The Hedge Knight: Dunk and Egg coming to HBO

 

The first four seasons of The Game of Thrones HBO series are among the best ever produced for television. (The later seasons were weaker, especially the last two, although I didn’t loathe the final season.)

The recent House of the Dragon series was fine. But it lacked any especially sympathetic or engaging characters in the mould of Arya, Tyrion, of even Jon Snow. 

Fortunately, some stories written by G.R.R. Martin in the world of Westeros that do include a couple of sympathetic and charming characters — “Dunk” (Ser Duncan the Tall) and “Egg” (Aegon V Targaryen) — will be made into a series: A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight. 

I’m cautiously looking forward to this. 

Thoughts on the Rings of Power and House of the Dragon

[Note: minor spoilers below.]

 

“The Rings of Power” (TRoP) and “House of the Dragon” (HotD) are both just past the halfway points for their respective seasons. Overall, there is no denying that the writing and acting in HotD is superior. Yet I find myself feeling rather indifferent to its story and characters. Unlike the original “Game of Thrones” series, there are no characters that I really care about – no one remotely as interesting, entertaining, or sympathetic as Tyrion or Arya. I kind of hope that Daemon doesn’t eventually become king, as he clearly would be a rather bad one, but he’s not in the same league of awfulness as, say, Joffrey or Cersei (or at least not yet). (However, episode six reveals Larys Strong as perhaps a spiritual villainous ancestor of Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish, so perhaps there’s some hope.)

 

Overall, I just don’t care that much about how things in HotD will turn out. Should Rhaenyra become queen?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Whatever. 

I’ll keep watching it, though, as I’m enjoying it well enough (and I’m a sucker for fantasy).

In contrast, TRoP – despite how deeply frustrating and frequently disappointing I have been finding it* – has certain hooks in me. I also care about some of the characters more than I care about any of the ones in HotD. Part of this of course is carried over from Tolkien’s writings. For instance, Elrond and Elendil are two of my favourite characters from the history of Middle-earth, so I find myself invested in their stories despite the series’ flaws. And Ar-Pharazôn’s tale is a great one, so I want to see how it is presented in the series. But I also find the “new” villains (or potential villains) far more intriguing than anyone in HotD. Adar in particular stands out, but I also want to know who Halbrand is (and what his story will be), likewise for “The Stranger,” and others.

 

In particular, I find myself obsessed with finding out (hopefully by the end of this season):

 

-       Who is Adar?

o      Is he Maglor [my current guess given his gauntlet]? Eöl or Eöl’s son Maeglin? [Of course, unlike Maglor, those two are supposed to be dead...] Sauron? What is his plan? Why does he care for the orcs so much? [Perhaps he helped Morgoth form the first orcs from captured elves in ancient times?] Why does his armour have a design similar to Gil-Galad’s?

-       What is the deal with the broken dark sword?

o      Why does Adar want it? What role (if any) will it play in transforming the Southlands into Mordor?

-       Who is the Stranger (“Meteorite Man”)?

o      Is he Sauron/Annatar? An Istar? A balrog? Something else? [My current guess is that he’s one of the Istari. I’m hoping he’s a Blue Wizard but worried that lazy writing will make him Gandalf.]

-       Who is Halbrand?

o      Is he Sauron? The Witchking? A different future Nazgûl? The king who makes the oath to Isildur at the Stone of Erech, only to break it during the War of the Last Alliance? [The latter possibility would require relocating the people of the Southlands to the White Mountains; not entirely implausible, given that the Southlands are doomed to become Mordor.] Is he Theo's dad?

-       Who is Sauron?

o      Someone already in the show, one of the above? Someone yet to appear? Is he already giving Celebrimor advice “offscreen” as “Annatar”?

-       Who are the weird cultists who appeared briefly in episode 5 and seem to be tracking the Stranger?

o      Surviving servants of Morgoth independent of Sauron? Servants of Sauron? Future Nazgûl?

-       How will the friendship between Elrond and Durin IV unfold?

 

So I have lots of questions. I just wish the show had better writers!

 

It's an odd thing to recognize one series as clearly superior overall yet care much more about what happens in the other.

