Whilst you're completely correct about the Targaryen motivation in the books, thats not really a plot point that carries over into the understanding of people who have only watched the show, and its likely not a plot point that would matter to a show runner because its not particularly important to the broader plot.

Also, on the random HBO producers point - GRRM is listed as a contributor and a writer for the series. But as I recall, he was listed as such for the final GoT series as well?

 

Uh, what? It’s been a while since I watched the show but I know they definitely talk about the Targaryen’s prolonged incest at different points. Perhaps the motivation for that incest isn’t dwelled upon in the show but it’s obviously an important factor into the whole “Targaryen’s go mad” thing which ends up being just a little bit important. Considering historical dynasties did similar things it’s likely large parts of the audience understand their motivation implicitly.

Isn’t the whole point of a show about the history of the Targaryen family so that more of things like their historical motivations can be shown anyway? Not sure why plot points that weren’t properly elucidated in the first show can’t be done properly in the second that’s focusing on a highly relevant plotline?

If one of the major motivations of the Targaryen family doesn’t matter to the show runner of a show focusing on the history of said family, that kind of says all it needs to say.

GRRM being listed as a producer/writer means HBO paid a lot of money to have his name attached to avoid further criticism post-season 8, nothing more and nothing less. I doubt he’ll be involved on more than an intermittent basis, and even if he okay’d a retcon like this it wouldn’t suddenly make it a faithful adaptation of the source material (like JKR being involved in the HP movies doesn’t suddenly mean they’re completely in line with canon).

 

Interbreeding for power is very different from interbreeding for looks though. The series made it obvious that Targaryen's did the whole brother/sister thing, but don't go into the appearance thing, or the marrying other Valyrian bloodlines thing.

 

Well, if that’s true (I’m doubting it but I’m not going to go through 8 seasons to double check) as I said it just sounds like a good opportunity for the show called ‘House of the Dragon’ to finally explain that, rather than try to erase it entirely.

You seem to want the shows to be somewhat divorced from the source material, and I’m honestly just gobsmacked by that. Some changes are necessary due to the different mediums, but outside of a handful of scenes around Tywin and Sandor, HBO has never shown their in house writing abilities to come anywhere close to GRRM’s. Any divergences they make are historically likely going to end up being for the worse compared to the original stories, and I’m willing to put money on that.

 

Just to build on this, but I've watched 3 episodes of the show, read 2.5 of the books, and most of 3-4 fanfics set in the universe, and even I know that heritage and "bloodline purity" is of utmost import to Westeros in general and the Valerians in particular.

Hell, wasn't the whole rebellion against the Lannisters primarily justified by Joffrey being blonde, rather than a brunette as was proper for Bobby's kid?

 

Not so much that I want it as that I fully expect it, because they've got no reason to stick with the book if they feel they can make better TV by doing something different.

 

Fair enough, it’s a reasonable expectation from what we’ve seen so far but it feels like you’re kind of defending this/advocating for them to do their own thing? You said on the last page you would complain if you saw this change created a plot hole or inconsistency, people explained how it would do so, and now you’re saying you think it will make for better TV?

Instead of asking people to defend why changing Corlys’ race is an issue, perhaps instead we should ask why it would improve the story? The usual response seems to be something along the lines of “Steve Toussaint is literally the only actor capable of doing the role of the Seasnake justice, despite not even slightly resembling the character, so it had to go to him” but I’m not really sure I buy it, there’s a lot of good actors out there and he’s not a big name.

This kind of reminds me of every time I read a quote from the show runner for the Witcher talking about how they needed to write their own original characters/plot lines into the show. Every time I just wonder, why are you doing an adaptation if you just want to go and do your own different thing anyway?

 

This whole thing is silly. Mord jumped the shark on racism where there was none, let's move on.

 

In the portion you quoted, I literally said IF they feel it makes better TV, not that I think it will make better TV.

And that sounds like every fan boy ever complaining about TV and movie studios not making things exactly the same as the book, comic, or game that they love. The fact is that studios change things, they change a lot of things, and expecting them not to change things is ridiculous. This won't be a faithful adaption of the book, just like GoT wasn't a faithful adaption of those books.

 

Some changes are inevitable when adapting a story to a new medium; some things that work in print don't work on film, and runtime limitations mean the story will have to be streamlined. However, there's only so much you can change before you start losing the core appeal of the original material, or run into a Ship of Theseus problem where it's less of an adaptation and more like an original work that borrows a few names from the source material.

Do a few casting choices that could cause plot issues mean the show will definitely miss the core appeal of Martin's material? Not necessarily, but after the disastrous finale of Game of Thrones I can't blame people for being worried about it. D&D made it pretty clear they never understood what made A Song of Ice and Fire work as a story, and the new showrunners haven't had a chance to win back audience trust after that disaster.

