HouseLark

If this is how the books end then I'll be happy. This season has felt very fast-paced but the ending was satisfying for me. It changed my idea of what the story was about. Now that it's over - and assuming it will end this way in the books as well - I think GRRM has written ASOIAF as the final chapter in the history of the Targaryen dynasty. The house that was fated to produce the saviors of humanity but would always be too unstable and unpredictable to build a peaceful regime. When read along with GRRMs short stories and histories of Westeros, the whole saga of the rise, fall, rebirth, and ultimate end of the house of Targaryen is a tragic fantasy epic. You can see why he has put so much effort into these ancillary works like Fire and Blood since they tell an essential part of the story of ASOIAF, they aren't just fun background reading. The best thing about the ending is that it is true to the nature of the books. There is a sense of possibility for the future but also a real sense that Westeros is still on a knife-edge, things could go wrong very quickly. Could the north remain an independent kingdom? Could it restrain any temptation to expand its territory? We've seen siblings go to war throughout the history of Westeros. Couldn't each of the remaining kingdoms decide that independence was an attractive option? What about the "rightful" king in exile? Varys wrote letters to others informing them of Aegon's existence, it wouldn't take much for some of them to try and plot a restoration at some point. There was some level of happiness in the ending but the seeds for it to all go wrong were planted, though we'll never find out how this turns out.

Jon will be back by episode two. The cast and producers are doubling down to sell the "death" because they need to try and maintain some thread of drama to it. But think about it: in what way does Jon's death at this point make any narrative sense? By the end of the series is Jon Snow's role really going to be limited to that of a POV so we can see what's going on at the Wall and in the lands beyond? He's on a classic hero's journey and right now we're at the end of the Empire Strikes Back. Can the show leave Jon aside for a season? Not in my view. The show has ramped up the threat from the Others and it was taken up a notch this season. We need to see action there in order to see the threat start to knock on the door of Westeros and the only characters at the Wall with any standing are Mel and Davos, secondary characters. Essentially, next season is going to be about Dany resolving the situation in Meereen and then making her way in Westeros, and the realm slowly seeing that there is a threat from Beyond the Wall. For the series to wrap up in season 7 we pretty much need to Others to be ready to marching on the Wall by the end of season 6. Plus, I suspect that season 7 will be primarily about the war against the Others (which I do expect to be a war rather than one epic Helm's Deep style battle, expect defeat, despair, turning the tide, etc) so a lot of dangling plot threads will need to be resolved next season. They could still retain the mystery surrounding Jon if they can keep Castle Black a closed set but I expect to see reports of Harrington spotted on set by the end of this year.

It's pointless to even try and review this episode after that final scene, all I can think of is: Fire and Blood

I thought it was a nice touch for Maester Luwin to tell Bran and Rickon to go to Jon. It was just a nice nod from an honest and wise man that Jon was a person who could offer the boys protection. It also demonstrates that decent people like Luwin see a person's true worth and don't just judge them for being a bastard.

The thing is, the dead soldier (it's a king on the book) with a wolf's head has only one interpretation: the Starks are set to lose the war. And the sword in the back is rather famously a symbol of betrayal. It's too heavy handed for the screen. The Rhaegar vision is something I'm uncertain about. I have said elsewhere that I wonder how many people genuinely think that the absence of this is detrimental to the story or did they really, really, really just want to see Rhaegar depicted on screen? I will concede that it would have been nice to have someone telling Dany of the "threes" (3 treasons, dragon has 3 heads, etc).

