The Small Council: Which character improved most from book to screen?

Welcome to a new weekly feature, The Small Council, where the staff and contributors of Winter Is Coming discuss and debate questions the most pressing questions of Game Of Thrones and the Seven Kingdoms.

This week, we’re asking Which character do you think improved the most from page to screen? (Other than our vague excitement for characters’ appearances in Season 5, this post is spoiler-free.)

Read, discuss in the comments, vote in the poll, and let us know any questions you’d like to see The Small Council discuss in the future!

Rowan Kaiser: Many non-point-of-view characters from the novels have had their on-screen roles expanded, but none have benefited more than Lord Varys the Spider. In the books, Varys originally appears as an intriguing, well, intriguer in King’s Landing, but as the novels progress….

It becomes more and more that he’s one of the dominant political forces in the Seven Kingdoms. By giving him Varys more focus early on, particularly in dialogue with his foil, Petyr Littlefinger, the show demonstrates his power and some of his motivation far earlier and with great affect. His progressing friendship with Tyrion in the second season gives him great scenes, as well as one of the best short speeches in the series.

This all works because actor Conleth Hill plays Varys with exactly the right amount of sly skepticism and conniving intelligence. His choice to downplay the sinister side of the character in favor of a genial artificial naivete ramps up the humorous tension of the Spider’s scenes, while making the character’s steely determination apparent to the audience without it being obvious to his rivals.

Ani Bundel: To my mind, the character who has benefited the most from moving from the novels’ limited third-person style to the show’s more objective perspective is Sansa Stark. Sophie Turner’s performance certainly brings the same flavor of a little girl lost in a fantasy story as appears on the page. However, the foolishness of Sansa’s beliefs are not as frustrating when mixed in with other characters on screen, instead of heavily dosed via her inner monologue on the page. (Theon is another character who benefits highly from this.) This POV loss also works in her favor from another direction. We never get quite the same view on-screen that her betrayal of her father to Cersei in Season 1 is directly responsible for his arrest and subsequent murder. Instead, Ned’s own actions are much more clearly at fault.

The streamlining of the story on the screen has also been a boon, as her never-gonna-happen romance with The Hound is not marred by dreams of Ser Dontos. In fact the cutting of Ser Dontos down to the bone left room for Sansa to form the beginnings of a friendship with Tyrion, making their star-crossed marriage more bittersweet for what could have been. Finally, the decision on the show to let her reveal herself as Sansa instead of obediently playing Littlefinger’s bastard Alayne Stone for chapters on end showed the character’s motivation to stand up for herself and start playing her own game. (Not to mention a fabulous new wardrobe!)

Rebecca Pahle: Like Varys, Margaery Tyrell is one of the umpteen characters who lost George R.R. Martin’s POV character lottery. In the books, there’s no proof that she’s anything more than a teenage girl being used as a pawn in her family’s political machinations. She could be acting in pursuit of her own goals—and she certainly doesn’t seem to mind being queen three times over from what we can see—but absent a first-person glimpse into her mind or those of any of the Tyrells, we can’t know for sure. But you don’t cast Natalie Dormer as a passive character being ordered around by her family, no sir. 

In the show, Margaery’s a much more active player with her own agency—she doesn’t want to be a queen, she wants to be the queen. A positive change in its own right–more devious, morally ambiguous female characters, please and thank you—this also makes Margaery a better, more complete foil for Cersei and friend/mentor for Sansa, which helps their characterization in turn.

And it’s only going to get better. A Feast for Crows plot line, come to me.

Andrea Towers: One of the reasons I love the HBO series so much is that is allows us the chance to gain a more complex understand of characters we already know from the page, by exploring their personality and actions through a more specific medium. With George R.R. Martin’s text alone, we don’t get a first person perspective for Cersei Lannister until A Feast For Crows, which means we see her actions and personality through the eyes of people like Ned, Tyrion, Sansa and Arya. Thus, Cersei is portrayed as a selfish, scheming woman. Many could (and do) look at the golden haired lioness as a spoiled and terrible individual. But watch Lena Headey’s performance in virtually any episode over the course of the past four seasons, and there is no doubt that Cersei is made of many, many layers–all of which are conveyed through her interactions with other characters, particularly her Lannister family. Look no further than “Blackwater” as an example of how Cersei’s many facets combine to give us a richer view of her character:

Through the show, we’re allowed to see Cersei’s grief and determination and more importantly, her reactions to things like being forced to marry Loras Tyrell, Myrcella being shipped off to Dorne, Robert’s death and Jaime’s return. By the time we get to plot points like Joffrey’s death or Margaery’s arrival, we have already seen the emotional effects of the events that conspire to make Cersei someone who feels like she’s trapped and misunderstood. Cersei may not be a good person, but she’s not black or white. She’s wonderfully morally grey, and I can’t wait to see this all come to a head in her scenes in Season 5.

Rowan: I think the thing that jumps out at me most here is that these four characters have all been primarily based out of King’s Landing for the duration of the show. One of the key conceptual differences between the show and the novels has been the shift from the point-of-view of individual characters as the primary focus in how we experience the story, to one based on place as demonstrated by the intro building its cities.

King’s Landing benefits the most from this as it has the widest collection of characters who are important politically but may not be POV characters in the books. Sansa benefits from their presence, and beyond the other three mentioned here, Tywin, Olenna, and Littlefinger have all been given more robust scenes.

I was somewhat surprised that none of us picked traditional fan favorites. Tyrion, Arya, Jaime, and Brienne are all characters who are great on the page, but seeing them played by their respective fantastic actors has made them seem even better. I’d also add that characters like The Hound and Ser Jorah have benefited greatly from the actors playing them, particularly the way Iain Glenn pronounces Khaleesi.

[polldaddy poll=8298124]

• Published on 09/10/2014 at 12:00 PM CDT
• Last updated on 10/21/2016 at 12:40 PM CDT