Rant and Rave without Repercussions [S7 Leaks Edition]

[SecretWeapon]

11 minutes ago, StepStark said:

You're right in a way, but "Fight every battle, everywhere, always, in your mind" is simply nonsensical thing to say. If somebody said that to me in real life, I'd surely ran away from the psycho and never come back.

I'd cringe irl, but in-setting it fits. I don't think it is nonsensical, it's simply an overly ornate way of saying "plan ahead considering all the possible outcomes" imo.

What i dont see is how the fuck does that relate to Sansa but i guess we'll find out soon enough.

[StepStark]

54 minutes ago, SecretWeapon said:

I don't think it is nonsensical, it's simply an overly ornate way of saying "plan ahead considering all the possible outcomes" imo.

"Overly ornate way" used for saying something as trivial is exactly the reason why I find it nonsensical.

[TheCasualObserver]

2 hours ago, SecretWeapon said:

I'd cringe irl, but in-setting it fits. I don't think it is nonsensical, it's simply an overly ornate way of saying "plan ahead considering all the possible outcomes" imo.

What i dont see is how the fuck does that relate to Sansa but i guess we'll find out soon enough.

But we've been over this. LF doesn't plan ahead, he throws shit at the wall and sees what sticks, climbing the ladder in chaos. Or something like that anyway. As I said earlier in the threat, that quote, however silly, would be better applied to Varys, and certainly doesn't apply to LF.

[TheCasualObserver]

7 hours ago, lakin1013 said:

Since this is the TV show forum (and it is) and not the book forum (which it isn't) the main way viewers have to determine the nature of a character is by using what the character says, and does.  You can rail against the writers, which it seems you do, but to criticize using actual dialogue to talk about the nature of a character is rather unreasonable, to my way of thinking.  

By marrying Sansa to Ramsey, LF made himself look like a good friend to the Bolton's (just in case they become more powerful),  met secretly with Cersei to better impress her with his information about this situation, (just in case she becomes more powerful), and is this when he meets with the Queen of Thorns about another, a handsome young man? (cannot remember),  Finally, he moved a player piece according to his will, thus further cementing Sansa as 'his' player piece.  I am not certain LF knew the extent to which Sansa would suffer.  He tells her he didn't.  And we all know this blew up in his face, but we can imagine his plans. 

I don't buy this at all. "A good friend to the Boltons?" Why would they be friends with him? He gives them exactly what they want and leaves. He abandons all leverage and effectively relies on the people who planned the red wedding to help him out at a later date out of sheer gratitude. This is idiotic.

I don't really understand why he needs Cersei's help, particularly when mid season 5 her position was deteriorating, but even so - if he wanted to impress her, why not tell Cersei that Sansa was in the north and then... not send Sansa to the North? He's cersei's only source of information here. How about acting like the LF from earlier seasons and tell a lie? It gets him everything he wants and doesn't endanger Sansa at all.

And finally, "he moved a player according to his will" is gibberish. He doesn't cement Sansa as a piece if she goes to Winterfell, she becomes a Bolton piece. He controlled her, then turned her over to the Boltons, and for what? Nothing tangible, nothing sensible and ultimately he tood to lose far more than he had to gain. Even if his army defeats the Boltons and he lays siege to Winterfell, as far as he knows Sansa is still inside. What stops the Boltons from killing her in that scenario. 

It didn't blow up in his face because he didn't know Ramsay was a psycho (why didn't he know that by the way?) it blew up because the plan is fatally flawed in every respect. If Sansa dies he has nothing - the Northmen won't follow him, the Vale lords think he's an idiot for losing Sansa, and he has nothing but a letter from cersei telling everyone he's in charge.

I feel like people just watch the episodes, swallow whatever bullshit the writers paper the cracks with, and not think critically about anything that happens anymore.    

 

[SecretWeapon]

21 minutes ago, TheCasualObserver said:

But we've been over this. LF doesn't plan ahead, he throws shit at the wall and sees what sticks, climbing the ladder in chaos. Or something like that anyway. As I said earlier in the threat, that quote, however silly, would be better applied to Varys, and certainly doesn't apply to LF.

Replace "plan" with "think" then. 

[TheCasualObserver]

25 minutes ago, SecretWeapon said:

Replace "plan" with "think" then. 

