Skip to main content

Why is Game of Thrones so popular?




I was a little late to the game of thrones party as I only started watching it after it had aired its fourth season. After constant peer pressure and years of blatant disregard of pop culture, I finally succumbed to the worldwide phenomenon that is game of thrones and how. After over two years of constantly speculating theories and waiting for the plot to move forward for the most part of the year, it’s safe to say that the seven gods have charmed me. What makes it so irresistible?

Politics and Power play
Politics is one of the major themes of the series. Every step taken is a step taken towards being more powerful than before. And power doesn’t come easy. Gruesome killings, murder, fraudulence, mind games come to people as easy as breathing. Where ostensibly good characters don’t make it even a few episodes whereas bad ones just keep multiplying their forces. You can never fully say who has the upper hand because power keeps radically shifting. And because of its likeliness towards the real world, though sans dragons, people cannot look away.

Shades of Grey
Most characters cannot be deemed either good or bad. The fact that everyone is flawed and imperfect makes them human which sets off comparisons with the real world. You find yourself rooting for a woman who killed her husband, man who pushed a kid out of the top of a tower and even murderers and rapists. Good people make horrific mistakes and Bad people are shown to be just as vulnerable. Everyone is fleshed-out with their own motivations and ideals which can be justified by human reasoning in most cases. It provides a different angle to the archetype of merciless emperor, a rouge murderer and has you sympathizing for them. And how can you not? You forgive their grave mistakes because that’s what humans are: flawed.

Historically accurate
Despite the obvious absence of dragons, Game of Thrones is more historically accurate than you’d expect. It draws heavy comparisons to the European history with rise and fall of empires, nomadic troops and city-states.  In the middle ages, not unlike the show, the arms and armour used to be very well-respected. Giving away your sword to someone actually did mean some great, as per historians. The streets used to be just as bloody back then too as the homicide per capita in the middle ages were off-the-charts. Public executions were quite common too. Historians and non-historians alike find this parallelism fascinating.

Uncensored
While most of the shows on TV cut cameras away as soon as things heat up, Game of thrones is unapologetically uncensored. And this element rather than pushing people away, has only made it more exclusive. Some people come for the nudity, and stay for the plot and for some it's the other way around. Either way, the nudity factor definitely sets it apart from the mainstream TV.


Fantasy
Game of thrones is so much more than just politics through. It's a remorseless portrayal of the society but with fire breathing dragons and magic. It's something that makes the show so identical to reality but also completely disconnected. The fine line that sets it apart from reality only keeps on stretching as the plot progresses. The audience have no choice but to be enthralled.

Unexpected
One of the pivotal reasons why game of thrones is so popular these days has to be the fact that you can never quite guess what's coming. You root for people but before you can theorize how they will win the game of thrones in the end, they get killed off and in the most gruesome of ways. Your favorite characters are never safe nor are the seemingly central characters because literally anything can happen at any point of time. And if you're lucky, the universally hated character will bite the dust and you'll find yourself questioning why a guy being eating by hounds is making you happy. What can I say, that's the beauty of Game of Thrones.

Happy Watching!


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Things and Places- II

Photo credit: Tumblr.com This is the second part of the story I wrote a couple months back. You can click on this link " Things and Places- I " to read the first part. Also, these stories are based on a real events. I'm kidding! Maybe :P Sameer It'd been two weeks since I'd been talking to Sneha over the email. And our conversations had only gotten more amusing. Like a few days back they had argued over their least favorite/favorite Book-to-Movie adaptation and I hadn't laughed like that in ages. Dear Sneha, Don't judge me. But my least favorite book-to-movie adaptation is ....... Twilight series. Yes, I've read them.  And watched ALL the movies. Yes, all five of them. Sue me. -Sameer Dear Sameer, Judge you ? what ? I respect you more because It takes guts to accept you've read Twilight series in today's world. :D Let me let you in on a secret, I've read Twilight series twice. lol -Sneha Dear Sneha, Haha, For Real?...

Encounters.

I had known it the second second I woke up that day. Something atypical was going to happen and I could tell. I lazily turned off the alarm on my phone. I just couldn't help but stare at the date. It was like the calendar was giving me signs. It just didn't feel "normal".  The thought was insane so I just brushed it off and got off the bed. I hurriedly got ready, had my breakfast and ran off to college because as always I was late. The rest of the morning was as mundane as any morning could be. I felt stupid for all the thoughts that came to my find earlier. I made a mental note to not buy romance novels the next time I went to a book store. I had some really boring classes that day and dreading it made those preposterous thoughts slip off my mind instantly. I had to sit through two consecutive Chemistry classes first thing in the morning and I was losing my mind. When the bell rang for break, I couldn't wait to get a breath of fresh air. I caught my...

about love

When I was 10, love was Familiarity. Love was big eyes and sweet smile, coming over to give me his share of chocolates that he got for someone's birthday. Love was getting picked to play with him first. Love was random calls to my house that my mom picked up. Love was waiting for his silly emails over long summer breaks. Love was knowing I was his best friend. When I was 14, love was a Secret. Love was staring at his pretty eyes from far away. Love was the music in my ears whenever I heard him call my name. However, love was also sly. Love was accidentally brushing against his skin while walking beside him. Love was catching him looking at me and at once looking away. Love was the crescendo of heartbeats that came after. Love was... finding out it was love. When I was 17, love was All-knowing. Love was thinking pretty eyes wasn't love at all. Love was realizing I hadn't met love yet but knowing exactly what he looked like. Love will.... definitely be taller than me....

