Mike Ward At Large

Too big for me

Game Of Thrones, to me, is like beetroot. Tried it once, hated it. And yes, I know that’s a shocking admission, what with me being a professional TV critic and that, but you’d hate me to lie to you. The only time I’ve watched ‘Game of Thrones’, which must have been, ooh, a year or so ago, was for a review I’d been asked to do on Channel 5’s ‘The Wright Stuff’ (a show where I stand in for the regular TV reviewer if he’s on holiday, and if the next 734 critics on the producer’s standby list are also busy).
I watched one episode, don’t ask me which, and I didn’t like it. Didn’t like it, didn’t care. Well, actually, I did care, I still do, but only in the sense that my wholesale ignorance of the current Greatest TV Show Ever™ makes me a social leper, particularly when I’m in the company of self-satisfied box set snobs.
These people are forever raving about ‘Game Of Thrones’: ‘bold, rich, sumptuous, epic storytelling, puts mainstream TV fodder to shame’, blah blah blah. All I can do is shrug, or check the football scores, or try to change the subject (“Ooh, look, guys, a horse wearing flippers…”).

My problem with ‘Game Of Thrones’ (based on that whole hour I had to spend watching an actual episode, plus various gushing articles I’ve flicked through before losing the will to live) is that it’s just too BIG. Too much stuff going on. Too many characters with odd names. Too many cloaks.
Oddly-named characters, and bloody cloaks, make me think of Tolkien, and I’ve hated that stuff ever since it was forced on me at school. But the bigness of this show, that’s my main problem. Big is something I just don’t do. I’m simply not programmed that way.
It’s why, for example, I find 3D cinema blockbusters a complete turn-off. It’s why I’d rather watch a band in a tiny club than a vast arena. It’s why, as an Albion fan (and do keep this to yourself ) I had far happier times at Withdean than I’ve ever had at the Amex.

And it’s why I get more pleasure from a witty throwaway line on Corrie than I’d ever get from endless hours of ‘important’ drama. ‘Game Of Thrones’ fans will, I’m sure, think I’m mad, or a moron, probably both, and insist I’m missing out on a life-enhancing experience. I dare say they’re right.
But answer me this. If a single question stood between them and winning a fortune on the National Lottery quiz ‘Who Dares Wins’, how many Rovers Return barmaids could they name?
Exactly. I rest my case.
Mike Ward is the TV Critic of the Daily Star and the TV Editor of the Daily Express Saturday magazine. Hear him every Monday afternoon with Guy Lloyd on Brighton’s Juice 107.2