Which books covered by which TV series?

[Bick]

No Spoilers for me please! Very simple question...

I have just finished Clash of Kings (book) and have not seen any of the TV adaptation yet. How do the TV seasons and books translate?

Is it simply: Season 1 = Game of Thrones; Season 2 = Clash of Kings, etc, or does the TV show progress quicker (or slower)?

It would be useful to know before I buy heaps of DVDs, as I may need to read further first. I daresay this has been asked before but, apologies, I cannot find the answer and figured folk on here will know readily enough. Thanks.

 

[tangaloomababe]

Hi Bic to date Season 1 pretty much stuck to Book 1 (A Game of Thrones) and season two pretty much told book two's story A Clash of Kings, with a few changes to the book though.. However Season three has and by all accounts will only cover part of A Storm of Swords, book three. By all accounts book three will be covered over two seasons.

After that its anyone's guess.

 

[ZombieWife]

Ditto what tanga said. Books 4 and 5 take place at the same time (for the most part). In book 4, you get a certain number of character POVs and Martin only focuses on those. In book 5, you get the other character POVs and get to see what happened to them over the same time period . . . up until the last 1/3 of the book. Then all POVs merge again and the story moves on.

Book 3 was 424k words (and was split into two seasons).
Book 4 was around 300k
Book 5 was 422k

So, since Book 4 and 5 kind of take place at the same time, that's around 722k words to work with. Going by numbers alone, those two could occur over 2-3 seasons.

BUT, it depends on what they keep and what they weed out in order to keep fans from going googlie-eyed over yet another new character/family/country to remember. There is a great deal that can be cut from book 4 (and book 5) that has some characters we probably won't get in the television series, some meandering that will make for lousy television and such.

If I had to guess, I would say they will finish book 3 next year (Spring/Summer 2014).
Books 4 and 5 will be 2 seasons (2015-2016). Martin will have Winds of Winter done by then, I'm hoping (it's set to be released in 2014, but who knows), then he'll have a few years to get the last book in.

The thing is, will this series go on for what? 9 or 10 years? We have no idea how long the last two books will be and what will happen. It's kind of up in the air. But, maybe this helps answer your question and make some estimations. Others might have different ideas, though.

 

[Lenny]

Wikipedia has a nice table of the adaption schedule (including the parts of the books that are being adapted), which I imagine will be updated each year as GoT is renewed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_of_Thrones#Adaptation_schedule

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Regarding how long the series might go on, Benioff and Weiss have said that they want to tell an eighty-hour story (which translates to about eight series):

MJ: So I gather that Game of Thrones could last eight or nine seasons. Does that mean putting novel writing on hold for a decade?

B&W: Yes, if we live that long and HBO keeps wanting to make the show. We have the opportunity here to tell a coherent story that lasts for 80 hours. And while a canvas of that size presents all sorts of storytelling problems, it also allows us to spend more time with these characters we love than we'll ever get again. Every once in a while we get five minutes to think about thinking about novels. But mostly we're just happy when we get to read one now and again.

Source: http://www.motherjones.com/media/2013/03/hbo-game-thrones-season-3-interview-david-benioff-dan-weiss

GRRM has told them how he plans to end it, so we won't get to the final series and find that it diverges wildly from the final book (whenever it may be released).

Seeing as AFFC and ADWD weren't originally planned, I'm hopeful that GRRM will be able to release the final book around the same time as the final series of the television show. If he doesn't, I doubt the show will just stop, so it's likely that a lot of people will wait for the final book(s) to be out before they watch the final series of the show. I know I definitely won't watch it until I've read it.

 

[Boaz]

Bick, if you've only read AGOT and ACOK, then don't watch all of Season Two. Much of the first five chapters of ASOS (including the prologue) are in the last couple of episodes of Season Two.

