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You mean Tysha. Talisa was a character they made up to be Robb's wife instead of Jeyne Westerling.
Everyone I know who only watches the show and hasn't read the books loved that finale. The context for the TV version of the events was there and easy to understand, and in many ways makes more sense than the book version.. It seems it's only book purists who having read the books and not really paying attention to the changes being made for 4 years on the TV show, who were expecting a different ending and got butthurt complaining about context.
The adaptation does stay very close to the books, but sometimes the context must change given the different mediums, the time constraints, or production budget. The main points still occur, they just may not occur in the same way as it happened in the book.
I haven't really read all of this thread since this episode aired, i'm sure someone else who actually watches the show may have posted this same breakdown since its quite obvious, but if not it's quite simple to understand.
Let's take the Tyrion scenes, which most book purists have a problem with, and break them down:
In the books, Tyrion was married to an alleged crofter's daughter named Tysha. He later discovers she was a whore paid by his brother so he could lose his virginity, and his father humiliates her and him by having his men take turns with her in the barracks, and then Tyrion does the same.
Since it's a book and Tyrion is a POV character you know this story intimately, because you are inside Tyrion's head, read his internal monologues and thought processes. his regrets and his memories. He thinks of Tysha often enough that you never forget this story. The life lesson he learns is that nobody would ever love him without his gold, that he can't trust women, and that he will never love anyone really. Shae who he meets near the middle of book 1, is a run of the mill whore who is only interested in the gold. he never really develops any feelings for her and she certainly doesn't of him. They simply have an arrangement, that she is his personal whore now. But again she's a whore, and she's off fucking that singer and various other random knights the whole time anyway and Tyrion doesn't put it together or just doesn't care.
When Jaime returns to KL, the first time he see's tyrion is when he is freeing him from the black cells. He and Varys are working together to smuggle Tyrion out to the free cities. Jaime tell's tyrion the reason he is freeing him is because a debt he owes tyrion, and when tyrion asks why jaime explains that his father made up the whole thing about Tysha being a whore. Tyrion rages out at Jaime and threatens to kill his entire family the next time he sees them, that cersei is fucking basically everyone in KL behind Jaime's back, and that yes he killed Joffrey. This is kinda out of left field and is really just a plot device to get tyrion angry enough to kill Tywin and burn all bridges in Westeros so that he can go east to Dany. He see's Shae and just kills her with no concern or remorse at all. Then he confronts Tywin about what happened to Tysha, and Tywin doesn't even remember. He calls her his first whore, and Tyrion says if he calls her that again he will shoot him. Then he asks where she is, and Tywin says wherever whore's go, and thump.
There are several plotholes in this story but over all, in the written form, with POV characters, seeing things from their point of view, reading their thoughts, etc, this is a great story. However, those plot holes though have led to several theories to explain what really happened. Namely that Varys manipulated the entire event, put shae into Tywin's bed to enrage Tyrion into killing his father, etc. Some even believe that the cost that Varys demanded of Jaime for his help in helping Tyrion escape, was for Jaime to lie to Tyrion about the Tysha thing (in fact, she actually was just a whore afterall), to enrage Tyrion into killing Tywin and also as a bonus, get Tyrion to break all ties with Westeros so he could be free to serve the future king and queen (aegon and Dany) which is the end game that Varys has been working towards all along anyway, and the reason he needed Tywin removed from power in the first place. Keep in mind in the books Varys is the first and only person Tywin suspects of freeing Tyrion (unlike in the TV show it's quite obvious to tywin that Jaime was the one who did it). Varys would of known that.
Now as a TV adaptation none of this really works. I mean, it may have, if they had done some scenes with a narrator giving monologues explaining thought processes, or rather if they had found a way to continually remind the viewers of the Tysha story for 4 seasons so that anyone would actually remember what the fuck they were talking about. But all of it is rather complicated. The TV show, even as a simplification of the ASOIAF story, is still too complicated for the average watcher to follow. They don't remember half of the character's names or what they are doing. They just follow a few "main" characters and nod and smile at the rest of it. So this call back to something that happened decades earlier was deemed too convoluted, and they decided to show it instead. Thus they decided to go a different way, and they decided it pretty early on.
In the TV show the first you hear of the Tysha story is when Tyrion is telling it to Bronn and Shae right after he meets Shae. She points out #1 plothole in the Tysha story: No woman who had just escaped being raped jumps into bed with anyone, not even her rescuer, of which tyrion wasn't. Jaime is the one who went chasing down the bandit. Tyrion only comforted her.
Then they had the Shae character, over a period of 4 years, basically become everything that Tysha was in the book story. She was a whore yes, but she actually falls in love with him and he actually falls in love with her. She is absolutely nothing like the Shae character in the books and hasn't been basically ever. The first 4 years of this show being aired you are watching a very hesistant Tyrion struggle with the feelings he's been developing for this character who actually reciprocates all those feelings back. The TV Shae is Tysha.
In the TV universe (as in the Book universe right up until GRRM decided it was convenient that they didn't) Jaime and tyrion have a strong sibling bond. He returns to KL much earlier than he does in the books and he is visiting his brother Tyrion nearly every episode. They always have via dialogue and the minor interaction they had together early in the show (like season 1), but they do everything they can to show this extremely close emotional bond that these 2 brothers have. Jaime is freeing Tyrion because he is his brother and he loves him, not because of any debt he owes tyrion. And when he asks tyrion if he actually did it, Tyrion immediately tells him the truth.
I think it's obvious, but my theory is that in the TV show (and possibly in the books as well), Tysha really was a whore that Jaime paid so that Tyrion could lose his V card. In the show, Shae is the one woman that truly loved him for who he was, that he truly loved in return. Just like in the books with Tysha though, his father is responsible for taking her away from him. The threat of hanging her forces him to do that scene out of pretty woman, reminding Shae of what she really is and that he cannot love her. To Shae this is a great betrayal so as a woman scorned she testifies against him at the trial, saying the lies they want to hear to get him convicted, which to tyrion is her betrayal of him (in his mind she should of left on the ship that bronn set up for her). Then she starts grudgefucking his Dad because she's reverted back to just being a whore, etc. So when Tyrion finds her in Tywin's bed its yet another betrayal to him, but since he actually does love her, the only way to keep the broad strokes of the book intact (Tyrion kills Shae and then kills Tywin) is for shae to grab the knife, presumably to protect herself, and tyrion reacting, crying and apologizing after he does it. There really is no other way to have tyrion kill shae that makes sense in the TV universe, other than in self defense. And then when he confronts Tywin about it, it's shae that he's talking about, and it's for taking shae away from him and forcing tyrion into a situation where he has to kill her, and his dad not giving 2 fucks and calling her some whore, that he shoots him.
So no, the show doesn't make Tyrion look psychopathic. The books do, it's clearly a complete mental break that he goes through when hearing that his first wife wasn't what he thought, and he goes on a killing spree after burning all his bridges with the one person (jaime) who ever gave a shit about him. The show version tyrion's situation is far more tragic and thus sympathetic. but only if you actually have been watching the show for the last 4 years. If you've just been using the TV show as a replay button for your own mental images of the books you read and then whining when the scenes don't match up to whats in your head, then yeah i'm sure its all fucked up to you. But it's certain that had they copied the book version of those scenes it would have been nothing but "WTF?" and made absolutely no sense to anyone, except a handful of book purists who haven't actually been paying attention to the show.
