Cyvasse Khal

8/10. Would liked to have seen a lot more of the Battle of the North, but what we saw was still good. Wasn't sure how to interpret Theon & Sansa jumping - whether it was suicidal or to potential safety. Walk of Shame was fantastic, all down to Lena Headey (although was slightly detached from it knowing it was a body double). Arya was decent enough, although the continuous face changing was a bit overdone and flashy just for the sake of it. Drogon just being like a big cat was pretty funny. Meereen convo was okay, but don't necessarily agree that the Meereenese people would follow Missandei & Grey Worm in any way. Enjoyed Tyrion & Varys, and wish these two would stick with each other for the remainder of the series. Dorne was ludicrous, so at least it's consistent. I was a bit underwhelmed by the Jon stabbing, I guess when you know something's coming it's hard to make it epic.

Season 3 as a whole has possibly been the weakest of them all. Hardhome was amazing, and a strong back half to the season, but the majority of the first 6 episodes were not great. I can safely say i'm more than ready for Winds. I need this story in George's words now.

7/10. Mixed feelings like I'm sure everyone has. Drogon ending was incredible, bravo to the CGI department and bravo to Emilia Clarke because this is where she shines most in these epic scenes unlike her Queenly-voice acting. The Shireen scene was tough to comprehend, tough to watch, tough to take. Book-Stannis still has my support, but nothing that Show-Stannis can ever do now will get me on his side.

are you serious?

I am. This last half of an episode on a tv budget shits all over anything Marvel has ever produced.

I rarely ever give 10s because it's so hard for anything to be perfect. I gave this episode a 10 because I honestly don't know how I could have been any more entertained, on the edge of my seat, and fixated on the screen more than I was for that hour. I mean blockbuster movies with an unlimited budget could only dream of having the sequences of scenes that Game of Thrones achieved at Hardhome tonight.

Cat of the Canals (or Lana of the Canals was it?) and Cersei in the Cells, and Sansa & Theon were all very strong scenes in their own right to support this wonderful episode.

Tyrion & Dany was fine up until the last part about 'the wheel' which was very hammy and lame. But, hey, who cares right?

5/10. I wanted to like it more but the parts I had problems with sat in equal measure with the parts I liked.

Pros

- Winterfell. Sansa/Theon scenes were wonderfully acted, they've both come on leaps and bounds since season 1. Ramsay appropriately chillingly evil as always and just piling on the reasons to want this guy flayed himself.

- Kings Landing. Apart from the Martyn..err..Tommen scene, everything else involving the High Septon, Olenna, Marg, and Cersei were great. Jonathon Pryce has been such a huge plus this season.

- Aemon. Nice send off for one of the few characters who has been kept almost exactly the same as the books.

- Fighting Pit. It was a cool moment to finally see Tyrion & Dany meet. I enjoyed Dany's reaction to seeing Jorah and the look on Jorah's face when she said to get him out of her sight was great. Poor Jorah.

Cons

- The use of women on GoT. I'm getting pretty fed up with so many of the women on this show being either treated as damsels in distress or products of sexploitation. Melisandre, Sansa, Gilly, Tyene Sand, Missandei have all had changes in the books or introductions of scenes that have painted them in either of those 2 categories, it's unnecessary.

- Dany/Daario. Criiiiiiiiiinnnnnnge. It's the writing this time (mostly), dialogue was just incredibly lame.

- Slave trading. Why would this be taking place in some back woods in the middle of nowhere? Then all of a sudden teleported to the fighting pits in the blink of an eye.

- Dorne. Both the Sand Snakes/Bronn and Jaime/Myrcella scenes were practically pointless and a compete waste of screentime.

- Melisandre. I don't know why she would think Stannis would be willing to sacrifice Shireen. I don't even know why Shireen or Selyse would even be on this war march.

9/10 for me this week yay! Finally. I'd usually do a list of Pros & Cons but there isn't enough cons for me to warrant doing that as every single scene I enjoyed. Maybe I'm just in a really good mood today. Anyway the only things that stop it from being a perfect 10 is a lack of a huge moment, and the Dorne stuff is still leaning more towards the cheesy end of the spectrum. Acting was superb by everyone in Bravos, KL & WF. Fantastic to see Lady Olenna again. House of Black & White scenes were particularly very powerful and I thought the whole episode was undercut by a beautiful musical score.

