Game of Thrones: Season 1, Episodes 1-3

Four years after development began, much of it charted in painstaking detail on multiple websites, Game of Thrones has finally arrived on American and British screens. As well as an adaptation of a much-beloved series of books, it's also a chance to reinvigorate the fantasy genre on screen and hopefully pave the way for other interesting adaptations to come.


The first episode, Winter is Coming, has a lot to do right off the bat. They have to introduce a ton of characters, explain who they are and what they're all up to. They have to establish the four primary locations of action in the first season: the Wall, King's Landing, Winterfell and across the Narrow Sea. They have to establish the notion of the Seven Kingdoms, there being several major houses (four of which - Targaryen, Baratheon, Stark and Lannister - are playing a major role in this first season) and seasons which last for years. They also have to set up the Free Cities across the water, the Dothraki, and the notion that the Targaryens are slightly weird and 'special' due to their old relationship with dragons. Oh yeah, and that dragons were once around and now extinct. But there are direwolves which are like normal wolves but much bigger and grow really fast. There's also geography to consider, cultural details (people in the North have a different religion to those in the south) and other factions (the Night's Watch, the maesters of the Citadel, the Kingsguard).

That task would be enough to send other writers running away shrieking, but Dan Weiss and David Benioff step up to the plate. Because so much needs to be crammed in, it's counter-intuitive that they take the step of starting slow, devoting a full quarter of the first episode to the encounter between the Night's Watch and the White Walkers (renamed from the Others in the books) in the Haunted Forest and then the execution of the only survivor from the battle, but it works well, with a haunting, disturbing and bleak atmosphere being established before we move to somewhat warmer, happier moments at Winterfell.

The producers hold back on too much exposition at this stage, though this has drawbacks (who is Theon Greyjoy and why is he hanging out with the Starks?) as well as the significant bonus of allowing the writers to press on with the emotional core of this opening part of the story: Eddard's divided loyalties between his family and his best friend. Sean Bean and Mark Addy have worked together several times before and are great friends in real life, and this really gives their relationship depth and believability. No, you never really buy the fact that physically Mark Addy was once a great and powerful warrior, but his performance is so superb that it doesn't matter: he convinces you anyway. The great performances are continued by Michelle Fairley, who brings a steely core to a Catelyn slightly softened from the books; Nikolaj Coster-Waldau's Jaime Lannister, who is successfully heading for Magnificent Bastard territory despite occasional accent slippages; and Peter Dinklage, who isn't so much great as Tyrion Lannister as he is Tyrion Lannister, the erudite, witty, cynical and hard-drinking beating heart of the story (at least at this stage).

The other emotional side of the story is Eddard's family, which is anchored on his son Bran (Isaac Hempstead-Wright bringing a maturity way beyond his years to a challenging role), his explorations of the castle and the startling climax to the first episode, although Robb (Richard Madden), Arya (Maisie Williams) and Sansa (Sophie Turner) have little to do at this stage. Jon Snow (a winning performance by Kit Harington) is also established as a major character at this stage, with his discomfort at Winterfell with half the people there being his friends and half wary of his status as a bastard being evident.

Across the Narrow Sea, the Targaryens are waiting in the wings to return home with their new allies, the Dothraki, at their sides. Harry Lloyd is a great young actor who reigns in what must have been a tremendous urge to overact cheesily as Viserys to instead deliver a quieter, more restrained but also more believable performance than was expected. Emilia Clarke's Daenerys is more of a blank slate, despite her impressive heat-resistant bathing abilities, though we get hints of her kindness and her fundamental desire to just find somewhere to live in peace. Roger Allam's Illyrio is a rare misstep, with the actor not really getting what the character is up to at this stage. He does his best but delivers his lines without much conviction. At the same time, Iain Glen - the go-to guy if you want 'earnest supporting actors with presence' - makes for a splendid Ser Jorah Mormont, coming over as gruff and as doggedly loyal as in the books. Though oddly he doesn't have the same Northern English accent as other Northerners (even his own father in later episodes) on the show.


The sequences across the Narrow Sea are, for all the strengths of casting, a mixed bag. There's some nice work being done by Lloyd as Viserys, but overall the Dothraki come across as a corncheese, simplified caricature of a nomadic Asian people. Given that the only characters of colour of note in the series are Dothraki, this cliched depiction of them as savage rapists is unfortunate although, fortunately, later episodes start giving them more depth.

