[Spoilers] Rant and Rave without Reprecussions - Season 6 Edition

[lostcause]

4 hours ago, Le Cygne said:

Sibling rivalry, they said. It's a shame, because both of their stories are going to be much better in the books. And I think she may get some of her story back eventually.

But I was still semi-enjoying Jon's story on the show, and that came to an abrupt halt with her arrival. She's the boss of him, and taking over his storyline.

He looked like a whipped puppy, looking at Mini Cat calling him a bastard. He was positively gaping throughout the episode, then she even gave him his garanimals to wear.

I try and stay optimistic with the show. My wife still like it a lot (though she has increasingly been overheard mumbling "Oh come on...), but what you write really hit a nerve of annoyance with me. It feels so unnecessary to it this way.

[Tijgy]

Bran Stark is a "Raven" 

http://www.makinggameofthrones.com/production-diary/isaac-hempstead-wrights-bran-stark-makes-waves-north-of-the-wall

Still: 

Isaac Hempstead Wright: Summer was a relic from the time of Bran’s father, and he’s a reminder of his father and the Stark way. But also, Summer was Bran’s first connection to this strange, mystical world; there’s a very deep connection there. For Bran to then lose him – especially having come this far and having successfully escaped so many close calls – it’s another crushing blow. For Bran, it’s like losing a piece of himself.

But D&D still thought his death should be treated as an afterthought. 

[Ser Quork]

8 hours ago, A_Cornered_Wolf said:

Can anyone explain what logical (not dramatically satisfying, but logical) reason there is for Sansa not to kill LF, ride south to Moat Callin, tell Royce she killed LF for being a traitor, take about five seconds to bend Robin Arryn to her will, and then march North with the Vale army with no strings attached?

Logically, what could LF possibly offer he that is worth more than that?  Particularly in the face of the fact keeping him alive is a liability because of how untrustworthy he is?  Don't tell me its her consciensce, she's ready to write her youngest brother off for dead.

Nothing short of plot armor explains it.

Would've dramatically satisfied me, for sure (especially as I'd never have to guess which accent Aiden Gillen would use this time).

6 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

I know we each have our favorites and I cringed along with others as their favorite character or story arc was destroyed... and now it is my turn.

Bloodraven is so important to the Westeros, both in history and recent events, that what the show gave him was shit. They could have just made him an actual barber and that would have at least explained the fresh haircuts everyone in the cave has.

They didn't even show any dread or tension of what Bran could become if he became bound to the weirwood throne like BR. There were no roots growing in and out, there were no muchrooms, there was no "terrible" red eye... there was nothing. This is Bran's Monster, afterall, as Coldhands tells Bran. Nope we get kindly old two-eyes-in-two grandpa

WHAT DID BLOODRAVEN TEACH HIM? The closest we got to any sort of training is when BR tells Bran not to stay too long or he will drown. But when Bran calls to his father at ToJ, Bloodraven doesn't tell him not to do that. And then we have the Bran/Hodor talking time crossover issue that may have been part of the reason for Hodor's death...(or may not depending on who you ask)

The last scene we get is Bran F'ing off around Winterfell. And Bloodraven sits there because it's not like he can touch Bran on the shoulder or anything to call him out of the vision like he did before.

And why no discussion mourning or mentioning Jojen?

Why pay a high priced actor to sit in an art project basket and not even make him look right?

Why tell the story if you are not going to tell it right?

I thought killing the direwolves for shock and awe pissed me off... this just threw me into a tailspin.

Possibly one of my greatest reactions in the books was to the 3EC = Brynden Rivers reveal.  I squealed!  It was just huge to me.  It's such an intriguing life and story, and in this show it went for nothing.

[Ser Quork]

5 hours ago, Tijgy said:

http://www.broadwayworld.com/bwwtv/article/BWW-Recap-GAME-OF-THRONES-Reveals-Shocking-Truths-in-The-Door-20160523

If your biggest concern watching GAME OF THRONES was finding out the origin of Hodor's name, then this was the episode for you! If the importance of finding out the origin of the White Walkers, the biggest threat that endangers the lives of all of our characters, is highest on the scale for you, you'll get answer, but the attention and care given to revealing said answer may disappoint you. It's all apparent just looking at the recaps and reactions. The most used phrase from an episode in which we learn where the White Walkers came from, another direwolf dies, a mythic race goes extinct, and the Starks make a battle plan, is "Hold the door!" That says quite a lot.

(...)