6/10. It was just so-so, bordering on dull for 50mins, saved by a strong ending. Score is kept low more by omissions rather than what was shown.

Pros

- Tyrion/Jorah. Really beautifully shot sequence through Old Valyria. Drogon flying over looked spectacular. Stone Men ambush was exciting. Fairly logical change to give Jorah the greyscale in lieu of JonCon. Interested to see where they go with that.

- Dany. I really kinda love the fact that the day after Barristan kicks the bucket, Dany's decision making just goes all over the place. They've always kept up this notion that without good council, Dany really is pretty clueless.

- The Wall. As it has been all season, amongst the strongest scenes of the episode.

Cons

- 2 weeks in a row without arguably the show's most popular character in Arya. That seems like poor judgement in storytelling considering the source material should have presented a lot of Arya this season.

- No Dorne either. 5 episodes in and essentially 2 scenes of the Martell's or Sand's. Way to hype up this storyline.

- Tormund. We've all really lost out on the larger than life, hilarious, jolly giant type character from the books. That's no knock on the actor, but we need bookTormund so much at The Wall.

- Winterfell. Everything just kind of annoyed me through most of these scenes. Why would Sansa blindly follow a strangers orders to go down to the end of a dark kennel alone?

- Grey Worm/Missandei. It's all been said here before.

6/10 this week. This was really very jarringly different from what we're used to. If it weren't for 2 or 3 really good scenes it probably would be my least favorite episode ever. I haven't gotten caught up about much changes from the books, but what I will say is that when D&D do go their own way it's just very noticeable that they don't write as well as GRRM.

Pros

- Jaime/Bronn. As suspected I liked every scene with these two, and as expected the two play off each other well.

- Cersei/Marg/Tommen. This has moved to my favorite storyline over The Wall now. Poor Tommen is just being mentally torn to pieces by these women, Dormer & Headey are on absolute A-games right now.

- High Sparrow/Faith Militant. The scenes were pretty heavy handed to be perfectly honest, but I'm just glad this storyline is here and in full - now when do we get to see Oldtown?

- Stannis/Shireen. This scene should really tip show only viewers into Stannis support now. It summed the man up perfectly.

- Barristan's death. I actually enjoyed being surprised about something, and in thinking about it this should kick things along in Meereen faster, and Barry wasn't doing much or meant to do much (considering no Quentyn) from here anyway.

Cons

- Jon/Mel. I must have missed the point of this scene. Jon's resolve to the NW has already been tested several times over. Mel has an interest in Jon - his character, his potential, his power, his knowledge...but I don't know why that translates to sex or what she was trying to achieve. Just a gratuitous HBO steamy nude scene for the sake of it?...and "you know nothing Jon Snow" - ugh, really?

- Sansa/LF in the crypts. The dialogue of everything here was so rushed and what should be really weighty information was not landing how it should for a viewer. I love that there are callbacks to the tourney at Harrenhaal and the Rhaegar/Lyanna affair, but they skipped through it so quickly that if I was a show only viewer I could understand people getting a bit lost with it considering it hasn't been brought up in detail in quite a while.

- Ellaria/Sand Snakes. Scene looked great - location, visuals, costumes, props = all on point. Unfortunately that's where it ended - dialogue, acting, drama, fleshing out characters = not a good intro to the Sand Snakes.

- Tyrion/Jorah. Pretty dull. Only thing really enjoyable was the way Jorah dumped Tyrion into the boat.

- Hizdahr. We've had the same damn scene like 3 times now!

- SotH vs Unsullied. Wasn't digging the choreography of this fight. Felt like a cheesy martial arts movie. I was actually kinda glad Barristan died because if he beat those dozen or so Harpy's on his own in that situation it would have been laughable.

