Previous Video - George RR Martin on Why Game of Thrones so Dark: • George RR Martin on Wh... A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones Author George R. R. Martin Interview
Good thing we didn't have a "Dany kinda forgot that she didn't want to be a tyranical ruler" to explain why she decided to burn a city full of innocent civilians that where rightfully fearful of an army of savages and a flying flamethrower.
What a perfect summation of Game of Thrones in general. GRR Martin giving detailed and interesting descriptions of the world he created, and D & D chiming in with basic, and sometimes redundant, snippets.
@@fusee974 they wouldn't but it shows they were out of their depth once they ran out of available source material. Season 7 and 8 for proof given how rushed and reliant on spectacle they were.
Yep I stopped watching this video the second those arrogant morons showed up - it's disgusting to put them in the same video as Martin sincerely discussing this world especially considering they created a character (the Bravosi playwright) specifically to shit on and mock Martin because he dared to criticise their incompetence.
Valyrians had no gods, because they saw themselves as lords of the world. Yet, slaves in Valyria worshiped thousands gods in thousands temples. R'hollor, among others, but also the Many-faced god, for instance. I don't know anything about Old Ghiscaris religion, and not much about "modern" Ghiscaris religion of the Slaver's Bay. As far as I remember, all we learn in the books in that they are polytheists, and that their clergy is maid of several "Graces order", with differents colors and responsabilities. Blues graces are healers, red graces are sacred prostitutes, etc. All graces are females.
Lol George says some divine amazing intellectual fantasy science that he created and then D & D say something that sounds insignificant and so dumbed down compared to Martin's love and complexity within the gods and history of Westeros
TV's and movies will always be criticized for an imperfect translation due specifically to time constraints... guess D&D deserve more criticism than most at this point, lack of pre-written material there greatest issue... we'll wait for the end of the book series...
@Lyfeldre the last season having 6 episodes, 6! all other seasons had 10, when this was to be the grand finale and they skimp on the best part it just says something about the integrity and longevity of the show to be enjoyed by future generations... they say even the scenes with ghost were cut due to budget constraints with cgi, either that's wrong and it was just lazy, there was cgi all over the place... or it was correct, in which case, why the fuck is that the case, the biggest tv show on the planet arguably at the time and we're to believe they were held back by budget constraints, maybe it is true, in which case, it's just sad...
And they didn't even explain that "Prongs" was Harry's dad! Or who any of the creators of the Marauder's Map were! I mean come on, it's a huge plot point!
Of course, since book 5 we know that the weirwood trees aren't just the symbols of the Old gods, but rather it seems like they ARE the gods. A telepathic organism that is able to absorb the consciousnesses of all the dead Children of the forest into one gigantic hivemind. Read GRRM's short story "A Song For Lya" if you want to see one of his earliest explorations of this concept. And also the short stories"Men of Greywater station" and "And Seven Times Never Kill Man!" if you want to get a clue of where George might be going with this idea in future books...
@ShalakumX Simba Martin obviously cribbed from History and ancient religions so these gods were universal in some sense. Martin has his spin on it, Avatar as well. I don't think Avatar plagiarized Martin's work.
They didn't mention the storm god from the books. He who brought down the castles that preceded the Storm's End and who, in the books, is said to be the enemy of the drowned god.
This religion died with the last Storm King. When Aegon's vasall took the Baratheon name and daughter, the Stormlands adapted to the Faith of the Seven
@@Keptaro The Durrandon's and Stormlands didn't worship the Storm god, they had worshipped the faith of the seven since the coming of the andals. Further drawing a direct line between the storm god and the god of the seas that Durran Godsgrief is said to have angered is a bit premature, as we do not know for certain if they could be regarded as the same mythological figure
When I first saw them pop up I was like fuck this, I'm not going to continue the video if they continue talking for the duration of the video. They can't even grasp 1% of what George RR Martin has created.
who actually cares at this point. GRRM clearly lost interest in his own books long ago. Everyone I know who I read the books with in highschool has completely lost interest in this story. I found Wheel of Time and can't take GoT serious at all anymore
You notice how Martin is the one doing the talking? But they have to include D&D repeating things they've been told to make it seem like they know what they're talking about.