 Now, this is seemingly a massive reveal. We were just given the backstory to the big "villains" of our story who are threatening to wipe out the human race. However, it didn't feel that way. It felt very low-stakes and was delivered to us in an incredibly nonchalant way, in the middle of the episode, with seemingly no repercussions regarding it in the near future. Bran was shocked, sure, but no one else was and the direction, writing, camera work, and visuals we were given didn't stress the situation either. In fact, it's one of the biggest problems with the Bran flashbacks. Flashbacks, as even D&D have said, are often "cheap" and "easy" expositional solutions in writing. Thus, in using them, all of them have to be of the utmost importance and have an impact. That can be done beautifully when they parallel and contrast starkly with the present-narrative. Bran's visions, however, have all just come out of nowhere, with no introduction, and give no indication, visually, of being different than the current story being told. Thus, when these flashbacks are meant to feel important, there are no visual cues to tell us, and often big moments, like this White Walker origin reveal, lose their impact and feel ordinary.

(...)

The context also matters greatly. Despite their insistence that this happens in the books, they've been known to have said things of a similar nature before regarding scenes that might garner some criticism that we know can't play out the same way in the novels. For example, last year, with Shireen's burning, they also cited Martin as the reasoning behind their choices. This notion is a bit frustrating because no matter what Martin told them, they have claimed numerous times the show is the show and the books are the books, even stating that they are diverging so far off the books this season that the show is becoming it's own beast, and in hiding behind Martin's word, they resist taking responsibility for their own writing. The context matters in every sense of the word and hopefully, because it wasn't necessarily structured that way in this sequence, we see the consequences of Bran and Meera's actions in the future episodes. Otherwise, they forced a disabled person, whom they seemingly disabled, to die for them without his knowledge or consent and, because of this whole timey-whimey jumble, that's what his entire life was about. Granted this was a disturbing realization to say the least, but to make it the focus of the episode, one can only hope that it must have been so to paint Bran in a different light. Although, if he turns out to be "bad", he can't be the great savior can he? I guess the Three Eyed Raven was right. He's not ready.

This episode was packed with a lot of information and a lot seemingly happened, but it didn't really feel that way. The episode was filled with illogical fallacies and some wheel spinning, but set up quite a lot of situations to explore in the future episodes. The greatest fault of this season is it's overtly fast-paced plot checklist being ticked off while feeling at the same time as if it were nothing was being accomplished. These big moments need set up and time to be explored, yet we spend minutes upon minutes listening to pointless conversations in Meereen as Tyrion attempts to "govern," and we watch Arya get hit with a stick every week. Hopefully these dire implications are explored next week though, as we get a peek of them in the trailer, and where we have an action packed episode of the crown's face off with the Sparrows while Sam returns home with Gilly to the likes of the infamous Randyll Tarly!

-----

Personally I do think the whole Hodor thing deserved the attention it got. It is something heartbreaking, ... and Hodor deserves the attention. 

But the problem is they put indeed too much one episode. They put Hodor, Summer death, the CotF, the Others, death of BR in one episode that was even not solely on those characters. 

The Other is one of the big mysteries of the books. But they just put no thought on it, we had no real talk with the Children why they did, ...

f.e. 

And they did sing. They sang in True Tongue, so Bran could not understand the words, but their voices were as pure as winter air. "Where are the rest of you?" Bran asked Leaf, once.

"Gone down into the earth," she answered. "Into the stones, into the trees. Before the First Men came all this land that you call Westeros was home to us, yet even in those days we were few. The gods gave us long lives but not great numbers, lest we overrun the world as deer will overrun a wood where there are no wolves to hunt them. That was in the dawn of days, when our sun was rising. Now it sinks, and this is our long dwindling. The giants are almost gone as well, they who were our bane and our brothers. The great lions of the western hills have been slain, the unicorns are all but gone, the mammoths down to a few hundred. The direwolves will outlast us all, but their time will come as well. In the world that men have made, there is no room for them, or us." (ADWD, Bran III)

GRRM said Summer and Bran have even a more unique bond than the other Starks and their wolves. While warging is important for Arya and for Jon, warging is a huge part of Bran's storyline. Summer is the wolf in whose head we have been the longest and the most. He has a very important place in Bran's life and heart. The relationship between Bran and Summer starts in the POV first chapter of the books. And what do D&D? They literally throw him in the trash. I cannot explain it otherwise. Summer's death should also have been built emotionally not just BAM, WHINING, DEATH, ... It is real horrible how they treat those wolves. But there is not time for him. 