Life as we know it :)

Hey peeps! Its been long so long I wrote something! Ughh... I want to do this more often but I run out of interesting things to write about ... It'd be awesome if you guys suggest me some ideas to write about as someone very rightly quoted : "A writer is , after all, only half of his book. The other half is the reader. And from the reader the writer learns..." :) Okay, so coming back to the topic, I watched a movie recently. The movie and this blog post share the same title (You might have wondered from where I pulled off the amazing title, eh?) ;)  The movie was about to people who totally dislike each other at first ....but eventually the circumstances in life make them fall in love with each other. It made me ponder. Isn't that what really happens in the real life too?  I'm not just talking about falling in love only. Taking the theme of the movie in a general sense, I think, its been able to depict the exact essence of life...as I've known it... :) ...

Forever ?

I ,personally, feel that forever is very overrated. Overrated in the sense that , people vastly use it without thinking of the clauses that comes with it  The real meaning of  'forever' seems to have lost its essence along the way. 'Friends forever', 'I'll be with you forever' ...e.t.c are the most common ones that falls upon my ears. But in fact, there is no such thing as forever. All the promises and the effect of the words fade away with time. Change is inevitable. It can neither be postponed, nor can it be sent back once it has arrived. It just comes as a strong wind, which gusts away all the promises and hopes of forever. If nothing lasts forever, why is 'forever' even used by the people who can't subside by its meaning? Why take all the trouble of even mentioning it, if you can't act upon your own words? Why promise of it, if you have no idea if you are going to live the next moment or die away ? Why bother ?  ~

Blank Canvas

Clarissa stared at the blank Canvas. It was the umpteenth time she had tried drawing that day and every time she had failed miserably. Heaps of scrunched white paper laid beneath her feet but even so, she wasn't done with the assignment yet. Art class that afternoon had been immensely enlightening. "Art comes from you heart and not your head. It unfolds the mystery of your sub-conscious. You may pretend things to be otherwise, but always remember that a piece of art is the window to your soul. It never lies", he'd said. And She had nodded, to herself more than anyone else. At the end of the class he had told everyone to draw something that made them smile, without reason and in the most turbulent of times. The pencil she'd been holding fell from her grasp and she bounced back from her reverie. She brainstormed again and again. She picked up the pencil and thought of various ways it could go. What was the thing she lived for ? She thought of the place sh...

How I Met Your Mother vs Friends

Photo:Pinterest I watched How I Met Your Mother for the first time when I was in 7 th  grade. At that time, the jokes most likely went right over my head and I probably didn’t understand the context to many things but still something about Ted Mosby resonated with me, even then. I have always struggled with keeping my love in check like him which has led to various failings throughout the years but Ted’s always had my back by being one step ahead. For these reasons and more, I whole-heartedly love the show. On the other hand, I watched F.R.I.E.N.D.S. a couple years later and thought it was mostly nice. I’d all but forgotten about it until last year when, for some reason, everyone started talking about it. I, by no means, thought it was a bad show but I couldn’t fathom why everyone liked it  so much . People started labelling it superior to HIMYM which didn’t sit well with me. So I decided to re-watch F.R.I.E.N.D.S to gain perspective which led me to the conclusio...

Switching Lanes

Photo credit: Toodamnyoung.com " Why did you decide to switch your field of study, from science to business? " Ever since I made it official that I'll be pursuing business administration for my undergrad, this question has been all the more frequent. So frequent that this is all anyone ever asks me. And to be honest, I had been expecting this. In the 21st century, people change their career paths all the time. So, the surprise element for me is not w hat people ask, but  why people ask. People say 'World is a small place' all the time and there's a reason they say it. There's constant innovation in every field possible, every few seconds. The stakes are so high these days, that you can't just zone out for a few months and think that you'll catch up in no time. It's so hard to keep up that you have to keep your best foot forward all the time. To make it in today's world, only straight A's just don't cut it. You got to be ...

Just Like The First Time

When I think about the first time I met her, the details are a little hazy. But I do remember thinking it being such a 'date' despite us resisting to call it that. A little coffee on her part because I hated coffee then, a walk along the dusty streets of Kathmandu all sealed off with Ice-cream for us both. The fact that it was a chilly December evening didn't stop us. Come to think of it, the details aren't all that hazy because I remember it being a Wednesday. When I saw her for the first time, the first thing I noticed about her were her beautiful brown eyes. I was in my early twenties and I had already been with half dozen other brown eyes but hers had that glimmer that no one else held. They were exquisite. Online dating was new to me whereas the whole dating scenario was new to her. She'd warned me beforehand that she was going to be awkward as hell on the first meet but when we met she was all talks and smiles- zero awkwardness. At that poi...

Rust & stardust

There's not much to say about love beyond what has already been said But in the past, every time we fell apart I always used to find new ways To bleed on paper about you. Yet, this time has been different Because the words I spit out about you now don't make any sense Just like how we fell apart doesn't             make                        any              sense. Every time I sat down to write this, My thoughts always went back to that one time  When you said I'd never be able to write anything without you in it, ever again. I laughed and rolled my eyes at you then But I knew you were right Even during the long stretches of radio silence between us,  my words always seemed to find their way back to you.  You were sometimes the hero in my stories Sometimes the villain And yet,  you were there Car...