Game of Thrones | Song of Ice and Fire

Although HBO has attempted to stop  Game of Thrones  leaking this year by not releasing early review copies of each episode, somehow episodes have still found their way online before the official broadcast. First of all, the sixth season’s debut appeared online just hours before broadcast. Now, the fifth episode, titled  ‘The Door’ , has leaked, according to  Torrent Freak . The initial upload occurred more than 24 hours before the episode was set to broadcast on HBO, and soon after a high-quality video appeared on Torrent websites. Ironically, the leak hasn’t been traced back to hackers but to HBO themselves – keen fans noticed the episode had been uploaded early to HBO Nordic. A screenshot of the episode available on the website has appeared online. View image on Twitter In recent weeks, HBO has reportedly been sending pirates warnings about illegally downloading their show, while online links have also been taken down within minu...

Tommen has a new successor. Good luck getting anyone in King’s Landing to care, apparently. Caution! Spoilers immediately ahead for  Game of Thrones  Season 6, Episode 2, ‘Home.’ Go watch it, it’s a really good one.  The body count in Westeros is really starting to pile up — and the return of one resurrected Lord Commander  doesn’t begin to make a dent in the numbers. In Season 6’s first two episodes, three of the Seven Kingdoms’ most powerful leaders have been usurped and unceremoniously tossed on the scrap heap: Roose Bolton (along with his wife and hours-old heir), Balon Greyjoy (last of the participants in the War of the Five Kings and the last of the leeches burned in the fire by Melisandre) and Prince Doran Martell of Dorne (that guy in the bathrobe and wheelchair). But the most important death is the one that barely got any attention: the poisoning of Princess Myrcella Baratheon, sister to King Tommen and official heir to the Iron Throne. ...

If there is one thing Machiavelli’s  The Prince  needed, it was more dragons. Alas, it would have been so easy! All he had to do was mention Saint George. Although the closest Machiavelli came to discussing these mythic beasts was a brief shout-out for Chiron the centaur , such omissions make HBO’s  Game of Thrones  and George R. R. Martin’s  A Song of Ice and Fire  all the more interesting in today’s classroom. After all, if Daenerys Targaryen were a Poli Sci major today, she’d have every reason to throw down her textbooks and demand: “Where are my dragons!” Where  are  her dragons? That’s a good question. I say they belong in her classes alongside Hannibal’s elephants. It may sound ridiculous to reference works of fantasy in order to better explain politics, but such a practice is as old as Plato’s dialogues on Atlantis. After all, what is a well-written fictional character other than a device for better understanding ourselves? One...

If you watched this past Sunday’s season premiere of  Game of Thrones , you were treated with a brief return to Dorne, that south-most region of Westeros where last season’s most boring storyline took place. And then,  after seeing one of the show’s greatest deviations from the books , you started wondering what the hell is happening here. Spoilers ahead… On a surface level, Ellaria Sand and the daughters of the late Oberyn Martell assassinated Prince Doran, tired of waiting for him to get around to taking revenge on the Lannisters for the many, many Martells killed at their commands. It’s almost as if the Sand Snakes had watched season five themselves, and got bored waiting for something interesting to happen in Dorne. Certainly now that Doran is dead, things are about to move a lot faster. But where, exactly, is this story moving faster towards? There’s no coup in George R.R. Martin’s books, and while the Sand Snakes are very much trying to pick a fight with King’s L...

There comes a moment in the fifth season of  Game of Thrones  (and I believe the third book of  A Song of Ice and Fire ) when Lord Varys, of all people, possibly reveals what the entire series is all about. In pleading with Tyrion Lannister to hold on to hope at the lowest point of his life, Varys asks him to imagine a world in which the strong do not prey on the weak, and where the neverending political intrigue and blood feuds are left behind. This being the shifty Varys, such lofty words are best taken with a grain of salt. Still, his suggestion makes one wonder: Is  A Song of Ice and Fire  ultimately the story of a long, bloody transition from a feudal, monarchical system to some kind of proto-democracy, in which all castes have a voice, and the nobles and the various religions must yield to the rule of law? In other words, can the game of thrones finally end, replaced by a civilization that actually works? This leads to another question, a f...

HBO Spoilers  for the season premiere of  Game of Thrones   are below. The sixth season premiere of  Game of Thrones , titled  “The Red Woman,”  ended with a major shocker for viewers, as the titular character — the Lady Melisandre — revealed that she’s been keeping a very big secret since she first appeared on the series. As unveiled in the episode’s final scene, Melisandre has been keeping her appearance magically disguised all along. Her true visage isn’t that of 39-year-old actress Carice van Houten — instead, she is immensely older. HBO Oh hai. It’s a revelation that certainly makes us look at some earlier scenes — like Melisandre’s seduction of Stannis Baratheon back in season two and  attempted seduction of Jon Snow  in season five — in a new light. And it’s another example of magic taking a more prominent role in  Game of Thrones  as the series moves toward its conclusion. (There will likely  only be two mor...

Alfie Allen and Sophie Turner star in Game of Thrones: The Red Woman   CREDIT: HBO Some major cliff-hangers were left unresolved The tension was incredible as  Game of Thrones  season six opened with the camera swooping low over Castle Black, alighting on the scene of noble Jon Snow’s bloody run-in with the traitorous Night’s Watch. Alas, the Bastard of Winterfell (Kit Harington) was, for the time being at least, staying very dead indeed , as confirmed by a haunting close-up of his waxy visage and the pool of scarlet arranged like a skewed halo. S hort of spelling out “He’s Dead!” in huge flaming letters it’s hard to see how much more emphatically show-runners David Benioff and DB Weiss (they also wrote the episode) could have driven the point home. W as this a sadistic riposte to fans who have spent the best part of a year constructing elaborate conspiracy theories as to when and how the grumpy heartthrob will return? Or a s...

Unless you’ve been held captive by the High Sparrow and his band of sanctimonious goons for the past eight months, you know that  Game of Thrones Season 6  will premiere on HBO this season. For the first time, even book readers are mostly clueless as to what might be in store, as most of the storylines in David Benioff and D.B. Weiss’ acclaimed adaptation are past the point where that George R.R. Martin has reached in his ongoing series of novels. Obviously, the big question on everyone’s mind is whether or not  Jon Snow is truly dead . Naturally, the Internet has some interesting theories about the newest Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch – as well on just about every other character that probably survived season 5. So check out our list of the best  Game of Thrones  Season 6 predictions  in the gallery below. But be careful – spoilers are coming: 1. Coldhands Rides Into Our Lives Coldhands is a mysterious (and probably undead)...