summer_stark

Great episode. Much tighter and more focused than that past few. The end was fucking awesome. Though I did wonder why Sam didn't take the dragon glass with him. But I can forgive that (and the fact that no one but gilly saw sam the slayer). Very glad they ditched Theon Robb and bran this episode. Made for a much better episode.

Eta: oh right. Gave it a 9.

Now that Fringe is over, please cast John Noble as...anyone...Randyll Tarly, Doran Martell, Wyman Manderly (even tho he's supposed to be obese, I think Noble would be a fantastic Manderly). I think Doran or Wyman make the most sense, but I'm sure I'm missing some other characters he could play.

Also, now that Merlin is over, Katie McGrath (Morgana) as the sand snake nymeria, or even Arianne. Bradley James (Arthur) and Colin Morgan (Merlin) as any number of characters.

But mostly, please cast John Noble...

Was that thing on the horse at the end a White Walker or a Wight? It looked quite a bit different from the White Walker that was in the series premiere...

Sorry if this has been asked before.

This. I think it's "supposed to be" a white walker, just like from the pilot and early this season w/crasters son...but it's like a "recast" like someone mentioned up thread -- the part of the white walkers are now being played by skeletor zombies...it could be them w/o the clothes? they always seemed clothed. either way, i thought they were terrible. the pilot one was creepy and awesome -- this was a huge step down. not to mention the fact that we saw the same type of white walker (from the pilot) early this season -- so why change it at the end of the season? it just makes it confusing.

Too much to read through and i'm too tired...so...my thoughts.

1) WHERE IS GHOST!?! I know, i harp on this every week, but it literally makes no sense in the story that there is no Ghost -- it makes sense budget wise since how do you make a cgi dw attack someone realistically, but to not have him there at all, I just don't understand it.

2) HOTU -- this was ok for me. I didn't think that drogo scene was amazing, honestly -- but the rest was fine. i am actually in the minority of people who are glad they didn't visualize the prophecies -- i had been hoping they wouldn't because some shit would've been way too obvious -- a wolf head on a guy dead at a wedding? hello super telegraphing. i mean, granted, they're already telegraphing a bit with the whole "cant betray a frey!" thing and newbies seem to think he'll die for it, but i'm glad they aren't totally spoiling it is mainly how i feel about it. when she went to the wall though, i thought we'd see a blue flower! otherwise, that was random...

3) jaqen+ arya=awesomeness. although the new guy/makeup (i think it was a new guy cos the voice was different) made me sad b/c i love Tom W. you will be missed...maybe he can wear jaqenface whenver we see him killing people in the series.

4) winterfell -- i liked that whole sequence. they will bring in ramsay and some people are already predicting that that's what happened -- granted, they weren't going to be able to show the razing w/o the whole subplot, which was a bummer, but i'm glad we get our reek and ramsay. cried when luwin died after talking to the boys...couldn't help it even though i knew it was coming. i sort of got on the "maybe they'll keep him alive" bandwagon after no reeds, but then once they were confirmed for season 3, i figured he'd die -- so as soon as he walked out after dagmer hit theon over the head, i thought, there goes luwin...but still cried! nice work GOT.

5) north of the wall -- i think they fucked this up way worse than dany's storyline. my newbie friends had no idea that qhorin egged jon on to kill him to become a double agent -- they just thought qhorin suddenly hated jon and tried to kill him. such a totally unnecessary way to do it -- of all the things they make blatant, to make this one subtle seemed like a huge mistake -- some newbie reviews think jon is now FREE from the night's watch and wonder what he'll do next! that is just a failure of the team. and it makes no sense whatsoever. the amount of time and money it would've taken to clear this up is very minor -- compared to how fucked up this makes jon look and how people will always wonder whether he is a double agent or just an opportunist -- he leaves the nw to join teh wildlings when that's the only way then joins the nw again -- maybe at that point it will make more sense that he was a double agent, but i dunno -- it just seems too random.

i don't understand why they did it that way and now i really wonder whether ghost is ever coming back?!!? is it just b/c they were up in the mountains and ... ghost couldn't follow? as long as he comes back, i don't care what their reasoning is. i presume he will come back, but what if he doesn't??? i can't see that happening. i mean i can, but i will be super bummed. ghost is literally my 3rd favorite character in the whole damn series. (which i know is very weird).