Given how they retconned the Faith of the Seven into fanatics, I strongly suspect gods and religions are something they hate (or at least Benioff hates).
@@Gongall How are they super-fanatical in the books? In the books, they only painted their religion's symbol onto their skin, clothes or shields. They never went on a rampage in the books, didn't have a thing about homosexuality, and their founding was peasants sick of the nobles power plays screwing them over to name a few. Plus the High Septon/Sparrow of the books was a clever man who played Cersei like a fiddle. Finally, the High Sparrow's predecessor was murdered on Cersei's orders in the books, while in the show he was a whoremonger (in the books one of the High Sparrow's rivals was a whoremonger).
English is not my mother tongue, but listening to this interview to Martin and D&D I can tell the difference between somebody that has very high communication skills and somebody else that has not :D G.R.R. is a great writer and communicator
@@PyrrhosHans lol I haven't done westworld in a couple years unfortunately. still love that show. its unique and a work of art. but during seaosn 2, hbo shared rights with WBTV. so every single video would get flagged for copyright. was such a pain in the butt watching the episode from a computer instead of TV, capturing clips. pausing to write notes, then pulling an all-nighter into 2pm the following day to try to get a video out in the rat race, and then its turned down for copyright lol. so I've just enjoyed seaosn 2 and seaosn 3 as a fan of tbe show without grinding on projects I'm focused on winds of winter, his dark materials, witcher, and the wheel of time nowadays. with other odds and ends pet projects randomly for fun :)(
@@PyrrhosHans on that youtube video with Michelle Fairley, I doubt you'll be able to find my comment, but I wrote a comment time stamping the spot in the interview where George rr Martin address a fan question regarding whether or not the gods are even real. if you can't find my time stamp, just skip about two thirds into the video. I think its within the final third. or just check out the whole video since grrm is awesome lol (it's not my video. you'll find it tho if you search for "George rr marti. and Michelle Fairley")
@@DarthPlato I love the idea someone posed in a theory vid about the "old gods" simply being a titanic pseudo-hivemind of all the children of the forest and greenseers across time linked deep underground by huge roots (which explains why the weirwoods planted in rocky places like the vale and casterly rock are wilted and dying, and the stumps still having some power), its not exactly a god but it basically well might be
The thing that jumps out at me is that he says "various nonhuman races," when describing Westeros' first masters. *Various.* I think that's meaningful. I think that says something very important about the Others. Assuming the Children count as one race, and the giants another, that would be only two. Maybe its pedantic, but I wouldn't use the word various to describe a group of two. Maybe the White Walkers were one of the other races. Maybe the others have been destroyed and forgotten - probably by either the Others during the Long Night, or the Children themselves long before.
@@jolan_bcx that hasn't been confirmed yet in the books tho. In the books the Others (or the white walkers) were described a bit differently than how they were presented in the show (like seemingly having their own languange and culture and stuff). Well for now, only grrm knows if the version shown in the show is the actual history of the Others or not.
George put so much into this world. He has a story to tell anywhere. If he were to just close his eyes and chuck a dart at a map, where it would strike has a story to be told. Just by ASOIAF and what little history he’s revealed the stories would without a doubt be very compelling. Awesome world building. The shadowlands and ulthos I’m particularly interested in.
They signed on to adapt a book series, not finish writing it. For what it's worth, they did an excellent job of adaptation for the first few seasons of the show. It's been over a decade since Dance came out. Winds was supposed to be the final book, but now GRRM says Dream will be. D&D did a good job at what they signed up to do, GRRM just didn't keep up his end of the bargain to finish the books before the show. So I see it much the other way around, GRRM "betrayed" D&D by forcing them to finish his unfinished series despite that not being what they set out to do.
