Game of Thrones - Season 1

Despite still being in progress, A Song of Ice and Fire is probably my favorite fantasy story, so I had a lot of expectations going into the television adaptation. And thankfully, they were mostly met. The show is far from without its flaws, but I was mostly impressed by how well and how faithfully they executed on the depiction of the world George R. R. Martin created and the events that take place in it. It starts with the casting and production, which are both excellent for TV. Almost everyone seemed well suited for their roles, and though not everyone lined up exactly with how I pictured them or how they were described in the book, they all seemed close enough to the essence of their personality, and on top of that the acting itself was generally great. A few of the younger actors seemed a bit unsure at times, (not including the girl who plays Arya, who pretty much nails it) but it was made up for by the multitudes of great character actors who play the grizzled veterans who represent the old days, when war was simple and there were no monsters coming to get everyone. The look of the series is fantastic, with a solid visual style and great locations, sets, and costumes for everyone. There are a few signs that it's not filmed on a blockbuster budget, especially the lack of any battles larger than minor scuffles, but they dance around that well.

All of that would be for nothing if the writers messed things up, but luckily they really didn't. Every episode except for two (one of which was written by Martin himself) was written by the creators of the show, and they definitely seem to get the series as well as anyone could hope. There are a few concessions that have to be made - I was iffy on the first episode because it seemed a bit obvious about introducing all the characters and their relationships, and once in a while there would be an expository scene that just felt clunky or unnecessary. The fact that they often tried to hide these flaws with gratuitous nudity (between this, True Blood, and Boardwalk Empire, HBO is THE go-to channel for superfluous tits) was a bit disappointing as well - the books have always been frank about sexuality, but it was kept to situations where it was warranted. But I was still mostly impressed by the writing, which retained the core essence of all the characters and plot points while dealing with the fact that they can't just throw all of the narration and internal thoughts of the various viewpoint characters from the book onto the screen. They also generally made good use of the ability to show events that the viewpoints from the book never saw - I liked seeing so many great moments get recreated on film, but some of the best scenes in the series were invented to show new things. They developed Tywin more and shows some of the relationship between Littlefinger and Varys, just a couple of the new elements I liked a lot. I wouldn't say Game of Thrones is totally great the same way the books are, but they're a more than serviceable adaptation, and I can't wait to see the next book get the same treatment in 2012.

Also, here are my recaps for all the episodes of the season:
Winter Is Coming
The Kingsroad
Lord Snow
Cripples, Bastards, and Broken Things
The Wolf and the Lion
A Golden Crown
You Win or You Die
The Pointy End
Baelor
Fire and Blood

The Station Agent

I was told to see this after hearing that HBO's adaptation of the brilliant book series A Song of Ice and Fire is officially getting a full season, because it was directed by Thomas McCarthy, who shot the pilot, and stars Peter Dinklage, who'll be playing my favorite character. McCarthy is better known as an actor, but he's done a couple films now and they've been very well received by the few people who have seen them. The Station Agent is short and light on plot, but it still manages to pack a lot of heart and humanity into its 90ish minutes. Dinklage plays a man with dwarfism who moves out into a rural part of New Jersey after his friend and the owner of the store where he works passes away and leaves him some property.

He's a quiet loner with a passion for trains and not much else, and you get a taste of his life where he's always seen as different and often mocked. Even the other main characters who come to befriend him over time seem to treat him differently because of what he is, and it's an interesting thing to watch. With the character being reserved, it isn't very obvious most of the time what he's feeling, but it still seems like you know what he's going through thanks to the subtle intelligence of the performance and the detached way he seems to view everything. The movie might have been especially poignant to me, since I was always short growing up (I still am, just not enough to be gawked at), although anyone who's ever felt out of place could probably get something out of it.

I may be making the movie sound too morose or something, but in some ways it could be called a comedy, thought a pretty naturalistic and understated one. It gets more serious in its last half hour, but in general it's simply a pleasant watch, well shot without an excess of flair and with strong performances from everyone. Patricia Clarkson got a few awards for her turn as a painter who separated from her husband after her son died, and rightly so, and Bobby Cannavale is enjoyable as the overly enthusiastic patron of a hot dog stand. The chemistry between the three friends is a unique one, as you'd probably not expect any of them to ever spend time together, but it makes for an entertaining and touching film. It's not the kind of thing I usually watch, but I liked it a lot and have even more confidence that Game of Thrones will be great.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian

The Chronicles of Narnia is sort of the more child friendly, overbearingly Christian cousin of The Lord of the Rings, and after the success of the latter as a film franchise, there's little surprise that someone would follow suit with the former. The first movie, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was pretty decent to my memory. It's less of a war movie in places and more of a kid's fairy tale, but it had some interesting ideas.

I liked Prince Caspian more though, as it seems more focused on telling a complete story and is just more confident with everything. There's no Mr. Tumnus prancing around or Turkish Delight being eaten, just the story of a war for the future of the land. The action scenes are actually pretty darn good for a PG movie, from a clandestine assault on a castle by moonlight to a deadly show of single combat on the field of battle. They make a point of showing how hundreds of years have passed since the last time the kids appeared in Narnia, with most of the mystical creatures sequestered into the forest and the rest reverted into wild animals. A human empire has taken over the land, and the battle between them and the natives is a nice contrast with the first movie which had their loyalties divided between a magical lady and a magical Jesus cat.

Um... yeah. Movies. A lot of the humor is kind of obvious and cheesy, but there are a couple chuckles to be had. Eddie Izzard plays a talking mouse, and his lines all kind of suck but it's still cool because he's Eddie Izzard. The kids are uniformly less annoying than the first movie, which is good. If there's one thing sequels have over initial installments it's not having to waste time establishing familiarity with setting and characters and all that. The uh... the special effects are pretty good. The battles are nice but the ending was fairly Deus Ex Machina. I'm willing to watch more of these movies, especially since the next one has such a bad ass title. Go look it up. Seriously, bad ass.