@ Anachosaurus......... if the show is so bad, why watch and come here to post? Also, if the show on it's own is so bad, why is it HBO's highest rated show ever? Most pirated show? I know people who only watch the show and they are just as passionate as a book reader is.

Everyone has a different opinion and view, the one thing I have never understood is why do something you don't like? I don't like to be kicked in the balls, so I don't ask people to kick me in the balls, but maybe that's just me.

Agreed. Also, getting kicked in the balls and then coming to a forum to rate and discuss the experience of getting kicked in the balls.

Rating an episode low and then saying everything you think is wrong with an episode makes perfect sense and leads to healthy discussion. But saying the whole show is just bad, continuing to watch it, then coming to the HBO series section of the boards and calling out everyone who loves the show (surely 95% of people here). Baffling.

8/10. My favorite episode so far this season. Pacing was good, and I Iiked pretty much everything. Not loved - but this episode gave me the feeling I definitely will be loving episodes in the near future.

Pros

- Cersei vs Margaery. Very strong scenes and full credit to Natalie & Lena. I know a lot of people weren't happy that Marg had been watered down to the sweet innocent girl, so I'm very glad we're starting to really get into this side of her character now.

- Arya. Enjoyed every scene at the HoBW. Even though the Waif isn't exactly as how described, it was cool that she has a presence in the show. Arya and Needle was touching, nice one Maisie.

- Jon. Everything was pretty much spot on here. Minor complaint is that Janos ended the way they treated him all along of being very cartoony evil and wimpering.

- Tyrion. Again this was all pretty good. They really want Tyrion to still be the most likeable character with the choice of not whoring it up, but that's fine, that chapter was tough to read anyway.

- Sansa. Lol I love the continuing story of Sansa getting betrothed to the worst people in Westeros.

- High Sparrow. Great casting. They're setting up this story well.

- Qyburn. Awesome glimpse into his experiments.

Cons

- Brienne/Pod. *snore*. Brienne the Beauty story is not really book material that needs to be shown. Lets move this along.

- Tommen and Marg consumation. This felt....odd. How old is show Tommen meant to be?

- LF/Boltons. This change seems a bit out of character for LF. His plan is very out in the open for everyone to see.

Only 5/10 for me this week, but I'm a harsh critic. I just felt a lot of dialogue was rushed in a lot of scenes tonight and they crammed a lot of story lines in. There was a lot of information and future planning for the characters to give and it just felt like they wanted to get it all out of the way this episode before moving on to more important events.

Pros

- I love Braavos, and they do a great job with the Titan, I get a kick out of seeing it.

- Meereen. I think the pace is quick enough moving through this story. They captured Dany's failing rule and her second guessing herself well this episode.

- Jaime going to Dorne. I think I like this change. I'm not 100% sure yet, but this feels like a better scenario than Jaime cleaning up Riverrun. His motivations are clear, and keeping Bronn active in the show will be a plus.

- Money well spent on the CGI Drogon, he looks awesome.

- 998th LC vote. This felt a little rushed and maybe a bit underwhelming, but I overall still enjoyed it and Sam's speech was great.

Cons

- Introduction to Dorne. This felt really underwhelming to introduce Dorne with a conversation between Ellaria and Doran that repeated stuff already known. Dorne will be big this season and to get people excited about it I think you needed the Sand Snakes in there right off the bat.

- Introducing Arya's next story. Similarly to the above, the HoBW will be a big part of this season and I really feel they didn't need to wait til the end of the episode to get Arya in there, and why would the Kindly Man/Faceless Man have the same 'Jaqen' face that Arya knows? That face should have been long discarded or at the very least not used for a long time.

- Brienne and Pod. D&D's solution to Brienne not wandering aimlessly is to have her create another enemy for herself and go on a seemingly fruitless tracking mission. We'll see what she does in the next encounter with Sansa, but i'm not holding much excitement for Brienne stuff.

- Tyrion and Varys. The only point to this scene was that people would be annoyed if Tyrion wasn't in an episode.

- Hizdahr's accent has slipped into almost completely British. Not quite what's needed there.

Good solid start to the season. 7/10. It's not going to be the best episode of the season, but I think they kicked forward 75% of the story lines for the season with clarity and a good pace.

