ground_control

This is actually *good* adaptation (not saying *you* disagree, I just thought this was a good post to which to reply). In the books, we get Dany's POV recalling the previous (off-page) reports, which works fine in a book. The show could have had her discussing it with somebody (Daario in the bath -- gag) before the scene, but I think it works much better to show the first claim (and foreshadow the problem), then later (when people are abusing her generosity) drop the bomb with a child's bones. And hopefully the show will at least wait one or two episodes before "resolving" this issue. The only problem I had with [this part of] the scene is that (to my untrained eyes) the bones looked like human remains. Maybe if there had been a clear goat skull that would have been better. It's too bad that too many other scenes in recent episodes have been extra-long attempts to introduce and resolve a plot point in one or two sittings.

That's good, I watched it twice and rewound that scene a few times and couldn't get anything but "Jesus Christ" out of it...maybe Pycelle shouldn't mumble quite as much (I have a hard time making out a lot of what he says most of the time).

4 of 10 -- well, at least it's been all uphill since episode 4... o Sailing into Braavos / Iron Bank -- awesome. o Asha/Yara -- not sure why they wasted time having her read the letter to the Ironborn just before arriving instead of a "previously on GOT..." before the opening credits, but whatever. The combat portion, like last week's at Craster's, was truly abominable. Seriously -- when Asha/Yara gave the Pulp Fiction hardest pipe-hitting Ironborn speech at the end of Season 3, I was expecting to see them getting literally medieval on the Boltons. Instead, it's like, "no harm, no foul, you keep Theon, we'll just put our tails between our legs and sail all the way back around Westeros, see you next season." o Mereen -- cheesy CGI, not sure why they showed human remains when it looked like it was supposed to be just goats *this time* to set up for it being a child next time...but I totally lost respect for the show with the whole Hizdar revisionist history thing. I understand the writer for this episode may need the money, but if he/she really hates Martin and the books that much, he'she should just get another job. Seriously, in the books, the slavers themselves choose who gets executed, and there is no indication that *any* of them opposed crucifying the children. This antifanfic is worse than Talisa + Shae + episode 4/5 Crasters. o Small Council / Varys+Oberyn -- not sure how Tywin demoting Mace to "ink boy" fits with his attitude last episode (saying how much they need the Tyrells). It's like the writers don't talk to each other or read/watch each other's episodes. Also, Mace is a buffoon, not a retard, so I fail to see him not noticing that Tywin is treating him poorly. Also, WTF -- did Pycelle actually say, "Jesus Christ" after Varys talks about The Hand? I know the writers have been sloppy with words this Season ("all the rage", etc.), but that's pretty bad. o The Trial -- pretty awesome. Too bad whoever wrote this part didn't write (or spend as much time) on the rest of the episode. Again, it would be nice if we could vote/poll on a per-scene basis, I hate the fact that a 10+ scene like the trial has to get buried by 1- scenes like the Dreadfort and Mereen.

Varys sniffs the necklace. "Iocaine powder, I'd stake my life on it."

I don't think you could do anything better than you already do -- you show us the raw data and raw average as well as giving us your "normalized" average. The only "problem" is that some people seem to think the numbers mean more than they do. I think that discussions the poll generates are what's really interesting.

I never used the term "protest vote" and that was absolutely NOT what I was discussing. A "protest vote" would be not liking what the average vote is and artificially voting lower (or higher) in order to move the average closer to your "true" value. I was discussing the observation that a *true* extreme negative weighs more heavily than a *true* extreme positive opinion if both voters usually give substantially positive ratings. Ran gives us both the raw average and an average with the 5% most extreme votes removed. Hopefully that removes most (if not all) impact from "protest voters" or people whose genuine opinion is "not book = trash just 'cause not book".

I don't think you get what I was saying. I really the like GOT, if I didn't I wouldn't bother watching it or posting about. So, what I consider to be an "ok" episode of GOT is about a 7.5. That means if I think an episode of GOT is truly "one of the best" and I give it a 10, that's only 2.5 points higher than I'd give an average episode. Now, if I really hate an episode, I can give it a '1', which is 6.5 points below my 'average'. Now, assume that I am not unique, and am, in fact, typical. That means that, on average, any one person hating the episode outweighs 2-3 people loving the episode, which is what my point was. For a frame of reference, I rated the first 5 episodes as follows: 8,8,7,1,3 Without the North Scenes, my ratings would have been 8,8,7,7,7 (The Sept and Mereen scenes dragging down episodes 3-5). My objections to the North Scenes are not because they are not book content, but because I think they were horribly written and shot. The fact that they were lumped into a 20-minute and 15-minute block in two consecutive episodes only made it worse -- had the scenes been distributed throughout more episodes, with even just a little better setup, I would have hardly rated every episode with parts of them in it in the 1-3 range, they probably would have brought them down to the 7 (maybe 6) range. And, it's for things like that, that I think it would be interesting to rate *scenes* as well as the episodes.

