Why Game of Thrones should not have been picked up as the mainstream fantasy series for normies

Mathieu Hendey
Jul 30, 2017 · 3 min read

Game of Thrones (or to give it its more accurate title, A Song of Ice and Fire), is HBO’s premiere TV show, featuring such previously un-sellable tropes as dragons, magic, monsters and incest.

Unfortunately, there are myriad better series that could have been picked up and had £££ thrown at. While A Song of Ice And Fire is certainly a passable set of books, I struggle to understand why, of all the amazing fantasy and SF book series that HBO could have gone with, they went for a slow, political intrigue programme where the few appearances of fantasy elements seem trite and out-of-place.

Book readers will sympathise when I mention the pages spent describing a character and their whole backstory, only for the character to disappear into the aether, never to show their face again. And the almost unfeasibly slow pace with which Martin both moves the story along and actually writes the story have become a trope among fantasy fans.

If you ask many fantasy fans, they’ll be able to list off a litany of SF and fantasy books better suited for TV. Classics like Dune, whose previously stunted movie remake have perhaps coloured future generations’ perceptions (and not in a good way). Sprawling masterpieces like The Malazan Book of the Fallen with its tens of storylines, all culminating in ways I guarantee even the most seasoned reader will not spot. Anything by Brandon Sanderson, with its easy-going humour tied with dark revelations. Not just entire worlds, but entire sets of worlds, like those in The Dark Tower (movie coming soon with Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey!). Metaphysical philosophy like that of The Wheel Of Time.

But no, HBO instead decided to pour all their money into A Song of Ice and Fire, a series of books being written so slowly it’s likely that the TV show will have finished before Martin gets around to finishing the book.

I’m not afraid to admit that I like neither the books nor the TV show, and would much rather have seen any number of fantasy/SF books make it to TV. There are so many fantasy series which leave their readers better people for having read them, yet we’re watching a run-of-the-mill political scheming drama, albeit with dragons.

One can only hope that with the advent of Netflix and small(er) budget production runs we will begin to see Wheel of Times, Mistborns, Malazans, but for now we’re stuck with political intrigue with dragons. I don’t think anyone would argue that there is a shortage of political intrigue on TV, with House of Cards being a prime example, I only wish production houses would push the boat out and go for something that truly rocks the boat.

If Game of Thrones served one purpose it was to show that dragons and monsters can be accepted by the general public, why not go all in and show them what they’re really missing out on?

I guarantee, if people like Game of Thrones they will love Malazan. Imagine political intrigue with alternate realities, gods, people who can become gods through inhuman feats on Earth, and a history written by a qualified anthropologist.


Sound interesting? I’ll bet it does.