Differences in adaptation/Game of Thrones: Season 3

Game of Thrones (Season 3) vs A Storm of Swords (book) Spoilers may follow.

Valar Dohaeris

• Nearly the whole scene of the Battle of the Fist of the First Men is omitted.
• Samwell Tarly is on the Fist of the First Men during the White Walker/Wight attack. He did send out the ravens, but only two of them carried a message.
• Ghost is not present during the battle, he's with Jon Snow.
• ​Most of the remaining brothers of the Night's Watch were all on horseback after their escape.
• In the books, Rast was never present at the Fist of the First Man as he remained a recruit and stayed at Castle Black.
• The Wildling spears are all tipped with metal points, while in the novels they're simple sharpened poles.
• In the novels, giants wear no clothing, they are covered in shaggy fur pelts like mammoths. They are much more like descriptions of a sasquatch or yeti.
• In the novels, when Jon Snow enters Mance Rayder's tent, Mance is singing a song, which makes Jon think of him as a singer and not the King-Beyond-the-Wall.
• Mance's wife Dalla and her sister Val were present when Jon encounters him in the novels.
• Jon does not kneel before Tormund.
• While Mance is glad Qhorin is dead, he is also sad since he was once his friend.
• Mance Rayder tells Jon that he visited Winterfell as a singer during King Robert Baratheon's visit.
• ​Jon gives a very different reason as to why he wants to join the Free Folk, involving his bastardy and upbringing in Winterfell.
• Tywin Lannister visited Tyrion many times while he was unconscious.
• Podrick Payne mentions that Bronn was anointed by the King himself. In the book, Bronn is anointed by a member of the Kingsguard.
• ​The scene with Sansa Stark and Shae does not happen in the book.
• Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish never approached Sansa Stark directly with his offer of escape, but acted through an intermediary.
• Baelish neve​r tells Sansa that Arya is alive, as he never visits Harrenhal to observe her as Tywin's cup bearer.
  • It isn't clear if Littlefinger is simply meant to be lying, and never recognized Arya at Harrenhal. Particularly given that Littlefinger doesn't know that Arya escaped Harrenhal, and moreover, that Harrenhal falls to the Starks in this episode, it wouldn't make sense for Littlefinger to realize that Arya was at Harrenhal but do nothing to let her fall out of his control. Compare that he earlier lied to Catelyn about having both Sansa and Arya in King's Landing.
• ​The scene between Tyrion and Cersei Lannister in Tyrion's chambers does not happen in the book.
• ​The scene where Margaery Tyrell comforts the orphans and hands out food does not happen in the book, though loosely happens "off screen" as it is reported to Tyrion that Margaery is deftly building up support for herself among the commoners by handing out food aid.
• ​The dinner scene with the Tyrells and Lannisters does not happen in the book.
• Davos Seaworth was stranded on a tall spire of rock, not a conical island.
• Davos was rescued by one of Salladhor Saan's captains, not Saan himself.
• Davos was not taken to see Stannis Baratheon for months as he was thrown in the dungeon almost the moment he set foot on Dragonstone.
• In the books it was Lord Bryce Caron who convinced Stannis not to bring Melisandre to the Blackwater, not Davos.
• ​Neither Catelyn nor Robb Stark went to Harrenhal.
  • Qyburn was therefore never encountered at Harrenhal having survived a massacre, nor was he affiliated with Robb's army.
• By this time in the bo​oks, Harrenhal was already owned by Roose Bolton .
• The conversation b​etween Rickard Karstark and Roose Bolton never happened in the books
• Astapor is constructed of crumbling red bricks in the novels.
• The Unsullied training also includes the recruits raising a puppy for a year before strangling it to death. Also unmentioned is that during their training the Unsullied are given a potion to drink known as the Wine of Courage, which gradually deadens their bodies' sensitivity to pain. In the books, it is stated that only one in three boys survive the years of training to become Unsullied, while the TV series says that only one in four boys survives.
• ​Daenerys is seen traveling with only one ship in TV series. In books she travels with three ships named "Vhagar", "Meraxes" and "Balerion".
• ​The ships were sent by Illyrio Mopatis in the books. In TV series, she bought one ship after she had looted Xaro's mansion in Qarth.
• ​The assassination attempt on Daenerys Targaryen is made back in Qarth, before she leaves for Astapor. It is also not made by the Warlocks, but by a Qartheen guild of assassins known as the Sorrowful Men.
• Ser Barristan Selmy​ does not reveal his identity until much later in the book.
  • This change is plot line is the one which could not be avoided as disguising a character in appearance for a TV serial is more difficult than doing so in the books.
• Daenerys first plans to go to Pentos, but takes a detour to Astapor on Ser Jorah Mormont's insistence.
• Ser Barristan is accompanied by Strong Belwas in the books, while this character does not exist in the series.
• Ser Barristan's white hair and beard were grown long as part of his disguise, but not in the series.