"Melisandre has powers granted to her by a divine being" is that confirmed though, do we know that she's backed by a literal God? Maybe it's just ancient magic integrated into a religion
That's a good question. She does come from a very magical place and all manifestations of her God only come through her. I was wondering about the other religions and in how far they were backed by any real gods. Obviously the old Gods have influence on the world, with the whole Three eyed raven, children of the forest-arc.. but I've never seen any manifestation of the drowned God, or the Seven, not even after the Great Sept of Baelor gets burnt down
In book 4 or 5, I don't remember, it is reveal that, most of the "powers" of Mel came from his chemicals and yeah, fire magic. I think some valyrians also had dominous on fire magic
Pedroalí Tovar it’s true! in adwd we learn through melisandre’s chapter that she protects herself with a ton of powders, and that her power is even stronger at the wall than it was in asshai, suggesting that her power is directly connected to the magic within the places surrounding her. she can do a shitton of encantations and honestly, the only “proof” of a god’s influence in her abilities is her visions in the flames. but greenseers also have visions, and the three-eyed raven believes those visions are a gift from the gods to “grace” their chosen ones
D&d didn't understand any of this story. It's like a kid explaining fantasy to a grandparent and the old person reciting what they heard but getting it mixed up.
Am I the only one who looks at Melissandra and sees Hatsumomo from Memoirs of a Geisha? Not in portrayal but in the way she cuts her eyes at people and in her movements.
They are two different authors with different styles, and if you haven't seen any other detailed worlds like Martin made, you should probably broaden your horizons with different fantasy and sci fi novels. There are a lot of authors whose worlds are as detailed and varied(if not more) than martins.
@@EM-vw7im Any recommendations? I've read a handful of fantasy but I haven't found many series yet that have this much consistent detail in their world building.
@@erwina4738 The Witcher books are good and definitely have good world building, but I don't feel they're quite on the same level as what Martin has accomplished. I'll have to check out Joe Abercrombie.
You know all the stuff they cut out of Martin's interview is where all the interesting nuggets were. This is basically a description of the plot at a 1st grade level. The Davids seem proud of their ability to barely state the simplest of facts about Westeros, gems like "The Seven gods are seen to be seven facets of The One God" and "he's saying I'm not a Stark, and he's going back to The Drowned God."
@@rajyavardhansingh4491 basically she craves attention 'oh look at me i am special and i gave names to my boobs' literally, on tv, magazines everywhere. It gets old, really fast
I wonder why does he never speaks about the Valyrian gods. I really wish to know like everything about them. Hopefully, he will talk about that someday.
Probably cause Valyrian is considered a Dead religion. Last practitioners of the religion were Targaryens before they converted to the faith of the seven after Aegon's conquest.
@@LukaMamukelashvili some Targaryens kept the faith alive even then. Most of it died with the dragons. Some citations in F&B sound weird to people who supposedly believe in the Seven.
my personal theory is that the valyrians worshipped some sort of the lord of light prototype. We know they practiced fire and blood magic which is integral to the religion. And also that’s what most of the descendant cities of valyria worship. Volantis is described as idealizing valyria, they pride themselves in being the “purest” valyrian blood and have an obsession with keeping the valyrian characteristics, they’re basically traditionals, and wouldn’t you know the main biggest temple of the lord of light is housed there. The wiki says valyrians worshipped multiple gods so I think they had multiple “gods” that represent different facets of fire, the one “true” god, kind of like the faith of the seven.
@@mysaria7641 Maybe the Lord of Light is similar how the Jews stole the Canaanite pantheon and basically focused on one of their gods (YAHWEH). They turned a real religion with multiple Gods in a cult worshipping just one. Yeah it really seems like what the Lord of Light is
I tried. I watched the first two seasons but haven't watched the third yet. It's been months, too. It's really hard to watch them knowing that most of the plotlines go nowhere.
