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The Daily Star, Oneonta, N.Y., Friday, April 4, 2014 2 By Jacqueline Spendlove TV Media I f you're going to get yourself invested in a multi-install- ment epic yarn, you'd best be prepared to pay a terrible price: waiting. It's been roughly 10 months since last season's final epi- sode of "Game of Thrones" aired on HBO, with filming for Season 4 starting early in July 2013. Bearing in mind the mul- tiple, far-spanning filming loca- tions, zillions of cast members and dizzying web of storylines, it's nothing short of a miracle that so many elements have come together in less than a year. Nuts to that, though, it's about dang time! Fans of the fantasy drama can breathe again at long last, as Season 4 premieres Sunday, April 6, on HBO. The series is based off George R.R. Martin's series of epic fantasy novels, "A Song of Ice and Fire," and showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have helped to adapt it beauti- fully for the screen. As avid readers of the book series will know, season 3 leaves off part- way through the third book, "A Storm of Swords." The upcom- ing season will cover the end of book 3, but will also draw from books 4 and 5 — "A Feast for Crows" and "A Dance With Dragons" — whose storylines run concurrently alongside one another. Like the previous sea- sons, this one crams all that ac- tion, killing and scheming into 10 hour-long episodes. To very briefly recap where season 3 left off — so skip this bit if you haven't seen it yet — the Starks, previously one of the most high-ranking families in the Seven Kingdoms (and oh so noble!), have been scat- tered to the four winds and, in the wake of the worst wedding in history, most of them are ei- ther dead or presumed dead. The rotten boy-king Joffrey (Jack Gleeson, "Batman Be- gins," 2005) is set to marry Margaery Tyrell (Natalie Dor- mer, "The Tudors") in a union of two powerful families previ- ously at odds with one another. Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, "Oblivion," 2013) has made it back to King's Landing, short a hand, while his rock-hard father Ty- win (Charles Dance, "Strike Back") is running the show as the King's Hand. So the Lannis- ters are in a pretty solid posi- tion of power — for now. The- on (Alfie Allen, "Atonement," 2007) has been losing body parts at an alarming rate, but when we last saw his sister she was sailing off against her fa- ther's wishes to rescue her brother from a sadist's flaying knife. The Wall is facing White Walkers on one side and a Wildling attack on the other, while across the Narrow Sea, Daenerys (Emilia Clarke, "Spike Island," 2012) is freeing slaves by the thousands and winning them to her cause while her dragons grow from cute little hatchlings to "Jurassic Park" proportions. As for season 4, there's a lot that can be expected, and no doubt we're in for a horrible death or three. If there's one thing previous seasons have taught us, it's that no character is too integral to be killed off (fans still cringe when they hear "Red Wedding"). George R. R. Martin has become known for going to extremes when it comes to snuffing out major characters, and not just the bad guys, either. Some of the most noble, moral and just plain likeable characters in the series have been taken from us long before their time. Since season 4 kicks off mid- way through a book, the action takes off right away. "It's not building towards one specific climactic event," showrunner Weiss reveals in an HBO pro- mo. "There are more climactic events in season 4 than there have ever been before." Adds Benioff: "There is tremendous clamor for revenge, especially in the wake of the Red Wed- ding." One said clamorer is a new character to the show, Oberyn Martell (Pedro Pascal, "The Ad- justment Bureau," 2011), also known as the Red Viper of Dorne and much beloved of fans of the book. Oberyn has a hate on for the Lannisters for their part in his sister's brutal murder years before, yet he'll befriend Tyrion in the latter's time of need and take up his cause in what's sure to be an epic fight. Oberyn, Peter Din- klage says in the HBO promo, is "the one wild card," adding yet another level of vengeance to a story already packed with revenge. Benioff adds that season 4 is the pivotal point in the series, and that it's from here that ev- erything begins to turn: "It feels like this is the midpoint for us," he tells "Entertainment Weekly." "If we're going to go seven seasons, which is the plan, season 4 is right down the middle, the pivot point." Devotees of "A Song of Ice and Fire" will know that the HBO series has begun to veer off from the books' content, and should expect more of the same for the upcoming season. In a Screenrant.com article, Kofi Outlaw quotes Jerome Fly- nn ("Soldier Soldier"), who plays lightning-fast swellsword Bronn, revealing in a 2013 New York Comic-Con panel that "fans would be 'quite sur- prised' by how different season 4 of the HBO show was from the books that inspired it." Outlaw goes on to say that "other actors from the series [claim] that season 4 will have even more death in it" — and that's saying something. In any case, with the show catching up with the as yet un- finished book series, it may be a good thing that the creative team is getting used to taking liberties where the source ma- terial is concerned. With the sixth book still in progress and the seventh barely a spot on the far-off horizon, there's a good chance the show will outpace Martin's writing pro- cess. Chirstopher's Coins 2 x 2 coverstory Rory McCann as seen in "Game of Thrones" In like a lion 'Game of Thrones' returns with a bang By Adam Thomlison TV Media Q: Does Michaela Conlin, Angela on "Bones," say the line "S.C. Johnson, a family company" at the end of the company's commercials? A: No, but oddly enough, in a way, the actress who does deliver that line, Lynette Mettey, is the Michaela Conlin of 30 years ago. Conlin's best-known role is as Angela Montenegro, workplace sidekick of the title character, forensic anthro- pologist Dr. Temperance (Bones) Brennan, who uses her medical knowledge to solve crimes. One of the TV precursors to "Bones" was the '70s NBC mystery series "Quincy, M.E." That series gave Mettey her best-known role, playing Lee Potter, a sidekick of the titu- lar Dr. Quincy, a medical examiner who also solved crimes. (Both characters are going well outside their normal job roles by doubling as investigators.) Of course, the parallels aren't quite that perfect — Mettey's role on "Quincy" was as his girlfriend who helped him on his cases, as compared to Conlin's role as a co-worker. As well, Mettey left early in the show's second season, whereas Conlin has been a fixture in all nine sea- sons of "Bones." Q: Will there be any more episodes of "Under the Dome"? It seems like they left us hanging with the last episode. A: For those who haven't kept up with CBS's changing whims, seeing a cliffhanger ending to "Under the Dome" this summer must have been as terrifying as anything Ste- phen King wrote himself. That's because at first CBS was marketing "Under the Dome" as a "limited series," which is basically a modern buzzword for "miniseries." A miniseries, of course, is sup- posed to have a neat and satisfying ending. "Under the Dome's" ending left all sorts of questions open, but that's because midway through the summer, CBS announced that there would be a second season, which will premiere June 30. In this case, it seems that initially calling it a "limited series" was a way for the network to hedge its bets. If the ratings weren't great, it could just tie the show off after 13 episodes (presumably the writers had a plan for that). However, the ratings were, in fact, great. Have a question? Email us at questions@tvtabloid.com. Please include your name and town. Personal replies will not be provided. hollywoodQ&A

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