 

I will say this for TRoP: the sets are beautiful. The scenes of Lindon, Khazad-dûm, and Númenor are amazing. And I like the look (and music) that they have created for Númenor: somewhat Minoan/Mycenean in terms of colour, murals, and overall aesthetics. The Númenorean ships look distinctive and cool. I especially liked the statue of Eärendil the Mariner with his welcoming hand – a nice contrast to the raised palms of the Argonath statues (Elendil and Isildur) that we see in the “Fellowship of the Ring” movie.

 

 

* Some of my frustrations and disappointments with TRoP:

 

Here are the three things that I find the most vexing about TRoP so far:

 

First, as I’ve mentioned before, the series writers are greatly compressing the timeline of the Second Age. Roughly, they are squeezing almost 2000 years of history into perhaps a decade or two: it covers events from shortly before the forging of the rings of power (the 16^th century) to the War of the Last Alliance (the 35^th century). I really dislike this move and think it’s unnecessary – the series could’ve had two parts, the first covering the forging of the rings of power and the War of Elves and Sauron, and the second covering the downfall of Númenor and the War of the Last Alliance.

 

The portrayals of some of the characters, especially Galadriel and Gil-Galad, strike me as simply terrible. Galadriel is comically monomaniacal (she’s not a son of Fëanor!). And Gil-Galad comes across in the show as an oleaginous politician. I really hope they improve as the series progresses. (In contrast, others, e.g., Elendil, Pharazôn, Elrond, and Durin IV, are solid in my view.)

 

The whole invented story about how a Silmaril (plus a pure elf, an evil balrog, a tree on top of the Misty Mountains, and a bolt of lightning) caused the creation of mithril – and (adding to this absurdity) that only mithril (because it contains some of the light of Valinor thanks to the Silmaril) can “cure” all the Elves that remain in Middle-earth – is absolute rubbish. I’m really hoping that the Silmaril-mithril story turns out to be false within the series. Elrond does refer to it as apocryphal, and in the previous episode Adar refers to the many “lies” told about Middle-earth. So perhaps this is a false tale promoted by Annatar to obtain mithril for his own purposes? (Fingers crossed!)

 

More Fantasy TV: Westeros and Middle-earth

It looks like there will be no shortage of fantasy television shows in the near future. In addition to the potential Dungeons and Dragons series that I mentioned in my previous post, The Witcher will be returning for certain, and rumblings of a possible Conan series are heard every so often.

Amazon’s Middle-earth series should be out later this year. This brief article confirms what I noted before: the series will be set during the Second Age. I would be thrilled—and not at all surprised—if the first season portrayed the rise of Sauron (as the comely “Annatar”) and his cooperation with—and eventual betrayal of—Celebrimbor in the creation of the Rings of Power. This should be followed with the great War of the Elves and Sauron, which would involve Númenor. The first season could end with the defeat of Sauron. The second season could portray Sauron’s return centuries later, his subsequent capture by and corruption of (a now decadent) Númenor, the destruction of Númenor and the founding of the “Realms in Exile” (Gondor and Arnor), and the end of the Second Age with the War of the Last Alliance. Perhaps more storylines could be added—e.g., the stories of Elrond, Galadriel, et al., during this time; the persecution of “the Faithful” by the “King’s Men” in Númenor; the establishment of Númenorean colonies in Middle-earth; and so forth. But I think that these two great conflicts—the mid-Age initial struggle with Sauron, and the late-Age defeat of Sauron—should be the overarching storylines. How could it be otherwise?

[Map of Númenor from the Atlas of Middle-earth by Karen Wynn Fonstad]

Also, HBO hasn’t given up on Westeros. In addition to the House of the Dragon (set about three centuries before the Game of Thrones), a series based on G.R.R. Martin’s “Dunk and Egg” stories is in development. I quite liked those stories. And given their modest, episodic nature, there is little risk that HBO will fumble the ending the way that they did with GoT. However, I don’t think that the stories provide material for more than one or maybe two seasons. That’s perfectly fine in my view—it worked for Watchmen. 

I actually don’t watch that much television normally, but I quite enjoyed GoT and The Witcher, and so will be happy if other fantasy series of comparable quality become available in the near-ish future.

The Elite Hollywood Dungeons and Dragons Club

If you have seven minutes or so to kill you might enjoy this Variety story and video on “Hollywood’s Elite Dungeons and Dragons Club” (the sound quality of the video is better here). 

