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The fire bombs were lame. I'm not sure why everyone is complaining about the skeletons though. Could've done without the hands popping out of the ground to grab at ankles, but other than that they looked amazing. Better than the dragons, giants, or any other special effects we've seen yet.

This is an adaptation, not a show based on completely original material. It's perfectly understandable for fans of the books to have certain expectations, and the producers should expect to be scrutinized over every significant change they make. Sometimes the changes turn out well, other times they deserve a lot of criticism.

5/10 - The scenes at the Wall were good. Ygritte's send-off seemed like a bit of a waste of time though. - The reanimated skeletons looked great, but having Jojen die right there next to the tree when the three-eyed raven knew what was going to happen and when the children of the forest could easily have stopped it seemed silly to me. Bad writing. - Very underwhelmed by the children of the forest. Leaf looked much more human than I imagined, like the producers really couldn't be bothered. The grenades were stupid too. - Loved the Cersei / Tywin scene. Great acting, especially from Lena Headey. - Daenerys locking away her dragons was a nice scene. - Having Brienne fighting the Hound was stupid fanfiction at its worst. I sensed they were going to do it after last week's episode, and it's not the first time this season they've invented such random encounters. The constant coming together of known characters just makes what should be a vast fantasy world feel tiny. At least they left the Hound's fate open though. - Tywin's death scene was handled okay. The dialogue was a bit different from the books which i'm sure will get some fans riled up (just like with Lysa's death scene), but I have no real complaints. - Not seeing Lady Stoneheart was a bit of a surprise. I'm not hugely disappointed though, because I didn't love that part of the books. - Arya's voyage was a nice way to end the episode.

Leaving Stannis out was definitely the right move. It would all have been too rushed otherwise.

5/10 Big action packed battles do nothing for me, and i'm not the sort to be wowed by special effects. Could have done without all the romance crap too, and the cheesy dialogue. That said, I was expecting much worse. They didn't go overboard turning Ygritte and Tormund into hollywood badasses as I thought they might. I was also very relieved they didn't kill off Alliser Thorne. I'm sure a lot will be disappointed Stannis didn't show up to save the day in this episode, but honestly, that would have been too rushed and anticlimactic. I think it's better this way.

As I said, you can feel a sense of affection for a cute little puppy without there being any sexual desire there. Friends and relatives can also love and care about each other greatly and feel a great amount of affinity and attachment... but an actual relationship between a hetrosexual or homosexual couple absolutely requires an element of sexual desire. That's not necessarily limited to physical lust however. Someone can seem like a desirable mating partner because of their outgoing and confident personality or their social standing, even if they're not immediately desirable at a glance.

The difference between affection for say, a cute little puppy, and affection between a man and a woman is sexual desire. Without some kind of hormone replacement therapy, a man who has been castrated isn't going to experience such desire... and certainly not to the extent implied in the show when Grey Worm was watching Missandei in the river. It just seems like the show producers can't bear the thought having two good looking actors on screen without some kind of sexual encounter happening. The fact that Unsullied are fully castrated in the books - i.e. the pillar and the stones are completely removed - probably won't even stop them from showing what they want to show. And beyond being a butchery of everything we know of the Unsullied from the books, I just don't find the relationship entertaining in any way. Friendship between the two characters would be fine as long as it doesn't make up too much filler content, but what they're showing is the kind of cringeworthy tripe i'd expect to see in a bad romance drama or some awful fanfiction story. It's bad enough that I have to tolerate the cheese fest that is show-Daario, D&D's Daenerys worship, and Emilia's bad acting.

Maybe the bite isn't what finishes him. Maybe in episode 10 they'll cut straight to a scene with Arya and the Hound running away from the Eyrie with the Hound having arrows in his back. That for me would be preferable to some fanfiction scenario where Brienne conveniently bumps into the two of them and either teams up with them against hill tribes or ends up fighting and mortally wounding the Hound. Nothing makes a fantasy world seem tiny quite like the constant "random" coming together of notable characters.