Dark Wings, Dark Words

• Jojen and Meera Reed are introduced much earlier in the books, in Winterfell.
• Jojen Reed is much younger in the books.
• In the books Bran dreams of a three-eyed crow, not a raven.
• Osha, Rickon and Shaggydog had split up from Bran, Hodor, Summer, and the Reeds beforehand in the book. The TV producers said they pushed the Reeds back into Season 3 because there wasn't enough time to fit them into Season 2 without overfilling the season with too many characters.
• In the books, Catelyn was at Riverrun at her father's bedside when he died.
• ​The scene where Joffrey insults Cersei does not happen in the books.
• While Shae did become Sansa's maid, the two were never on friendly terms as they are in the show.​
• Loras is considerably upset when he meets Sansa in the books, as she reminds him of more innocent times at the Tourney of the Hand. In the books, Loras killed Renly's two Kingsguard members Robar Royce and Emmon Cuy who were outside his tent when he was assassinated. This was not a calculated punishment, but a "red rage" that the bereaved Loras flew into when he discovered that his beloved Renly was dead. Afterwards, Loras was filled with remorse at his actions. Thus when Sansa first meets Loras after the Battle of the Blackwater, she reminds him that she saw him earlier in the Tourney of the Hand by mentioning that she saw him defeat Robar Royce in the joust. Loras explains that he has killed Royce as well as Cuy, and becomes quite distraught.
• Sansa Stark's description of Joffrey to Olenna Tyrell is actually much longer in the books. Olenna does ask Sansa to tell here the truth about what Joffrey is like, but (as in the TV series) it becomes increasingly clear that Sansa is worried that they will be overheard by the ever-present spies around the Red Keep. Therefore, Olenna bids her jester Butterbumps to sing The Bear and the Maiden Fair loudly, then louder and louder, until he is bellowing it out at the top of his lungs. Meanwhile, Sansa leans in and whispers to Olenna, while the loud singing drowns out their conversation from any who might be listening. While the exact conversation is not presented in the text, Sansa describes in explicit detail all of the atrocities that Joffrey has committed since becoming king and long before that - lying about Mycah, causing her father to kill Lady, ludicrously ordering a dozen guards to kill a crowd of starving peasants numbering in the hundreds, shooting refugees with a crossbow simply for begging for bread at the castle gates, having her stripped and beaten in front of the entire court, etc. This did not seem to concern Olenna and Margaery, who apparently have already known what monster Joffrey is, and what Sansa told them only confirmed that.
• Cleos Frey (who was replaced by Alton Lannister in the series) is with Jaime and Brienne in the book. Shortly before the encounter with the Brave Companions, they were attacked by archer outlaws who killed Cleos and injured Brienne. It Cleos' sword that Jaime took when he dueled Brienne. Brienne was injured by two arrows before she fought Jaime. Both managed to injure each other, but Brienne overcame Jaime.
• Lord Karstark never expresses any thoughts about losing the war in the book.
• Neither Robb nor Catelyn had any hope that Bran and Rickon might be still alive.
• Catelyn Stark's tale about cursing Jon Snow with pox is never mentioned in the book.
• In the books the Wildlings only speak the Old Tongue, though a few speak the Common Tongue, not 7 different languages.​
• The character Orell appears in this episode, but in A Clash Of Kings, he was slain by Jon Snow shortly before he encountered Ygritte for the first time. Technically Orell should not appear in the third season. He lives on by warging in his eagle. The TV character "Orell" is more of a condensation with another warg character, Varamyr Sixskins.
• A character called Small Paul, steward of the Night's Watch, carries Sam on his back in the book.
• Sam, Grenn and Paul fall behind the survivors of the Watch and encounter one of the Others. The entire scene is omitted from the series.
• The Night's Watch was retreating through the Haunted Forest in the novel.
• ​Arya, Hot Pie and Gendry were all on horseback and were headed for Riverrun using a map Arya stole.
• Arya came across the outlaws on a road near a river, not the forest.
• ​The singer Arya hears wasn't Thoros, but a man named Tom of Sevenstreams, who was singing about a maid of Gulltown, not Rains of Castamere. 
• ​Thoros wasn't with​ the outlaws who found Arya. He is described as wearing faded red, almost pink, robes. Being for Myr, he also has a foreign accent.
• Shae does not come to visit Tyrion until much later in the books, and even then they meet in the cellars at the dragon skulls.
• Shae never expressed any concern about Sansa.
• The crossbow scene with Joffrey and Margaery doesn't happen in the books.
• Renly's homosexuality was only implied in the books, though George R.R. Martin has independently confirmed that he intended Renly and Loras to be lovers. Cersei's private disgust with Renly as a "degenerate" does not correspond to a scene from the novels at this point, though she does make similar comments to this effect disparaging Loras' homosexuality at other points in the book.
• The events surrounding Theon's imprisonment are not mentioned in the novels until the fifth book, A Dance with Dragons. The reader was left wondering if Theon had survived the Battle of Winterfell, though it is mentioned by Lord Bolton that he is being flayed at The Dreadfort.
• Sandor Clegane does not appear until much later in the book. He does not reveal Arya's true identity to the Brotherhood Without Banners. Several members of the Brotherhood Without Banners are actually the last remnant of her father Eddard's personal guard that he sent out to bring Gregor Clegane to justice, and one of them, Harwin, recognizes Arya instantly. Harwin was actually present when the newborn direwolf pups were found in the first regular chapter of the series (after the first Prologue scene).
• The people that find Jaime Lannister and Brienne of Tarth are the Brave Companions (who do not exist in the series), not Bolton's men​. There was no farmer who told them where to find Jaime and Brienne. The noise they made while fighting attracted the attention of the Brave Companions. They also fought for a long time before being found, and ended in a river where Jaime slipped and fell.