Pros

- The Wall. We've hit the point in the books where The Wall is a very interesting place to be. For the first time in 4 seasons past I want to spend the most time here. About a dozen great characters (and acting) all in the one spot.

- Changes to the Mance Pyre. I didn't mind losing Mance here. Cieran is a very good actor but he's never really captured Mance. Interested to see what character is chosen for Mance's future duties, maybe Tormund?

- Lena Headey. It's going to be a big season for her and already every little nuance is on point. The character of Cersei is in very capable hands and I think Lena will be MVP of this season.

- Enjoyed the opening Maggy the Frog scene. A lot of it word for word from the books. Where was the valonqar prophecy though? or did Cersei remember that later? I hope they don't leave that out because that's a huge driving force in Cersei's psyche.

- LF/Sansa. It's pretty exciting not really knowing where this is going to go this season. Robin's pathetic fighting was enjoyable to watch.

- Sons of the Harpy. Cool scene, very cool masks.

Cons

- Brienne/Pod. Whatever they decide to do with them, I just hope they make it quick. There is no upside to them wandering aimless for another several episodes.

- Emilia Clarke. I really don't want to be negative on her all season like I was last season, she does some types of scenes well like speaking Valyrian or more action oriented scenes. But her 'Queenly' scenes I still do cringe.

- Tyrion/Varys. I'm open to changes from the book, and I knew this one was coming for months, but I don't love the interactions here and depressed Tyrion is going to be, well, depressing.

- Hizdahr. The show really has not put the ground work on him if he is going to be used the same as he is in the books.

7/10 for me to end the season. Glad the final episode got a few of the shock moments to conclude some storylines this year, compared to the always mediocre season finales after amazing ep9's in previous seasons. However, most of the 'shock moments' came across a bit flat for me. It also wasn't as long as was promised by at least 10-15 mins right?

Positives

-Jon/Mance: Dialogue was consistent with both characters. It felt very realistic and how 2 great leaders on opposite sides would discuss terms.

-Stannis: My favourite part of the episode. The arrival was cool, the way Stannis' men tore through the free folk was cool, and overall Stannis' presence from then on was great.

-Meereen: Surprisingly everything was great here. I feel we went through quite a few book chapters in these scenes, and for the better. Pro's of being a slave, Drogon killed a kid, dragons must be chained and locked up. Good stuff, can we move at this pace at Meereen next season please?

-Cersei/Tywin/Jaime: All 3 characters were in the middle of toying between head vs heart and all with quite different motivations. Fascinating to see the dynamics at play.

-Brienne vs Hound: It was a book shift that didn't really need to happen as everything ended up the same. I'll count it as a positive because the fight was pretty brutal, and it'll be interesting when people realise what path Brienne could have lead Arya to.

-Varys: We need more Varys. He is such a good character and I loved the way Conleth played this. Just by his look you can tell he's part of something big.

Negatives

-No LS: The big one. They've missed out on an unforgettable ending shot. Now it's going to be diluted if its shown early or mid season, if at all.

-Tormund: I'm just not feeling we are ever going to get the jovial hilarious Tormund from the books somehow.

-Bran: The skeletal wight attack was a bit messy, Leaf's powers came across way too OTT and almost too fantasy if that makes sense. First impressions of Bloodraven/3 Eyed Crow = underwhelming.

-Arya/Hound: I don't know, it just didn't feel right. It was neither sad or powerful or anything really. Arya getting on the boat again i think they were trying to go for uplifting but I wasn't feeling it.

-Tyrion/Shae: Didn't like this scene in the books, didn't like it in the show either. The beginning of dark Tyrion shouldn't have started with Shae's killing, but that's just me.

-Tyrion/Tywin: I don't know for sure but it felt like they missed a lot of dialogue here. The whole scene felt rushed tbh. Tyrion didn't make comment on his lack of shitting gold, and we never actually got to see Tywin die....lame.

-Tyrion/Jaime: No discussion of Tysha? Has the show forgotten about this. It's pretty big for Tyrion's mindset from here on. He's not supposed to think there is anything for him in Westeros anymore. Not contnue to think Jaime is the best bro ever.

