torsdag 29 november 2018

Game of Thrones seasons four and five: The Great Games

Things are looking well on the belated watching of Game of Thrones front. I got through seasons four and five at quite a pace, compared to season three which was really hard to get through. Though season four was more satisfying than season five, they both proved ideal TV entertainment for ordinary workdays when you don't crave anything too emotionally engaging. At this rate, I have a fair chance of catching up on the whole series before season eight starts airing (and it will probably be some time before it's accessible to Swedes, anyway).

Not emotionally engaging, I hear you say? But what about those dramatic set pieces from both seasons, where characters we have reason to root for are betrayed, raped, killed or put through the wringer in other ways? I know, but though the characterisation has improved a lot since season one - where I was almost gleeful about how clumsy it was - and there are now several characters I would describe as likeable, interesting and/or funny, I'm still wary of getting too attached. I wonder if this is just me, keeping my distance because of the character-murdering nature of the show, or if there actually is an estrangement effect built into it. Either way, watching Game of Thrones makes me feel like a spectator at the gladiator games so abhorred by Daenerys Targaryen: I'm absorbed by the drama  played out in front of me and mostly pick a side, but if the combattant I favour loses I shrug and move on to the next fight.

And like a gladiator game spectator, I sometimes feel a little dirty for watching the thing. The show's creators could, I suppose, explain the reason behind most of the individual gasp-inducing scenes we see by way of the dramatic payoffs they lead to. The accumulative impression you get, however, is that the show has a tendency to go for shock value just because it can, because it's the gritty Game of Thrones, isn't it? This impression is strengthened by the number of times a meal is made of some particular character's plight. I felt queasy twice while watching season five and was close to pushing the forward button (which hitherto I've only done once - during the castration scene and the prelude to it in season three). One time was when we see a nasty bit character hitting under-age girls in particularly questionable circumstances (he then gets his eyes gouged out and his throat cut, and no, that wasn't nice to watch either), the other when Cersei, admittedly a bitch of the first order, goes through a humiliation scene which goes on forever, and just so happens to be in the buff the whole time. We didn't have to witness either of these happenings in quite such excruciating detail. The tragic death in the penultimate episode was pretty drawn-out as well, but I sat through it, in my desensitised Game of Thrones state, mainly wondering whether the show's writers were referencing Greek mythology or were just complete bastards.

And yes, I know that the TV series is based on a series of novels by George RR Martin, and that the reason bad things happen in the series may well be because they happen in the books. Nevertheless, I suspect the TV series has a flavour of its own which isn't always pleasant. And it's not as if the payoffs we get really need all that build-up. It's a powerful image to see Sansa Stark and Theon Greyjoy prepared to leap off a steep wall because they realise that yes, there is such a thing as a fate worse than death. But did we really have to follow them every painful step of the way there?         

I should stop whingeing now, because I really enjoyed these seasons of Game of Thrones, and there was nothing in them that disgusted me as much as the Theon plot in season three. The wallowing-in-violence factor probably wouldn't bother me so much if I didn't feel that the show has been hyped for its flaws rather than its strengths. It's a good show despite all the slicing and dicing, not because of it, and it's largely due to the superlative acting throughout. In season five, we got such delights as Jonathan Pryce as the most charming and avuncular implacable fanatic you are ever likely to meet. I'm also pleased to see Anton Lesser as a disgraced scientist and friend of Cersei's, who as soon as he has the opportunity covers her up after her ordeal. It's moments like that which make me think that somewhere buried beneath all its self-imposed edginess this series has a heart after all.