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Game of Thrones Season 4 Poster: ALL MEN MUST DIE
The countdown is on for HBO’s jaw dropping, spine tingling fourth season of Game of Thrones and just to wet your appetite EW has revealed its marketing poster. It featuring the deadly expression “valar morghulis” which means “all men must die” in High Valyrian. But don’t worry it’s in English on the poster for all of us non-Valyrian speaking simpletons. These words are only outshone by the steel black crow that appears to be coming apart in dangerously sharp pieces of metal. It is also reminiscent of the King’s chair otherwise known as the iron throne which has the same barbs of steel. Who will be struck by death this time?
The fourth season will roughly be based the second half of on George R. R. Martin’s third GOT installment, A Storm of Swords, with some bits taken from the fourth and fifth books of the A Song of Ice and Fire series.
What do you think of this year’s poster?
HBO’s fantasy hit returns on April 6.
Read the First Excerpt from Game of Thrones Sequel ‘The Winds of Winter’ by George R.R. Martin
When it comes to Game of Thrones, nobody is more enthusiastic about new information than the book fans. The fans who have read through thousands of pages and still not been satisfied with an ending in over two decades. It has been three years since we have heard anything about when The Winds of Winter will be released. While we still don’t have that information (SORRY!) but we do have an excerpt from this writer’s personal favourite character – Tyrion!
Check it out below:
TYRION
Somewhere off in the far distance, a dying man was screaming for his mother. “To horse!” a man was yelling in Ghiscari, in the next camp to the north of the Second Sons. “To horse! To horse!” High and shrill, his voice carried a long way in the morning air, far beyond his own encampment. Tyrion knew just enough Ghiscari to understand the words, but the fear in his voice would have been plain in any tongue. I know how he feels.
Many thanks to Entertainment Weekly who shared the quotes. They also report that the whole chapter will be available in March through Random House’s A World of Ice and Fire app.The chapter will feature Tyrion and be available even in the free version of the app, along with new location descriptions and character profiles.
The release date for Winds of Winter has yet to be determined but I’m willing to be that 2015 will be the year. Martin likes to take his time writing the books but he has a new motivation to complete the books faster now that the TV series is already up to Book 3. The last Game of Thrones book, A Dance with Dragons, the fifth in the series, was published in 2011. While we eagerly await a release date you can be sure that the exclusive chapter in March will be a big tease!
Game of Thrones Season 4 will premiere on Sunday, April 6, at 9:00 p.m. EST/PST on HBO.
‘Game of Thrones’ Casts Major Season 4 Role: Oberyn the Red Viper
The most anticipated new role coming to the fourth season of Game of Thrones has been filled! Thanks to EW we now know that Prince Oberyn Martell will be played by Chilean actor Pedro Pascal, who has previously had roles on CBS’ The Good Wife, ABC’s Red Widow and USA’s Graceland.
For those who haven’t read the books, here’s a spoiler-free description of the character: Oberyn is a brash, charming, cunning prince of Dorne (part of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros). His sister Elia was brutally murdered by the Lannister knight Gregor “The Mountain” Clegane when Mad King Aerys was overthrown by Robert Baratheon and the Lannisters. In season four, Oberyn comes to King’s Landing with revenge on his mind.
Oberyn Martell has a pretty awesome nickname too – The Red Viper. What could the story behind this nickname be? We’ll probably find out next season!
“This was a tough one,” showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss said about the casting. “The Red Viper is sexy and charming, yet believably dangerous; intensely likable, yet driven by hate. The boys love him, the girls love him, and he loves them all back. Unless your last name is Lannister. We found a fellow who can handle the job description and make it seem effortless. He wasn’t easy to find and he won’t be easy to stop.”
HBO hasn’t yet announced its Comic-Con plans, but if you’re headed to San Diego, it’s safe to assume Thrones will have a presence this year. Game of Thrones returns in 2014.
If you want to know more about what’s coming for Game of Thrones Season 4 check out this article. And if you’re a book fan eagerly awaiting George R.R. Martin’s next book in his acclaimed A Song of Ice and Fire series, read all the details we know so far on The Winds of Winter.
CW Releases Trailer for ‘Capture’ a ‘Hunger Games’ Styled Reality Show
It’s rare to see a book come to life beyond the movie screen. I’m sure when Suzanne Collins was writing The Hunger Games trilogy she was thinking about tv shows like Survivor and other reality tv shows in which the audience at home gets thrills from seeing the human interactions of people on their screens. Now CW has created a tv reality show named Capture that pits 12 teams against one another for 30 days. There is just one goal: Don’t get caught.
There won’t be any dead children, Capture is a tame version of The Hunger Games, a book by Suzanne Collins in which teams are pitted against one another and fight to the death. I think this turns Collins’ whole moral point upside down. Are we really so like the Capitol in her books that we need this show? Decide for yourself when you see the newly released trailer below:
“In this intense new wilderness competition, 12 teams of 2 will enter a fenced-in enclosure in the middle of the wild, where they must live for one month and compete against each other for scarce resources,” writes The CW in their official synopsis. “With $250,000 on the line, it’s a winner-take-all battle in which the teams must hunt each other down to survive.”