5/10 for me. Look lets be honest, I don't know many people who were overly thrilled about spending 55mins at The Wall. It worked for King's Landing in a few episodes, notably the Blackwater, but the storylines attached to The Wall have generally been the dullest for definitely at least this season. To me this was an episode that had to happen, but I'm glad we're past it now.

Positives

- Cinematography: It looked great. The light snow falling, the fire arrows and torches against the darkness, The Wall itself, you really got the feeling of how high up they were with the wind and perspective you got.

- Alliser vs Tormund: I enjoyed that one-on-one more than any other. For an older guy and a large robust guy, they both moved great.

- One-liners: There was a couple of really nice little lines amongst the chaos that i liked. My favourite of the episode was Jon's "yeah it's a shit plan, what's your plan?"

- The Wall's defense: I really liked a couple of The Wall's defense mechanisms. That giant swinging axe thing was fricken amazing, and the oil barrels with added fire for explosions later were cool too.

- Giants & Mammoth: Looked amazing. When that Giant was running through the tunnel, I felt intimidated just watching.

Negatives

- Sam: This is one of the biggest problems. John Bradley is fine, Sam as a character is ok. But, he was largely responsible for carrying about half of the entire episode, and he is just not a good enough or strong enough character to be able to do this.

- General fighting: It got repetitive, like really repetitive.

- Ygritte's end: This one is not the shows fault. When i read her book death I thought it was pretty cheesy at the time. It was as expected even more cheesy on the show.

- Battle speeches: Did nothing for me, no matter who was giving them, couldn't put my finger on why. Possibly just general cliche type dialogue maybe.

- Janos Slynt: The show has gone a bit overboard in making him look as pathetic as possible i think.

- The ending point: The other major problem here. Where they ended it was dumb. They could have cut a good 15mins of this episode and used that time to make Stannis' arrival and quick victory the ending point.

My first 10 of the season! Phenomenal television. I was also really happy with the format the storylines took. For an episode that went to just about every location, sometimes in similar episodes a storyline gets lost if its shown after say 5 minutes and then returned to again at the 40th minute. But loved that every location got one 5-10 minute block of time. It really heightened the importance of each IMO.

Positives

- Mole Town raid: Set the tone early. Pacing wise it was a good decision to start off with some action, nice touch with Ygritte not wanting to kill a mother and newborn, maybe she knew she was a fellow wildling too?

- Theon: Continued good work from Alfie. Loved the internal struggle of knowing he has to act assertive and Lord-like discussing the peace terms, but his fragility is just about to burst.

- The Boltons: This may seem really minor to some, but I really really loved that they showed Roose being so immensely proud of holding The North. Similarly, showing how much Ramsay loves the Bolton tradition of flaying (wow, gross scene).

- Jorah sent packing: Better late than never I guess.

- Sansa: Holey shit Sophie is on fire this season. Her 'confession' speech to the Lords of the Vale was great, but the conversation between her and LF afterwards was even better for me because of smart dialogue. A simple line from LF saying better she went with the guy she knows as opposed the stragers she doesn't. And Sansa's line of "I know what you want", the way she looked and the way she said it was terrific.

- Arya/Hound: So perfectly played out. Finally they made it, it's over, they both get sort of what they want. Nope, wait, after a couple of years on the run, Arya is 3 days too late. What else can you do but laugh at the incredible misfortune. Great stuff.

- Tyrion/Jaime: Ok the beetle story itself was a bit weird and i'm sure there is more of a point to it than what I got out of it. But, this is about the most natural on screen conversation you're likely to see. Peter and Nikolai play off each other like they've been friends for 30 years, and what I got out of it was a touching reflective chat between two brothers who love each other and are fully aware there is a good chance it will be the last time they speak.

- The trial by combat: Wow. Speechless. Confronting, emotional, shocking. The fight was really well choreographed. Like most people, definitely going to miss The Red Viper and have a great respect for Pedro's acting for a flawless portrayal of a character.

