Afleveringen
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House of the Dragon is not Game of Thrones, but neither is it the same show that it was in Season One. This uneasy evolution has continued to haunt our discussions, and more than anything, this episode â âRhaenyra the Cruelâ â is a collection of growing pains. In addition to our beloved audience polls (conducted every week on Instagram), discussion topics include: abandoning the Team Black / Team Green framing, reevaluating Blood and Cheese, seasonal / episodic pacing, the Rhaenyra / Daemon duality, and the intricate work of dramatization.
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Time Codes:
00:00 Reevaluating Blood & Cheese
06:09 Propaganda Redemption
15:56 Adding Rhaenyra to the Cargyll Duel
29:24 The Purpose of the Duel
36:05 Rhaenyra Out of Character
41:43 Rhaenyra vs. Daemon: Dialogue Dilemmas
44:58 Rhaenyra vs. Daemon: Victimhood & Duality
53:38 The Problem with Team Black / Team Green
59:57 The Shadow of Game of Thrones
01:04:18 Pacing Problems & Procedural Structure
01:13:16 Make This Into Two Episodes
01:16:44 Expectations & Optimism
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Is emotional vulnerability a fatal mistake or a saving grace? Sansa attempts to perform he way through this chapter as a hundred classical fantasy archetypes explode and bleed out all around her. We track the possible futures that branch off from this moment of enlightenment, following the black-out indulgence of King Robert and the aggrieved nihilism of the Hound. Cam catches a real-time distillation echo, and Maggie pulls back the veil of Sansaâs willful ignorance.
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Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
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Get bonus episodes on Patreon! House of the Dragon is BACK, and we couldnât be more excited to dive into this world again. Friend of the show Tristan is here to partake in our rousing discussion of the Season 2 premiere. The infamous Blood & Cheese incident steals the show, and we debate the impact of what should have been a monumental moment for our characters. Maggie does a full deep dive into the showâs new intro sequence, comparing it to the medieval Bayeux Tapestry and analyzing the implications of this real-life connection. We examine the looming presence of grief and guilt in this episode, particularly as it affects our two female leads. We do a breakdown of some key characters and their performances, including King Aegon, Larys Strong, and Helaena Targaryen. Our episode ends with a round-up of listener feedback, and we ponder where the show will go from here. Check out the Bayeux Tapestry: https://www.bayeuxmuseum.com/en/
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00:00 Welcome Back01:00 Blood & Cheese: Devastating or Disappointing?
17:25 That Crafty New Intro Sequence
23:37 The Bayeux Tapestry Connection
29:31 Helaena the Secret Narrator
35:08 Compounding Horrors: Guilt & Grief
40:07 Alicent's Isolation & Larys' Elevation
53:24 Reconsidering King Aegon II
01:00:38 Season or Sequel?
01:06:29 Audience Poll Results
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Catelyn Stark might just be the most complex and rewarding characters in A Game of Thrones. This chapter is a cascade of memories and breadcrumbs that simultaneously resurrects the past and animates the future -- of House Stark, House Tully, and even Catelyn herself.
Expect full books spoilers: We're going deep on Lady Stoneheart, generational echoes, poisoned nostalgia, and problem of evil folktales.
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Get bonus episodes on Patreon! Maggieâs biggest gripe with modern games has always been how inaccessible, unapproachable, and challenging they can feel to newcomers. Many games are designed with the assumption that players have already had experience with similar games, and as a person who didnât grow up playing anything beyond the original Super Mario or games on DisneyChannel.com, she often finds it difficult to get into games that are more âcomplexâ than your basic side-scroller. Hogwarts Legacy completely changed that. This episode is a love letter to the approachability and welcoming nature of Hogwarts Legacy â how it greets players from a wide range of abilities and experiences, how it provides a vast number of adjustable settings and features, and how it constantly aims to reward the player who is passionate about the Wizarding World. This game opened a huge door for Maggie â we hope you enjoy our conversation.
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In the space of a single chapter, Ned Stark has gone from a bumbling amateur detective to Batman -- or has he? In this episode, we look at Ned's unsteady relationship with honesty in a world of liars. Maggie returns to the themes of femininity and unseen power that have complicated our Fire & Blood episodes over on Patreon, this time to examine the relationship between 'whores' and 'bastards'. Cam wonders if parts of Westeros are actually cursed by an overexposure to the problem of evil, and tries to dig deeper into the claim that GRRM's style of fantasy is 'historical'. We work through cycles of history, repeated mistakes, self-sabotage, and the important difference between corruption and the much sneakier, ever-present temptation.
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Oh these are our favorite type of episodes: falling in love with a work of art we didnât expect to care about at all. Shout out to Tristan for bullying us into watching X-Men â97, and to Maggie for having a perfectly timed hankering for cereal. This is a conversation about reclaiming your imagination as an adult, our histories with the X-Men, the ritualistic experience of watching the show, and the lasting impressions that these stories left on us.
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Samwell Tarly joins the narrative just in the nick of time, as an unlikely answer to the existential and immaterial problems threatening Westeros. Cam argues that Sam embodies the hope, forgiveness, and second chances that lie at the heart of GRRMâs supposedly bleak and grim world. Maggie explores the Tolkien feints within this chapter, unspooling the echoes of fellowships, disappearing uncles, and loyal sidekicks. We work together to theorize our way through Jonâs impossibly poignant dream, and close out the discussion by resolving the Doctor Faustus curiosity we introduced a few weeks ago.