Having rewatched the episode now that i'm over the excitement of Oberyn's death, I think a 7/10 was too generous. The duel itself along with the buildup beforehand really should have been a lot better than it was. I also think I gave too much praise for the Sansa/Littlefinger scenes. Sansa's speech to the lords of the Vale is excellent, but i'm bothered by how clueless it made Littlefinger look... and the scene where she comes down the stairs dressed in black and gives Petyr that look is a bit much. I'm surprised they didn't stick a thin black moustache on her face for her to twizzle. We get it, she's not a silly little girl anymore... Aside from Theon's visit to Moat Cailin, which was perfect, almost everything else about the episode was poor. D&D really need to improve their writing if they're going to continue their fanfiction power trip rather than sticking to GRRM's material.

For me the issue is less that they're deviating from the books, and more that I don't believe the writers are anywhere near competent enough to do ASOIAF justice with their fanfiction. Some of it turned out quite well, like Tywin encountering Arya, but most of it has been substandard garbage that's barely fit for a bad action movie or a daytime soap opera. I seriously worry for future seasons because it sounds like the fanfiction will only increase.

7/10 Good: - Loved the duel. The sudden and horrific nature of Oberyn's defeat in the books was a huge shock moment for me, and one (unlike the Red Wedding) which I didn't see coming, so i'm really glad they got it right in the show and didn't tone it down at all. - The Sansa / Littlefinger scenes in the Vale were excellent. - The Moat Cailin scene was great. Alfie Allen did a fantastic job of showing Reek almost falling apart while presenting himself as Theon Greyjoy in front of the Ironborn. The scene wouldn't have been anywhere near as compelling if he'd just strolled in and out of there confident with no signs at all of the frail, broken person behind the masquerade. Bad: - The love story between Grey Worm and Missandei is just awful. Pointless filler content that's probably going to drag on into the next two episodes. - Arya and the Hound arriving in the Vale seemed like a pointless deviation to me, and the way Arya bursted out in laughter seemed so forced and random. Indifferent: - The attack on Mole's Town was forgettable. - Not quite sure what to make of Tyrion and Jaime's conversation before the trial. I was waiting for some kind of point to the whole bug crushing story, but it never arrived. Perhaps the writers deliberately left it a mystery to get fans talking and coming up with crazy theories? Who knows. - Jorah getting caught and banished was okay. Certainly not Emilia Clarke's worst performance this season. Edit: Perhaps i'm being a bit generous giving the episode a 7/10 going by previous scores i've given this season. There was a lot of pointless filler content and bad deviations. I'm sure once i'm over the excitement of the duel scene the episode will probably seem more like a 6/10 to me.

I didn't get the complaints about his accent at all until this episode. He sounded so Irish at one point, i'm amazed they didn't re-shoot the scene.

6/10 - The scenes inside Tyrion's cell were all great. - Liked Sansa/Robin's scene, and the moon door incident didn't disappolnt. - Not so keen on the new Mountain now that we've had a good look at him. He has a better build for the role than the previous Mountains, but because of his Nordic complexion and his age (he looks mature for his age but still reasonably young) I have a very hard time believing that he's Sandor Clegane's brother, let alone older brother. I also hated the not so subtle way they felt they needed to reinforce the fact that he's an evil baddy. - I really didn't like how they had Brienne/Podrick encountering Hot Pie and Rorge/Biter running into Sandor/Arya in the same episode. Having characters come together like this always does fantasy worlds a disservice in my opinion and makes the world feel a LOT smaller and less grand than it should be. This isn't just a dig at the show, because GRRM does it too (notably with Samwell bumping into Stark children constantly). - Daario was awful as usual.

Did I say that I hate the whole series? I've enjoyed it a lot for the most part, even though the deviations from the books seem to be getting progressively worse with each season. There have been episodes that have left me disappointed or underwhelmed by certain scenes, but this is the first episode to rub me the wrong way so much that i'd go as far as to say I hated it.

I've actually been fairly tolerant of a lot of the changes they've made to the series up until now. Tonight's episode just made me cringe though. Repeatedly.