Blackrook
Diamond Member
- Jun 20, 2014
- 21,211
- 10,858
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Game of Thrones is groundbreaking on so many levels, it brings fantasy into the mainstream, in a way that even Lord of the Rings did not.
I was not an early adapter to fantasy, when I was a boy I was die-hard science fiction fan, I read almost everything I could find written by Heinlein and Asimov.
Fantasy, I did not understand.
I remember asking my brother, when we were watching a cartoon version of the Hobbit, "Where is Middle Earth?"
As a science fiction fan, I understood the concept of other planets, with alien life forms, but the concept of a planet just like Earth, with Earth animals, trees and plants, but also with fantasy creatures like dragons, dwarves, and elves, was something I couldn't figure out. The fact that Middle Earth had landmasses totally unlike Earth increased my confusion. I really couldn't figure out where Middle Earth was supposed to be, and as a science fiction fan, I needed to know that to make sense of the story.
Also, the game Dungeons & Dragons made no sense at all to me either. I saw my brother playing it with his friends, and all I saw was them sitting on the floor with some books, but then my brother would tell me he had 12 sons. At school, my classmates told stories relating events like they actually happened, though I knew they had not. I could not imagine how a game could result in such detailed stories.
It was only when I started playing D&D myself at the age of 18 that I began to understand fantasy. I played one game and I immediately wanted to make a world myself and be the Dungeon Master. After that, I have been the Dungeon Master in more than 90% of the games I've played. Other people, most people, simply don't want to be a DM, and when they do, they can't pull it off as well as I can. So people almost always demanded that I be the DM, because playing in my world was the "real thing."
And my campaigns were always "Games of Throne"-ish long before Games of Thrones was ever conceived. In my worlds, kings, queens, princes, princesses, lords and ladies are constantly engaged in endless political games that pit them against each other, and the player characters almost always end up as pawns in these games. And good alignment will not protect you in my world, good characters fight with good characters for the same reasons that Christians fought with Christians in the Middle Ages, land, power, gold, and different interpretations of what the Bible means, and these differences were worth killing for when people really took religion seriously.
Game of Thrones has brought all of this kind of thing into the mainstream, and now it's not just a niche group of fantasy fans and role players who are into the intricacies of medieval politics, it is everyone who watches the show or reads the books. Also, fantasy has broken out of the PG-world of traditional fantasy, with its almost complete lack of sex, cuss words, and adult situations, and has become something for adults.
I would therefore say that Game of Thrones, as a franchise, has done more to promote fantasy than perhaps any other work besides Lord of the Rings. It means people like me, who have enjoyed fantasy for decades, are no longer considered weird or peculiar. I can go to a respectable dinner party and talk about elves, dwarves, trolls and wizards and not be looked at like some kind of anti-social loser who just climbed out of my mother's basement.
I was not an early adapter to fantasy, when I was a boy I was die-hard science fiction fan, I read almost everything I could find written by Heinlein and Asimov.
Fantasy, I did not understand.
I remember asking my brother, when we were watching a cartoon version of the Hobbit, "Where is Middle Earth?"
As a science fiction fan, I understood the concept of other planets, with alien life forms, but the concept of a planet just like Earth, with Earth animals, trees and plants, but also with fantasy creatures like dragons, dwarves, and elves, was something I couldn't figure out. The fact that Middle Earth had landmasses totally unlike Earth increased my confusion. I really couldn't figure out where Middle Earth was supposed to be, and as a science fiction fan, I needed to know that to make sense of the story.
Also, the game Dungeons & Dragons made no sense at all to me either. I saw my brother playing it with his friends, and all I saw was them sitting on the floor with some books, but then my brother would tell me he had 12 sons. At school, my classmates told stories relating events like they actually happened, though I knew they had not. I could not imagine how a game could result in such detailed stories.
It was only when I started playing D&D myself at the age of 18 that I began to understand fantasy. I played one game and I immediately wanted to make a world myself and be the Dungeon Master. After that, I have been the Dungeon Master in more than 90% of the games I've played. Other people, most people, simply don't want to be a DM, and when they do, they can't pull it off as well as I can. So people almost always demanded that I be the DM, because playing in my world was the "real thing."
And my campaigns were always "Games of Throne"-ish long before Games of Thrones was ever conceived. In my worlds, kings, queens, princes, princesses, lords and ladies are constantly engaged in endless political games that pit them against each other, and the player characters almost always end up as pawns in these games. And good alignment will not protect you in my world, good characters fight with good characters for the same reasons that Christians fought with Christians in the Middle Ages, land, power, gold, and different interpretations of what the Bible means, and these differences were worth killing for when people really took religion seriously.
Game of Thrones has brought all of this kind of thing into the mainstream, and now it's not just a niche group of fantasy fans and role players who are into the intricacies of medieval politics, it is everyone who watches the show or reads the books. Also, fantasy has broken out of the PG-world of traditional fantasy, with its almost complete lack of sex, cuss words, and adult situations, and has become something for adults.
I would therefore say that Game of Thrones, as a franchise, has done more to promote fantasy than perhaps any other work besides Lord of the Rings. It means people like me, who have enjoyed fantasy for decades, are no longer considered weird or peculiar. I can go to a respectable dinner party and talk about elves, dwarves, trolls and wizards and not be looked at like some kind of anti-social loser who just climbed out of my mother's basement.
