? These characters are instrumental for the development of others. All of the above interfere with the Long Night. Why the hell did Jaime return to Cersei? Did he learn something in the riverlands? Then why all of a sudden he would care about what's happening North and the coming of the Others?
11:00
Maybe GRRM knows, after everything that's happened between him and HBO, that polite professional conversations with people like Condal don't work. Shifting public opinion will work, because people like GRRM more than they like HBO or Condal, and he has every reason and every right to use that fact to achieve a worthy end - a faithful adaptation, and finally someone putting their foot down in regards to what corporate studios like Disney and HBO can and cannot do to beloved franchises.
Honestly I love him for this post even though they made him take it down. He's making shit public to make waves and considering how HBO has massacred his work in the past I support him
“He’s being very candid”
Yeah, probably breach of contract candid 😂 he started nerding out and accidentally said WAY too much
I hate how Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon throw out a lot of things, only to be replaced by filler.
For once, I'm siding with George on this one. This is the only play he has. Revealing the dumbassery while there's still time to course correct. It's a desperate play, but I get it.
I have a few thoughts on this, I do find it a bit odd that George RR is doing this, but I find it more odd he seems privy to the script and isn't under a NDA, or seems to not care about it if he is. But, I think I get why he would speak out, and on his blog specifically. For one thing, this show got a lot of premature good will based on George's involvement and backing it and even supporting the
"this is what the history book was trying to portray" telling of the show; so I understand why if the show has begun doing things that he fundamentally disagrees with that he would feel compelled to have his disagreement be known. Second, while I won't say his blog isn't exactly unpopular or anything, the chances of even half of the major TV audience that watched House of the Dragon reading his blog is very small, I feel like he is okay saying this somewhere with a relatively smaller audience. Finally, I think he's playing a hand that maybe he felt he should've during Game of Thrones but didn't, trying to see if he can get the show to change course somewhat.
The reasons he’s publicly airing out his dirty laundry could be that Condal simply doesn’t listen when GRRM advises him why not to make certain changes. I think us book readers have also foreseen all these butterfly effect changes for awhile. From what GRRM is saying, it’s likely that he voiced his concern before, and given the disaster we got this season, it’s apparent that he a was ignored.
Go off, George.
Also Ryan Condal and Sara Hess did more damage to HotD than the cutting of the last 2 episodes. I'm tired of having writing rooms full of people who refuse to respect the source material.
Ryan and Sara weren’t responsible for cutting the last two episodes! They had 10 episodes planned initially! HBO executives are the ones who came in and cut both the episode count and budget!
@@InNotOf395 That's why the comment said "more [...] than".
3:17. It doesn't have to traumatized young actors. They just have to explain what is happening to said kids, run it through a couple times and perhaps gotten a slightly older kid who looked younger. That's what they do for horror moves and plenty of kids love to "play pretend".
i dont think it's weird at all, he chose diplomacy 10 years ago and he saw that it got worse and worse leading to a universally hated final season. This time, he thinks there's still time to steer the ship so he's chosen violence
Facts. When playing nice doesn’t work it’s time for hardball, politics, and veiled threats 😂…And I’m not even joking tho
4:39 it seems obvious why he's doing it. He's fed up and rightly so!