NOTE: Spoilers for Game of Thrones season 5 episode 6 and the George R R Martin novels
Some viewers of Game of Thrones this week will be shocked at the fifth season's sixth episode's ending. The book readers because the character involved - Sansa Stark - is not the same one used in the novels, and those loyal to the show simply because of how extremely unpleasant it was to watch.
Weddings never have a happy ending in Westeros. Whether it's the Red Wedding or the Purple Wedding or Daenerys' once happy life betrothed to Khal Drogo, there's always doom and misery waiting for those who are keen to share their lives with another. And so this week it is the turn of Sansa Stark to be married to Roose Bolton's son Ramsay, the psychopathic murderous man who's holding stake in the north.
Following their wedding, Ramsay takes Sansa back to their sleeping quarters and demands she take off her clothes - all while Reek AKA Theon Greyjoy watches on, crying. Too slow for his liking, Ramsay rips off her clothes himself and proceeds to rape her, taking her virginity and leaving viewers feeling hollow. But did the show go too far?
Many were outraged, leaving their comments of distain on social media such as those included below.
Producer Bryan Cogman has now spoken out to defend the scene however, along with Sophie Turner who plays the Stark.
Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Cogman explained: "This isn't a timid little girl walking into a wedding night with Joffrey. This is a hardened woman making a choice and she sees this as the way to get back to her homeland. Sansa has a wedding night in the sense she never thought she would with one of the monsters of the show. It's pretty intense and awful and the character will have to deal with it."
Turner added that she 'loved' doing the scene: "It was all so messed up. It's also so daunting for me to do it. I've been making [producer Bryan Cogman] feel so bad for writing that scene: 'I can't believe you're doing this to me!' - but I secretly loved it."
Book series writer George R R Martin also took to his blog to address the episode, writing: "There have been differences between the novels and the television show since the first episode of season one. And for just as long, I have been talking about the butterfly effect. Small changes lead to larger changes lead to huge changes.
"There has seldom been any TV series as faithful to its source material, by and large... but the longer the show goes on, the bigger the butterflies become. And now we have reached the point where the beat of butterfly wings is stirring up storms, like the one presently engulfing in my email.
"Prose and television have different strengths, different weaknesses, different requirements. [Series showrunners] David [Benioff] and Dan [Weiss] and [writer/producer] Bryan [Cogman] and HBO are trying to make the best television series that they can - and over here I am trying to write the best novels that I can.
"And yes, more and more, they differ. Two roads diverging in the dark of the woods, I suppose... but all of us are still intending that at the end we will arrive at the same place."
Game of Thrones will continue on Sunday nights at 9/8c on HBO in America, with the episodes simulcast at 2am on Sky Atlantic in the UK, repeated at 9pm on the same channel Monday nights.
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