TV Series Review: GAME OF THRONES (Season 1, Episode 1)

Game Of Thrones
Season 1, Episode 1
Starring Sean Bean, et al. An HBO show.
Genre: medieval fantasy
Format: dvd box set

About Game Of Thrones:

Game of Thrones is an American epic fantasy television series created for HBO by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss. It is an adaptation of A Song of Ice and Fire, George R. R. Martin's series of fantasy novels, the first of which is titled A Game of Thrones. Filmed in a Belfast studio and on location elsewhere in Northern Ireland, Malta, Croatia, Iceland, and Morocco, it premiered on HBO in the United States on April 17, 2011. The series has been renewed for a fourth season, to air in 2014.

The series, set on the fictional continents of Westeros and Essos at the end of a decade-long summer, interweaves several plot lines. The first follows the members of several noble houses in a civil war for the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms; the second covers the rising threat of the impending winter and the mythical creatures of the North; the third chronicles the attempts of the exiled last scion of the realm's deposed dynasty to reclaim the throne. Through its morally ambiguous characters, the series explores issues of social hierarchy, religion, civil war, sexuality, crime and punishment. It is the most recent big-budget work to have contributed to the popularity of the fantasy genre in mainstream media.

Game of Thrones has obtained an exceptionally broad and active international fan base. It received widespread acclaim by critics, although its use of nudity has been criticized. The series won numerous awards and nominations — including two Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Drama Series, a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Television Series – Drama, a Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation in Long Form, and a Peabody Award. Among the ensemble cast, Peter Dinklage won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series and the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Series, Miniseries or Television Film for his role as Tyrion Lannister.

Source: Info in the About Game Of Thrones was taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_of_Thrones on 16/04/2013.

Review:

I bought this DVD box set because the hype looked good. But when I started watching this show I could barely get through the first episode and I have to have lots of breaks because the show does not keep my attention and my mind keeps wandering away while I was watching. I was thinking that this might be one of those shows that gets better as it went along but the first episode is not that riveting. An audience has to persevere to get through the first dvd... and am still waiting for the good part to appear.

Let's talk about casting. I think they hit paydirt when they took on Sean Bean, he fits the role like a glove. Like he was born to be Ned Stark. Now Daenerys Targaryen is described as a very beautiful woman such that her beauty is supposed to be renowned in all the realms. Emilia Clarke is pretty enough but her beauty is "homey" and more like a "girl-next-door" kind. Not the kind which is renowned in all the realms. It didn't fit. Now I haven't read the book, so those of you who have read the book and watched the show, tell me what you think of Emilia Clarke as Daenerys Targaryen? Speaking of the books, George R.R. Martin is currently writing book 6 of the 7-book series. Book 5 took him 5 years to write. If we follow that pattern, does it mean that book 6 will get published in what? 2015? Book 7 in 2020? What happens to the show then? Stalled? Cancelled? Or the show diverges from the books and gets it's own story? ...and this series gets an alternate story? I think I will wait for the answer to that question before proceeding with this dvd box set because then I can decide better whether this show is worth wasting my time with or not. As it stands, I can barely stay with the show halfway through Episode 2 before abandoning it entirely.

Empirical Evaluation:
Attention to details = 4
Acting = 3.5
Cinematography = 4
Casting = 3
Character development = 3
Story itself = 2.5
World building = 4

Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 cherries