Walk of Punishment

• Brynden Tully isn't too upset with Edmure Tully for missing his father Hoster Tully's funeral boat with his flaming arrow. The book makes it explicit that Edmure misses because he is so consumed by grief at his father's death that he cannot shoot straight. Brynden later tells Catelyn that Hoster himself, at the funeral of Hoster and Brynden's father, was so consumed by grief that he also missed his father's funeral boat.
• Edmure had been enraged that Walder Frey had sent "a cripple and a bastard" (Lothar Frey and Walder Rivers) to the funeral, but Robb had greeted them with courtesy and gives Lothar Frey a spot as pallbearer.
• Podrick doesn't get a reward for saving Tyrion Lannister's life in the book. Particularly, he isn't rewarded with prostitutes: Podrick is much younger in the books, only about 12 or 13 years old, but was aged-up for the TV series.
• Tormund and Orell are not among the Wildlings that Mance Rayder sends to scale the Wall.
  • Also in the books, Mance sent 200 men to scale the wall. In TV series he sent only 20.
• The specific scenes with Tyrion, Littlefinger, Ros, Bronn, and Pod at the brothel do not happen in the books, though after Tyrion is made Master of Coin he comments on discrepancies in how Baelish has been running things.
• Samwell Tarly doesn't see the birth of Gilly's baby in the book.
• The events surrounding Theon's escape are not mentioned in the novels until the fifth book, A Dance with Dragons.
• Locke (analogous to Vargo Hoat) does not personally maim Jaime in the book. Vargo gives the order, but one of his subordinates in the Brave Companions, a fat Dothraki named Zollo, carries out the deed.
• ​Vargo Hoat never participated in Brienne's attempted rape as he was already informed about Tarth's sapphires.
• The literal "game of thrones" that Tywin Lannister plays with the Small Council does not occur in the books. However it is an accurate assessment of the disposition of these characters: Baelish is zealously ambitious, Varys is content to let Littlefinger think he has the upper hand, and Pycelle has survived numerous regime changes in King's Landing by not actively competing with the other advisors. Cersei is determined to be at her father's right hand even when he doesn't provide her with a position to be so. Tyrion, meanwhile, actively disdains trying to win his father's favor at all, and mocks the others by going out of his way not to.
• ​Tywin's Small Council has more members in the books. Mace Tyrell, his bannermen Matthis Rowan and Paxter Redwyne, Kevan Lannister, and the High Septon are all present at the first council meeting
• Arya Stark and the Brotherhood Without Banners don't stop at the Inn at the Crossroads, but a different inn further southwest known as the Inn of the Kneeling Man. The irony is that last episode, Arya made a big point stressing that the Red Fork of the Trident River is a hundred feet wide and difficult to cross...yet in order to reach the Inn at the Crossroads from Harrenhel, they would have to have crossed the Trident "off-screen" during the middle of the previous episode (as they are already having a meal at the inn by the end of the episode). In the books, the Inn of the Kneeling Man is south of the Red Fork, between Harrenhal and Riverrun.
  • Hot Pie therefore stays at the Inn of the Kneeling Man in the books, not at the Inn at the Crossroads. He stays behind to work baking bread, and he hasn't been mentioned in the subsequent fourth and fifth novels.
  • The innkeeper of the Inn at the Crossroads, Masha Heddle, was killed at the end of the first novel, when the Lannister armies overrun the Riverlands. Tywin has her hanged from a gibbet for allowing Catelyn Stark to kidnap his son. Tyrion himself is upset at this, as Masha was just an innocent bystander and didn't have any choice whether Catelyn took him prisoner or not. The inn is subsequently run by Masha's nephew. Masha's death hasn't been explicitly established in the TV series. In this TV episode, Hot Pie says that "the innkeeper" was impressed by his baking skills, but this doesn't necessarily mean that Masha is still alive in the TV continuity, as Hot Pie doesn't state what the specific name of "the innkeeper" is.
• Melisandre leaving Dragonstone to search for "a king's blood" is a heavy condensation of Stannis Baratheon's storyline in the third novel. In the books, his brother King Robert does have one acknowledged bastard son, Edric Storm, who was raised at Storm's End. In the second novel, after Renly is assassinated outside of Storm's End by a shadow-creature, Cortnay Penrose the castellan holds out against Stannis and refuses to hand over Edric, so Melisandre has to make another shadow-creature to assassinate him as well. Subsequently Stannis takes control of Storm's End, and takes Edric Storm back to Dragonstone for safe keeping. After Stannis' crippling defeat at the Battle of the Blackwater, Melisandre urges that she must make a blood sacrifice by burning Edric alive as an offering to the Lord of Light. Much of the Dragonstone subplot in the third novel revolves around whether or not Stannis will go through with sacrificing Edric Storm. The TV series apparently didn't want to introduce too many new characters, so Edric Storm's place as a bastard son of Robert possessing royal blood has been condensed with Gendry. In the books, Melisandre never journeys to the Riverlands to find Gendry.
• Willem and Martyn Lannister are not distant relatives of Tywin, but his nephews. They were not captured by Edmure Tully in the Battle of Stone Mill, but by the Starks long before: Willem and his cousin Tion Frey (son of Genna Lannister and Emmon Frey) were captured in the Battle of the Whispering Wood, while Martyn was captured in the Battle of Oxcross. However, it isn't clear if Robb was simply being sarcastic to make dramatic emphasis that if Tywin didn't stop when his own eldest son was prisoner, he won't stop when his more distant relatives are prisoners either.