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Furiosa is massively different than Fury Road. The tone, the pacing, the style of characterization â our first viewing was largely a process of adjustment and recalibration. But on after seeing it a SECOND time, the movie really opened up for us. This episode chronicles the journeys we went on through the Wasteland, our experience watching the very first Mad Max, and the avalanche of echoes that revealed themselves on a titanic IMAX screen.
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The question that hung over Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga was simple. What can this film offer that is different or better than Fury Road? As it turns out, the answer is Chris Hemsworthâs performance as Dementus - a bonkers, fearless villain who somehow simultaneously evokes Charles Dickens, Jack Sparrow, Shakespeare, Victor Hugo, and the great Ian McShane. This is one for the ages, and weâve got LOTS to say about Hemsworthâs work in this movie.
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Ned Stark may already be dead. In this chapter, Littlefinger eulogizes him to his face, capping off a series of three failed initiations into the world of liars and crooks that is Kingâs Landing. Camâs diving into unseen spymasters and unnoticed liars, while also keeping an eye out for Bran Atreides the God Emperor and the conspicuously absent white walkers. Maggie examines the suffocating falsities present here, both on the page and throughout the Red Keep. Pour yourself a glass of iced honey milk, and try not to gag! PS: can you imagine if Ned had a direwolf?
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Oh it feels so good to say this: Diablo IV has never been better than it is in Season 4. Loot Reborn is a full-scale reworking of the gameâs core systems. The gameplay loop and recurring activities are stronger than ever, and for once in this live game, all of these great new additions are here to stay. The campaign is short and sweet â incredibly rewarding while trimming the fat of everything we have disliked in the past. The Necromancer has become one of the best classes in the game with multiple viable builds and an electric mix of close- and long-range combat. After doing a power ranking for all the classes, we discuss the ideal time investment for seasonal content, and debate the lifespan of this new and improved Diablo IV.
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In his own words, this chapter had Cam feeling âpuckishâ. Forgoing all the traditional ambiguities and symbols, he focuses on the character trend that quietly runs through these pages: a devastating comedy of manners and pretense that crushes the spirits of all our major players. Meanwhile, Maggie dives headfirst into the mythology, the metaphors, the dreams, and the complicated relationship between stories and memories. We close by revisiting last weekâs Faustian dragons and the ongoing narrative resurgence of the white walkers.
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The Fall Guy feels like a passion project about passion -- it's a love letter to stuntmen, artistic craft, and the fading genre of romantic action comedies. It's also the best movie of director David Leitch's career. So why is the entire discourse surrounding the film about box office receipts? Join us for a little 'state of the union' about online film discussion, barometers of success, and the rip-roaring good time that is The Fall Guy.
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This third 'Targaryen Checkpoint' delivers a whole new level of prophetic, high-concept imagery for us to discuss. Maggie focuses in on Dany and Viserys as avatars of the House of the Dragon's simultaneous rise and fall, before diving deeper into Viserys' ghostly, almost undead turn in these pages. Cam finds a corollary for all the White Walker breadcrumbs we've been chasing in Dany's fiery dragon dream, which he analyzes through the lens of his beloved 'Doctor Faustus'. We close with an unexpected, possible Dune crossover as GRRM seems to tip his hat to Frank Herbert -- and remind us to always be on the lookout for aspiring tyrants.
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Get bonus episodes on Patreon! 600 pages of expertly dramatized philosophy and theology, starring a giant worm with a human face â this book was written for Cam. Our discussion starts with the compounding, echoing relationship between all of the Dune books, before settling on the unexpected Nietzschean flair of Frank Herbertâs God Emperor. Alongside the ghola, heâs one of the central walking thought experiments that plays out the intellectual curiosities of this world and their underlying and emotional agonies. This series remains a thought provoking and devastating character study. Herbert has managed to pull a fourth rabbit out of the same sandy hat.
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Every Arya chapter is Valjean screaming âWho am I?â at the audience, but this one in particular really is a carousel of futures. Cam examines the half dozen personas explored in these pages and the constant refinements of that central question. Are you your circumstances? Are you your defining characteristics? Are you your vocation? Maggie revisits the Stark children / direwolf relationship for all its prophetic implications. Together, we take a closer look at the Stark family mantras, grappling with the survivability of the lone wolf vs the pack, and debating the utility of âwinter is comingâ.
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Get bonus episodes on Patreon! Grab your Leviathan Axe and hop in the boat: weâre heading to the Lake of Nine today to discuss Maggieâs experience playing (and not playing) the masterful 2018 God of War. Maggie has been going further and further out of her comfort zone with games, and God of War was no exception. But the world and the story gripped her so much that by golly she was going to make it work for her. Join us as we discuss Maggieâs unique journey of playing through the game (with a big helping hand), her increasing interest in story-focused games, hopes for accessibility in games, and questions about where to go from here.
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This week weâre all the way at the edge of the world, and what do we find? Shakespeare! More specifically, Cam gets to talk about the Old Man archetype, which crops up here thanks to Lord Commander Mormont. The conversation spirals into a theory about omens, ignored warnings, and narrative vindication. Cam presents a relay race theory about Tyrionâs role as the bridge between ice and fire, which Maggie reinforces with a callback to Branâs prophetic and ambiguous dreams.
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The Tortured Poets Department isnât âaboutâ anyone. This episode is an interrogation of that painfully wrong-headed way we talk about the biggest artist in the world. It represents an incurious tabloid toxicity and a strange rejection of creativity. An artistâs experience CAN inspire their work, but that observation should be the tip of the analytical iceberg, not the entirety of our public discourse. This is an episode about artistâs intent and unknowability, the beautiful mystery of imagination, and the humility required to discuss and interpret a work of art.
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