Overall the first episode trucks along nicely, hits the right marks and gets us to that all-essential cliffhanger ending in good time. The Dothraki sequences aren't well-handled but otherwise the show hits the right notes.

Moving into the second episode, The Kingsroad, the Dothraki sequences continue to be problematic. Whilst Daenerys seeking her handmaiden Doreah's advice in using her sexuality to assert power over her brutish new husband is on one hand an interesting piece of character development, it risks sending a mixed message about abuse victims trying to please their abusers. However, these sequences have provided an impetus for some interesting discussions on various forums about these issues which normally wouldn't be discussed, so on that level they are of value. And of course Glen and Lloyd continue to do excellent work.

Elsewhere, the episode benefits from a structure and theme reflecting movement and change: Eddard and his daughters on the road to King's Landing and Jon and Tyrion on the road to the Wall. Both journeys are learning curves for the characters. Eddard learns that Robert has become cynical, depressed and more ruthless in his seventeen years on the throne, and Robert his friend and Robert the king can be two very different people. Jon realises on his way north that the Night's Watch is not the institution of honour and glory that he imagined, but rather a dumping ground for the realm's criminals and wastrels. Between these moments we see Catelyn nursing her son back to health, and eventually finding evidence incriminating the Lannisters in two attempts on his life.

This is where Catelyn's changed character development in the show brings the producers to grief. Having changed Cat's motivation in the first episode to something softer, having her complain about Eddard's decision to leave for King's Landing rather than pushing him into it as in the novel, the about-face here where Cat decides to leave and chase after him to King's Landing to alert him to the danger really doesn't track very well. Book Cat's decision to leave is the kind of hard-headed political decision we've already seen her making earlier in the novel; on TV the softer, kinder Cat who won't leave her injured son's side for anything and tried to stop her husband leaving abruptly announces she's off on a dangerous mission for several months. Hmm.

As a result, both the ongoing problems with the Dothraki storyline and Cat's rather random decisions make this a disappointing episode, though elsewhere Lena Headey's Cersei (a bit one-note in the first episode but developing more here) has a great new scene which is emotionally powerful until you look at it a bit more, and then wonder if you (and Catelyn in that scene) have been hoodwinked. And of course Dinklage continues to impress.


The third episode, Lord Snow, finally manages to smooth out the bumps. The frantic pace of the first two episodes means they can throttle back here and take their time a bit more with characterisation. There's an interesting scene where Robert, Jaime and Barristan swap war stories which works well (though it's a little disconnected and may only exist to justify paying Mark Addy for his name in the titles this week), and Eddard and Arya get a terrific scene together as well. On the Wall Tyrion gives Jon some good advice and then gets a lesson of his own from Benjen and Maester Aemon when their fervour makes him wonder if there is 'something else' out beyond the Wall after all. In King's Landing we have a truckload of new characters, but Conleth Hill immediately impresses as Varys, opting for a slightly more restrained take on him than the 'mincing eunuch' Varys himself projects in the books.

Generating mixed opinions is Aidan Gillen's take on Littlefinger. A lot of fans were very excited about Gillen's casting, and I'm wondering if people were expecting him to basically be Mayor Carcetti from The Wire all over again. Instead he goes for a slightly seedier, more obviously dodgy take on Littlefinger (Littlefinger in the books owns some brothels but has others run them for him, but here he's more hands-on) but he manages to still bring out some genuine ambiguity in his scenes with Cat and Ned. It's a somewhat different Littlefinger to the one in the books, but one that could work very well.

Most crucially, the scenes in the Dothraki Sea are starting to come together. Daenerys exercises her authority in a more convincing manner, and there's an excellent scene with Ser Jorah Mormont and Rakharo (Elyes Gabel) comparing Westerosi and Dothraki tactics in the same manner two guys from different cultures today might bond over football. There's still some wincing - Dany and Drogo now being totally happy with one another after their bumpy start is a bit unconvincing - but this part of the story is also moving in the right direction.

The episode also ends in an unexpectedly subtle way: we meet Syrio Forel (Miltos Yerolemou, by way of Inigo Montoya*) and he begins training Arya with the sword, but as they fight the wooden clunks of the practice swords suddenly turns in Eddard's mind to the clash of real swords. A terrific moment which ends the episode on a moment of unease in what should be a triumphant scene (where Arya gets her own way).

