For context, I'm a book fan -- I read them first in 2003 or so and have been a fan ever since. I watch the adaptation with excitement and trepidation and my feelings about characters and such are definitely colored by that. My only comment here, though, is that you will probably be disappointed if you like Jaime for not being tortured, as Jaime tends to be, in fact, exceedingly tortured, just not in the habit of talking about it much. :P
But yeah, I think one big strength of the series is that it doesn't depend on manpain in general -- or, in fact, on you sympathizing with characters because they're Designated Hero or strictly because they have some suffering in the past. The feelings they feel and pain they suffer is here and now, or manifests here and now, and bad things happen and danger comes to them here: it makes it much easier to relate to than The Nebulous Difficulty of Being Harry Potter or The Ongoing Overwrought Burden of Being Batman or whatever. I love it. I do highly recommend the books.
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But yeah, I think one big strength of the series is that it doesn't depend on manpain in general -- or, in fact, on you sympathizing with characters because they're Designated Hero or strictly because they have some suffering in the past. The feelings they feel and pain they suffer is here and now, or manifests here and now, and bad things happen and danger comes to them here: it makes it much easier to relate to than The Nebulous Difficulty of Being Harry Potter or The Ongoing Overwrought Burden of Being Batman or whatever. I love it. I do highly recommend the books.