7) the white walkers looked so bad i cringed. super bummed. i liked the weird black ones way better -- they looked way more mysterious and cloaked and creepy. these reminded me of like a skeletor zombie and agree that it makes no sense not to kill sam immediately and there's no way sam is getting out of there w/o some absurdly contrived storyline. what? he kills the horsed white walker and the wights are just like ok nevermind we're out.

8) i didn't love tyrion/shae's scene -- i loved how now the whole 'they're in love' story is now very clear and will be very painful, but something about it was ... off. maybe it's just the fact that i know her feelings and i can't watch tyrion love her instead of it being a problem w/peter and sybill (?)'s chemistry.

9) the doreah betrayal was a cool surprise, and i liked how they are starting to make dany ruthless and fucked up...and regardless of how terrible doreah's betrayal was -- locking her in an empty vault w/one other person, who will likely eat her b/f he dies of starvation/dehydration -- was just another level of fuckeduppedness that is totally the dany i have come to dislike.

10) brienne was bamf and the scene with them trying to pass jaime off was hilarious and then the dude asking them to count to 3 and then say his name at the same time was friggin genius. also, the whole, if i'd known i was jaime lannister, i wouldn't have had to steal that pig bit was awesome.

so if i added it up:

KL +1

Winterfell +5 (with extra points to theon's hilarious diatribe about the horns; and luwin's death scene. and b/c at least bran and rickon's direwolves still exist)

HoTu +1

north of the wall -10

stannis +1

robb/talisa 0

jaqen/arya + 5

jaime/brienne +4

all in all, a pretty mixed bag

another thing i love -- that grrm gives us background on shae -- that she's lorathi and dispelling the stupid idea nonbook readers have that she is high born

ok. i loved that episode. i'm not a big "battles" person -- but i loved that episode so much. THANK YOU GRRM! Cersei is a bitch, joffrey is almost sympathetic, the hound is scared, the troops scream halfman, the wildfire blows shit up. tyrion is very obviously in charge of the wildfire strategy and getting taking out the guys ramming the gate. pod saves tyrion -- who has the look on his face i imagined upon seeing ser mandon -- relief then bewilderment. sansa comforting the ladies in maegor's holdfast. wildfire blowin shit up. loras standing in as renly's ghost and i was actually choked up when tywin came in. bronn and co singing rains of castamere, and then them talking about how it was the lannister song -- and then the national playing it at the end. so friggin psyched right now. too bad the season finale won't be 2 hrs. i wish everyone else's storylines could have as much time to end with as KL's storyline.

Yes, I had a brain fart and said the Times instead of the Daily News, and I made a generalization that all critics loved the show. I will take that back, and say the vast majority of the critics love this show. My point here is that we, as ASoIF fans have an incredible television show to watch. As a lifelong fan of fantasy in particular, this show is unparallelled in acclaim, and rightly so. I watch A list actors give emmy and golden globe performances. I then come into the forum, and I read about how the show is "terrible", and all of the characters have been "ruined". If you are reading this, the next time you want to say how bad this show is, go and read the fabulous works of Jim Baker called the Dresden Files. Right after you finish that incredible series, watch the adaptation of that for the sci fi channel. You can use the terms "terrible" and "ruined" for that. I am not talking here about the people who just point out things that they didn't like in an episode. I myself have little bits every week that may or may not make me want to turn a table over. I am talking about the people who have nothing to say but how horrible this show is, and incessantly whine for thread upon thread about how the whole thing if full of garbage because Lommy only said the word yield once instead of six or seven times like in the books.

fair enough :). and i love jim butcher's ;) desden files -- except that i think the most recent book sort of jumped the shark, but i still love the series. and yes, the show was hilariously bad.