* Every person who reviews this episode has to raise this comparison by law.

So far, so good then. Onto the next episode.

101: Winter is Coming (****)
102: The Kingsroad (***½)
103: Lord Snow (****½)

Forthcoming: Cripples, Bastards and Broken Things (8/5/11), The Wolf and the Lion (15/5/11), A Golden Crown (22/5/11), You Win or You Die (29/5/11), The Pointy End (5/6/11), Baelor (12/6/11), Fire and Blood (19/6/11).

Thank you

The blog today (or some time last night) passed one million site visits since April 2008, and about 1.52 million hits overall in the same time period. That's pretty mind-boggling figures for a site that contains absolutely no pornography whatsoever (unless you count this).


So, cheers muchly to everyone for reading. I'll try to keep up the good work! :-)

Moon Over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch

Chief Inspector Thomas Nightingale, the last government-sanctioned wizard in Britain and the guy who handles all the weird stuff the Met is clueless about, and his apprentice Peter Grant are on a new case. The body of a jazz musician is found with strong evidence that he was killed by magic. Grant, whose father is an influential 'almost made it' jazz musician in his own right, finds himself drawn back into his father's troubled life as he hunts down the murderer in Soho.


Moon Over Soho is the sequel to the recently-published Rivers of London (called Midnight Riot in the USA for reasons that have never been adequately explained), which made an impressive splash when it was released just three months ago. This series has been described as a British take on The Dresden Files and though there are vague similarities, the main difference between them is cultural: Aaronovitch lives and breathes London, its history and culture, and that comes out in his writing (not just here; anyone who's seen his Doctor Who TV serial Remembrance of the Daleks can see it there as well). London in his books, even this alterno-magical London of river spirits, chimeras and emotional vampires, is as much a character as Grant, Nightingale and the slowly-expanding recurring cast of semi-regulars.

As with the first novel, this is good stuff. The plot unfolds at a cracking pace, there are intriguing backstory revelations about Nightingale and the history of magic, and the characterisation is very strong. There's some effective moments of true horror, and Aaronovitch doesn't brush the consequences of events in the first book under the table. There's some simmering subplots (like Grant's awkward relationship with the river spirits, most notably Lady Tyburn who is in danger of becoming his nemesis) and the introduction of a presumably recurring villain, no doubt sowing the seeds of a multi-book ongoing storyline. In fact, this series is screaming out for a TV adaptation, so applicable is the structure of a stand-alone main plot with ongoing subplots combined with interesting characters.


There are some minor negatives: one plot twist - where Grant's judgement takes a jump out the window as he gets involved with a potential suspect - I assumed was the result of Grant being bewitched or put under a spell, but it appears not, so is just inexplicable. One bunch of characters - who have the potential to be a sort of jazz-playing equivalent of the Lone Gunmen from The X-Files - are introduced who appear to be important to the plot, but then don't do much here (I assume they'll be back later on). Nightingale has some key scenes but generally sits a lot of the book out. In this sense the TV correlation is less successful as there's a fair amount of loose ends left flapping around where their establishment doesn't accomplish much in this book (whilst others, like the setting up an ongoing villain, work much better). Still, we don't have too long to wait for the third book: Whispers Under Ground will be out in November this year.

Moon Over Soho (****½) has a more focused plot than the first novel but also feels a little more unresolved, so it evens out. It's still a relentlessly entertaining, fast-moving and enjoyable urban fantasy with intriguing hints of greater depth waiting to be explored. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers

The Caribbean, 1718. Jack Chandagnac - Jack Shandy - is sailing to Haiti to reclaim some property when his ship is boarded by pirates. Shandy is recruited onto the pirate crew and becomes aware of a bizarre conspiracy that is unfolding between one of the passengers, Benjamin Hurwood, and the feared pirate Blackbeard, involving Hurwood's daughter Beth and the mythical Fountain of Youth. Shandy is soon drawn into a strange and magical quest set against the backdrop of the dying days of piracy in the Caribbean.


On Stranger Tides is arguably Tim Powers' most well-known and influential novel. Published in 1988, it has been quoted as one of the primary inspirations behind both Ron Gilbert's splendid Monkey Island computer games and also the Pirates of the Caribbean film franchise, to such an extent that the film producers bought the rights to the novel and the imminent fourth film in the series is both named for and draws on some of the plot elements of the book. Yet it's not quite the swashbuckling, good-time adventure that the those later works would suggest.