The Dungeon Master of this ‘elite’ group is Joe Manganiello. Among the players (in addition to actors like Vince Vaugh) are Kyle Newman, who is one of the authors of the excellent Art and Arcana book (the history of the art of Dungeons and Dragons), and D.H. Weiss (co-creator of the Game of Thrones HBO series, which I was quite fond of despite the final season [which I found disappointing but not terrible]).

While I generally find these kinds of stories somewhat diverting, I don’t really care about or ‘follow’ celebrities. I only know who Joe Manganiello is because he sometimes shows up in D&D or RPG-related stories and segments, like this one from Stephen Colbert’s show from two years ago. (He does seem like a decent fellow, though, and his gaming basement looks amazing.) 

Insofar as these tales of celebrities enjoying Dungeons and Dragons helps to promote and further destigmatize the RPG hobby, though, I am happy to have them appear. (But as much as I like D&D 5th edition, it would be nice if a different role-playing game might be mentioned in these ‘mainstream’ articles once in a while.)

[Picture by Chuck D of “Public Enemy”]

Game of Thrones concludes

Some thoughts on the ending of the Game of Thrones...

[Spoilers below!]

So that’s that. While I think that the last two seasons were the weakest of the series I also think that they were pretty solid overall (a ‘B+’ grade, in my judgement, as opposed to the ‘A+’ for seasons 1-4, and the ‘A-‘ for seasons 5-6). I certainly enjoyed watching them, and remain immensely grateful that this series was produced. (My grade 8 self, doodling warriors and wizards in the margins of his class notebooks, could never have dreamed of an eight-season television epic like this.)

Yes, seasons seven and eight felt rushed compared to the earlier seasons. There’s no denying that. Sometimes things happened too quickly, characters’ motivations were inadequately explained, and so forth.

And I’m disappointed about how the whole Night King story unfolded. An existential threat that had been built up for the past seven seasons seemed to be resolved in an overly tidy way (with Arya acting as ‘ninja Isildur’ vis-à-vis the Night King’s ‘Sauron’). We never learned anything about the Night King’s motivations, why he wanted to kill the Three-eyed Raven (Bran), and so forth. Even a little exploration of the Night King’s reasons for doing what he’s been doing for the past several millennia would’ve helped. Surely Bran (qua Three-Eyed Raven) would know—and be able to tell us—something? (At the same time, though, I don’t know how that storyline could’ve been resolved in a truly satisfying way. So at least I was surprised that the show did it in the first half of the final season—I was expecting it to happen in the final episode.)

Despite those criticisms (and other smaller ones), I think the series had a solid ending. I wasn’t perfect but it was solid.

Daenerys Targaryen’s decision to be ruthlessly destructive in the penultimate episode struck me as appropriate (though I would’ve had her attack the Red Keep directly first, had I written the episode). I think that one of the main reasons that episode has proven to be so polarizing is that many people misinterpreted her character—badly. I also think people were upset that Cersei did not receive her proper comeuppance—but that’s one of the main themes of GoT, namely, that just deserts are rarely dealt.

I also thought that it was appropriate for Jon Snow to be the one to kill Daenerys. (I was worried that it would be Arya—I’m so glad I was wrong!) And I was sure that Jon would not become king—the Targaryen dynasty had to come to an end. (I would’ve been outraged had he somehow ended up sitting on the Iron Throne.) I expected that he likely would die at the end—perhaps in retribution for having killed Daenerys—but having him rejoin the Night’s Watch was an ‘okay’ alternative. At least he finally petted poor Ghost!

Arya going off to play explorer (ach! that was supposed to be Tyrion—as I explained in my previous post) was a tad silly, perhaps, but then what else was she supposed to do? In any case, I’m glad Sansa survived and became Queen of the North. She ended up being one of my favourite characters.

The scene wherein Brienne wrote the final chapter of the life of Jaime was touching. The scene of the Small Council was entertaining. Yes, they were ‘fan services’, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that sometimes, especially in a final episode.

So, overall, I am fine with how the series ended. Seasons 7 and 8 suffered from being too short, and events certainly felt forced in places. But aside from Tyrion strangely losing much of his intelligence upon becoming the Hand of the Queen, the characters pretty much realized who they really were in their actions, and the ending made sense (for the most part) given the assumptions of the fictional world.

It certainly ended a million times better than Lost!