As a standalone episode I thought this was excellent. There are problems of course but that's the same with everything. The big postives for me were finally something satisfying happening in Dany's storyline and the ending at the Fist of the First Men which was just brilliant. Dany's storyline has been poor this season, suffering from the writer's desire to have Emilia Clarke on screen more than she would be if they followed the book. But the House of the Undying worked very well for me. I know fans are disappointed with the lack of "visions" but how many can you put on screen without ruining future seasons? What they did worked well because it alluded to the past and future, of what could be and what might have been, showing Dany glories and tragedies. It served to emphasise the point that the future is uncertain (e.g. showing Drogo with Rhaego which obviously never came to pass). This is a good counterpoint to Melisandre's certainty about her visions which leaves viewers with the question: is the future already written as Mel believes or is it uncertain as suggested by Dany's visions? If I have to nitpick here, I'd say that since they wrote Dany a vision at the Wall then they might as well have had a close up of a Blue Rose, seems like a simple opportunity missed that would have had purists wetting themselves. Shifting 3 Blasts from the ASOS prologue to Season Two was a great cliffhanger and now I can't wait for Season Three - pryaing for Neil Taylor to be given directorial duties on the battle at the Fist. On Jon, I'm on the side that likes how this ended but I would like to have seen some more realisation from Jon that what he was doing was necessary, or at least what Qhorin wanted. I like that it looked like it was done in anger but it's stretching audience credulity a bit to ask to accept that Jon new what Qhorin's plan was, especially when Jon has been depicted as a bit slow on the uptake so far. Also, this would be a big decision for Jon, a huge moral dilemma; it would have been good to see him wrestle with that. The only major criticism I have is the burning of Winterfell. If you don't have a book reader friend to explain it will be hard to know what has happened there - who did it? Why? Why didn't Luwin say anything to Bran or Osha, such as: "be careful of some of the Northmen Bran, they just burned down your home"...? Still, very excited for next series. ACOK always feels like a bit of a transitory volume whenever I read it; it's just there to bridge the gap between AGOT and ASOS but it's not a middle act in a three act play, it's more of a bridge to the middle act. That's hard to adapt and kudos to the show creators for handling it well overall.

There's some callback to the beheading of Ser Rodrik here. If you recall it weakened Theon's character when he couldn't carry out the execution cleanly - it didn't just speak of his physical strength it also said that he wasn't ready to lead, his position was false. The gruesome scene in Blackwater told you about Stannis, his physical strength, his ability, and it alluded to his strength of character. Also, this was discussed in a scene from Spartacus: Vengeance earlier this year.

Definitely, it's an easter egg, nothing more. It's not much of a plot point anyway but those little nods to the book fans are nice. There's no way that any non-book reader would think of Renly at that point.

A visceral episode. Before airing I was concerned that there were no real stakes for viewers since Stannis' character has been underdeveloped. But three characters absolutely saved it: Tyrion, Sansa and the Hound. The stories of those three were so well done that they raised the stakes. Tyrion has always had a well-written story but Sansa and the Hound have been given scraps really. But with Blackwater both had solid emotional arcs and the actors both nailed it. The Hound was especially good, to see that fear of the flames and all his courage desert him was incredible. I know everyone is banging on about GRRM writing this episode and I don't buy the argument that the other writers aren't up to scratch. But GRRM "gets" Sansa and the Hound in a way that the other writers don't. I should add that I don't give a damn about the "SanSan" thing which I find irritating in the extreme. I believe that Sansa serves another purpose for the Hound, their joint story is not about any sort of relationship, but I won't go into that here, it's more of a book discussion. There's a few loose ends which will be cleared up next week (Tywin, Tyrell, Mandon Moore). It would have been great to have this as a two-hour season finale and when I watch this back on DVD in the future I'm sure that's how I'll view it. Excellent.

That's kind of harsh, it was a perfectly Arya-like thing to say, I don't think it reflects how the writers feel about women. But just o go back to the female characters; Yrgritte hasn't been a fighter so far. As I mentioned, she's been forthright and playful. Obviously she will become a fighter but she's also overtly sexual and passionate in the books. I also think that there's more to Margaery and Melisandre than scheming, both are most definitely passionate women. Where I might agree is that there aren't any examples of emotionally vulnerable women in the show, other than maybe a couple of scenes with Cersei (and of course Sansa). But then, the men tend to fall into a few defined categories or schemer, fighter, good leader, or cruel leader; only Jon Snow and Sam are providing anything different right now, and maybe Hodor for different reasons.

They've done well enough with Sansa, Melisandre and Margaery who do not fall into either category. Even Ygritte hasn't really been portrayed as a tomboy so far though I expect that she will further down the line. So far she has been fiery, playful and very feminine. The points you make about Cat are fair, I just don't think that it's accurate to generalize from that.

No he doesn't. If he did, he would have locked up this serving girl from the off just to satisfy a germ of a suspicion that she might be Arya Stark. He has figured out a lot and knows she's not a stonemason's daughter but as far as he is concerned, the Stark's are all accounted for. My guess is that it will dawn on him at one point, probably when he finally gets to King's Landing. Either that or there will be some action scene where Tywin finally hears of Arya's escape from KL just as she is going to make her escape from Harrenhall.

I expect Harrenhal to fall to the North in the next two episodes. Northmen will be captured next week leaving Arya to decide whether to use her third wish to kill Tywin or free her people.