You have also then Bloodraven who is one of the most mysterious guys from the books. Nobody doesn't really know what he is planning? Is he good? Is he evil? Is he... But in the show there was also no time for this. 

And should we not focus on Bran? How he feels about everything? Is he not the protagonist of his story? Or should everything about what mysteries of other people, like Hodor, R+L=J, ... - Oh, wait, they did show something. He is an impatient and curious kid who of course had to pay (again) for his impatience and curiosity while a bunch of other characters can do whatever they want without any consequences. Which is nice for them of course. 

Should we not have talked about Jojen? How Meera feels about his death? 

Last season they decided to put Bran aside for a year because training is boring or whatever? They could have let Bran some scenes with Bloodraven, the children, ... to discover the mysteries, ... But scenes like Arya brushing the floor is more interesting, the whole Dornish Debacle too, ... 

They just put too much in one episode and they might everything around Hodor's reveal. Hodor deserves that attention but CotF, Bloodraven, Bran, Summer, Meera ... deserve a lot more, they at least deserve it more than the thousand Arya/waif beating, cheesy Jorah/Dany scene, Saint Tyrion who should have been quentyned, ... 

What a special post.   Thanks for this.  It very much sums things up.  (And good to see a decent criticism from the press.)

[Ser Quork]

4 hours ago, LazyBazooka said:

Remember when we spent a whole season on Tyrion's trial because he was supposedly guilty of kingslaying and kinslaying? Neither do D&D.

[Ser Quork]

This is interesting: https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/4kruq7/spoilers_everything_got_to_hear_grrms_thoughts_on/

Spoiler

Quote:

He interviewed Joe Hill (Stephen King's son) at the Jean Cocteau. Afterwards he answered questions while Joe Hill was signing books. Someone asked him about the show's Hodor name reveal. He said that his name reveal in the books will differ in the context and how it happens. So while the name will still mean the same thing (Hold the Door), it will be very different from the show's reveal. He said he came up with the name idea in 1991 and seemed depressed that the show got to reveal it before he did. He said he had no one to blame but himself for his slow writing. He joked about how jealous he was of Stephen King's writing speed. He said he seemed to release an entire book every time he's only just written about a chapter and a half.

Someone else asked him if he was caught up on this season and GRRM said all his focus is on the books. Someone complemented his chapter that he recently released online. GRRM said that this is a character that isn't in the TV show as his response. The tone of his show related responses made it seem like he no longer likes it. He did defend the show writer's need to make major cuts to the books.

I thought so, apart from anything, there are no sooper speedy skellingtons in ASOIAF (for which I am truly grateful).

[Maid So Fair]

I've just realised why the Britanny scene feels so totally deaf (apart from all the logistical issues) - here's Sansa finally (finally!) standing up for herself and in the process voicing all the complaints about her S5 plot that people have been pointing out since last year. It should be glorious, fist-pumping moment and for a second it is. But then they decide to portray that well-justified rant as dumb, by her rejecting a free army, and finish it off by turning a sympathetic character into a two-faced bitch who let herself be manipulated by a man eho pimped her out to a psychopath and choose to trust him over her own brother. Inside th episode, as always, makes it worse. I'm so done with Britanny.

[TheCasualObserver]

28 minutes ago, Maid So Fair said:

I've just realised why the Britanny scene feels so totally deaf (apart from all the logistical issues) - here's Sansa finally (finally!) standing up for herself and in the process voicing all the complaints about her S5 plot that people have been pointing out since last year. It should be glorious, fist-pumping moment and for a second it is. But then they decide to portray that well-justified rant as dumb, by her rejecting a free army, and finish it off by turning a sympathetic character into a two-faced bitch who let herself be manipulated by a man eho pimped her out to a psychopath and choose to trust him over her own brother. Inside th episode, as always, makes it worse. I'm so done with Britanny.

Not to mention not securing the loyalty of the Vale on her own and cutting LF out of the loop. For a show that made it's name depicting medieval politics (and named itself after that concept) it doesn't show much interest in politics anymore does it?

[Ruhail]

5 hours ago, LazyBazooka said:

Remember when we spent a whole season on Tyrion's trial because he was supposedly guilty of kingslaying and kinslaying? Neither do D&D.

[Tijgy]

What do you think what happened to the weirwood? Did it burn down? 

