At the Cohn Zohn we don’t get HBO or Showtime, so we rent TV series from Netflix and watch them all at once. It’s fun to do it that way. We just finished the first season of Game of Thrones, which came highly recommended. I like the show but I don’t love it, and I hope someone out there can introduce me to its special qualities which I seem to be missing. Also, I never read the books.

Part of the problem may be Mrs. Cohn Zohn and I just finished watching all of Deadwood, a masterpiece. It’s a Shakespearean western — you can hear the iambic pentameter in the dialog. So, Game of Thrones has a high bar to get over in our house.

Among other things, I look for complex characters in movies and books. In Game of Thrones I see two — the dwarf and Ned Stark, who just got his head cut off. That leaves one.

I am not dumping on the show. I like it and will continue to watch it when season 2 gets to Netflix. I need someone to help me understand why it’s special.