Game of Thrones Season 1 (Blu-Ray) Review

Game of Thrones is an epic fantasy show that adapts George R.R. Martin’s fantasy series, A Song of Ice and Fire. Much like the film adaptation of Alan Moore’s the Watchmen, it is a feat that this series exists, much less that it is as good as it is. The show first aired on HBO in April of last year and recently finished its second season. In order to promote the second season, HBO finally released the first season on Blu-Ray and DVD. It is hard to talk about the plot of the show without giving away spoilers, which ruins the experience of watching this highly engrossing and addicting show. However, to give some context about the show, which does not give away anything that happens in the show proper; here is some background information that leads to the thrust of this first season.

Fifteen years or so prior to the events of the show, King Aerys Targaryen rules the realm of Westeros (the fictional continent where the characters live). During the end of his rule, he is quite mad and does some foul acts toward his people, this is known. This does not sit right with Robert Baratheon, so he decides to rebel against this Mad King. Baratheon along with Ned Stark and many others end up overthrowing the Mad King. After Robert’s Rebellion, Robert becomes king of Westeros and Ned Stark goes back to Winterfell in the North. The series picks up fifteen years or so later with King Robert heading to Winterfell to visit Ned. Now this is a broad strokes context and summary, the season fills out more detail, context and different perspectives on the rebellion. As well, these events do not appear in the series, only hinted at in dialogue between characters.

The Show

Game of Thrones follows in the footsteps of HBO’s most prestigious programming in terms of quality. Impeccably acted, written and directed, the show is easily the best series currently airing on HBO. While ostensibly the fantasy elements of the show draw viewers in, it quickly becomes clear that the series is not simply another rote exercise in genre pandering. Rather it is a hugely complex and intricate narrative about the trappings and desires of power and the struggle for it, that happens to be set in a fantasy backdrop. The series is dense, the first episode introduces more than a dozen characters that the show will follow for the rest of the season while continuing to introduce dozens more. That fact demands that viewers pay attention to the events happening on screen. This show is not simply something that can be background viewing. Not only that, but also all these characters become fleshed out and more complex throughout the season. Each character has his/her own motivation and desires that compete with every other character’s motivation and desires making the narrative richly textured, while never falling into a simple good and bad dichotomy. Morality in the show is as gray as the color scheme of Winterfell.

Special Features

HBO loaded this set with a bevy of special features. There are the standard audio commentaries that one expects on a major release featuring input from directors, writers and actors. Yet special among these commentaries is one featuring A Song of Ice and Fire author and screenwriter of episode eight, “The Pointy End”, George Martin, that is worth listening to for anyone interesting in the curious nature of authors adapting their own work to a different medium. As well, Martin elaborates on things cut from the episode and elements of the book that the show runners did not use in this season.
One of the most delightful and useful features is the “In-Episode Guide” that plays with each episode, so if the viewer ever forgets who is who of this enormous cast of characters, they can click over to the guide and look at their profiles without stopping the episode. The “Guide” also gives a summary of the locations each scene takes place and the option to switch over to the “Complete Guide to Westeros” to get a more detailed explanation on the history & lore, lands or houses that characters mention in the episodes. (The guide only plays if the viewer selects the option).

This “Complete Guide to Westeros” is another wonderful feature that contains tons of added and elaborated details about the world of Westeros. The coolest of these are the “Histories & Lores” which are sketched animations that discuss past events of Westeros. Many of the series’ actors narrate these animations and they often offer multiple perspectives on some of the histories by the houses involved thus keeping with the complexity of the series proper by never giving a definitive viewpoint. This is an excellent feature to help add context and clarification to the show’s built-in density.

The majority of the special features are behind-the-scenes looks at the creation of the show. One of the most impressive examples of this is the “Anatomy of an Episode” for episode six, “A Golden Crown”. This feature plays along with the episode where all elements of production and the people responsible for bringing the show to life talk about particular challenges in the episode and how they manage some of the effects, writing the show or directing particular scenes. It is fascinating and gives the viewer a greater appreciation of how difficult something of this scale is to pull together. Obviously, watch this after seeing the episode proper as it is kind of like learning the secret behind a stage magician’s “illusions”.

