Meant to post our fourth in a series of discussions concerning George R.R. Martin’s A Dance with Dragons yesterday, but RL got in the way. So, here it is! This time around, we tackle some of the prophecies—both old and new—and how events in the novel may (or may not) have fulfilled some of their conditions.
(This turns out, inadvertently, to be part 1 of 2—it seems someone [*coughcough*Elio*cough*] forgot to upload the second part and has since deleted it from his computer, so we’ll record a discussion of that last prophecy we wanted to discuss at a later date!)
College Humor envisions how a retro computer RPG inspired by HBO’s Game of Thrones might look… I would totally play this game, lets just say that.
Also: someone show this link to Dan Weiss!
And the casting news keeps coming: Winter is Coming gets the scoop on Jaqen H’ghar, the mysterious Lorathi prisoner that’s among Yoren’s recruits for the Night’s Watch. He was (sort of) glimpsed last season, as a shrouded and hooded figure sitting silently in a cage.
According to WiC, Jaqen will be played by German actor Tom Wlaschiha, who’s made a number of appearances in German film and television, and has since branched out into international productions, including films such as Valkyrie (with the show’s Melisandre, Carice van Houten!) and Munich. He’s had a brush with fantasy in German film Krabat, as well, so this won’t be entirely new to him. It’ll be interesting to see how it goes.
See below for a short film featuring Wlaschiha, and a link to a long showreel showcasing some of his work in series such as The Deep (with Minnie Driver) and Brideshead Revisted.
Last week we shared VFX breakdowns from the first season of Game of Thrones, produced by the lead VFX vendor during the filming, BlueBolt.
Now we’ve a second breakdown video, this time from another VFX vendor who was involved in the process, Irish post-production and VFX house Screen Scene. By the looks of this show-reel, they handled a few quite memorable sequences, including Bran’s climb, the sprawling Lannister encampment, and various bits of CGI-enhanced violence that are really quite amazing when you look at how they were done.
Screen Scene has some details of their work on the project at their site—it looks like they’re a very full-featured post facility indeed, having not only worked on VFX, but also color timing, editing, sound production, and more.
Ed Bruce, Screen Scene’s VFX supervisor, notes that Screen Scene produced 350 of the circa 686 effects shots across the season, working in collaboration with the series VFX supervisor Adam McInnes. We hope to get in a short interview with Mr. Bruce about Screen Scene’s work on the show, to release in a few day, but until then, feast your eyes on the videos below, the first being the specific breakdown, the next being a more general showreel (featuring a lot of Game of Thrones footage) set to Johnny Cash’s “When the Man Comes Around”:
HBO’s opening the floodgates (well, cracking them open a wee bit, in any case!) with casting news. Hot on the heels of EW getting the confirmation on Asha Greyjoy (renamed “Yara” for the show), HBO’s given us wee scoop: the indentity of Qartheen merchant-prince Xaro Xhoan Daxos, who will provide Daenerys shelter and support in the ancient, decadent city of Qarth…
For a price.
Cast in the role is British actor Nonso Anozie (Facebook page), a noted theatre actor who set a record for the youngest actor to play the part of “King Lear” in a professional production (at the age of 22 or 23), and won the Ian Charleson Award in 2005 for his performance in the titular role in the Cheek by Jowl production of “Othello”. The first Charleson award winner? Jennifer Ehle, who played the part of Catelyn Stark in the pilot. Fine company! And for that matter, we see over at IMDB that Anozie has also appeared in the forthcoming Conan the Barbarian 3D film with Jason Momoa, aka Khal Drogo. I wonder if he had a chance to talk with Momoa about the show?
Below, see Anozie in a trailer for the film Cass, in which he plays the title role, and an interview with the actor:
British actress Gemma Whelan was first reported to have been cast in the role of Theon Greyjoy’s older sister back in July, but that has not been officially confirmed…
Until now, that is, thanks to James Hibberd and EW. They also confirm a choice that is bound to be controversial among some fans: Asha’s name has been changed to what somewhat less mellifluous “Yara”, out of concern that her name otherwise sounds too much like “Osha”. As some have noted, “Yara” might be readily confused with “Arya” by some, so it doesn’t seem a great choice in that regard. Also, notably, Osha’s name seems to have never been properly used in the TV series—it’s only mentioned outside of the show, in extra material or casting notes—so, all considered, we might have preferred it if they re-dubbed Osha and let Asha keep her name.
Still, in the grand scheme of things, it probably doesn’t matter too much. Though we would have loved it if they named her Disa or Katla…
Below’s a showreel showing Ms. Whelan in several roles:
Continuing our discussion series of videos concerning A Dance with Dragons, this time around Linda and I turn our attention to the topic of… Ashara Dayne. A favorite topic, actually, because we do love Dorne and the Daynes have always held a special mystique from the very first book. This new novel has potentially exploded some long-held beliefs of many fans, and we try and provide some insight into why that may be.
Please feel free to comment, but beware, spoilers! For more discussion about the series (and pretty much every topic under the sun), give the A Song of Ice and Fire forum a try!
The So Spake Martin collection of interview links, correspondence, and more has been growing by leaps and bounds of late. Today, we’ve added two new entries: a link to an excellent interview at the Sydney Morning Herald, and a transcript of a Q&A with Martin at the Redwood City signing, led by Tad Williams. The transcript comes by way of his Twitter account and his wife, Deborah Beale.
Visitors at Westeros.org have chosen two essay topics for Pearson Moore’s Game of Thrones Season One companion book, “Direwolves and Dragons”, following a poll!