Negatives

- Sam: His character continues a slippery slope of annoying and pathetic (far more so than the books).

- Missandei/Grey Worm: Not sure where this is going, or why it's going at all, and i'm pretty sure I don't care.

- Dany: I hate harping on about a point i've made a fair few times on these forums now. Emilia's acting sticks out like sore thumb in most scenes. It wasn't as bad as she has been in a few episodes this season, but everything felt very forced, and I think the seething but restrained talk to Jorah needed to be more subtle.

4/10 for me (the lowest i've ever given an episode). If I were to judge this based on an average episode of any other series it would be above average. But I need to compare it against other GoT episodes otherwise the 9s and 10s don't mean as much. Really disappointed this week. Almost no flow to the episode, just a series of different story lines chucked in and most of them were not riveting television.

Positives

- Tyrion's potential champions: Liked all 3 segments. Good dialogue between Tyrion & Jaime/Bronn/Oberyn. Clearly and logically explained why Jaime and Bronn won't do it, and a surprisingly touching end to the Tyrion/Bronn bromance.

- Oberyn: Pedro was fantastic. Emilia take note. That is how you deliver lines flawlessly and build up emotion as the scene goes along.

- Jon: The show has successfully made the transition with Jon to someone who you believe can be a great leader. His good suggestions that you can tell are getting respect from most, but managing to tow the line with Thorne without ruffling feathers is being handled well.

Negatives

-Meereen: Awful. No exaggeration, just awful. Dany/Daario was just about the most awkward i've seen two actors before, zero chemistry. Why on Earth was Emilia talking so fast with Jorah? I could barely keep up with what she was saying and it was all really hammy. I can't over state how bad I thought Emilia was tonight, and I had just started warming on her again.

-Brienne: These scenes just felt like a bad sitcom with her and Pod. And bringing back Hot Pie? Pointless, and he was really annoying.

-The Wall: Although I liked Jon. How much more do we need to hear that the wildlings are coming? I swear it actually went backwards from they'll be here in a few days to they'll be here before the next full moon.

-Melisandre: So very boring. Carise is hot, but pointless nudity HBO.

-Hound/Arya: It felt a bit off tonight. Rorge & Biter 'fight' was really underwhelming. Almost looked like Rorge just walked straight into needle. Don't think the unsullied will be happy knowing The Hound goes because of that bite.

-The Eyrie: I tried to put my finger on what was off about these scenes. And i think i've come to the conclusion that you wouldn't have needed to have read the books to know that slap was coming, that kiss was coming, and that fall down the moon door was coming. They were all set up really predictably.

8/10 for me. A classic case of an episode building momentum as it goes along culminating in a great ending. By midway through I was getting bummed because it was heading towards another so-so episode, but as soon as King's Landing started things just picked up enormously, and that's no coincidence, the major players and the major acting talents were on full show here.

Positives

-The Titan: We already saw it in the trailers, but that didn't make it any less impressive and a great scenic shot of Braavos gives us a sneak peak before spending more time there next season.

-Drogon: Wow. Awesome.

-Meereen/Hizdahr: First time this season I have included Meereen in the positives. I loved how it played out. Showed Dany can make the easy decisions like repaying lost goats, but flounders when it comes to dealing with more complicated matters. The actor that played Hizdahr(apologies I don't know him) was terrific, his delivery of good written dialogue was very good.

-Small Council: Every character got to have a little say here and all of it was important stuff acted brilliantly. This episode made me realise I had missed seeing more of Varys this season.

-The Trial: Perfect. I loved every second of it. Once again every character was just highlighted, everybody was seen to be important, the exchanges between all the characters were fantastic.

-Tyrion: Special mention to Peter Dinklage. Time and time again he just proves when he needs to step up and knock a scene out of the park, he does it. His scathing address to the citizens of KL is definitely up there in my favourite moments.

Negatives

-Iron Bank: For two reasons. Yet again Stannis has been given pretty shoddy treatment here. He can't persuade the IB but Davos can? Just made him look weak. And we are supposed to believe that the IB(pretty much the most important institution in this world) can just change their minds on a pretty damn important decision where they have already laid out their reasons for declining, but switch based on a somewhat rousing speech from Davos? Really not a fan of how all that played out.