First of all, I didn't highlight the first part of your post, but I just wanted you to know that I thought it was eloquently put as for some of the reasons that you question the writing in places. I make note and compare as well, and I do believe that some of the changes aren't as good as what I read in the books. The Bran story arc is one of them. That said, This TV series IS universally loved by critics and audiences alike. Not only is it the highest rated scripted show on a cable channel right now, but it has also been showered in awards. A show doesn't win Emmys and Golden Globes without being an incredible hit with the critics. I have personally seen hundreds of critics put it as the finest show on TV over the shows that you named. http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/top-10-tv-week-20-2012-article-1.1079108?localLinksEnabled=false NY times giving the highest scripted episodic television ranking on the best shows on TV this week.

it's definitely not universally loved by critics, especially not by the New York Times (see e.g., http://tv.nytimes.com/2012/03/30/arts/television/game-of-thrones-on-hbo.html). The link you gave us was the NY Daily News -- not the NYT by a long shot. the NYT has been anti GOT from day one -- many critics and viewers love it (me included), but saying it is universally loved is just false -- to be universally loved is to be loved by all -- nothing is universally loved. universally means by everyone in every case. just sayin...

where the $(#^U&P%$!!! is Ghost?

a thousand times THIS.

yes, asha was great this episode. i really liked her. and i was glad they had the boys double back -- that's what i was hoping would happen, but thought it was a small chance. love that they're in the crypts. still though, where. the fuck. is ghost?!! no one can tell me with any logic whatsoever that ghost wouldnt come and kill people as soon as jon is captured -- they sense danger for their masters. no sense whatsoever. glad sam/grenn found the dragon glass though

yes. i did. until last episode -- i worried that it wouldn't happen. but i figured there would be enough time for tywin to leave and norther prisoners to get caught and brought in. no tywin necessary for that scenario.

Argh.. No Weasel soup, no iron coin trick? No beheading Karstark? Instead we had time for stupid romance between Rob and whatshernameintheshow? And is she even going to be related to the Lannisters? How is this gonna lead to "Jaime Lannister sends his regards" ? The scene between Jorah and Dany was weak too I thought..

7/10 for me.

exactly. i just started my first ever topic re: arya b/c i'm so pissed. i knew this shit would happen. grrrrr

According to the Twitter recap on winteriscoming.net there are in fact some non-readers who think Bran and Rickon really died.

if you go on twitter and type theon or bran you'll find far more people who didn't believe it -- the recap is just highlights of what he wants us to see, which, admittedly, are awesome -- but not enough people to make up a good indicator of how the masses reacted.

I just dont get what is the problem with the viewer knowing the boys weren't Bran and Rickon. The scene was designed for the viewer to figure it out. This follows the book as Ramsey was carrying outfits and a wolf pin and nobody reading the book thought the boys at the mill were B and R even as they were being killed.

The people who were supposed to be fooled were the people still at Winterfell and that happened - except Maester Luwin wasnt left with enough evidence to figure out the truth.

Disagree. The hints in the book were subtle. Lots of book readers I know missed it, myself included -- some people put the book down and after reading that and would only pick it up again upon my prodding. i'm no genius, and certainly don't read very carefully the first time i read fiction -- the second time around the clues were there, and the first time around when theon is looking at the bodies and thinking how stupid people are, i thought -- hmm maybe.

but to compare it to the scenes in the show where it was like hey two orphan boys at the farm where theon will be led to! totally different. haven't met a nonbook reader yet who thought it was b/r. and frankly, i think the point is that it was a missed opportunity for a great cliffhanger -- is it essential to the plot? of course not -- the point is, as you stated, that winterfell and westeros generally believe them to be dead. fine. noted. however, considering how many contrived scenes we are getting to up the intensity/emotion/shock value (e.g., making the shadow baby a cliffhanger, craster braining jon, dragon-napping), the fact that they wouldn't pick this one for a good cliffhanger, when it's already there in the books and easily made into a cliffhanger with the deletion of a couple of lines of dialogue and the old guy who asked for the orphans, seems like an unnecessary waste of the chance for some great television.

i liked this episode. a lot actually, but there were some things that bothered me. some less important than others.