On Stranger Tides is rich and full of vibrant colour that brings alive the setting, but it's also weird, offbeat and often downright bizarre. Jack Shandy is a reluctant hero who spends a fair amount of time moping around and musing on his bad luck rather than getting on with business (especially in the second half of the novel, dissipating dramatic tension rather than building it up) whilst Beth is a fairly weak character lacking much motivation, rather disappointing given there aren't many female characters in the novel (in this regard the inspired works have done a better job; Beth is no Elaine Marley and isn't even an Elizabeth Swann). On the plus side, the likes of Blackbeard and Davies make for more interesting characters, though as one of the main villains Ben Hurwood lacks any real defining characteristics beyond being insane.

The writing is crisp, clear and flows nicely, with Powers conjuring up some dark and threatening vibes whenever seriously weird voodoo goes down. He's also good at the skirmishes, with cutlasses flashing in the sunlight and pirates and navy crewmen urgently reloading their pistols and boarding one another's ships with wild abandon. There's also a nice maudlin feeling evoked at the dying of the pirate culture in the face of increased colonisation of the islands from Europe, though Powers never lets the reader forget that, for all its romantic image, piracy was built on theft, pressganging and murder.


On Stranger Tides is thus a mixed bag: the central plot starts and stops a bit erratically, and some well-rounded, three-dimensional characters with well-explained motivations sit uneasily next to cliches and cyphers. The dark and foreboding atmosphere evoked by the magic is impressive, but then tends to be undermined by the 'science' of voodoo, which sometimes reduces it to just another fantasy magic system. The action sequences are rousing, but infrequent. But overall the novel has a strange, offbeat atmosphere that is interesting and, if the plot doesn't flow as well as it could, the weird collection of characters and their antics makes for an enjoyable, if not entirely page-turning, reading experience.

On Stranger Tides (***½) is available now in the UK and USA.

A DANCE WITH DRAGONS completed

George R.R. Martin and his wife Parris were in New York yesterday to attend the TIME Magazine 'Most Important 100 People' dinner. It also appears that GRRM took advantage of the visit to drop by Bantam HQ and drop off a fairly substantial package on his editor's desk.

Photo by Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images North America

So, eleven years to the week after A Storm of Swords was delivered and almost six years to the month after A Feast for Crows was submitted, A Dance with Dragons is done and dusted. It's off to the editor for a final polish and then the production process will step into high gear to get the book onto shelves on 12 July.

Of course, this wouldn't be ADWD if there wasn't some controversy. After promising that the completion announcement would be unambiguous, erm, it was fairly ambiguous if you've never seen King Kong, or if you didn't know that GRRM has been calling the book 'Kong' for a good two years now.

Let's hope The Winds of Winter has a smoother ride, though I can't really imagine it being possible for a book to have a rougher one.

UPDATE: From George's editor:

There were a few moments of George in a spare office yesterday, cleaning up the last bits and inserting a few new bits in longhand, while I typed the changes into the electronic files, but we are honestly and officially done.

And there is MUCH rejoicing!

New interview with Paul Kearney

I recently teamed up with Pat's Fantasy Hotlist to interview Paul Kearney on his new novel, Kings of Morning (due in November), the recent reissuing of his Monarchies of God series and the news that his Sea-Beggars series will be getting a much-delayed finale next year.

Check out the interview over on the Hotlist.

GAME OF THRONES maintains ratings performance

If last week's story was about Game of Thrones smashing UK expectations and doing moderately well in the USA, this week was about maintaining that healthy performance and not losing ground.

Gregor Clegane urges viewers to watch his debut episode.

Studying TV ratings is an interesting game, something I first experienced back when anxiously biting nails over whether Babylon 5 was going to be renewed each year and watching Doctor Who's ratings plummet as the BBC did its level best to kill the series with insane scheduling decisions (which they successfully did in 1989). A familiar pattern is to see a new series, especially one as heavily-trailed as Thrones, start off strong, then drop over the next few weeks and then either level out (renewal, but possibly only as a mid-season replacement with fewer episodes), shoot up again (full renewal) or keep dropping (cancellation). However, Thrones doesn't seem to be doing that.