Personally I believe the Lord of Light is a real God in the GOT universe, but I think the Old Gods May exist as well, everyone who has insulted them or left them has faced terrible fates, Theon losing his manhood and being tortured, Drogo insulted them and in his hubris was killed, that’s just me though
@@jayoctopus8832 nvm I read the full comment after I actually looked for it. At first I tapped your profile and only saw the beginning. I still don't agree. They are as bad as everyone thinks because they refused to hire another writer, even when knowing full well that they were clueless. They wanted to be known as the two guys that finished game of thrones. And their arrogance has shamed thousands of hours of work from George
Sean Damon II yes but i didn’t use the word good. I used the word not as bad. They still did that wrong but they adapted pretty well for the first couple of seasons.
@@jayoctopus8832 they also frequently tell us all the ways they didnt give a shit about the characters or nonmentallyhandicapped plot. They really did need an ice bear tho!
Fascinating how it went from worshipping nature (shintoism ?) to some kind of Greek/Roman religion with several gods and their own roles and in the end welcome something such as monotheism that we mostly get now with the lord of light, GRRM really knows how to make parallels with our own history
This is metaphorical to the actual evolution of religions in our world. The first religions were animistic, worshipped the forces of nature (pagans). Somw thousand yrs ago came the Polytheistic religions, Hinduism, jainism, buddhism, etc. Finally, the youngest and the most violent religions, the monotheistic ones: Judaism, Christianity and Islam
I love how unlike Tolkiens Legendarium the mythological aspect of ASOIAF is left more ambiguous and up to interpretation of what is real, who is the true divine power, and who is a servant of The Great Other.
Well, Tolkien legendarium could be just that: Legends. Of corse its umpossible that in the Trees age, Mid Earth would had life with no sun. So I guess the Silmarillion is just the legends of the elfs. In LotR there is no trace of the Valar.
@@adamnesico Prior to the sun and moon there were the trees of valinor, and before the trees there were the two lamps. Galadriel was literally alive during the years of the trees and saw them. Within the legendary world of arda, the years of the trees did happen, the silmarillion are the ancient history of an ancient world.
@@Hatypus And Middle Earth had forests while having no source of ligth according to Silmarillion? The mounts of Amman stopped the light of the trees and didnt arroved to Middle Earth. Thats nonsense. I see the Silmarillion more like a book of legends. Part is truth, part is just myth.
I love how they decided to include only one sentence from the interview with actress playing melisandre and it sounds as if she’s an actual follower of this fire religion
Okay I didn't know the Septas were clergy, I thought they were nuns. So a Septa could also have a sept and congressional members they guide, and can preach and teach?
One of the best parts of this world is that none of the gods are confirmed to be real or fake. Things happen that can't be explained, but the gods will never make an actual appearance in the story. Very realistic when it comes to world building.
I wouldn't say it's only for a realistic world building considering everyone does it different but because game of thrones really just seems like an altered universe with dragons and zombies, just like in the real world God leaves men to their choices that they made. Sometimes I would actually want to see the God's because I think that part of fantasy can be fascinating.
Heavily implied none of them are objectively real in the world of GoT. The various delusions and misinterpretations used to justify them are far more fascinating.
@@jonharrison9222yeah but the gods are definitely real, or atleast their powers are. Melisandres and thoros's feats of magic are straight up proof of rhollors existence, and bloodraven is definite proof of the old gods.
Like our Universe has only one God (Creator, who is outside the Universe), the “Ice&Fire”-universe has its own one and only god-creator who is outside this universe. Yes, It's GRRM. All the other so called “gods” in this universe, the seven, the old gods, the drowned god and so on, aren’t real gods as they are part of this universe and have not created it, like our old “gods” Zeus, Poseidon or Thor.