Descriptions of the show indicate that each week one of the teams will be “The Hunters” and it will be that particular team’s job to capture as many of the teams as possible. There will be tracking devices on each of the teams that will display the location of the team if they stop moving for more than three minutes.
Of course, this competition isn’t as intense as The Hunger Games because no one is getting killed. We will just have to see how the ratings will go.
Capture premieres July 31 on The CW.
‘Buffy’ Star Amber Benson Joins ‘Morganville’ Web Adaptation
Buffy star Amber Benson has signed on to play Amelie, Morganville founder, in a Morganville Vampires web series adaptation. New York Times bestselling YA author Rachel Caine has launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund the adaptation.
The Kickstarter has raised $22,285 of the $75,000 goal to date, and has another 24 days to run before it closes at 11.29am EDT on Thursday 11 July.
After several failed attempts to get a Morganville Vampires adaptation done in a more conventional manner, Caine took matters into her own hands. Teaming up with web producer/director Blake Calhoun (Continuum, Exposed), Caine hopes to bring the story to life in an initial run of six episodes.
It is unclear exactly which of the 14 books the web series will be based on, however it will be called Morganville: The Series.
The Kickstarter campaign offers rewards ranging from a personal twitter shout-out from the author, to a signed DVD of the final product. If you pledge $10,000, you will get a co-producer credit on the series – but that’s for the most die-hard fans.
Looking to the Future: ‘Game of Thrones’ Season 4
HBO’s hit series Game of Thrones is over for another year after a thrilling third season. After shocking and blowing the minds of fans all over the world, we can already confirm that the next season will be just as thrilling – if not more so!
Although no reports have confirmed an official start date, it’s speculated that Season 4 of Game of Thrones will begin late March/ early April 2014, following the usual scheduling it has been given in the past few seasons.
Season 4 will pick up where we left off, about 2/3 of the way through A Storm of Swords, the book written by Game of Thrones mastermind George R.R. Martin. The filmmakers have been incoroprating future events from later books also, but for the most part we can expect that the next season will cover mostly A Storm of Swords and perhaps a little of A Feast for Crows. Filming for the next season will begin July. Showrunners David Benioff and D. B. Weiss confirmed the filming start date as July 8 in a recent interview with KCRW UpClose.
“Right now we’re writing Season 4,” Benioff and Weiss explained. “We start shooting July 8, and we have to have all 10 scripts ready before we start shooting, because we crossboard the entire season. So, scenes from the final episode might be shot the first week of production. And then we finish shooting, we go straight unto post-production, and also outlining the coming season.”
Three new characters for Game of Thrones season four, as confirmed by Geroge R.R. Martin himself, will be Wildling leader Magnar of Thenn, Margaery’s unimpressive father Mace Tyrell and the Red Viper Oberyn Martell. Since Oberlyn will definitely be seen in season four of Game of Thrones, it’s been rumored that Ellaria Sand, Oberlyn’s lover, will also join the cast of characters.We can’t wait! If you’re feeling some Game of Thrones withdrawal and are a book reader (or TV show fan looking to be spoiled) read up on all the news and facts we have for Martin’s next book in the Song of Ice and Fire series, The Winds of Winter.
‘Game of Thrones’ Actor Maisie Williams (Arya) Reacts to Red Wedding
A funny reaction made by Maisie Williams, the actor who portrays Arya Stark in the HBO series Game of Thrones, has surfaced on Vine. As Arya, Maisie, puts on a voice and plays out her shock from the events of last week’s episode.
You can watch the video here.
*Spoilers* Game of Thrones episode 9 revealed the shocking ends of Robb Stark, his wife Talisa and his mother Catelyn Stark. The internet exploded on Twitter and you can read some of the best reactions right here. A Song of Ice and Fire author, George R.R. Martin, spoke out about last weekend’s episode and admitted that the series ending will be “bittersweet.”
While we’re on the topic of Game of Thrones’ latest 9th episode shocker, read what the events of the episode mean for readers of the books. (Our smug superiority of knowing everything that happens in the show was a little dampened.)
The final episode of this season of Game of Thrones is on this Sunday – be sure not to miss it!
[Opinion] What if Downton Abbey was a Book Series?
It is a crisp winter’s afternoon here in Melbourne, Australia and I’m settling in for a night of Downton Abbey. Despite watching the two seasons available about a hundred times each I still can’t get enough of this appealing Edwardian costume drama. When it first aired it was a refreshing change from the usual criminal dramas that fill up the nightly prime time television spots. I remember being surprised to hear that it wasn’t based on a book or play. (Technically. You could say it was based on Gosford Park but Downton is significantly more developed.) The ITV hit was simply an idea that Julian Fellowes wrote and of course, being a period drama, it was a hit.