First off, an extra few days' analysis revealed the full, adjusted-for-DVR-and-online figures that Thrones hit for its first episode: 6.8 million watched in the the USA in the first week, compared to 7.1 million for Boardwalk Empire, the most successful premiere in HBO's history. Impressive. Most impressive. Of course, HBO did completely nuke their channels with showings, trailers, more showings and behind-the-scenes videos for the series to the point where an impressive performance was highly probable anyway, but given the lack of a real star name or known behind-the-cameras talent (such as Buscemi and Scorsese), not to mention the perception of fantasy as an off-putting genre, Thrones' first episode performance was impressive.

Similarly, in the UK DVR and Sky Online viewings lifted Thrones' ratings from an already-spectacular 743,000 to a downright phenomenal 1.07 million (or over 10% of potential Sky viewers tuned in, which considering that drama makes up a very low percentage of Sky figures is startling).

For the second episode, HBO kept things ticking over nicely. The overnights for Thrones were 2.2 million, for the first showing alone, exactly the same as for the first episode. The overall figures will likely be down due to the fact that HBO aren't going quite so repeat-happy with the episode this week, but the fact that the show maintained its audience figures on a holiday weekend when the expectation from everyone was that we'd see a notable drop-off remains a solid achievement.

In the UK, Sky Atlantic delivered 531,000 (unadjusted) for the second episode, a significant drop compared to the first. However, the unseasonable weather in the UK (we're currently experiencing the sort of temperatures we normally see in July) and the fact that Bank Holiday Monday was an extra day off for most of the population meant that many more people were out and doing things than a week earlier. Also, the drop-off of 30%, although disappointing, is nowhere near as bad as what Boardwalk Empire experienced (dropping from 400,000 to well below 200,000 by its third episode). It is also possible that, for the reasons mentioned above, many more peopled timeshifted the episode this week than last. That figure will be interesting to see, hopefully later this week or early next. Episode 3's figures will likely be more telling for the show's future success in the UK.

So far, so good. Whilst a second season is in the bag, the ratings performance of the series overall will likely be a factor when HBO comes to decide whether to renew the show or not for a third season in a year's time, so the more success now, the better. But so far things are off to a good start.

Bantam confirms that ADWD will NOT be split

With the release date of A Dance with Dragons' drawing closer and the novel growing larger, there has been speculation in some quarters that the novel would have to be split in half for hardcover publication. HarperCollins Voyager have already said that the UK paperback will be two volumes and Bantam hasn't ruled out a two-volume US paperback, but the status of the hardcover was less certain.


After all, back in 2005 when A Feast for Crows was split, Martin said that the 1,600 manuscript page mark was a line in the sand that couldn't be crossed, and once it was other plans had to be made. Dragons passed the 1,600 manuscript page mark several weeks ago, leading to fears of a split. Of course, the context is somewhat different: Martin is a much bigger-selling author now (A Song of Ice and Fire has more than doubled its total number of copies sold since 2005) and at the time of Crows's split he still had hundreds more pages to write, whilst with Dragons not much more work remains to be done.

Still, the question was being asked enough for Shawn Speakman of Suvudu and the Terry Brooks website to ask Martin's US editor what the score was. Her reply was pretty clear:

Shawn's Email to Anne, George's Editor:

"Hey Anne, has there been any talk of having to split DANCE? Seems like it is getting quite large...? -- S."

From Anne:

"No, we cut some stuff back out. Will be about as long as ASOS..."

So that's one possibility laid to rest. A Dance with Dragons will be published in one volume on 12 July. Although I'm sure everyone will be happier once GRRM confirms that the final manuscript has been fully completed and delivered.

Re-release of Chris Wooding's THE BRAIDED PATH

Chris Wooding's excllent Braided Path trilogy is being reissued in omnibus by Gollancz this July. This is the second time the trilogy - The Weavers of Saramyr, The Skein of Lament and The Ascendancy Veil - has been made available in omnibus, but the the previous edition has gone out of the print.


Unfortunately, it has to be said that the new cover is not that great. It's yet another dude in a hood with swords. To be honest, I don't even remember there being very many dudes in hoods with swords playing a role in the book. It's also unfortunate that the novel's Asian-themed backdrop is not represented at all on the cover, unlike the previous omnibus:


The new edition should be hitting the shops in the UK on 21 July. Even with a weaker cover, it's still a fine and enjoyable novel mixing traditional fantasy tropes with Asian influences to great effect.