Again, most scenarios where LF has succeeded could not have been thought out in advance. He makes a move and then reacts to the fallout. He didn't know that Catelyn would meet Tyrion at the crossroads at the perfect time and he didn't know that Renly would die by magic, giving him the chance to broker a marriage. Neither of these could have been anticipated by LF. Having Joffrey killed is a wrench in the works - he gets an in with the Tyrells by helping them ice Joffrey, steals Sansa away and retreats to see how things pan out, letting the chips fall where they may. 

I suppose if we are really simplifying the quote to something like "think ahead" in a general sense then that's fine, LF does do that; but so does every rational human being. This interpretation exposes just what a facile piece of writing it is.   

[The Dragon Demands]

Why the nonsensical Arya chase scene in Braavos happened:

 

[Back in Black-Snow]

There is a new leaker! Apparently they saw Episode 1 and have details about it and has been answering questions.

[lakin1013]

18 hours ago, TheCasualObserver said:

I don't buy this at all. "A good friend to the Boltons?" Why would they be friends with him? He gives them exactly what they want and leaves. He abandons all leverage and effectively relies on the people who planned the red wedding to help him out at a later date out of sheer gratitude. This is idiotic.

I don't really understand why he needs Cersei's help, particularly when mid season 5 her position was deteriorating, but even so - if he wanted to impress her, why not tell Cersei that Sansa was in the north and then... not send Sansa to the North? He's cersei's only source of information here. How about acting like the LF from earlier seasons and tell a lie? It gets him everything he wants and doesn't endanger Sansa at all.

And finally, "he moved a player according to his will" is gibberish. He doesn't cement Sansa as a piece if she goes to Winterfell, she becomes a Bolton piece. He controlled her, then turned her over to the Boltons, and for what? Nothing tangible, nothing sensible and ultimately he tood to lose far more than he had to gain. Even if his army defeats the Boltons and he lays siege to Winterfell, as far as he knows Sansa is still inside. What stops the Boltons from killing her in that scenario. 

It didn't blow up in his face because he didn't know Ramsay was a psycho (why didn't he know that by the way?) it blew up because the plan is fatally flawed in every respect. If Sansa dies he has nothing - the Northmen won't follow him, the Vale lords think he's an idiot for losing Sansa, and he has nothing but a letter from cersei telling everyone he's in charge.

I feel like people just watch the episodes, swallow whatever bullshit the writers paper the cracks with, and not think critically about anything that happens anymore.    

 

You will never catch me defending much of the writing ever.  Watching LF, one has to guess why he does what he does.  I do think LF is a scanner, in that he 'scans' the horizon for power changes, and then decides to do something, or not.  The Boltons are well situated in the north (at this time) and I think LF felt that 'getting in good with them' would be later leverage. He gives them a virgin Stark, which improves the Bolton position in the north. LF can come calling later, to collect on this debt. Same with Cersei.  Tell her some report, let her think she can trust him in the North.  

The giving of Sansa to the Boltons is more psychological from my perspective.  LF is always in a dark corner.  He did not get the girl he loved, he got beat up, and he does not get respect.  If he loved Sansa at all, giving her up is a form of punishment, a form of masochism without the sex.  His worth will be proved through his suffering.  

Why LF did not know about RBolton can only be blamed on bad writing.   I do not particularly like LF but my opinions are the only way I can watch and interpret what he does.  The writers just do not tell us. 

[Rhodan]

4 hours ago, Travis said:

There is a new leaker! Apparently they saw Episode 1 and have details about it and has been answering questions.

Well, while we don´t know if his info is legit, there´s a guarantee that this thread will be damn funny soon :-). 

[SerProle]

On 7/9/2017 at 6:51 PM, The Dragon Demands said:

Why the nonsensical Arya chase scene in Braavos happened:

 

Excellent! I was just thinking about the infamous Wolverine parkour and hoping you would tackle the subject lol;)

[The Dragon Demands]

The leaks sound plausible and not particularly Earth-shattering.

We've seen Benioff raving before that "Cersei's one redeeming quality is that she loves her children" (NO, she does not in the books, she's a god-damned narcissist) and that now we'll see Cersei "Free of that" in Season 7.  The leaks make it sound like, tonally, she's actually book-Cersei now.  With Tommen dead she just stops pretending.  

