• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Game of Thrones 2.2 - "The Night Lands" - Rate and discuss

Grading


  • Total voters
    43
I really hope Saan isn't a sign that they're going to make Lys, Mereen, etc. all a stand-in for Africa. The fact that those cultures are predominantly white (and, in the case of Lys, very very white) is one of the few things keeping their cultures from looking like lazy orientalist stereotypes. It is the one inarguable flaw in the books IMO and for them to pile on by making them the only notable non-white cultures in the show will be a damn shame. I'm practically the last person to call racism on entertainment, but this irks the hell out of me.
 
I really hope Saan isn't a sign that they're going to make Lys, Mereen, etc. all a stand-in for Africa. The fact that those cultures are predominantly white (and, in the case of Lys, very very white) is one of the few things keeping their cultures from looking like lazy orientalist stereotypes. It is the one inarguable flaw in the books IMO and for them to pile on by making them the only notable non-white cultures in the show will be a damn shame. I'm practically the last person to call racism on entertainment, but this irks the hell out of me.
Judging by the castings for the Quarth characters, they won't go this way. Pentos also didn't look that African to me ...
 
Pentos, Braavos, etc. (the free Cities) are all just across the narrow sea, so it makes sense that they would be pretty comparably white since that is where the First Men and the Andals came from. Lys is a little island just south of the narrow sea so it is a bit more flexible. Once they hit Astapor and Mereen, etc. though they're either going to have to just stick with all white casting (other than people from lands and cultures we never see like Saan or the Summer Islanders) or tread very carefully into non-white casting of an entire culture.

Personally I was advocating some color-blind casting in the main cast early on for people like Bronn, The Hound, Littlefinger, etc. (pretty much anyone not from a long-standing family) so they could establish that people from a lot of different cultures are all over the pace and not have to worry so much about casting cultures with specific ethnicities.
 
^They are? I guess I missed that, but I tend to skim over long-winded descriptions sometimes.
 
What about when they reach Dorne? The Martell family is most certainly black.

In what book? In GRRM's description, their skin tone seem more like Spanish or Arabic/North African at most. We'll see how the Martells are handled in season 3.

In GRRM's writings the black characters come mostly from the Summer Islands, and presumably the Sothoryos continent.
 
What about when they reach Dorne? The Martell family is most certainly black.
They're not black, we know that several Targaryens married Martell women and Dany is a little bit too white to have black ancestry. The Martells should look southern european, that makes much more sense.

I am against color-blind casting in a show like this, it works if a show is set in a modern, multicultural society, i.e. every character in Nikita can have every ethnicity, it doesn't matter. But a fantasy medieval world like Westeros? No way! It's a little bit too politically correct to pretend that the cultures mixed and all happen to be in Westeros, people just didn't travel that much during those times, non-white people should be the exception and stand out, the last thing I want to see is the "chinatown" of King's Landing, it wouldn't make sense.
 
Hmmm, I swear they were described as dark skinned somewhere in AFFC, but I can't for the life of me find it. Ah well, I could be running under a false impression, then.
 
The Martells are described as having "olive" skin; some other Dornishmen are more obviously Arab. Dorne is based on Spain under the Moors.
 
There are the salty Dornish, the sandy Dornish and the stony Dornish.

The Stony Dornish are the Andals and First Men of Dorne and live in the mountains and passes between Dorne and the rest of Westeros.

The Salty Dornish are the coastal peoples who are probably the most pure-blooded Rhoynish of the three, with olive skin, dark hair and eyes, etc.

The Sandy Dornish live everywhere in between and are darker skinned than the Salty Dornish.

Basically you could think of them as being most similar to Greek/Turkish/Persian/etc. peoples. Or alternatively Iberian/Berber/Moorish (basically the peoples of the Iberian peninsula in the middle ages. )
 
Hmm, second episode was better than the first but still not at that "excellent" level yet. the Arya and Gendry scenes were as fun as I was expecting but the whore house scenes still drag. I think the show would be better off if they tried to avoid tossing in new stuff.
 
I did manage to watch this last night and wanted to ask, for others here that have also seen it, was the sound a little "off" for you as well? Like dialogue moving at a fast pace and everyone's voices sounding ever so slightly higher pitched. I was looking through the comment thread on the leak on winteriscoming and people were reporting that it was sped up. Hopefully I can get my hands on the non-GO version after it airs Sunday night.
 
Could somebody tell me in a spoiler what was that thing that took away the children?

What does it do to the babies?
 
Could somebody tell me in a spoiler what was that thing that took away the children?

What does it do to the babies?

It's been a while since I read the book but....

I believe it was a white walker. From what I remember , Craster leaves the male children out and the walkers come and take them away. That's how he stays safe while the other villages get wiped out. It's like a sacrifice
Again, it's been a while since I read it so maybe someone else can tell you with more certainty
 
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top