DarkAndFullOfTurnips

Because they don't show rape every week and every time they do it does serve a purpose, you just dislike the purpose or you insist on pretending to be outraged to hop aboard the circlejerk of whiners and complainers. If it wasn't rape this episode it would be character assassination or some other flavor of the week thing to complain about. By the way I rewatched that episode and there's like 4 seconds of actual rape on the screen. But on the flipside, did GRRM really need to tell us about Septa's being raped, their tits being chewed off, or half the things Shagwell says? We already knew Westeros was a brutal place, so he could've spared our sensitive sensibilities and cut that stuff out, surely? Not a great argument. Just because you want to find something to complain about, it doesn't mean it has no purpose. Everything is wonderful gospel and brilliance when GRRM does it, but when D&D do it it's redundant, gratuituous, distasteful, or whatever keyword you're all using these days to parrot each other's arguments.

I think it was pretty clear that Karl is aware they're running on limited resources and a highborn hostage would be a huge asset.

Regarding Bran's arc, people seem to be upset that they aren't taking an opportunity to showcase the histories and lore of Westeros this season. They actually have an entire season for Bran to catch up to everyone else in Season 5 where it would make much more sense for he and Bloodraven to do a little tree investigation. There is honestly zero material for Bran between what will happen to him by S4 end and S5 end, so that seems like a likely time.

Littlefinger has almost the same exact conversation with Sansa in the books. It's like really almost verbatim so how's that for making sense? Chapman did a fine job. He was a recast and people were concerned about his acting ability, but moreso that a 16 year old kid could seem so naive and innocent. He conveyed that very well without saying much, which isn't exactly easy. No one is saying he's the best actor in the world, just that they were pleased with his performance. Pod is just happy to be a squire and people are happy that he called her Ser, my lady like he does in the books because it was funny. So far Pod hadn't shown to be completely at a loss for words so it was nice to see a little call on the books. You have a legitimate gripe with Craster's scene.

I agree, I think for the average fanboy or fangirl it was a victory of sorts, but it was presented in a way that should be concerning, especially with Ser Barristan's reticence to crucify the slavers.

You can quite easily see when I joined compared to yourself. Regardless of time spent on a forum, people shouldn't let it slide if you make irrational knee-jerk assumptions based on no information whatsoever.

Got it, so we're just making assumptions based on little to no information and chastising the showrunners for it. Ok.

I can completely understand why someone would want it in the show, I just stated why, to me, it wasn't all that interesting. It was like taking a test without getting the results after...I find the test interesting and fun but only if there's closure in the end. I think you're being unfair stating the showrunners don't want to ask questions about the WW's since they've already shown us more than GRRM himself has in 5 books. I suspect they'll make it quite clear that the story is basically centered about an ancient war threatening humanity and the "Good guys" are probably just humans fighting to survive. But wigths and necromancy has never been a favorable trait for a society, I don't think GRRM really makes me think "Maybe the Others are really the good guys" as long as they murder people willy nilly and resurrect dead corpses to fight against the living. Although now that we're on the topic...One of the NW rangers turned wight clearly goes to get Jeor Mormont. I never really put too much thought into that, but there might be a lot more there than simply killing the leader of the NW for the sake of weakening the NW.

To clarify I find it uninteresting and unnecessary to introduce a character in a complicated story that only further complicates things. I think it was ok in the books and honestly I didn't even care about it until I found these forums, but on the show I think it's too much, especially if there are spoilers attached to it.

Well the fact that he's probably never going to appear in the books again and left us with more questions than answers I suppose.

I think they might be some sort of "Crown" if the Night's King thing is to be believed.

I agree, Bran and Jon being at Craster's could've been better if they really wanted it to happen. Kit has had a good season. Since Jon's one of my favorite characters I was beginning to worry about his ability when he gets meatier scenes but I'm pretty confident in him now.

Nothing major will change. Relax. The only thing with major implications is that Jon and Bran may meet, but they probably won't. Bran will still go North to the 3EC and Jon will still defend the will, will still be presented with a chance to be Lord of Winterfell, and will still be Lord Commander. There is literally nothing different other than the journeys getting there, which they're making less detached and more suspenseful/active.