the first and foremost was the handling of the search for bran et al and the showing of the burned kids -- not one person i know who hasn't read the books thinks its bran and rickon -- and if you look on twitter, 85% (ok that's a guess) of the nonbook readers there dont either. it was just so damn obvious -- and why?? in the books i was shocked, and as another poster did, i had to skip ahead to find another bran chapter to be able to keep going. there were small inklings -- the thought theon has that people are so stupid while looking at the -- but it was very subtle.

i don't see why they couldnt have made it as subtle here -- did bran and rickon have to stop by the farm and talk about the orphans? couldn't they have just been shown own the road...then cut to theon at the farm and the walnuts? hell if they wanted some conversation re: not being able to go to a neighbors, they couldve had them talk on the road about how they cant stop anywhere b/c theon's hounds will track them. and am i the only one disappointed by the fact that they dont hide in the crypts? my only thought was that maybe they turned back around and went to the crypts -- and the timing is just shown differently, but that makes no sense since they'd meet each other on the road. my only other thought is that this is how they find the reeds -- who will harbor them and because the live in the marshes or whatever its called, no one can track them there.

either way, i thought that big reveal was super obvious, and was disappointed to find out that most non-book readers did too. such a waste of a great chance for one of the better book cliff hangers. *shakes head*

otherwise, i did like it -- i even liked the pyat pree multiplies himself and takes out everyone forcing dany to go to the hotu. makes logical sense in the storyline that she'll go there and burn the place down and the warlocks will be hating on her after she leaves.

the jaime scenes were great, but i thought the kinslaying, while shocking and awesome in that way -- though it was obv he was a dead man as he inched closer to jaime -- was a bit absurd. if they had to go to the extreme of physicality instead of conspiracy to pretend he's dead, he couldve said, i'm going to have to bloody you up a bit to make this real -- make sure you scream etc. he's impulsive sure and thinks cleos is an idiot in the books, but i dunno, as much as i'm not a jaime fan in the books anyway regardless of his redemption (same goes for theon i couldnt bring myself to feel sorry for him except to the extent that no sentient being should be treated that way) - but the whole scene was contrived

and as much as i'm liking ygritte, i think those scenes are also illogical. where the fuck is ghost? it's not like they show how ghost cant come with him b/c he is climbing the skirling pass or whatever -- they're just wandering the tundra. ghost just takes off for days or weeks but isn't physically unable to come to jon? seriously? hunting for a few days is one thing, but just not following jon at all for no reason other than "direwolves are wild"? no they're not -- not where the starks are concerned, dammit! i like that they cgi'd the dw, but at the same time, it has made them even less a part of the story than last year - when at least they attempted to have the dw attack and defend - here, they're just eye candy. bummer. that said, i am enjoying the show quite a bit, and do like being surprised and after each episode i'm pretty happy, so i gave it an 8

-1 for not having room inside the largest keep on Westeros

overall, i'd give this a 7.5. it was good, but i liked last week better. and i have a terrible memory, so most of my gripes aren't based on a comparison to the book--and for the record, i friggin love this show--i'm obsessed. i watch each episode at least 3 times, which is probably why i notice some of the gripes i have. also, i thought the first 4 episodes of season 1 were fairly slow as well--and it was really episode 5 where it got awesome--so i think things will improve a lot starting next week.

I'll start with the things I disliked:

1) the fart joke--are you friggin kidding me? i literally cringed and thought about how all the people i've introduced the show to would be rolling their eyes at yet another fart joke, as if the previous one wasn't bad enough. plus, the whole--gotcha oh wait we really are going to die thing is so overplayed. it definitely irritated me--they couldve just had the guy get up and say "do you hear someth...aaahh" gets eaten by grey wind,

2) qarth. the scene was so random--the whole scene felt inauthentic is really what my beef is. too cheesy fantasy movie for my tastes. the spice king reminded me of jabba the hut, but with the demeanor of ...i can't even think of who--but just lame--the entire time i was thinking why dont they just take her dragons? is she seriously yelling at them? i mean, i thought it was ok to show her desperation bla bla...but if she was so desperate, wouldnt she just show her dragons? i mean, they're pretty obviously in the "pier 1 baskets" so it just seemed weird. obviously it also shows that she's got the crazy targ streak, but still felt forced. plus, the whole invoking sumai thing--wow, how cliche. some parts of the qarth thing were ok--the "horde?" line, the look inside, pyat pree in the background. and honestly, i didn't even remember how the whole qarth scene happened in the book, so this is just based on my tv viewing, not book comparison.

