Gaz0680

Overall, the episode I thought was decent, but far from great. I thought that Kit and Emilia had almost zero chemistry as actors together. Kit has more onscreen chemistry with Rose Leslie, Peter Dinklage and Liam Cunningham than with Emilia. I didnt enjoy the Jon/Dany scenes at all and at this point both characters are incredibly dull. Tyrion and Jon scenes were way better than Jon/Dany ones. Lena was very good and I think it was Indira Varma's best acting performance as Ellaria in the whole time she has been on show despite (or maybe because of) the fact she had no real dialogue. Dianna Rigg was amazing in Olennas farewell scene. Great character and actress. Bran and Sansa scenes I thought were good. They exaggerated how distant the 3ER is from others, but aside from that was good.

Yes, the writing for Arya along with pretty much every other character has been beyond stupid and the show just has character s doing what they want them to do regardless of the impact it has on characterisation. The writers should NEVER have had Arya make the Frey pies. That was a huge character assassination right there. And her whole Braavos arc was written terribly. As for her Walder Frey disguise, we have no idea how long that went on for. Her killing all the Freys could have been same day or day after she killed Walder for all we know.

Bah, Arya is one of the few interesting characters left. I could name several less interesting main characters who could die before her: Jon, Daenerys, Sansa, Bran. Maisie has been fantastic this season, brilliantly displaying all the genuine emotions Arya is feeling, both obviously and more subtle ones, despite generally poorly written scenes, from killing the Freys to the interactions with the Lannisters to the reunion with Hot Pie and then the reunion with Nymeria. Maisie has been great and Arya, at least to me, still comes across as a very conflicted but intriguing character, just as she is in the books.

The direwolf was Nymeria. You misunderstood what Arya meant by saying "its not you". She did not mean it wasnt Nymeria. It WAS Nymeria. She meant that Nymeria isnt the same as she was as Aryas companion in Winterfell. She is wild now leading her own pack and is not just going to go back to being someones pet.

Arya is Arya, but is changed from the Arya that originally left Winterfell with Ned and Sansa. She is not noone. Arya failed most of the Faceless Mens tests. That storyline is season 5 and 6 was horribly written but it doesnt change the fact Arya's experiences and actions have changed her outlook on things. As for why Nymeria didnt want to go with her, that should be obvious. Nymeria is not a pet. She recognised Arya and clearly didnt want to do her any harm, but at the same time was not about to just roll over and become a slave for her former master. Nymeria is a leader with her own pack and is also wild. She would not be easily tamed again.

Aryas season 6 storyline and the way it was told particularly was nonsensical, but her season 7 storyline makes perfect sense to me and Maisies acting in conveying the thoughts and feelings going through Arya at various times has been really on point.

Your points are sound and I agree with you, but I dont think D&Ds perception of Aryas journey in Seasons 5 & 6 matches what a large amount of their audience actually interpreted. What was shown - Arya failing her missions, not becoming noone, failing to do what was required in HOBAW, her miracle survival after stabbing by the waif, etc - I think was genuinely D&Ds way of trying to tell a story of a wronged girl becoming a truly badass assassin through learning many lessons on the way. To my mind, they ruined Aryas plotline and failed miserably in getting across the story they intended to with Arya, but it doesnt change the fact that in Season 7, Arya is supposed to be a highly skilled FM, maybe not on par with Jaqen but certainly better than the waif ever was, and is able to completely change into someone else. This is the point I feel a lot of people are missing. They dont believe Arya is as powerful as they are showing her as right now (and intend her to be) because of the terrible job D&D did of telling the story of her journey to reach that point. We are nearing endgame now. Arya I believe is intended to be near the height of her powers as an assassin, just as Bran is close to reaching the pinnacle of his as a warg/greenseer, Sansa hers as a player and Jon his as a leader/warrior. The storytelling of the journey of all these characters could and should have been much better. Sansa is inconsistent as hell, Jon has made several stupid leader decisions and seems an idiot at times etc.

Just watching season 1 again this week, the writing in the show has definitely deteriorated. Season 5, in the slow moments, has just felt completely pointless and aimless. Season 1 and even season 2, the slow moments were far more interesting and moved the plot along better than seasons 4 and 5. The consistency of the storytelling has declined dramatically. I hope next season they focus on consistent, believable, intriguing storytelling, rather than most of the episodes being really slow and mostly aimless, then a few *shock* moments in the final episodes. It's terrible. Seasons 1-3 are so vastly superior to season 5 it isn't funny.

Show Stannis was given a total character assassination this episode. It was dreadful. Just a few episodes ago we had Stannis telling Shireen how everyone told him she was going to die from the greyscale but he told them all to go to hell and called in every apocethary, every maester, essentially every resource he could muster to save his daughter's life. This was a man who loved his daughter fiercely, even though he didn't show it. The Stannis of episode 9 was a religious zealot convinced by the red woman's promise that sacrificing his daughter is necessary to achieve his destiny. There was no build up or gradual proof being even shown to Stannis that if he didn't sacrifice his daughter he would lose. We are expected to believe that Stannis Baratheon simply took the words of Melissandre at face value and willingly set his daughter to the flame. It is just so unrealistic that his character would do a total 180 like this without anything at all shown in the show that could have caused him to do this. Stannis will be hated now and most viewers will see him as as big a monster as Ramsay/Roose, if not moreso. That was fucked.

It may seem that way, but Arya is going to have a huge role to play in the end game, you can count on that. Bran and Sansa will too. Everyone seems to think the ASOIAF/Game of Thrones is really all just about Jon Snow, Tyrion and Dany.......I think when the Winds of Winter is released, that will be far from the truth