And Now His Watch is Ended

• After having his hand cut off, Jaime rode on the same horse as Brienne, at first tied back-to-back, then face-to-face as part of the abusing he suffered from his captors.
• Varys told Tyrion the tale of how he was castrated before the Battle of the Blackwater, while they were discussing the strange circumstances of Cortnay Penrose's death. In both versions Varys explained that he traveled around in several of the Free Cities before being castrated in Myr, but in the books, he also adds the detail that he was born in Lys.
• Varys never captures the sorcerer who cut him in the books.
• Varys' scene with Ros does not exist in the books; Ros is an invented character for the TV series, but even in the books no character spys on Littlefinger for Varys this way. In the books, no one else is aware of Littlefinger's plot to sneak Sansa out of the city.
• Bran Stark's greendream with the Three-eyed raven doesn't have an exact equivalent in the books.
• The scene with the Lannisters and the Tyrells in the Great Sept doesn't happen in the books.
• It is not Joffrey but Stannis who mentions Aerion Targaryen. In fact, Aerion was the older brother of Maester Aemon.
  • It's somewhat ironic that Joffrey mocks Aerion, given that Aerion's personality was actually quite similar to Joffrey's: mentally unbalanced, pointlessly sadistic, cruel to animals, and terrorizing his younger siblings.
• Joffrey wants to show Margaery the tombs of the last Targaryens (presumably the Mad King Aerys II, his son Rhaegar, and Rhaegar's children Aegon and Rhaenys), and that Robert Baratheon wanted them burned and scattered in the Blackwater River, but the High Septon convinced him to give them a proper funeral. In the books, the Targaryens were very proud of their descent from the Old Valyrian Freehold, and maintained the Valyrian custom of cremating their dead. Thus there are no tombs containing the corpses of past generations of the Targaryen dynasty. Even Rhaegar Targaryen was cremated after he died at the Battle of the Trident. Rhaegar was a man who Robert Baratheon utterly hated and even fantasized about killing again even years after he died, but even Robert still gave Rhaegar a proper funeral (when Rhaegar's soldiers who surrendered at the Trident insisted on it), cremating his body according to the customs of Rhaegar's family. Robert never had to be talked out of throwing their remains into the Blackwater river by the High Septon.
  • That being said, the books never specify what exactly the Targaryens did with the resulting ashes: they might have scattered them, but it is entirely possible that they interred urns containing the ashes (i.e. in a columbarium within the Great Sept of Baelor). Joffrey does state in the episode that Aerion Brightflame's ashes are kept in an urn, but of course, Aerion was burned from the inside out when he consumed wildfire. Joffrey's line still seems to imply that burning the last Targaryens would have been an insult; but his line might plausibly be interpreted as that scattering the ashes (instead of interring them) is what would have been offensive.