-Filler time nudity: Come on HBO. The Sallador scene was pointless, as was Ramsay's sex scene(that didn't even really feel like a Ramsay thing to show).

-Storm of Dreadfort: Rushed and sloppily done.

-Yara/Asha: Don't think D&D really know how to portray this character, and that mostly comes down to not getting enough screen time for her to be fleshed out more. Her speech to the Iron-born was good, but that sort of contradicted the retreat and regroup decision she makes in the end.

Damn. 5/10 for me. This season has been about struggling to string together consecutive great episodes. So many things fell very flat this episode. But as always I'll start with the positives:

Positives

- Lysa/Sansa: Lysa was just as unhinged as i hoped she would be. The reason i really enjoyed that scene was how good Sophie played it though. From finally feeling almost as ease, to being put on the back foot, to panic, to the final shot of her sobbing where you can just see she is thinking "i'm not sure i'm any better off here". Great acting.

- Cersei: I liked how we saw pretty much all sides of her tonight. Sensible Cersei keeping her Tyrell enemy close, Clueless Cersei despite being in power for 20 years not knowing how anything is run and being schooled by Tywin, and Mother Cersei showing genuine concern for Myrcella.

- Pod/Brienne: I think they got the intended outcome right here. Brienne thinks Pod is useless and should go, Pod casually explains through his Blackwater story that his loyalty means he will do anything for his Lord/Knight. Respect from Brienne.

Negatives

- Dany/Jorah: Emilia's delivery in the same way every time is really starting to annoy me. Also, guess Jorah isn't going anywhere any time soon?

- Hound/Arya: Their scenes just screamed out that D&D have nothing left for these two until they part ways. Nothing new added at all with their screen time. Also, The Hounds make-up looked terrible! His burns were a weird yellow colour and looked so much faker than it ever has.

- Craster's: So many things wrong here. Even the Unsullied knew Night's Watch would prevail, and they treated that battle just that way. The show has no idea how to show 'the sight', Jojen's visions were messy. They've wasted Bran warging Hodor to fight now, would have been much better if they used that for when they have to fight wights(if that still happens). So much promise they could have had with the Locke character, now he's gone.

- Lysa/LF: I know it played that way in the books, but, gross.

I've seen on a few podcasts, chats, forums on which the question of 'where did Dany get her giant banner from?' is asked and a popular response seems to be that it's from the sail on her ship. Which i guess would just beg the same question of how did she get a Targ sail made too?

Does anyone have any evidence to support or refute that?

8 for me this week. Thought it was a really good 'move the story along' kind of episode, and found myself liking the book deviations.

Positives

- LF/Sansa: LF getting Sansa to talk through his moves was a great step in immediately showing that Sansa is about to start learning the game.

- Locke: what great use of him, this is just the kind of plan Roose would make and Locke made Castle Black so much more interesting.

- Olenna/Margaery/Tommen: from Olenna schooling Margaery in feminine manipulation to the bedroom visit so Margaery can lure Tommen away from Cersei's grasp, all very well executed. And Ser Pounce!

- Bran: i might be disagreeing with most here, but liking he has a bit of extra danger to deal with, his story was really flat-lining but business has picked up now.

- Thorne/Slynt: May be only a small part of it but Janos just reminding Thorne that Jon is pretty popular and an election needs to be held so they gotta do something about that, was good because that was pretty important info there, and it was nice to see these two actually strategising instead of being asses.

- Whitewalkers: It felt like the right time to show these guys again. I also love that they are pushing this ambiguity of good or evil. They are scary as hell but we haven't seen them do anything evil, and them being referred to as God-like beings by Craster's Wives really shows we can't see them as villains or monsters.

- Pod/Brienne: Pod's 30 seconds shows real promise to get some Hound/Arya style comedy moments in the future.

Negatives

- Tyrion/Jaime: I wasn't feeling that conversation. It felt too soap opera-like with the constant reminder of the son/brother/sister/uncle/father intertwined family stuff. We get it, you guys are in a screwed up family.