Though of course....as I've said....the TV show writers openly admitted they put in scenes of Cersei actually caring about her children basically to show off that Lena Headey can emote "motherly".  They depicted her as really caring about Tommen.

And the leaks, broadly, say that she's resentful of Tommen now - his suicide was a moment of rebellion & rejection that abandoned her (the ultimate "I'll have no part of this").

And you can almost see that but.......basically they're shifting to writing her as book-Cersei (good) so drastically that the transition may seem random (bad).....just as we had "sympathetic Cersei" suddenly blowing up the Great Sept.

But this is to be expected.

Arya parts seem pleasant enough.  Debate on this.  Some wonder what the fate of all the Freys will be in the novels.  I don't know.  Rumor is Arya will poison all the men or something but spare the women.  Now in the books that would be 'Kill everyone from wife one through four, but no child over the age of ten" or something.  Maybe this is just their shorthand way of dealing with that, I don't know if I can blame that (the TV show at least never introduced younger male Freys who were good, unlike the books).  So whatever

Sandor travels with BWB.  Seems pleasant. 

Rumblings of Euron proposing marriage-alliance to Cersei.  After "The Forsaken" this seems plausible enough.

Really the only part that jumped out at people is the North:

As we've heard from multiple sources, general idea is that Sansa wants to punish Houses that didn't turn on the Boltons (i.e. we know Alys Karstark, their version of her, has been cast). 

Obviously all of this is screwed up by the fact that the Umbers WOULD have turned on the Boltons in the original lost ending of the Battle of the Bastards, but they hid their failure by editing around it once they ran out of time. 

But even in book-universe, I can generally see, yeah - how far do we punish?  Even Stannis is going "look I don't think Arnolf Karstark's serjeants knew what he was doing, it would be a waste to execute them". 

Jon meanwhile urges that they need every  hand to hold a sword they possibly can, with the White Walkers coming, so they need to stick together with so many external enemies and he pardons the survivors. 

To be honest, on a broad level, in and of itself and on paper this isn't the worst setup....but it feels like D&D will use it to pontificate "Wow, look how great Jon is!" -- hey, maybe I just worry because they stupidly ran out of book dialogue by going too fast. 

But anyway, given what happened last season with all its shortfalls, none of this strikes me as particularly unusual....yet.

The one thing worrying people is the leaks say that in private, Sansa argues with Jon; he's annoyed he openly questioned her, she insists that showing mercy is bad.....by saying that being honor-bound got Ned and Robb killed. 

.....we ourselves say this.  Ned showed mercy to Cersei and Joffrey and they repaid him with death.  Even though TV-Robb's Jeyne Westerling plot was gutted, at least the other point remains - kind of more relevant to this sequence - that the whole reason the Karstarks turned on Robb is because he felt honor-bound to execute Lord Rickard after he killed unarmed boy prisoners without his permission. 

So IN PRINCIPLE, this isn't even wrong.

But given all we've seen of "angry bitter crazy Sansa" who D&D nonetheless think we're honestly supposed to be sympathizing with (it isn't "a character" anymore it's just "Sophie Turner mugging for the camera")......I fear that...TONALLY it will come off wrong.  That once again this isn't just Sansa being "brutally honest" but "Sansa would never 'reject' Ned and Robb this way". 

So I'm sorry if I'm going for a measured response here......but that's the question:  on paper Sansa pointing out that mercy and honor got Ned and Robb killed is correct.  But is this yet more of D&D making no attempt at coherent Sansa characterization?

I also predict they're going to be pandering Lyanna Mormont until we hate her as much as we did Olly (remember when we kind of liked Olly in Season 4?)

 

[Bear Claw]

On 7/9/2017 at 7:51 PM, The Dragon Demands said:

Why the nonsensical Arya chase scene in Braavos happened:

 

Thanks. The Arya plot really threw me for a loop last year. I  am looking forward to the Sansa video. I completely don't understand what is going on with Sansa. The character has done nothing but complain about being betrayed for the last few seasons.  Now the show is hyping the possibility of Sansa betraying her family, and it just doesn't make sense to me.  Last season there was a ton of unexplained (no dialogue) emoting going on between Sansa and Jon.  The show actually focuses the camera on the emoting without giving any explanation.The Inside the Episode videos are ridiculous because they don't even match what I saw at all. I almost feel like I should skip watching the show and just watch the Inside the Episode videos at this point.  Reading Sophie turner interviews regarding Sansa are just as perplexing. I am going to watch this year and hope that things are cleared up from last year and that no new weirdness starts. I don't think I can continue to invest time in watching a show only to have it all undone a few seconds later when I see the Inside the Episode. 