The GAME OF THRONES title sequence

Making a good title sequence is a disappearing art on American television. With only 44 minutes available for a network show once adverts are removed, losing 1 or 2 minutes of filmed material to a title sequence is understandably something shows are now keen to avoid. This wasn't always the case - Babylon 5 had a terrific opening title sequence which changed every year - but more recently shows like Lost and Heroes have only just flashed up a title card quickly and gotten on with the action.

Of course, premium cable shows which run without adverts have more time to spend on title sequences. Recently we saw Starz's Pillars of the Earth, which had a great title sequence with paintings coming to life and the cathedral rising out of the ground (this is the only link I could find, but weirdly it's been mirrored), but HBO generally has had some of the best title sequences recently: Rome with its graffiti coming to life as daily life in the city plays out around it; True Blood with its evocation of sex, religion and heat in Louisiana; The Wire with its scenes of life on the streets of Baltimore; and Carnivale's weird, surreal juxtaposition of darker moments from history with Tarot cards.

Obviously HBO were going to come up with something special for Game of Thrones and contracted Angus Wall and his company Elastic to do the job. Wall was the creator of Rome's title sequence, which won him a BAFTA, and also Carnivale's, which won him an Emmy. His work as an editor on The Social Network also won him an Oscar, so clearly he had the qualifications for the job. In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, he explains that the title sequence was meant to evoke the maps found at the start of every Song of Ice and Fire novel (and fantasy books in general) and the mechanical innovation of a late-medieval society (not a primary theme of the novels, though such innovation is referenced in the maesters' Citadel and also the Free City of Myr, where great advances are being made in optics) whilst also fulfilling story-telling functions: the sequence subtly outlines the history of the Seven Kingdoms and will change several times a season as new locations come to the fore.

The conceit of the sequence is that there is an immense globe of the world, with the continents of Westeros and Essos outlined on the inner surface of the globe rather than the outer, with a sun at the heart of the sphere ringed by a mechanical astrolabe. The whole thing is similar to a miniature Dyson Sphere. Under the surface there are gears, cogs and pulleys which, when activated when the camera gets near to particular locations, allows buildings and features to rise up out of the surface of the map. In the first episode, the cities of Kings Landing and Pentos, the castle of Winterfell and the Wall all rise up out of the map, with individual buildings and locations (such as the Red Keep and the Great Sept of Baelor in King's Landing, and the godswood in Winterfell) easily visible.

These locations will change as the series progresses: Pentos disappears from the sequence in Episode 2 to be replaced by Vaes Dothrak, whilst the Twins and the Eyrie will join the sequence in later episodes. With Season 2 confirmed, I'd expect to see Dragonstone, Pyke, Storm's End, Riverrun and Qarth appearing on the map.

A very nice touch is that the astrolabe surrounding the sun has scenes from the history of Westeros chiselled into the side of it. We see three such scenes during the title sequence: at the very beginning and end, and just after the camera visits Winterfell. In the first sequence we see a volcanic eruption destroying a city whilst a dragon looks on and people flee by boat, a clear depiction of the Doom of Valyria and the flight of the Targaryens to Westeros (technically the Targaryens didn't flee the Doom directly to Dragonstone, they were already there manning a trading outpost with the Seven Kingdoms, but that doesn't sound as cool). In the second the dragon is being brought down and killed by a direwolf, a lion and a stag, a reference to the alliance between the houses of Stark, Lannister and Baratheon that removed the Targaryens from power. The final scene has the other animals bowing down to the triumphant stag, noting that the Baratheons now hold the Iron Throne.

We then get the final logo for the series, backed by a great sigil showing the heads of the Targaryen, Baratheon, Stark and Lannister heraldic animals and setting out what the principle factions in the game of thrones will be.

It's a great title sequence. Some elements are odd - the 3D map, the Dyson Sphere-like set-up and the mechanical gears seem too advanced for the setting - but it also does a great job of showing the various locations and hinting at the deeper backstory behind events. Ramin Djawadi's theme tune is also a bit underwhelming at the start, but it's growing on me every time I hear it. HBO have poured a lot of effort into this - Wall apparently worked on the sequence for over a year - and the results are impressive.