YoungGriff89

Maybe this has been asked before, I apologize if it has. I didn’t want to dig through three separate threads. I was thinking about something earlier and it dawned on me, why was the term “war of the five kings” even a thing in the show? Robb, Stannis, and Renly were vying for the iron throne or at least defeating the Lannister’s. However, Balon Greyjoy literally had nothing to do with the conflicts in the crown, storm, or river lands. He was calling himself king sure, but he wasn’t making any offensive moves against anybody relevant to the overall war. The Iron Born in the show seem to literally just secede because there’s a war going on and forces who might retaliate are all too busy. Nothing ever seems to answer the question of how their secession was ended either, at Joffrey’s wedding one of the dwarf jousters is Balon Greyjoy but the show never explains why he’s no longer king of the iron islands or what it had to do with the war “Joffrey won.” I just watched seasons 1-4 within the last month or so and there weren’t any kind of skirmishes mentioned between Stark or Baratheon forces and the iron born. The closest thing would be Theon taking Winterfell, and even then Balon Greyjoy didn’t want the north nor did he make any attempt to go after the iron throne. That was solely a northern problem only faintly related to Robb’s involvement in the war against Joffrey. It also happened after the war council in season two where “war of the five kings” was first talked about. Did I miss something really obvious or am I onto a plot hole that hasn’t gotten much attention?

I don't think Barristan will ally with FAegon. I think he'll end up doing most of what we've seen Grey Worm do in the show. Once it's all over he'll be the only person left to speak for Dany's administration. Daario probably will be left behind to look after Meereen in Dany's absence, Missandei will probably live and he'll escort her back to Naath once it's all over.

The actual flashback was the very first scene of season five, the word valonqar is never uttered.

I understand but certainly don't agree with a lot of the hate this episode is getting. Most people ranked it 1/10? What? I did hate the fact that we didn't at least get a scene of Jon telling Ghost thanks for being the best boy before he sent him north of the wall, and I did think Euron just sneaking up on Dany's fleet was beyond silly but this show is not known for its naval battles. I think most of the hate stems from people not liking where the story is going vs the episode itself actually having issues. This has actually been one of the most logically consistent episodes in recent memory even though most people acted like idiots, they were true to form idiots.

To the bolded portion it is most certainly the latter. If he was going to kill Cersei he wouldn’t have any reason to lie to Brienne when questioned. Unless it was Bran warging Jaime or something.

Gave it a solid five. What the episode did, it did pretty well. I liked the Arya stuff to include the Scooby-Doo moment, I enjoyed the walk, I liked the Sam and Jon exchange, I thought the Dorne stuff was passable, Hell I even enjoyed the Sansa stuff in this episode. What it did bad...well the butchery is too abhorrent for words to correctly convey.

I don't think a shadow baby is going to be able to sit the iron throne if Stannis manages to take it. What does he plan on doing about an heir now? Gendry? Legitimizing a bastard? That's the question I have taken from it.

Gave it a solid six. Not a bad episode overall. Certainly not the worst of the season, but it was a little too uneventful and really the ending felt rushed. Didn't even get to see a wedding between Dany and Hizdar before he got red shirted. If he was leading the sons of the harpy all along then he failed lol. Of all five seasons it's by a very wide margin the worst episode nine. I'm very disappointed at what they've done with Stannis this season, he just seems so distant from who he was at the beginning of the season now. Uncomfortably so. Maybe that particular event does happen in a book to come, but we'll have to wait and see on that. Hopefully episode ten is a beast and can make up for how disappointing I feel this season has been.

A solid 9. Honestly in my opinion the battle itself was probably the weakest part of the episode. There wasn’t really a weak weak point though. Dany and Tyrion exchanges were great, Arya’s scenes I think are quite enjoyable, they didn’t overdo it and they didn’t under-do it either. I absolutely hate Sansa in Winterfell and in my opinion D&D couldn't possibly misfire and mess a POV character and their development up anywhere near as bad as that. Dorne in all off its cheesy, silly, anti-climactic, and intelligence insulting glory isn't as bad a decision as Sansa in Winterfell (I think) and I actually enjoyed seeing the exchange between Sansa and Threekon. I was happy to finally see the wights in action, and not so surprised with the potential TWOW/ ADFS spoiler that Valyrian steel does in fact work the same as dragon glass for killing the others. As far as gripes go I think Olly’s potential role coming up is being shoved in everyone’s faces. I also felt it was kind of cheesy for Ramsay to suggest he was going to leave a “Feast for the Crows.” “Because Superman IV: The Quest for Peace!” On top of that, I did think as hyped as this episode has been the battle was a little too short and the sin of overly shaky camera work was committed a little too much for my liking. Good action but if they knew season 5 was going to include this battle Neil Marshall really should have been booked in advance. I also didn’t like introducing the female wildling character just to kill her off though, the death and un-death really meant nothing. To me this just doesn’t stand up to Blackwater or The Watchers on the Wall. Best episode of the season though by far.