 

[Gumboot]

I watched a panel discussion where Martin was asked about the issue of the TV series catching up with the books and he outlined his anticipated seasons as follows:

A Game Of Thrones - Season 01
A Clash Of Kings - Season 02
A Storm Of Swords - Season 03-04
A Feast For Crows/A Dance With Dragons - at least two seasons (S05-S06) but possibly two seasons per book (S05-S08)
The Winds Of Winter - 1-2 seasons (anything from S07 to S09-S10)
A Dream Of Spring - 1-2 seasons (anything from S08 to S11-S12)

One aspect of the series that is going to get very problematic with a schedule like that is the age of the younger cast. Maisie Williams was only 13 when she started in Season One. With the longest schedule from above, she will be 20 by the end of A Dance With Dragons which is far, far too old to match the books. Even by the shortest practical schedule she's going to be 18 by the end of ADWD. In the books Arya's only 12 at the end of AFFC.

 

[Bick]

Many thanks to all for the useful feedback about the series and scheduling.

Bick, if you've only read AGOT and ACOK, then don't watch all of Season Two. Much of the first five chapters of ASOS (including the prologue) are in the last couple of episodes of Season Two.

Cheers Boaz - this is exactly the kind of info I need - I'd better read ASOS soon then, as I definitely want to have read whatever I watch...

 

[ZombieWife]

I watched a panel discussion where Martin was asked about the issue of the TV series catching up with the books and he outlined his anticipated seasons as follows:

A Game Of Thrones - Season 01
A Clash Of Kings - Season 02
A Storm Of Swords - Season 03-04
A Feast For Crows/A Dance With Dragons - at least two seasons (S05-S06) but possibly two seasons per book (S05-S08)
The Winds Of Winter - 1-2 seasons (anything from S07 to S09-S10)
A Dream Of Spring - 1-2 seasons (anything from S08 to S11-S12)

One aspect of the series that is going to get very problematic with a schedule like that is the age of the younger cast. Maisie Williams was only 13 when she started in Season One. With the longest schedule from above, she will be 20 by the end of A Dance With Dragons which is far, far too old to match the books. Even by the shortest practical schedule she's going to be 18 by the end of ADWD. In the books Arya's only 12 at the end of AFFC.

Yeah, Bran already looks like he aged 5 years from last season!

 

[Stephen Stagg]

Series One was Game Of Thrones, the series was based on the book, almost scene for scene and the dialogue was the same.

Series 2 more or less follows Clash Of Kings.

Series 3 is following book one of Storm Of Swords and presumably s4 will be the second part

If they keep the continuity and there is a s4 that could follow Feast For Crows

The problems start if and when we get to Dance Of Dragons where the stories are split over the book and continuity goes out the window. This actually works fine for reading, but for filming half the cast will not be in an entire series

 

[JagLover]

I watched a panel discussion where Martin was asked about the issue of the TV series catching up with the books and he outlined his anticipated seasons as follows:

A Game Of Thrones - Season 01
A Clash Of Kings - Season 02
A Storm Of Swords - Season 03-04
A Feast For Crows/A Dance With Dragons - at least two seasons (S05-S06) but possibly two seasons per book (S05-S08)
The Winds Of Winter - 1-2 seasons (anything from S07 to S09-S10)
A Dream Of Spring - 1-2 seasons (anything from S08 to S11-S12)

One aspect of the series that is going to get very problematic with a schedule like that is the age of the younger cast. Maisie Williams was only 13 when she started in Season One. With the longest schedule from above, she will be 20 by the end of A Dance With Dragons which is far, far too old to match the books. Even by the shortest practical schedule she's going to be 18 by the end of ADWD. In the books Arya's only 12 at the end of AFFC.

I think the producers have a very different idea of the likely length. One has said seven seasons, so I think it will be eight seasons as a maximum.

They have also said they don't want to expand the number of characters too much and in fact want to SHRINK it in S4. Cutting out most of the new characters and their plotlines, condensing existing material for those who don't seem to do much Brienne, Tyrion etc and starting AFFC/ADWD from about 2/3 of the way into S4 means that they can be easily wrapped up by the end of S5.