I'd have to disagree -- the Sept scene was Episode 3, and deservedly weighed it down, but I think any effect it had on episodes 4 and 5 was minimal compared to the strong opinions many have about the North scenes. Since many people give the show high ratings by default, a strong negative opinion is more noticeable than a strong negative opinion. I think that those three episodes all earned their < 8 ratings on their own merits. Again, it would be interesting to see polls set up to allow per-scene ratings as well. :)

3 of 10 -- A bit better than last week, but the same major problems dragging it down -- weak Dany/Mereen scene, and the North scene was brutally horrible (although fortunately only 15 or so minutes this week instead of last weeks 20). My issue isn't that the material isn't in the books, it's that these scenes were so utterly horrible -- bad writing, bad acting, bad directing. The North scenes were two long blobs of material that just screamed filler -- everything set up and resolved in two episodes. The assault on Craster's Keep did not look like 9 NW taking on 11 drunk deserters by surprise. And the special effects (Jojen's hand burning, Karl Silvertongue & corpse) were pretty cheesy -- seriously, I'd rate them as "on par" with 80's slasher movies (Friday the 13th, et al). Hoping not to see the North again until Stannis shows up.

I'm not sure how hard it would be, but it would be interesting to see ratings for each scene as well as the overall rating. I think the easiest way would be to add a separate thread/poll for each scene (after the epsiode airs, of course) to compliment the "overall" rating thread.

Well, about 40% of this episode was pure invention, not adaptation, so that could have a lot to do with it. I know that things get moved around after writing some times -- do we even know for sure what parts Cogman did and didn't write?

I really hope not, but then I really wish they hadn't put in the part you liked (not because you like it or it was bad, but because I think it goes against the books). Also, it wasted time that could have been used to show more of the actual conquest of Mereen.

Lol, maybe Marg asked Pycelle for the Moon Tea (without really needing it) so that he would tell Cersei, and she would think she had something on Marg. I agree, Pycelle is a tool, so Marg may as well use him.

I'm not a book purist if that's what you mean. I've liked a lot of what's been added or modified to make the books fit, especially Theon's arc last season. I specifically don't like the "new" scenes in Ep04, and I think they are horrible because they suck, not just because they aren't in the books. I think the book scenes I mentioned were skipped for a good reason (they wouldn't make for good tv), just that *even so*, they would have been better than the schlock we got.

Yeah, but the Theon stuff was at least extrapolated from the books -- Bran's scenes were just low-grade fanfic. I'm not objecting to D&D adding stuff that fits with the story if they need to give the actors screen time, but what we got was (IMO, obviously) garbage. I'd have rather seen the scene with The Little, maybe some mention of The Knight of the Laughing Tree, but getting stupidly captured by the new crew at Craster's Playhouse was lame.

1 of 10: Reason -- no lower options The first scene was a bit iffy, but I liked the KL scenes for the rest of the first half, but the last half (the North) was as bad (or worse) than Season 2. Seriously, I can't see us getting less than 1 hour total of completely invented/rewritten scenes, which means at least 10% of this season's total running time, and that's *not* counting scenes outside of the North. 1) Sam told Jon about Bran -- OFF SCREEN, even 2) Craster's Keep no-names doing no-name stuff 3) Bran & crew getting captured What a waste of screen time. FYI, I'm ok with Locke at the Wall (minus overhearing Bran) and the Craster reveal, but most of it was just complete garbage that does not substitute for actual (or implied) book material. On the plus side, at this rate, we'll be done in six seasons with no real spoilers about how the last two *books* end.

8 of 10 -- Solid effort, but nothing spectacular A few disappointments: o Stannis burning Ser Axel as an "infidel" who refused Stannis's command to tear down idols...I don't think this is as "fanatical" as most people seem to think, it seems Stannis is justifying it because of disobedience to a Royal Command, not a general religious persecution, but saying, "He was caught trying to negotiate a marriage between Shireen and Tommen without my leave" would have taken as much screen time and been true to the book. o I missed Tyrion telling Joff that he [Joff] was the only person he [Tyrion] could beat -- as with the Stannis change, it doesn't make the show bad, but it doesn't improve the show, so basically it's different just to be different. o Shae was painfully stupid, and I feel the time spent on her scene(s) was a waste (but I feel that way about pretty much every second that gets wasted on her "expanded" role) o Roose/Ramsey was a bit weak (I know it can still come later, but "Don't make me rue the day I raped your mother" would have made this scene a bit stronger o Brienne's scenes were nice, but awkward (she didn't have to deny being a Lady to make it clear she was awkward being considered as one) -- still, as far as changes to the book goes, I don't think the Jamie/Brienne arriving early is being done that badly overall, and I do understand that a tv show has to give actors more consistent screen time than a book's author does