Out of a field of seven essay options, visitors chose “The History of Westeros” and “The Seven Claims to the Iron Throne” for inclusion in the first season omnibus of essays.
According to Pearson, “Visitors chose the two most interesting topics. If they hadn’t selected them, I probably would have included them anyway. These are fascinating threads in the storyline!”
The ebook edition of “Direwolves and Dragons Season One Essays” will be published around August 30, and the paperback edition should be available in mid-September.
In his latest “Not a Blog” update concerning his signing tour, George R.R. Martin notes that a thousand people turned up to have their books defaced in Seattle… but that that wasn’t the only thing he did. He visited the Amazon.com headquarters, apparently… and he dropped by the studio of renowned game developer Bungie, creators of the Halo franchise. Well, suffice it to say, this has raised some eyebrows.
Bungie has moved to being an independent developer after a long stint under the auspices of Microsoft, and they caused a bit of a stir when they announced (on April 29, 2010) that they had signed a 10-year deal with Activision Blizzard to develop games based on a “new IP” for the company. Details have been thin on the ground, except that there has been some argument as to whether the first big project within the IP with be an MMO (sometimes dubbed an “action MMO” by the press) or not; a spokesperson stated they were at a conference, only to have Bungie later state that it was actually a joke. So, MMO or not? Who knows.
Rumors have certainly suggested it’s an FPS MMO, and an anonymous source—claiming to have been one of thirty contractors let go by the company—indicated it was in a new, science fictional setting. So… maybe it really is just that Bungie are a bunch of geeks and sent out the invitation to George (who, for all we know, may well have played games of theirs like Myth: The Fallen Lords, in the days when he had time for such things).
Or, maybe it’s something else? This doesn’t even go to mention the possibility that Bungie’s new IP is actually licensed from works other than A Song of Ice and Fire, such as his ‘Thousand Worlds’ science fiction setting, or something like Wild Cards. However… there does seem to be one thing that may—may—suggest that it’s definitely not ASoIaF, and may indeed have nothing at all to do with GRRM’s work: the studio put forward the notion that the property could include spin-offs like comics or movies. It seems clearly impossible for ASoIaF to fall under that, and while Wild Cards is a shared-world series, it doesn’t seem to us like the Wild Cards Consortium would necessarily have a game studio take over such aspects of their intellectual property (than again, we could be wrong).
Wait a minute. A massive social game. Something on mobile platforms. And guess what Bungie announced in June? Yeah, that’s right, a social/mobile initiative called Aerospace in which Bungie partners with independent studios and provides them resources and support to get their games out there. Is this what’s going on? This seems to fit the sort of thing that may be going on, rather than the “new IP” which surely sounds like it’s something Bungie wants to own lock, stock, and barrel. Who’s ready for a Game of Thrones game where rather than farm, Farmville-style, you burn crops and raze buildings to the ground? That’s what Grok! Studio—which represents some of the media rights for GRRM’s work, as well as that of many other notable authors—has been hinting at, suggesting that HBO may be looking into a massive, multiplayer social game based on the TV series.
Okay, enough speculation. Whatever the reason for Martin’s visit to Bungie, we won’t have to wait for Bungie for a PC game based on A Song of Ice and Fire: Cyanide Studio and Focus Home Interactive are aiming to release A Game of Thrones: Genesis—a unique strategy game—this summer, and they have an RPG in the works as well.
Thanks to Maureen Ryan of AOL TV, there’s a great article covering both the TCA and part of Ryan’s exclusive interview with George R.R. Martin Yesterday, HBO had its session at the Television Critics Association press tour, and while they discussed many of their current programs, questions did circle back to Game of Thrones, presently in production for its second season.
Surely we can call the World Fantasy Awards a tourney? Because the third “Dunk and Egg” novella, “The Mystery Knight”, is nominated for this year’s awards. Published in the Martin and Dozois-edited cross-genre anthology Warriors (US, UK), “The Mystery Knight” is the second of the “Dunk & Egg” novellas to be nominated for the award, with the first entry in the series, “The Hedge Knight”, also having been nominated.
Also of note, 2012 A Song of Ice and Fire Calendar (US, UK) artist, John Picacio, has also been nominated in the Best Artist category.
Congratulations to them both, and to all the nominees!
Continuing our video series discussing plot elements and details of A Dance with Dragons (first video here), Linda and I discuss some important things concerning Jon Snow. Suffice it to say, there are spoilers! Comments will, naturally, have spoilers as well.
For more discussion about the novel and the series (as well as the TV show), be sure to visit our board, the A Song of Ice and Fire Forum, where we’ve a pretty amazing community with a lot of great discussions on just about everything under the sun.
An hour and a half left before the submission of questions, and voting on same, closes for tomorrow’s live-streamed Authors@Google chat with George R.R. Martin!
A lot of interesting questions in there. At this stage, unless you’ve a really amazing question, it’s unlikely that a new question will get enough up-votes to be in the top selection… but you can certainly influence which questions are likeliest to be asked, just by voting!
The event will be the first Authors@Google event to ever be streamed live from the Googleplex. It will start at 12PDT on the 28th, via this URL.
BlueBolt, the lead visual effects vendors for the first season of HBO’s Game of Thrones, have posted a video of VFX breakdowns to give a sense of the process. It’s a great display of movie magic. According to our interview with BlueBolt co-founder and first season VFX producer Lucy Ainsworth-Taylor, BlueBolt will not be the lead VFX vendor this season; check out our interview for some of the reasons why, which are actually pretty exciting!