There was nothing amateur or poorly done in that scene. Just a case of people complaining for the sake of complaining. The choosing will certainly happen next season, they're too busy to squeeze it in here and we'll need Stannis to be there besides. I have a feeling Locke is not making it to next season. I don't think we'll really hear from Rickon again before meeting Manderly which will also happen next year when Stannis is trying to rally the North.

Presumably the WW's have a way of preserving the baby's life. Fire consumes, ice preserves.

Why are you jumping to this conclusion in the first place? Bowen Marsh is cast on the show. Locke has no reason to want Jon dead, he just wants to find Bran. Sure, Locke could become involved if he's even around next season, but I really don't see how you jumped from Locke befriending Jon for Bran info to Locke orchestrating the assassination attempt on Jon.

Stannis is the King (At least according to him), not the King in the North. Not sure what's so hard to understand about that. He's just rallying the north to fight for him. The Iron Throne is in the south, Kings in the North don't sit the Iron Throne.

Stannis never claims to be King in the North...He's just the King. He tries to offer Jon Winterfell and the Lordship, but Jon is hesistant because the seat isn't his to take and he would have to burn down the Godswood, not to mention he'd be abandoning his NW duties. In the show Stannnis will offer it, Jon will want it but ultimately not take it for the same reasons and then get voted to LC anyways. I'm not sure how this fucked up anything. It makes the decision possibly slightly easier for Jon, but he will still be tempted and ultimately decline for the right reasons.

I don't know, I guess people wanted her to smiles, clap, and eat popcorn while listening to the screams of men crucified at her orders. I understand your point but they can't have Bran do nothing the whole Season. It feels forced to you because it didn't happen in the book. I agree that the logic of Bran being there wasn't very good and that could've been handled much better, but for a character that's extremely important to the narrative as a whole, they need to invent some stuff to keep them involved and interesting. Unfortunately it was a bit awkward here, but they're going to need to fill some gaps from the books with invented stuff. I was just glad to see a bit of warging, some of the Reeds, a shot of Ghost, and some WWs.

This was bound to happen eventually, as we knew GRRM takes quite a lot of time to put out the books whereas D&D can't really delay the show for an arbitrary amount of years. I came to terms with that last season and now I just view the two mediums relatively independantly and have been able to enjoy watching much more. Also readers are almost universally hated for spoiling information and coming off as arrogant for having read before watching, so I doubt any TV viewers really care.

This was one of my favorite episodes across all seasons. You can put me in the camp that dislikes having Bran's story tie in with Craster's, but it at least makes his story more entertaining and makes it less detached from the rest of the characters. I don't think anything major will become of that deviation. The Night's King reveal was fucking huge. I'm not positive how I feel about his appearance, but the show doing what I'd hoped GRRM would do (Give us any insight to what appears to be the most important part of the story through five books) was great. Not being tied down to PoVs really helped here. I wont be able to stop thinking about this for a long time.

It's not just the concept of the show being different than the books, it's that the community as a whole has become a more blatant circlejerk than most subreddits. Try to read through a single thread without seeing "Agency, male gaze, gratuitous, butchered, character assassination, heavy handed" or whatever the newest hot word on the forum is. So some people voice outrage and then suddenly everyone comes out to declare how something relatively ambiguous caused them such distress and physical pain that they're giving the show one last chance before abandoning it. But another contributing factor is that nothing major happened, really. Some people will rate last week's episode higher just because Joffrey died, as the impact of that single episode is considerably more memorable.

These forums are pretty well known for over-the-top reactions, particularly when something is presented differently than it was in the books. You'd think they showed Ser Davos killing babies the way the community is "outraged" about it, so all of that invented disgust just to be a part of something seemingly controversial unfortunately overshadows what was easily the best written episode of this season so far.

I rewatched the scene and it was more obvious to me that it was partly consentual, but the way it ended was weird. Just have Cersei look somewhat into it if a little conflicted, rather than an ambiguous zoomed in tug of Jaime's clothes. I think too many will focus on it though, and it's a shame because the episode was really well written and there was clear direction and purpose to every scene.

I voted 8 because other than some questionable direction choices in the Jaime/Cersei scene I thought this was actually a great episode. The dialogue and overall thematic unfolding of the episode was great.