On a side note, his reaction to Ned's beheading was hilarious. I gave the episode a rating of 1. Not ashamed of that, and I just did it today after re-watching the episode on HBO Now. I'll stick by the rating I gave the episode until my last day. The House of Black and White scenes were the only scenes I actually liked. Tyrion and Jorah were ok in this episode, nothing special. Those two storylines I had no real issue with. The King's Landing scenes were good in terms of acting, my hat's off to the cast on that one. Storyline? Not so much. The birthmark was such a ridiculous piece of evidence and they're taking a male prostitute's word over the queen? They have as much evidence she's lying as they have that he's telling the truth. I suppose you could make an argument that Loras' reaction gave it away I suppose but I don't think that a reaction and a sworn statement are the same. Religious fanatics or not there are myriad ways a squire could have seen Loras had a birthmark. I can forgive Littlefinger having a jetpack and not sharing the technology with the rest of the country, but the believability of the developing storyline is trying my patience. I actually think sending Jaime to Dorne was a good story idea, it does make sense to me. The execution of that however, has been terrible. I understand the idea of introducing new characters and locations through a character we all know and are familiar with. And with the talk of war in Dorne and Myrcella being there, I could understand Jaime negotiating for peace there instead of the Riverlands and taking Myrcella back similar to taking a hostage in ADWD (I forget who that was at the moment). To me it isn't that far of a departure from the book since the same thing he was doing in the Riverlands he's just doing in Dorne. Well, in episode two they decided that character we were familiar with was Ellaria and not Jaime. Then they also decided it will be six episodes in before anything actually happens with Dorne. Say what you want about AFFC but Areo Hotah's first chapter was chapter 2, they wasted no time to jump into Dorne, and the show shouldn't have either in my opinion. Then we have the Sand Snakes. The Sand Snakes aren't overly humanized or developed in the books either, odd thing to stay faithful to in the show especially when two characters who are fleshed out in the books are absent from the show (Quentyn and Arianne). Then they're all ethnically the same as Oberyn, ok whatever I can see how sending Sansa to Winterfell to get raped took priority over fleshing out the world that the story takes place in and having an interesting plot in this new place. I could have forgiven the "coincidental" rendezvous between the Sand Snakes and the Cooper/ Darnell team if the fight it led to had been good. It wasn't, and moving the camera around to hide poor choreography only works so much. I did like Areo Hotah paraphrasing the Blackfish though, that was a nice touch and about the only positive thing I can say about Dorne besides enjoying Alexander Siddig's turn as Doran Martell. Despite the fact he's had very little to work with. The Winterfell storyline has been ok up until going backwards with Sansa's plot development. However, there was no point in her dying her hair or taking the identity of Alayne Stone. There was also no point to Theon even being at her wedding since it was so much smaller in the show and as far as I know there were no northern lords to convince. I think F/Arya was easy enough to do on screen, I wish they would have stuck to the book in that regard. They sent Sansa to Winterfell just to have her be raped, that's a stupid, stupid idea regardless of whether or not she's taking the Lady Stoneheart role. F/Arya's treatment in the books was disgusting and over the top, Sansa having her story at the Vale replaced with F/Arya's story from the book just so she could get raped and need Theon to help her escape? A total downgrade and step backwards for the character. Sophie Turner is working on X-Men anyway, you don't want a boring season in the Vale? Same playbook with a boring season of Bran, just give her two or three scenes and leave it at that, make it up by actually getting into some of the interesting stuff you could have done with Dorne. Which brings me to my final thought: Does it seem like a jump in logic, cutting out and modifying some of the more popular lines/ events/ characters from the book because it's an adaptation but then forcing the show despite all the changes to ruin the book's ending? Wouldn't changing things so dramatically free the writers from spoiling too much of the book's ending? Making R+L=J irrelevant for example. We've gone nearly five seasons with any suggestions or hints of who Jon's parents are, since any references to it now are going to be forced why not just end the show with Jon really being Ned's son? It's an adaptation and different from the source material right?

I’m going to give you verbatim my predictions (in bold), what really happened, and then my reactions. I went with the spoiler tags since maybe not everyone has seen the episode yet. Don't know why you'd be reading this thread if you haven't but I'll still be a courteous guy. If you're curious as to why I give the episode a solid 2 then read away. Begins with Jon Snow and the Wildlings/ Stannis Stannis Stannis! Cuts to the Red Keep where Qyburn and Pycelle reveal the Mountain was poisoned Cut to Tywin and Ellaria (give us a hint Tywin has been poisoned)/ Cersei and Tywin/ Cersei and Jaime Cut to Brienne meeting Hound and Arya Spoiler Didn’t happen here, this scene happened instead: Cut to Drogon burning the kid/ Dany has to make a choice Spoiler They never actually showed Drogon burning the kid and Dany actually chained up the dragons (the two who didn’t do it might I add) in this scene. I was kind of underwhelmed by this scene, I just think they’ve gotten too far into A Dance With Dragons, I’m sure there was a way to fluff up her story in Meereen to not give us any material from that book. The scene with Hizdar Zo Loraq in episode six was brilliant and I don't think it came from the book. We could have definitely used more of that. Bran and the Gang meet Bloodraven/ cotf after white walker attack. Dany Chains up the Dragons Arya meets Braavosi Captain and begins journey to Braavos. Jon and Stannis arrive at the wall/ Rise as Jon Stark, Lord of Winterfell Jaime frees Tyrion/ Tysha story/ Tyrion kills Shae and Tywin/ leaves for Pentos Lady Stoneheart ends the episode Bottom line, gets a solid 2 from me. Their worst finale yet.