3) shadowbaby. not all bad--but the fact that most non book readers think it's a smoke monster--because that's what it looked like--bugs me. and i know some people are saying that's how it was written, but i disagree--nowhere in the scene does it say that it comes out amidst smoke and then forms--it says the hands wrap around and the head comes out and it comes out and then gets huge (i.e., the size of a large shadow)--not that it is vaguely formed and smokey, then takes human form.

also, i thought davos' initial reaction was sort of comical--he didn't look very scared--poorly acted--though i usually think he is great--that face he made took me out of the moment for a second. but, knowing what it was, i have to say i thought it turned out pretty good--mostly, i just hate that it was made in such a way that it legitimately is called the smoke monster from lost, or a dementor.

4) the mountain--i know the other dude left to play the hobbit, but this is the scariest big guy you could find? he made a face that was like a genial smile at one point--which made him seem like a giant teddy bear.

5) the moment ser meryn is about to hit sansa for the last time and tyrion stops him--it felt like the actor playing ser meryn was going to stop, or even did, just before tyrion said anything--like the timing seemed off, so when he raised his sword, i thought it was comical, again taking me out of the moment. tyrion more than made up for it though.

6) fading to black for what seemed like 5 minutes during the battle...

7) LF--the whole making a play felt poorly acted and ill timed (not in the sense of her being a widow, that too, but in the sense of the actors playing off of each other).

8) did anyone else think the shot of davos and mel in the boat, after the long shot, where they are rowing into the cave was disconcerting? he was rowing, but not moving at all--was that supposed to happen--couldn't they have made him move a little? part of the problem is probably that i watched the episode 3.5 times so i noticed all the random things, but even the first time i watched it i remember thinking, why are you rowing if you're not going anywhere?

9) the music--it felt off for some reason--like it was too modern at certain moments.

----

Likes:

1) tyrion/sansa/bronn scene: i thought it was awesome. period.

2) tyrion/lancel--hilarious, and i thought eugene simon (lancel) did a great job.

3) the joff/ros scene--it was disturbing as fuck, but i thought it was very well done--and i think that nonbook people get a real sense of the psychopath/sadist that joffrey is, that they didn't seem to get before, so i was fine with this addition (though it couldve been shorter).

4) harrenhal--from arya saying "dead people" to hot pie peeing himself when the guy he is taking after (who said he never gets picked b/c he stares at the mtn, so hot pie stares at the mtn), gets picked, to rat torture and tywin being superb--i loved it. arya and her storyline, even the truncated version, is one of my very favorites. (a little worried about how the tywin cupbearer thing will play out in terms of the jaqen storyline).

5) the stannis/renl parley: i loved this scene. i thought it renly was hilarious and stannis perfectly rigid. i dont see the point of the peach in this context, because the peach's ongoing significance is all in stannis' inner monologue, so we couldn't get that on the tv show anyway.

6) margaery--i adore the tv version of her character--though i hope her grandma makes an appearance in the next couple of seasons. thought the way she shut LF down was awesome.

7) the new map! i cheered out loud.

8) the robb/grey wind shot--loved love loved it.

9) shadowbaby--some parts of it were awesome--the hands curling around her legs--that i specifically remembered about the book and loved how it added to the creep factor--and i thought it was also appropriately disturbing and creepy, so i liked that.

10) Roose! i almost forgot--so fantastic...

on the fence:

robb/talisa--i liked the look on his face when she was amputating the dude's foot--like, oh you're so dreamy...it was fun and funny in a cringeworthy scene. but i am not sure how i feel about the change--if it is indeed a change.