• The books don't give explicitly detailed descriptions of what the Seven look like, other than basic details such as that the Father carries a set of scales, the Crone carries a lantern, etc. Being a visual medium, the TV series of course has to make fully realized artwork depicting the Seven. This episode shows the interior of the Great Sept of Baelor for the first time, and the statues of the Seven in the main sanctum are depicted as Greco-Roman or Renaissance artistic nudes, i.e. the Father looks like a Classical statue of Zeus, with a flowing robe that does not conceal his nudity. The Faith of the Seven is meant to be a loose analogue of the medieval Catholic Church, which was quit conservative and frowned upon such artistic depictions of nudity (albeit Jesus was frequently depicted as naked or nearly so on the cross, etc.) Then again, the Art History of the Seven Kingdoms doesn't need to necessarily correspond to social currents in real life, and such artistic depictions of nudity and religious figures were common in the Renaissance, i.e. the Sistine Chapel.
• Theon Greyjoy never openly stated that he considered Eddard Stark to be his real father in the books, nor did he ever admit to anyone that the boys he killed and tarred were not Bran and Rickon.
• The scene where​ Cersei Lannister discusses Jaime and the Tyrells with Tywin never happens in the books.
• ​Varys does not discuss Sansa Stark with Olenna Tyrell in the books. In fact, Varys takes no particular interest in Sansa in the novels and the plot to have her marry a Tyrell is Olenna's alone.
• ​The scene where Margaery Tyrell and Sansa walk along the coast never happens in the books.
• There is no character named Allana in the books, either of House Tyrell or otherwise.
• ​The Tyrells planned to marry Sansa to Willas Tyrell, who is Lord Mace Tyrell's eldest son and heir, not to Loras, who by this point in the books has become a Kingsguard and couldn't marry. 
• ​Craster has his throat slit by Dirk in the novels, while in the TV series, a dagger is thrust into his throat by Karl, up into the roof of the mouth.
• Lord Commander Jeor Mormont is stabbed in the gut in the books not by Rast (who was not there and remained back at Castle Black) but by Ollo Lophand. Mormont did not manage to fight his murderer.
• Before dying, Mormont told Samwell Tarly to go to the Wall, and to tell them "All. The Fist. The wildlings. Dragonglass. This. All. Tell my son. Jorah. Tell him, take the black. My wish. Dying wish. Tell Jorah. Forgive him. My son. Please. Go".
• Sam stays back in the books, holding Lord Commander Mormont as he lays dying. Mormont commands him to escape with the others but he doesn't. Then two of Craster's old wives convince him to take Gilly and the babe and leave. 
• ​Sam and Gilly escape on horseback in the books (the Night's Watch still had some of its own horses when it arrived at Craster's Keep).
• ​The Unsullied respond to Daenerys Targaryen' offer of freedom by shouting "Dracarys!" in the novels.
• Daenerys swings the slaver's whip in Kraznys mo Nakloz' face and then releases Drogon on him with the command "Dracarys".
• Daenerys offers her ships along with the dragon to buy The Unsullied.
• Missandei is already aware that Daenerys can speak Low Valyrian.
• Daenerys orders the Unsullied to harm no child under twelve. In the TV series, she wasn't so specific, and just said "harm no child".
• Daenerys' followers are aware of her plans beforehand and attack the slavers as soon as signaled (when she shouts "Dracarys" and the dragons begin to attack).

​See also

• ​Differences between books and TV series - Season 1
• Differences between books and TV series - Season 2