Impressions of GoT ep 1

[salinea]

Generally speaking I think the Lannisters are great. Jaime's perfect : arrogant bastard but charismatic (and loving of his family); Tyrion's utterly awesome, and this Cersei I'll probably love much more than the book version.

The Starks feel a bit dull overall. Arya and Bran shone well enough. Cat's been changed a lot from the book version, I'm not sure if that's for the best; we'll have to see. Ned, Jon and Robb - don't have a very definite impression yet. Sansa I felt was actually a bit more dislikeable than in the books, even at that point. Then again, we didn't have any PoV of her at that point, but here the little we have is her being very silly and (justly) annoyed at her sister.

Robert's great - almost likeable in his Robert-ness, while very faithful to the character.

Loved the number of smalls moments from eye contacts, like the Ned & Cersei gaze. And Cersei & Cat with Cersei totally uninterested then being condescendingly nice to Sansa XD (I fear I may ship it - oh well). We even had Tyrion and Sandor already exchanging barbs ♥ Makes this fangirl happy.

Viserys is perfect, and the actress for Daenarys is great despite the little the role let her do so far. I'm not sure what I think about the choices of change they made to the narrative so far, so I'll reserve judgement until we see more of it. The lack of the riding her Silver, "gave me the wind" line was sorely missed though (hey, it's the one scene of the book i ever fanarted). The Dothrakis come across as even worse caricatures than they were in the books though :(

Visuals overall : I was very impressed by the first scene beyond the Wall; but less so by other stuff. Though it's still amazing to see serious, adult fantasy on the screen. I was worried about the Targaryen hair looking very silly from the stills, but it worked well enough (though Viserys' eyebrow was distracting). Lots of boobs though - I'm not sure it's more than what's implied in the books generally speaking but it's more striking in visual media.

I'm optimistic the show can be great once they find their tone more, it's a solid if a little bit bumbling beginning.

Comments

[scriva.livejournal.com]

I like almost everyone of the cast. For some reason, I don't have really clear mental pictures of anyone in the books, so the actors fill the their respective roles quite fine, even though I like some scenes more than others. I think the Starks are supposed to be somewhat dull, especially compared to the Lannisters. ;)

I'm so-so on Dany's wedding. I always had problems with the instant-bonding with the horse and Dany being a perfect rider right away, so I didn't miss the scene. There was still a sense of wonder when she understood that the horse was her gift. So right now, I'm more curious than anything to see how or if they I can manage to really build Dany's character.

[etrangere.livejournal.com]

I like most of the casting as well - they don't always work well with my mental picture (in so far as I have one, I'm not a very visual person), but in terms of presence most of them work well.

haha, the instant bonding was a bit... mary sue sparkly princess in a way? But I'm a sucker for magical horsies so yeah :3 other people seem more fond of the direwolves than I am OTOH. ASOIAF does have its part of cheese on such things.
But yeah, I'm curiously how they'll render Dany's story; it's an important one.