[Ruhail]

1 hour ago, Tijgy said:

What do you think what happened to the weirwood? Did it burn down? 

Whats a Weirwood? I thought Bran Mind fucks people to look into the past?

[White Harbors Wrath]

And Bran...wasn't the whole reason for him being omitted from 5 that they wanted to skip over his training and have him come back like "Skywalker in Jedi"?

Yet...he's bumbling around...making mistakes, not knowing his limitations, going places he shouldn't...and getting people killed? Seems kind of like the exact opposite of Skywalker in Jedi. We in fact got half a season of him being trained anyway.

[Tijgy]

3 minutes ago, White Harbors Wrath said:

Yet...he's bumbling around...making mistakes, not knowing his limitations, going places he shouldn't...and getting people killed? Seems kind of like the exact opposite of Skywalker in Jedi. We in fact got half a season of him being trained anyway.

We saw whole his training in three episodes  How many time did they spend on Arya? 

Or rather we did see really his training. Everything about Bran is not him but about everyone else story except his own  They even did not want to spend too much time on 3ER, Children or the Others 

[TheCasualObserver]

14 minutes ago, White Harbors Wrath said:

And Bran...wasn't the whole reason for him being omitted from 5 that they wanted to skip over his training and have him come back like "Skywalker in Jedi"?

Yet...he's bumbling around...making mistakes, not knowing his limitations, going places he shouldn't...and getting people killed? Seems kind of like the exact opposite of Skywalker in Jedi. We in fact got half a season of him being trained anyway.

No - we got half a season of flashbacks, followed by the three eyed crow just dying and now all his knowledge is somehow being "uploaded" direct into Bran's head. We don't get to see his training, but we do still have to watch him bumble around. 

[Ser Quork]

35 minutes ago, Tijgy said:

We saw whole his training in three episodes  How many time did they spend on Arya? 

Or rather we did see really his training. Everything about Bran is not him but about everyone else story except his own  They even did not want to spend too much time on 3ER, Children or the Others 

Right!  My absolute favourite PoV, pretty much dissolved by D&D salt.

[alienarea]

56 minutes ago, White Harbors Wrath said:

And Bran...wasn't the whole reason for him being omitted from 5 that they wanted to skip over his training and have him come back like "Skywalker in Jedi"?

Yet...he's bumbling around...making mistakes, not knowing his limitations, going places he shouldn't...and getting people killed? Seems kind of like the exact opposite of Skywalker in Jedi. We in fact got half a season of him being trained anyway.

But we honestly  have to blame GRRM for that. There aren't any more Bran chapters. And if they had inserted his training earlier, like in season 4 or 5, they would have had go reveal what we learn now earlier.

Let's face it: the plot that the White Walkers are Terminators gone rouge created by the CotF and Bran timewarps is a little thin.

[Sir Loin Steak]

13 hours ago, SerProle said:

Yikes, my first post lol;)

I cut and paste some of the excellent reviews of the episode to send friends who are still reeling from how terrible this season is and trying to cope. Thanks especially to SerLoinSteak and CasualObserver for the great posts in recent pages, but lots of great stuff in this thread.

For those who like Preston's stuff, Chad's name origin reveal in is his latest episode review is hilarious.

Welcome aboard! 

[Tijgy]

 

3 minutes ago, alienarea said:

But we honestly  have to blame GRRM for that. There aren't any more Bran chapters. And if they had inserted his training earlier, like in season 4 or 5, they would have had go reveal what we learn now earlier.

Let's face it: the plot that the White Walkers are Terminators gone rouge created by the CotF and Bran timewarps is a little thin.

No, it is not. GRRM started the whole training with Bran already in ACOK.

D&D are just using Bran powers as the new shining tool to show things from the past. Fine for them. 

 

[ArabellaVidal]

http://www.mtv.com/news/2881128/game-of-thrones-recap-burning-down-the-dosh-khaleen/

I came across this. Salty.

[SuperMario]

1 hour ago, White Harbors Wrath said:

And Bran...wasn't the whole reason for him being omitted from 5 that they wanted to skip over his training and have him come back like "Skywalker in Jedi"?

Yet...he's bumbling around...making mistakes, not knowing his limitations, going places he shouldn't...and getting people killed? Seems kind of like the exact opposite of Skywalker in Jedi. We in fact got half a season of him being trained anyway.

Yeah, he makes it to the Two Eyed Raven in season 4 and then is not seen again until season 6. What has he been doing for a whole season and a half if it seems like his training just started.