Rounding out the special features are several behind-the-scenes featurettes. The main one is a making of video, where writers, directors, art directors, actors, etc. talk about the challenge and pride that comes with making a show of this magnitude. It serves as a launching platform for the rest of the features that elaborate on details mention in “Making Game of Thrones”. The two most interesting of these are “Creating the Show Open” and “Creating the Dothraki Language”. Both of these features are testaments to the level of detail and craft put into the show from the creation of one of the most spectacular opening credits ever to commissioning the creation of an actual language for the Dothraki people to speak.

Adaptation

Whenever adapting a highly regard work or works, it is always a difficult challenge capturing the essence of the original work while managing to change it enough so that it works in a new medium. Show runners, D.B. Weiss and David Benioff pull off this challenge masterfully capturing the spirit and themes of the source material while making enough changes distinguishing the show from the book. Thus, the book tells the same story but in a different enough way, that it warrants a read by fans of the show to see what was left out or what changed in the adaptation. As well, Game of Thrones is in a different position than most adaptations of celebrated and popular works because the author of A Song of Ice and Fire, George R.R. Martin, works closely with the show and producers. Martin’s input gives the series authenticity and allows the series to act as faithful an adaption as it can be while not being slavishly beholden to source material.

The earlier comparison to the Watchmen film adaptation stands as a way to contrast what Zack Snyder did there and what Weiss and Benioff did here. Snyder’s adaption, outside of a few parts, uses the comic as a storyboard and does not veer too far off that path. That works for the most part, but forgets that film adds dimensions not present in comics. Weiss and Benioff do not make this mistake. They seem fully aware that they cannot simply follow the prose of the novels down to the last detail because the nature of film has its own challenges and considerations. For one, the multiple perspectives of the novels is impractical because film gives a sense of events from an outside perspective as if the viewer is watching things unfold in real time. Since that detail is not present, the show has room to add new material of characters that we cannot see in the novel because the POV characters are not involved. That is a huge benefit of the show to elaborate and flesh out characters from the novels.

George R.R. Martin himself writes an episode this season, episode eight, “the Pointy End” (an excellent episode and one of the best of the season). This adds a difficult wrinkle and asks the question, how does an author adapt his own work to a different medium? Martin talks about this in his audio commentary and for fans of the books or narrative discussion, it is someone they should listen to at some point. Yet book purists might be angry with some of the changes that the show made from Martin’s novels. To these complaints, Martin says something profound about the switch from prose to screen, “There are things that one can imagine when one’s writing a book that work fine in the imagination of readers, but when you actually put it on screen you discover problems with it. That perhaps it doesn’t get across what you wanted to get across” (George R.R. Martin “The Pointy End”, audio commentary).

Sound and Picture

The picture quality on this set is in 1080P and it looks gorgeous. It is the best way to watch the series because everything pops on the screen. The quality allows the viewer to take in the rich details of every location and enjoy the beauty of the screen version of Westeros and the Free Cities. The audio side of things features DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 for the episodes. This makes sure that everything sounds crisp and clear. The viewer can hear the visceral snap of bones and the snick of a sword as it cuts through a thickly corded neck of some foe. As well, it gives the viewer the ability to hear the richly orchestrated and textured score to the show in rich detail. The show looks and sounds amazing.

Overall

In short, this show is magnificent and a must watch for any fan of good television. Even if fantasy is not a genre of choice, Game of Thrones is worth a shot because it is so much more. William Simpson a storyboard artist nails what makes the show so good when he says, “Fantasy is so easy to get wrong, and it’s so easy to put things in just because you think, we’ll okay, ‘Let’s do something so completely different.’ But in a lot of ways, the good stuff isn’t so completely different, it’s just slightly different [from reality]” (Anatomy of an Episode). As good as it is though, it still does not top Breaking Bad or Mad Men as a top tier drama, but it and Boardwalk Empire are a step in the right direction for HBO. The Blu-Ray set is incredible, it is well put together and the packaging itself is a pleasure to look at. It is not recommended to watch this show in small chunks; it is simply not meant for viewers to consume it that way. Marathon viewing sessions are the optimal way to watch this show. Start episode one and before the watcher knows it they are finishing episode ten while the day slipped right past them. This set is a must buy and offers ten hours of entertainment with the season itself, but the extras add several hours more of intrigue.

Overall Ratings – Game of Thrones Season One (Bluray)

Entertainment:	10/10
Special Features:	10/10
Audio:	10/10
Video:	10/10
OVERALL SCORE:	100%