The Killer Snark

I voted it a 9. I really couldn't go any higher, because of a desperately slow and padded middle third that almost derailed things, but I thought it was terrific apart from that. Nice to see the Battle of the King and the Two Queens set up now. Goodye, Tommen, Walder, the High Sparrow and his fanatics, and good riddance. Unfortunately, farewell to Margaery. We will miss your pretty little smirks. PS - Before anyone gets it in first here, does anyone else think the Sand clan should have told Lady Olenna at their conference she 'needed the bad pussy'? I actually would have clapped at that. It would have been hilarious.

I gave it an unreserved 10. Voted 8 for last week's. I was hoping last week's fairish, but somewhat stopgappish episode, was just that - a stopgap. Thankfully, I was proved right. This was one of the best episodes so far of the entire series. It was absolutely majestic. It had everything in it. I'm not even going to quibble about the whiff of pandering in the show's reinvisioning of Yara. I actually quite like the show version anyway. Everything else was more or less very probably the way it goes down in the next book. Wonderful, wonderful. I actually checked the time a few times during the battle to make sure there was a very real probability of seeing Ramsay cop it at the end.

I rated it a 9. Nothing much I'd really fault it on. An improvement over the episode before, but I'm reserving a higher grade for when things really gel together unless next to every scene's a doozy. Loved the King's Landing and Arya scenes, though.

Ha, ha.

I voted 8. Well late, because I only just saw the episode after a week in Blackpool and watching the Euro. Solid, but a bit underwhelming after the multiple build-ups of the last episode. Seemed a bit like a stopgap. No dull moments, but on the other hand nothing particularly stood out.

I gave it a 10. I thought it was flawless. I won't bother critiquing it, though, in depth, because I'm late to the thread.

I gave it a 10 after watching it last night, even though I was watching a download that had poor sound, so I had to struggle to catch the dialogue. I thought it was terrific, everything from the burlesque that Arya watches at the start, and its lovely nudity, to the finale with "hold the door." The only nit I really have is with the consistently bad dialogue they keep giving Theon. The Kingsmoot was well enough realised, except for some truly awful speech-giving, but I'm not letting that affect my overall score.

Was thinking about an 8 during the more leisurely parts, but the last twenty minutes sealed a 9. I'm responding late, though, so I won't bother reviewing the episode, but nice to see Jon about to confront Ramsay at last, and our mother of burnt off clothing getting her mojo back again.

I gave it a 9. I would probably have scored it higher were it not for the anticlimactic treatment of the expected Jon resurrection and the sense that future episodes will be better as soon as the story strands develop. You really get a sense that D and D are either going back to adapting the books now after the half-uncanonical last season, or at least they are paying attention to fan theories in online boards, either of which is a good thing, because it at least means they sustain the feel of an adaptation. Nothing in this episode was a revelation. Everyone knew that Ramsay was going to kill Roose, though Walda's death was ingeniously grisly. Poor girl. Everyone suspected Euron may have killed Balon. It was all well acted, sequenced and put together, though. Cool Gregorstein moments, cool Tyrion moments, etc. Almost contained everything that we could reasonably want.

Re Mel, how do we know that she isn't really still a red haired vixen, and she's only putting on a glamour to make herself look like an ancient woman in order to escape from the Castle, because she knows she's under threat from the rebels at the Night's Watch?

The latter word is probably 17th century in origin. It seems to be adapted from 'pursy', meaning 'resembling a purse.'

Accidental double post.

That's exactly what I said earlier. That whole 'pussy hair' exchange made no sense whatsoever. I actually like Emilia Clarke, but I dearly wish the costume department had decided to dye her eyebrows. The obvious clash between Clarke's natural hair colour and the character's is an annoyance point to this day. It's possible to be blond and have dark eyebrows, but not with that colour of hair.

Since Areo has been mentioned, I have to admit I was disappointed not just with how easily dispatched he was, but also with how throwaway the character was, given that D and D had a chance to actually design a character on top of the cardboard cutout he is in the novels. Completely missed opportunity, there, as was the treatment of Trystane. And it does make no sense whatsoever that a coup by Ellaria could ever be greeted warmly by a public that did not exactly despise Doran as a leader even though his brother was held in more respect. If I'd been more bothered, I'd have given the episode a 7. I don't expect anything except an uncanonical diversion from the show version of Dorne about now. The Dornish stuff isn't that interesting in the books anyway. What I really resented was season 4's negation of the Kingsmoot and the appalling Asha (Yara) at the Dreadfort shite.

I gave it 8. Solid, if hardly revelatory or spectacular. The Theon and Sansa, and Deanarys scenes were good, but nothing else stood out much in terms of advancing the overall plot. But poor Daenaerys. Not only does she have some guys discuss if she has 'white pussy hair' when it is obvious she doesn't because she has black eyebrows, but now she's condemned to live her life among a bunch of discarded old fogeys when presumably she only wants to jump the khal because he has an interesting beard. PS - The Dorne coup was not convincing, but I've given up on expecting D and D to treat the whole Dorne storyline either faithfully or sensitively by now.