The end of Game of Thrones

I clearly am not ready for Game of Thrones to end. In fact, recently I had a dream of a trailer for a spin-off series. It begins with the following voice-over: “The journeys of Tyrion Lannister did not end in Kings Landing…” This is followed by scenes of Tyrion travelling to exotic places throughout Essos (meeting kings and merchants, exploring ancient ruins, etc.). Essentially he is the Westerosi version of Marco Polo. 

[Map of Essos from here.]

For some reason, Tyrion is accompanied in his journeys by Izembaro—the character played by Richard E. Grant. (Izembaro’s theatre troupe ‘The Gate’ was based in Braavos, so perhaps they met there?)

Actually, an episodic fantasy ‘buddy’ series starring Peter Dinklage and Richard E. Grant does not sound too bad…

Some thoughts on 'The Bells' (Game of Thrones: S8 E5)

Some reflections on tonight’s rather epic Game of Thrones episode, ‘The Bells’…
[Needless to say, spoilers below!]

I thought that some of the key relationships were wrapped up in relatively satisfying ways (given how ‘rushed’ the final season seems overall). In particular, I was not left unsatisfied by the following relationship resolutions:

1. Tyrion-Varys.

2. Tyrion-Jaime. (I thought this scene was beautiful—surprisingly touching.)

3. Sandor-Arya. (Again, really great—a small bit of redemption for the Hound.)

4. Sandor-Gregor. (‘Cleganbowl’ was never going to be able to live up to fans’ expectations, but I thought that the fight was good fun—and it ended in a fittingly poetic way.) 

I’m a bit mixed about the Jaime-Cersei ending. I was firmly convinced last week that Jaime was heading back to King’s Landing in order to kill Cersei (and that he harshly misled Brienne about his reasons in order to sever their relationship since he expected to die in his endeavour). But given that that did not go the way that I thought it would, how they died together seemed … appropriate.

The Euron-Jaime fight was terrible. (But then Euron Greyjoy is a ridiculous character in the television series. He’s pretty much as awful as the annoying-and-unmissed ‘Sand Snakes’.) It was out of character for Euron: why wouldn’t he just grab a ship and flee once the outcome of the battle was clear? Moreover, it was pointless—it did nothing to change Jaime’s ultimate fate. Blech…

Also, while I’ve never been a fan of Daenerys Targaryen—it always seemed clear to me that she had something of the ‘mad king’ in her, and so I never regarded her as the potential ‘saviour’ of Westeros—her descent into full-blown berserker madness struck me as a bit too quick to be plausible. A bit more control in her vengeance—say, going directly to destroy the Red Keep instead of strafing every neighbourhood in King’s Landing first—would’ve made more sense. But I guess the script writers felt it necessary to really (really, really) illustrate that Daenerys is the ‘bad guy’ now.

 

On a more positive note, I loved following Arya through King’s Landing as everything was being destroyed around her. Some comments that I’ve read said that it went on too long, but I thought it was great. In fact, I can’t believe how tense I felt the whole time. And it provided a much needed ‘townsfolk’ perspective on the cruel destructiveness of Daenerys’s actions (and war in general). 

Overall, I’d rank this episode as tied with the second one (“A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms”) as the best of this (otherwise somewhat disappointing) season. 

One giant's milk latte please...

Something does not belong in this scene from last night's episode of Game of Thrones:

Disbelief: no longer suspended!

Some amusing takes on this screw-up here.

Will Middle-earth be getting the ‘Game of Thrones’ treatment?

It looks like Amazon will be producing at least one series set in Middle-earth. And—interestingly—it appears that this series will not cover either The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit stories:

The new series will explore Middle-earth in a time period before the events of The Lord of the Rings — but given that Galsor says that it will concern “previously unexplored stories,” we might not be looking at another adaptation of The Hobbit either. That leaves two options: Amazon could plumb the depths of the appendices of The Return of the King, potentially detailing the early romance of Aragorn and Arwen, the creation of the Rings of Power and the history of the line of kings from which Aragorn is descended. 

Or, in what would be more of a revelation for Tolkien fans — and provided that Amazon had also purchased the television rights to the author’s The Silmarillion — the series might have the entire history of Middle-earth from its creation to play with. Amazon’s press release does note that the deal with the Tolkien estate “includes a potential additional spin-off series.”