- Sam/Jon: So sick of Sam, glad he wasn't in it for long, his trip to Oldtown better be a lot more riveting.

- Meereen: I found the whole sequence weird. The Grey Worm opening was odd, they went straight from 1 master about to be killed to oh Dany won again, usual Dany speech.

- Craster's Keep: I've seen that actor before in a couple of other things, but he was way OTT in his delivery, i just found him weird instead of finding him intimidating,

IMHO, the average ratings of episodes, specially when they belong to different seasons, are not comparable. I don't think much people really believes "Breaker of Chains" is the worst episode of the series. I'm convinced voters are not maintaing consistent ratings among seasons, as there is no any indication about how episodes should be evaluated: what's a 5? an average GoT episode? an average TV episode? an average episode of an HBO show? a weak episode that still gets a pass because its my favorite show in TV? an episode that met my expectations? ...

Myself, I'm surely evaluating episodes from those past two seasons much harsher than in the first ones. At the beginning, I was excited just with the great scenarios and casting. Now, I take those things for granted and my expectations are much higher.

I think that's a fair point. If everyone was rating each episode in comparison to how they would rate episodes of other tv shows then i'm sure each episode would be getting 9's and 10's. Expectations are obviously pretty high now, but we also have 3 seasons worth of episodes to now compare against, so I believe every rating these days is a fair rating. In season 1 every episode would probably have been given a higher score than it would now simply due to the excitement that this series is being made so well.

A 5 for me. I expected a fallout from a big event episode to be a bit of a come down, but there was a few extra bits that wasn't working for me either.

Negative

- Jaime/Cersei rape scene was terribly handled and not how it is supposed to or should have gone down. Discussed at length in another topic so don't need to get into it.

- The Sam/Gilly scenes were crap quite frankly.

- Stannis/Davos was not that riveting and unless you've read the books I think Davos realising to use the Iron Bank to help Stannis' cause would have gone over a lot of people's heads. The "not enough men to raid a pantry" line was great though (finally more of Stannis dry wit!), and Davos' general grumpyness when he first starts his reading lesson was funny. But not enough to save those scenes.

- Never thought I'd say this but too much Tywin talking this week. Great they brought Tommen straight into it, but that Tywin lesson about what makes a great king went for too long, especially considering he had another long (but more necessary) convo with Oberyn later.

- Dany. Please stop trying to make everything she does epic D&D, that catapulting the broken chains thing was lame.

Positive

- Hound/Arya. Knowing that not much happens with these two until Arya leaves for Braavos was a bit of a concern coming into this season. But once again just really funny stuff. The way Maisie delivered that line of 'you are, the biggest SHIT! in Westeros' was just amazing. Could watch these two all day.

- Wildings raid and warning to Night's watch. Brutal and just what we needed to realise they need to be taken seriously so we are invested in the upcoming battle at Castle Black.

- Tyrion/Pod. That was a sweet scene.

9/10 for me.

I thought the wedding was great, I loved every minute of it. Even the conversations and interactions that didn't happen in the book but were included in the show even though they didn't add much, I didn't care because it was just cool to see characters interacting that don't usually get the chance to like Cersei/Brienne, an early Loras/Jaime etc.

Bolton stuff was great. Bran's vision was cool, I suspect only one scene an episode from Bran this season otherwise he'll be at the end of ADwD already.

Yeah Stannis continues to be mishandled, and so the only point this ep loses was the burning. I did quite like the scene of Melisandre presenting her religion from her POV to Shireen(the audience). We've had similar scenes before but I felt like it was needed to save Stannis from being the villain from now on.

Other thoughts include: I worry Tommen and Myrcella have not been built up enough. The show doesn't have the luxury of Cersei chapters where she thinks about all her kids quite regularly. When Tommen becomes King by default i think the TV only watchers will be like "wait what? have we seen him before?". Also, they should be reinforcing that as much as Oberyn hates the Lannisters, they can't touch him because of Myrcella. It was slipped in so quickly in that conversation and it's because they haven't paid any mind to Myrcella being in Dorne since she was shipped off.