And yeah, race/color does matter when the plot line centers around accusations of infidelity. If Robert Baratheon had been black, it would’ve been pretty ridiculous that nobody thought it was odd that all his children had blond hair and blue eyes.

(Granted, there’s a lot of room for discussion on how the fantasy genre as a whole has a troubled history with race and racial coding, but this thread isn’t the place for it.)

 

I have to say, as long as it doesn't contradict the actual plot of the TV series I truly don't care about them going for a more diverse cast, certainly the whole ancestry issue does in my opinion not come anywhere near the need for more inclusion in TV. Just because G.R.R.M did not care for inclusion or indeed anything other than bad stereotypes of other cultures that does not mean we shouldn't.

 

There are other ways to add diversity with out shoehorning. Like actually adding a character from a different region. Have the Hand of the King be a Summer Islander, or have someone like Davos, there are so many ways to add real diversity with out messing with a logical world.

The World of GoT is similar to Europe a few hundred years ago. Where yes there were the occasional Black, Asian and Middle Eastern person, but they were rare, and would also be note worthy. Hell read stories from this day of Black people going into Eastern Europe or parts of Asia and they are still an anomaly.

I don't have high hopes for the season in general, and this isn't a game changer, I just think its a silly choice when there are so many other ways to add diversity with out fuckaroo like this.

 

Diversity definitely works differently in print compared to visual media, since physical appearance just isn't as big of a deal in books. As mentioned earlier in the thread, Hermoine being black or white changes basically nothing in Harry Potter. Unless the character's skin color is really plot-relevant it's usually not a big deal.

 

If they needed more inclusion I imagine they could have found a script suited to it so diversity wouldn't have to be shoehorned in.

 

Or just been smarter with casting. I’m sure there are plenty of other characters they could’ve used to broaden the diversity who weren’t so closely tied into a legitimacy plot line.

Granted, the source material doesn’t give them a ton to work with. One area where Martin didn’t break from traditional fantasy tropes was keeping pretty much all the main characters white and European. Though considering the story that started off as the War of the Roses with a whole lot of fantasy elements.

Some source material doesn’t lend itself to diverse casting. Which reminds me of one of the ongoing headaches with historical movies: balancing historical accuracy and modern sensibilities.

 

He was probably just more familiar with Medieval Europe than Medieval anywhere else. Not to mention, if you come from a particular cultural background, the historical iterations of that culture are probably going to be waaaaay more familiar and compelling to you as a writer and as a human than some random, totally unfamiliar society. Basically he's a man living in a mostly European-descended culture in the modern western world. Of course western European history is going to be his greatest area of knowledge and interest, for the same reason you don't see a lot of Arab writers producing historical fiction set in Medieval Ireland or ancient Japan or some such.

As for the "bad stereotypes" of other cultures, there is a lot of unreliable narrator stuff in his books, and in irl history, garbled stereotypes were pretty much all the vast majority of the human race knew about people from far-off lands before the modern era.

And if you're planning on creating a fantasy world with a medieval level society where humans have evolved independently from those in our world, then it's just good worldbuilding to pay attention to real historical precedent, attitudes and demographics when putting it all together. A multiethnic, cosmopolitan SJW's wet dream of a society CAN exist in those types of worlds, but realistically they don't just pop into existence out of nowhere. They would have to be the result of some seriously complex historical interactions and migrations, and the depth of lore needed to explain the existence of such a culture in a logical, internally consistent way is a little mind-boggling.

There's a reason why it takes multiple college-level history courses to just get a reasonably solid, big-picture understanding of the U.S.A.'s relatively brief history, much less the rest of the Americas or even the world. Trying to squeeze that level of background into a series (especially if it's not actually all that relevant to the plot of your story) can very quickly bog down into endless exposition about things that don't actually matter to the story. If you (as a writer) try to bypass this by throwing out hints and turning the issue into J.J. Abrams' infamous "mystery box," you run the serious risk of infuriating your fans if you never actually explain. And if you just try to handwave it, your world comes across as shallow and slapdash.

All things considered, it's much, much easier to simply leave the issue alone and go with a world where logistics and transportation technology haven't yet made the mass migrations of wildly disparate ethnic populations possible outside of a few notable exceptions. It is fairly realistic from a real-world historical standpoint after all, even if that particular bit of realism doesn't cater to modern political sensibilities.

So it's not a matter of "not caring about inclusion." If you were already planning on doing the level of worldbuilding that G.R.R.M. was, then going that route is more a matter of managing to produce a quality product, while also preserving your sanity as a writer.

 

Just make Rhaenyra's lover also non-white. Problem solved.

 

Diverse multi-ethnic societies weren’t as much of a thing in the pre-modern era. Usually it was either a major trade city like Constantinople, or somewhere like the Middle East where the diversity came in the form of multiple invasions and occupations by diverse groups of outsiders. Westeros is pretty geographically isolated, isn’t a trade hub like the Free Cities, and hasn’t had a major invasion in centuries.