Regarding The Silmarillion: I was under the impression that Christopher Tolkien was 100% opposed to allowing anything like this to be done with it. (He loathed the LotR + Hobbit movies.) But I would be delighted if he has changed his mind!

Even if The Silmarillion isn’t covered, though, there is a goldmine of storylines in the LotR appendices. And since those storylines are quite sketchy, there would be more room for writers to be creative with them within the overall framework of Middle-earth.

As for Amazon hoping that this might be ‘their Game of Thrones’, I think that they should remain true to the distinctive character of Middle-earth. While the Akallabêth (the tale of the fall of Númenor) is kind of ‘GoT-ish’ (with it many nefarious actors and the Stark-sh House of Elendil), Middle-earth is much more black-and-white than the GoT world. That should be retained—if not emphasized—not downplayed. Viewers might be in the mood for such a change (especially given how GoT-ish the real world seems these days).

Music-Movie-Fantasy Crossover Images

Over the years I’ve acquired a few cool ‘nerd’ shirts and hoodies (or at least I think they’re cool; my wife seems to disagree). For the most part, the image on one of these shirts is drawn from a single source. Examples in my collection include the two-headed snake image of ‘Thulsa Doom’ from the original Conan film, and the ‘White Tree of Gondor’ symbol from The Lord of the Rings. Some mock the ubiquitous ‘university’ promotion shirts. For instance, I have a few ‘Miskatonic University’ ones (e.g., ‘Go Pods!’, ‘Miskatonic Metaphysics Faculty Member’, ‘Miskatonic University 1930 Antarctic Expedition’, etc.) and one ‘Mordor University’ shirt (I like to tell my students that the graduate program there has a terrible attrition rate).

But probably the most unusual shirt that I own is this mash-up of the movies Reservoir Dogs and The Lord of the Rings:

(From left-to right: Sauron [notice the ring!], the Balrog of Moria, the Witch-king of Angmar, the Mouth of Sauron, a Nazgûl [Khamûl?], and Saruman.) 

I also have a shirt with an image that tweaks the cover of Joy Division’s classic Unknown Pleasures album to include Barad-dûr:

But probably the most unusual mash-up I’ve ever encountered is this one:

Wow. So there is a market for Leonard Cohen - Game of Thrones crossover fan merchandise. (“First we take King’s Landing, then we take Berlin…”) That … is unexpected. 

Pity the shirt is so damn ugly (I couldn’t bring myself to get one).

Valar Morghulis

Like 99.9% of the global fantasy nerd community, I am looking forward to the seventh season of The Game of Thrones, due to start tomorrow evening.

Since the series only has 13 episodes left, and given its propensity to kill off major characters in unexpected ways, the question naturally arises: who will survive to the end? Vox assesses the chances of 15 important characters here. While I agree with author Todd VanDerWerff that Samwell Tully is the most likely character to survive at the end (someone has to be able to tell the whole story, after all), I disagree with some of his other predictions. Specifically, I think that Tyrion Lannister is more likely to survive than Jon Snow (as I can see Snow going out in a blaze of glory in the final episode, whereas Tyrion will carry on with cunning and bluster no matter what), and I would place Arya Stark’s odds of making it out alive quite highly—above those of Sansa Stark and Daenerys Targaryen. Finally, I would rank Bran Stark’s chances above all other characters except Samwell, given that he seems to be pivotal to the entire history of Westeros.

While not ‘major characters’ in any sense, ravens appear regularly in the series. This is because ravens are central to the communication system of Westeros. This is one of the reasons why I like the setting so much. I’ve been fascinated by ravens since a teenager, when I first learned about their high intelligence. It turns out that they are capable of planning for the future.

[Image found somewhere on the intertubes]

Fantasy and Science Fiction films and television shows in 2015

2015 is over, and this article does a decent job in covering some of its highlights in terms of fantasy and science fiction pop culture (films, television shows, and novels).

One problem with getting older is that the years seem to blend together.  I now have a difficult time remembering which films, television shows, or novels (or role-playing games) came out in which year.  So I always have a hard time when asked, for instance, what was my ‘favourite film of 2015’.  For instance, I think that Ex Machina is a great film, one of the best science fictions films in recent years, but I can’t remember if it came out in 2015.  (Okay, I just checked Wikipedia: it did.)