[The Bard of Banefort]

11 minutes ago, The Dragon Demands said:

Obviously all of this is screwed up by the fact that the Umbers WOULD have turned on the Boltons in the original lost ending of the Battle of the Bastards, but they hid their failure by editing around it once they ran out of time. 


 

 

Can you explain this further? I know nothing about it.

 

[Rhodan]

Generally, the leaks sound predictable. Personally, I´ve got the laugh about the minor scene, where supposedly maester asks Sam why maesters exist and he, of all the people, has nothing to say, so it´s explained to him by some piece of obvious writing.   

[Queen of Procrastination]

@The Dragon Demands Yeah on paper it doesn' t have to be bad. In the hands of a talented writer nearly everything can work no matter how ridicolous it sounds. Unfortanetly the show is writren by D&D and I've come to expect the worst of them. 

Just now, The Bard of Banefort said:

Can you explain this further? I know nothing about it.

 

In short. The director admitted that BotB was supposed to end differently, but it was pretty much unfilmable and they ran out of filming time at the end. Something Miguel Sapochnik repeatedly warned D&D about beforehand. We don't exactly know what the original ending of the battle was, but there are hints that the original plan was to have the Umbers turn on Ramsay. 

Just now, Rhodan said:

Generally, the leaks sound predictable. Personally, I´ve got the laugh about the minor scene, where supposedly maester asks Sam why maesters exist and he, of all the people, has nothing to say, so it´s explained to him by some piece of obvious writing.   

In the past I would have said: "It sounds like bad FanFiction and not like something that would happen on the show, so I don't believe the leaks." These days I think that it sounds exactly like the sort of thing D&D would write. 

[The Bard of Banefort]

37 minutes ago, Queen of Procrastination said:

@The Dragon Demands Yeah on paper it doesn' t have to be bad. In the hands of a talented writer nearly everything can work no matter how ridicolous it sounds. Unfortanetly the show is writren by D&D and I've come to expect the worst of them. 

In short. The director admitted that BotB was supposed to end differently, but it was pretty much unfilmable and they ran out of filming time at the end. Something Miguel Sapochnik repeatedly warned D&D about beforehand. We don't exactly know what the original ending of the battle was, but there are hints that the original plan was to have the Umbers turn on Ramsay. 

In the past I would have said: "It sounds like bad FanFiction and not like something that would happen on the show, so I don't believe the leaks." These days I think that it sounds exactly like the sort of thing D&D would write. 

Okay, thanks. It seems like the directors on this show often butt heads with the D's. . . . 

[The Sunland Lord]

2 hours ago, Queen of Procrastination said:

In short. The director admitted that BotB was supposed to end differently, but it was pretty much unfilmable and they ran out of filming time at the end. Something Miguel Sapochnik repeatedly warned D&D about beforehand. We don't exactly know what the original ending of the battle was, but there are hints that the original plan was to have the Umbers turn on Ramsay. 

Luckily they ran out of filming time, since Umbers turn on Ramsay would be lamest thing to do. After they bring Rickon to Ramsay and killed his Shaggydog, no reason and logic this Smalljon would've betrayed Ramsay.

Why oh why did they have this dumb idea is beyond me.

[Rhollo]

Sapochnik leaving the show is a huge loss. His direction was one of the few highlights last season. That there was actual tension in the nonsensical way Cerseis Wildfire-plot played out was his achievement.

Congrats to D&D for turning talent away instead of learning from it.

[RhaenysBee]

3 hours ago, Rhollo said:

Sapochnik leaving the show is a huge loss. His direction was one of the few highlights last season. That there was actual tension in the nonsensical way Cerseis Wildfire-plot played out was his achievement.

Congrats to D&D for turning talent away instead of learning from it.

Didn't they say at the end of season 6 that Sapochnik would return for season 8?