If anyone has lightbringer it's Beric Dondarrion. he's a follower of the lord of the light... been brought back 6+ times, and he uses his blood to flame up a sword not sticking it in fire to catch fire..
A beautiful coincidence is that Stannis swords name 'Lightbringer' sounds eerily like 'Leidbringer' which in german means the "bringer of suffering/pain/grief". I always found that to be very fitting abiguity.
Anyone else notice that three of the main religions of this ‘verse are similar in different ways to Christianity and adjacent religions? The Seven could be seen as analogous to the Holy Trinity, the Lord of Light “casts a shadow” which created another god that he’s at war with (God and Satan), the Drowned God was a sacrifice (like Jesus) and the religion itself has baptism.
This is so painful to watch. George in the books has created these religions that feel alive and real while D&D didn't know what to do with them. Just for context on how the religion feels in the book: -The Old gods are scary, they are creepy and a constant reminder of mortality. It is such a strange religion that south of the "Neck" only few lords still workship them like the Blackwoods in Raventree Hall. Their faces carved in ancient times bleed with red sap like blood and they are full of magic energy. Most lords in the north have a "godswood" were a weirwood tree stands tall. But one of the most mysterious places is actually down south in the God's Eye a lake next to Harrenhall there is a Isle called "Isle of faces", a place said to be full of weirwood trees and magical creaures, where the first men made peace with the children of the forrest. A place no one can sail towards because the water currents and crows will attack anyone that approaches. (They are completely forgotten in the TV show) -The Faith of the Seven is what Catholicism was to medieval Kingdoms of Europe. A very centralized, organized and powerful institution that operated next but also independent from the nobility, a religion that gives legitimacy to all Andal rulers south of the Neck. Their original seat is in Old Town, the Starry sept with its High Septon/Pope who is elected and seen as the absolute authority in all religious matters. But just like Catholicism many heretical and fanatical movements would sprout from time to time some from small folk other from noble houses that would challenge any affront to the gods, Maegor Targaryen entire rule was just a total war against the faith and some of their most vocal and charismatic preachers can come from humble origins and rally people into fanatical rage so intoxicating they would gladly give their lives to the stranger. (This is why something as moronic as blowing the sept and killing the pope would be political suicide which the TV show ignored). -The Drown God, oh boy i could spend entire pages describing how mysterious and fascinating this religion is but just to summarize they are inspired by H.P Lovecraft. The original workshipers are considered also to be an entire species that lives underwater and build their thrones with black oily stone. Said black oily stone is also seen in places that don't make sense like Old Town, Yeem, Asshai, Isle of Toads all these places are separated by days if not months or years of travel and yet they share this same black oily stone in their buildings. Their finger prints are everywhere and some fear that Euron Grayjoy himself has discovered their secrets and wants to bring back krakens through blood sacrifice and even turn himself into a living god that will drown the world with a watery apocalypse. Plus a fool named Patchface is considered by many as the unwilling prophet of the Drown god. (All of this completely and totally forgotten in the TV show) -The Red God, the Lord of Light, the Heart of Fire, and the God of Flame and Shadow. This religion is just George giving an entire new meaning to world building because it comes with stories and prophecies from the white walkers to the long night, to the prince that was promised. A religion that has objectively demostrated to bring the dead back to life for "The night is dark and full of terrors". No more can be said for many of its priest are mysterious and even they don't understand the visions and prophecies they are being shown by their god. (This was also used and discarded in the TV show) -And many, many other less known religions like the Many-Faced God "Valar Morghulis", the Valyrian and their old gods that allow them to dominate dragons, the Empire of Yi Ti that has a living God-Emperor or some mysterious islands that are told to have statues of old ancient gods asleep waiting to be awakened heck even the White Walkers are seen as some form of gods/nature made flesh... and everything was runied in the show....
What if civilization ends in a nuclear war and we find these books in 1000 years and believe that it's actual historical record and worship these gods?
