It’s easy to take for granted how spoiled we are with TV right now. Sure, there’s a blizzard of bullshit that makes you embarrassed for our civilization. But think of all the superlative shows to ascend in the last several years. Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Justified, Friday Night Lights, The Walking Dead and those are just dramas. The comedy landscape has been blessed with Parks and Recreation, Louie, Archer, Modern Family, Community and the continued success of the likes of 30 Rock, Futurama, and Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Game of Thrones is one of those rare shows where I love the characters so much, I have a hard time trying to decide who’s my favorite. Every one of them has layers of depth and complexity that make it difficult to paint them in terms of blacks and whites – a quality that is satisfyingly true to life. There aren’t really “good guys” and “bad guys,” just relatable schmoes dropped in extreme situations, folks with emotional baggage pushed to the brink, and crazies whose craziness the viewer understand. For such a richly unique and creative world that begs so much for backstory explanation, the show manages a very delicate dance between giving enough context to engender the sense of scale and stakes to the plotlines without bogging down the action with history that predates all the onscreen characters.

Perhaps my favorite thing about the show is the implications for TV as long-form storytelling. Books have long been used as material for movies, many with great success. But adapting a story from a long form (the book) to a short form (a 90 – 120 minute movie) is a complicated technique that always disappoints at least some fans. At worst, things get entirely lost in translation. Game of Thrones could have been a movie, the first post-Lord of the Rings epic fantasy blockbuster. But the producers went for TV instead, and their choice has paid off. Shows like Game of Thrones show TV’s potential for the long form story, how TV isn’t necessarily the “small screen” minor league to movies’ main event, and how TV is actually a preferable medium for adapting something as weighty and complicated as the A Song of Ice and Fire books. Game of Thrones has demonstrated commitment to proper adaptation of the source material, going so far as to solicit script-writing input (and entire scripts) from Ice and Fire author George R. R. Martin.

Finally, Game of Thrones the TV show can’t necessarily take credit for coming up with the jaws-to-the-floor twists no-way-did-that-just-happen cliffhangers, but it can certainly be commended for shooting them in ways that get under the audience’s skin and makes them squirm. A well-executed story, in any medium, should be able to make the audience uncomfortable – discomfort is a measure of emotional investment in the characters. If you haven’t seen this show or read the books, well…it’s not for the faint of heart. But again, that is an excellent compliment for a TV show to receive.