Beginning

'All men need a distraction from the mundanity of every day life for else they would go mad.'

We should take the premise that all TV shows, as depositories of creativity and expression, must be categorised as art. If you disagree with that and think only painting and say, i dunno, sculpture are art then you're wrong, sorry. And if art is an alcoholic cocktail, for too long have I dwelt in a TGI Fridays bar of acceptability and mediocrity.

When you go to TGIF and you peruse the cocktail menu, each concoction you note will comprise of ingredients you like and those that you dislike. 'The Poo Choo'....amaretto and vanilla [yes, yes, keep talking]....mixed with Sprite and crab paste [oh bollocks]. 'The Wrong'un'....Gin [ok]....blended with cherry panda pop [good God].

And up to this point in my life, most forms of art have been a bit like this. No painting, book, statue, song has ever, really, consumed me as perhaps true art should. There's never been a TV show or a novel that I've deemed as perfect. Something that I could describe as being exactly what I've been looking for. Nothing, until Game of Thrones came along.

Yes I know, it's sad to speak of it like that. It's just a TV show, blah blah blah. But I bloody love it. 

If Game of Thrones were a cocktail on the TGIF menu it would be made up of everything that I really like.......Knob Creek bourbon, olive oil, terry's chocolate orange, garlic, seafood sauce. Alright, that would be absolutely disgusting as a combination, but you get the point I'm making here.

Firstly it looks sensational. 

In crisp, high definition the audience is transported from the azure blue skies and orange deserts of Essos, licked by the flickering rays of a scorching sun; to the snow carpeted tundra found north of the wall where the icy valleys, grey mountains and wintery forests nestle under clear night skies.

It's a truly beautiful show. 

My mates like The Wire. I could never get into it. If you spend your days dressing in work suits, commuting into town and sitting in an office surrounded by paperwork why then watch a show about people in work suits, sitting in an office, surrounded by paperwork? There is no beauty there. No mystique. No other.

The time period in which Game of Thrones is set looks a kaleidoscope of ancient history, the dark ages and the medieval era. As a student of history and somebody charmed with these worlds, the show taps in to something I hold a great deal of enthusiasm for.

The music is magnificent. From the moment the credits appear and the violin-infused theme fills the air, reverberating around your body you know you're watching something that will last the test of time and be spared the scorn of pretentious newspaper critics. And how about the atmospheric 'Rains of Castamere'? The Lannister theme, a musical symbol of impending strife. The soundtrack is  captivating.

Yet Lord of the Rings had stunning locations and beautiful music, so why then is Game of Thrones so much better [in my, ill-educated opinion].

The characters, simply put.

For the Tolkien [peace be upon him] model for characterisation appeals to our base hopes in the world. That there is good out there, that it will prevail over evil. We have been fed such narratives in fairy tales since we were nought but little shits being read stories by our parents. Or, if you're from a working class background like me, when we watched little shits be read stories by their parents in American films on TV. 

It's black and white, grey scares us. Don't be fooled into thinking I'm slagging Tolkien off, you know I'd never criticise a successful brummie, and secondly the man was outrageously intelligent, mere words on this blog couldn't do it justice. He taught himself to speak Anglo Saxon Olde English for God's sake.

But the characters in Game of Thrones aren't good, and they aren't evil like so many in Tolkien's novels. They're somewhere in between. That intrigues us. 

Is Ned Stark a good man? He's played by the ostensibly honourable Sean Bean, he is a man of tradition and family values. When he discovers Joffrey's parentage he humanely gives Cersei a chance to flee the capital. He would seem a Tolkien-esque bastion of honour. But here is a man who cheated on his wife, shagged a whore and begot John Snow. Here is a man who lied to the dying King Robert and altered his final deathbed will changing 'my son Joffrey' to 'my rightful heir'. 

Cersei is held up as an 'evil' character at first, but we see how dutiful a mother she is for her children. She frequently weeps for them. She invests everything for their well being. She would die for her children. The lines between what constitutes a good person and a bad person are blurred in Game of Thrones.

How can you hate the Lannisters when Tyrion is of that house? How can you love the Starks when the bumbling and frustrating Robb Stark is held aloft as their champion? Robert Baratheon was a fun loving cad. Stannis Baratheon is a puritan. The beautiful Daenerys exudes spiritual purity; she saves the goat women from a raping; she is intent on bringing down the Essos slave trade; she speaks to her soldiers as equals. But then again, she's got no qualms with burning the witch doctor alive and plans to invade Westeros - a move that would ignite war and cause mass suffering for thousands of innocents. Is she 'good'? Is she 'bad'?

Like real life, this is a world of conflicted individuals, not just at war with each other, but often at war with themselves. There are no 'goodies' or 'baddies'. Nuance rules. This is what separates Game of Thrones from its fantasy predecessors. 

Oscar Wilde famously said that there is no such thing as good or bad people, there are just those that are ugly and those that are charming. We can use this when watching Game of Thrones. If you are searching for a character that only acts with pure morals you will search for a long time. Ultimately whichever characters you opt to 'root' for must be those who entertain you most. Those that are the most charming.

What a show we have here then.

Throw into the mixer beautiful locations; high definition filming; sublime music and nuanced, conflicted characters that jump out of the screen, you have something special I believe.

Not everybody will agree. Some will see the show as being overrated and they will prefer the likes of Breaking Bad, The Wire maybe even The Walking Dead. Just as the man drinking The Poo Choo at TGIF might baulk at the lady next to him ordering a Wrong'un. It's all subjective.

But forget those pissed-up philistines. Let them wallow in their slow story lines. I'll be there waiting for next week's Game of Thrones come Sunday night and I hope you'll join me. [Not literally, you're not welcome in my house obviously].

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This blog will be my distraction from the mundanity of real life, to write about a show I take great enjoyment from. Whether one person reads this or one hundred will be immaterial, I've just been filled with such strong emotion after watching the show that I want to create something loosely linked to it. Something I can read back in years to come and either cringe my arse off at how bad this is and how I lacked self awareness, or I'll read back with a wry smile. Who knows.

I've not read the books after a Clash of Kings, so nothing written in here will be a spoiler past where the TV show is currently at. And I'm not sure whether to write about Game of Thrones with a comedy tinge, or by analysing using history, psychological and sociological themes, or even just do an episode review. I imagine it might become a mix of all three.
 
This has been the 'beginning'


Anyway, after writing all that I could do with a drink. So until next time.  

Game of Thrones blog entries to date:


The Rains of Castamere - http://gotrowett.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/the-rains-of-castamere.html


Baelish, Working Class Hero - 
http://gotrowett.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/baelish-working-class-hero.html


Misunderstood Masters -
http://gotrowett.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/misunderstood-masters.html


The Beauty of Daario Naharis -
http://gotrowett.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/the-beauty-of-daario-naharis.html