Ha! That's exactly what I thought. Robb welcomes his mother back and doesn't even take a glance at the big sodding giant that she's brought back with her. You'd think he'd at least make some subtle gesture, or that Catelyn might even make an effort to say "yo boy, this is my new close protection. Oh, and she's a woman who can remove the head from the shoulders of any man". In fact, you'd also think that half the camp would be stopping to take a glance. That's kind of the point of Brienne; she's something of a curiosity which is partly where her awkwardness comes from. In fact, one of the things that I've noticed is that a lot of the subtlety has left this series. Last series, there were little asides hat added to the depth of the characters (the nods between Robert and Ned at Winterfell, the glance between Ned and Arya when Sansa was talking about Joffrey, Theon's reaction to the news that Robb would have to marry a Frey, etc). Those little touches are being removed or replaced with hit-you-in-the-face exposition or WTF!!! moments.

The letters may be linked but I can't believe that Talisa was writing her spy reports in plain sight as some have suggested. She was sat in the middle of the camp and making no effort to be secretive. Any nosey parker peering over her shoulder might spot a word or phrase that gave the game away. I think reading, writing and messages were just one (I'm bundling them here) of the motifs used in this episode so you see examples all over. I was much more intrigued by the suprisingly high quality of the paper/vellum that everyone had access to.

I'm just going on one of the few things that is said by Tywin of Amory Lorch, specifically, that he didn't have the wits that the gods gave a turnip. To be honest, sending messages isn't the most difficult of jobs; all a person has to do is carry it to the maester and tell him the name of the intended recipient. It's a job for a low-level lackey. That Tywin chose a Lord to be his gopher is actually something of an insult.

The best episode of the series so far. I have no real problem with any of the book-to-screen changes, the only disappointment is the King's Landing riot which seemed small scale because of the now-familiar budgetary constraints. The Ygritte-Jon scenes were fine and there's still space for Jon to release her in the next episode - I fully expect this to happen. I didn't even mind the grinding; it wasn't sexual in any way, Ygritte had just found a way to make Jon very uncomfortable and he didn't know how to deal with it whereas if she had done anything else to try and get to him (spit at him maybe) he would probably have been able to deal with it. The Winterfell scenes were fantastic, very well done. I loved that Theon could not carry out a clean execution; it marked him out as something other than a Stark. Executions are a big part of the books and Theon's inability to perform a clean execution will find a counterpoint in future series when a "real" stark, Jon, takes Janos Slynt's head. Rodrik and Bran were great in those scenes, devastating. I have less of a problem with Lord Tywin having a softer side than most people. I thought Tywin was one-dimensional in the books and in truth, this different side to Tywin (i) isn't really that soft and (ii) is perfectly in-keeping with his character since it is all related to his family. He's proud of helping Jaime to learn to read but it quickly becomes apparent that he did so to ensure that Jaime was not in any way weak like Tywin's father. The two stories of Tywin helping Jaime learn to read and his description of his father's weakness were very much related. I'll forgive the Arya-Amory Lorch chase as a moment of action. My only hope for that storyline is that we start to hear more about the Ghost of Harrenhal. The small folk would be superstitious and two unexplained deaths would have them whispering. There is a bit of a problem with the poison dart though - Tywin will now know that there's an assassin in the castle... I don't have much to say on Dany's story other than that I think it should have been cut. It seems largely irrelevant and I wonder if it has been stretched because Emilia Clarke will be one of the few actors that have been contracted for 4-6 years so they need to have her do something. A couple of stray points: 1. Do we have an idea about the passage of time between episodes? It's hard to get around the Littlefinger Teleportation issue without that. Maybe weeks passed, if so then I suppose it makes sense. But then so little time appears to have passed in Qarth and beyond The Wall between E05 and E06. 2. I'm starting o think Stannis is a problem. This episode really benefited from not having the Stannis storyline inserted anywhere. His arc is feeling pretty weak right now and I think that part of the problem is the lack of any real foreshadowing in series one. In hindsight, I wonder if they regret not at least having Stannis talked of a lot more last series.

You can't blame that one on D&D. Martin made Amory Lorch an idiot. I also don't think that Lorch is entirely illiterate as many have been saying; he's simply a poor reader or maybe even just lazy. Tywin will always have a place for useful idiots like Lorch who are willing to do unspeakable things. Even Robb has a place in his retinue for a man that he knows would flay people alive given half a chance.

Ned and Robert argued and fell out when Ned heard about the deaths of the young Targaryens. Ned left Kings Landing without resolving the argument to go break the siege at Storms End. They only reconciled when Ned told Robert of Lyanna's death.

And Aegon reached Westeros in one book. He seems more effective and efficient than Dany :)