But what if Downton Abbey had been a book series first? So many movies and tv series are based on books. In fact, you could say that at least 90% of movies being made now are based on books. So if Downton had been a book series would it have been turned into a movie or a series of movies with a split ending? Downton Abbey: The End Part 1! Or would it have remained a TV series? I feel like the answer is both. In this alternate universe it would depend on how many books Fellowes wrote in his series. If it was three or less I think movie execs would have been happy to condense it into a blockbuster movie to rival something like Pride and Prejudice. It would make a nice sum of money that’d be sure to make even Fellowes smile all the way to the bank. But then a whole other series of questions would arise from this: Would Fellowes take his success from a Downton Abbey movie and turn it into a tv series, like the one we have now? I rather think he would.
All of these thoughts swirling around my head suddenly stop when I think of what kind of state these poor books would be in. What kind of integrity would be left for the written form that it started in? It would have been torn to pieces for a movie, and then put back together with additional parts sewn on for a television series. All of these things make me glad it wasn’t a book. But wait one minute! We haven’t yet considered what the book would be like in itself.
It would be amazing! Combine Fellowes wit and skill with a feather quill… or rather a pen, together with the powerful characters of Grandma Grantham, Robert, Mary, Matthew and friends, and I imagine that Downton Abbey the book would be quite riveting. The book/s might include some stream of consciousness, maybe we could fall in love with Matthew all over again when he describes to the reader how his feelings toward Mary are changing. We would get far more information and development from the Sybil/Branson relationship. And can you imagine how fun it would be to read a book from the Dowager Countess’ point of view?
This post is all in fun, so I hope nobody thinks there are actually are Downton Abbey books out there or that they’re being written and developed into a film – they’re not, because they’re all in fantasy land. If you want to read about the world of Downton Abbey though, I hear there are some great fanfictions out there. Or better yet write your own!
I leave you with two fantastic clips of Maggie Smith doing her stuff in a sneak peek of Season 3! Season 3 premieres September on ITV in the UK and January 2013 on PBS in the US.
‘Game of Thrones’ Casts Kerry Ingram as Shireen Baratheon
Fans were beginning to wonder if Stannis Baratheon’s daughter Shireen had been cut from the show after he and Melisandre discussed having children a few episodes back. But a recent season 3 character list confirmed that Shireen will indeed be appearing, and now we know who’s going to be playing her!
12-year-old Olivier award-winner Kerry Ingram, who has appeared on stage as the title character in Matilda, will join the huge Game of Thrones cast next season. She confirmed the news herself on her Twitter account, writing:
Can’t wait to start on game of thrones :0) xx
— Kerry Ingram (@kerrywerryberry) May 31, 2012
It has since been confirmed that she will play Stannis’ daughter.
In the novels, Shireen is described as a not very pretty nine-year-old girl, with her father’s square jaw and her mother’s large Florent ears. She also suffered from greyscale, which has left half her face covered in grey and black dead skin.
She is often accompanied by the fool Patchface, and enjoys playing with the bastard boy Edric Storm. Shireen’s mother, Queen Selyse (formerly of House Florent), will also appear.
Kerry will also appear in the upcoming movie adaptation of Les Misérables.
Game of Thrones Season 3 ‘A Storm of Swords’ Characters Revealed
Like others who read A Clash of Kings before HBO aired the series I was somewhat disappointed with the absence of many key characters: Jojen and Meera Reed and the Tullys to name a few. But all is not lost! Directors David Benioff and Dan Weiss confirmed to EW that we will indeed be seeing these characters in season 3. *YAY*
“[Jojen and Meera Reed] haven’t been written out. It’s important to point out that that we have the largest cast on television right now. We introduced dozens of new characters in season 2. If you hurl 300 characters at an audience, the story collapses under the weight of too many faces, too many names, and too many subplots. We need to be just as mindful of the audience members who have never read the books as we are of the readers; the series will fail if we only appeal to those who already know the characters. So we try to be parsimonious about how many new roles we introduce to the story and when we introduce them.”
Here’s the list of characters that we will be seeing including some non-spoilery descriptions:
– Mance Rayder: We’ve heard about him all season. A former member of the Night’s Watch who became the “King Beyond the Wall,” the leader of the Wildlings.
– Daario Naharis: A confident and seductive warrior.
– Jojen Reed; Meera Reed: A teenage brother and sister duo with special insights.
– Edmure Tully: A brash young member of the Tully family.
– Ser Brynden Tully (The Blackfish): Catelyn Stark’s uncle.
– Lady Selyse Florent: Stannis Baratheon’s wife.
– Shireen: Stannis’ daughter.
– Olenna Redwyne (The Queen of Thorns): Margaery Tyrell’s sharp-witted grandmother.
– Beric Dondarrion: A skilled knight who is the leader of the outlaw group Brotherhood Without Banners.
– Thoros of Myr: A red priest who follows the same religion as Melisandre.
– Tormund Giantsbane: A Wildling raider.
Young Adult Book Reviewer 