Another problem with getting older is that I don’t seem to be able to see nearly as many movies or television shows as I used to when I was a twenty-something with loads of spare time.  (Heck, I haven’t even owned a television in over a decade.  I used to rely on DVDs, and now I rely on internet subscriptions, for most of my television series watching.)  And of the films and shows that I do watch, I often get to them months (or even years) after their release.  So many of the films or television shows that my fellow nerds talk about, whether in person or online, are things that I haven’t seen yet (and in some cases will never see).

All that having been said, I thought that I would mention that my favourite science fiction film of 2015 was Mad Max: Fury Road.  (If you want a fun afternoon, watch The Road Warrior and then Mad Max: Fury Road.  The two films go quite well together.)  My favourite new television series was The Man in the High Castle (about which I plan to write a post once I watch the final episode [I just finished episode 9 last night]).  The Game of Thrones continues to impress, of course, and I quite enjoyed Black Mirror, Jessica Jones, and Daredevil as well (the latter two are surprises for me, as I am not a huge superhero fan).

I still need to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens (I have plans to do so this weekend).  And I want to watch the first season of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell (as I loved the book 10 years ago). 

So many great shows are being produced these days, especially for television, it’s a surfeit of riches.  And I look forward to what 2016 will bring…

Book of the New Sun: the television series?

I’ve recently posted links to articles on Gene Wolfe and The Game of Thrones television series.  A good friend of mine (this guy), who is a massive fan of Wolfe’s ‘New Sun’ stories, recently explained to me why The Book of the New Sun would make an amazing GoT-style televisions series.  

Here it is:

I really think it would make a great HBO series! Here's why: 

1. It is completely episodic. 

2. The characters are amazing:
• A giant and his fox-faced companion
• The most beautiful woman in the world (until the augmentation-magic wears off)
• A resurrected woman who coughs up the lead slugs that were forced down her gullet to sink her body(!).
• A robot who has repaired himself with found biological human body parts.
• And a professional torturer who turns out to be Jesus, but not before he consumes the flesh of his aristocratic girlfriend and absorbs her memories and personality. And then proceeds to have sex with literally every woman he encounters in the story....and then becomes the king. 

3. The settings are amazing:
• Buenos Aires in a million years is quite a different place.
• The citadel in the middle of the city is actually a spaceship, but no one realizes it.
• The city is surrounded by a mile-high wall to protect it from rampaging giant aquatic aliens who are currently quiescent and laying in wait in the oceans deep.
• The mountain ranges to the north (the Andes) have been under the rule of this particular civilization so long that every single one of them has been carved into the likeness of one king or another.
• Further north the "rotting jungles that circle the waist word' divide our heroes land from the "Ascians", their sworn enemies and Ascia is the ultimate totalitarian state: people may only speak by quoting from a collection of approved texts. 

4. Mysteries abound:
• Is the hero's lover really his grandmother?
• Is the injured robot actually from North Korea in our era (not kidding)
• Is the giant actually a baby version of the giant evil aquatic aliens?
• Is the fox-faced guy actually the giant's homonculus-slave? 

5. And finally, like "Lost"...there are no answers!

Fair enough!  (Although I'm not sure about #5.  Years later, I still get annoyed when I think about "Lost".)

I personally would love to see such a television series.  But I’m not holding my breath…

Class Struggle in Westeros

“Wildlings of the north unite!  You have nothing to lose but your cumbersome furs!”

Okay, here is another short post with a slight political philosophy flavour.  Fans of the Game of Thrones television series (and/or novels) may enjoy reading: “Can Marxist Theory Predict the End of Game of Thrones?”  (Don’t worry, gentle readers, you don’t need to be a Marxist [I’m not] to enjoy it.)

This part struck me as especially quote-worthy: 

Westeros needs capitalists – such as those who frown puritanically at us from Dutch portraits in the 17th century. And they should, as in the Dutch Republic and the English civil war, launch a revolution.
But that can’t happen in the secondary world of fantasy fiction…
There is a reason so much fantasy fiction adopts the conceit of a feudalism that is always in crisis but never overthrown. It forms the ideal landscape in which to dramatise the secret desires of people who live under modern capitalism.

‘Secret desires’ indeed!  (Am I wrong for wishing that I could be Jaqen H'ghar more than any other character in the series?  Ah well, "valar morghulis"…)