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How would you rate episode 409?  

898 members have voted

  1. 1. What's your rating from 1-10, with 10 being the highest/best

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      34
    • 2
      13
    • 3
      13
    • 4
      21
    • 5
      36
    • 6
      45
    • 7
      80
    • 8
      139
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      216
    • 10
      298


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I give the episode an 8, as a lover of the book I don't see why the night's watch wasn't better prepared for the attack and had Mole town survivors aid in the battle. The nights watch was aware of the wildlings attacking Moletown. I wish I knew how the writers make their decisions when to stray from the book. Sometimes it works, other times it leaves me wondering why its necessary.(like the Thenns being canibals) The action was great and the episode did fly by, i kept waiting for Stannis's charge. I didn't like the fact that Jon came up with the assassination plot against Mance, it seemed out of character.


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Definitely a 10. The mammoths/giants looked amazing and there were a lot of good lines/speeches from tonight.



Outstanding performance by all the actors, especially Owen Teale and John Bradley, lines were very well written too. As much as I liked Pyp and Grenn, I can understand why they had to die as they don't do much after the battle/during DWD, apart from being shipped off to Eastwatch.



Disappointed because of the lack of Stan the Man, but at least there will be enough time to properly show the Jon/Mance negotiation and Stannis saving the day in the finale


Edited by BarriStannis
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I liked the episode a lot. I also agree with a good deal of the criticism that has been offered in this thread. There have been valuable observations offered on either side: negative criticisms (such as those of the scale of the battle, which I quite agree with) and positive criticisms (the marriage of character/action beats). The least valuable criticism I've seen so far is that which has targeted the people offering arguments rather than the arguments themselves.



For my part, the episode as a whole worked. However, I think the Wall plot line could have been tightened so that some of the moments that were forced to occur here could have been implemented more smoothly earlier. But this complaint concerns episode 10 more than it does episode 9: I'm just worried that pushing Stannis' appearance into episode 10 is cramming even more into an episode that's already brimming with incredibly important stuff.

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Gave this one a 10, by the by. Although I do not consider it the best episode of the series, it's among the best, and it really beautifully put together action and character beats.

I admit, I am shocked at the reaction from those who became wholly wedded to the idea that Stannis was going to show up to save the day. Ya'll need to re-read the books and consider why GRRM decided to have the Watch successfully hold off the wildlings for awhile before Stannis's arrival. It serves a very different purpose than when the Lannister-Tyrell host saves King's Landing at the last minute (hint: where does the credit go?)

Having Stannis in the next episode is pretty accurate to rhythms of the novel, in allowing Jon and the Watch to have the full weight of their sacrifices given some meaning rather than having it undercut by a Johnny-come-lately.

That's a good point but that puts a lot of pressure on next weeks episode to give quite a bit of story. Condensing to get Stannis there NOW means that they can spend more time on the final S4 arcs next week. It's a lot of story to put into one episode, and I think that's where my biggest criticism is coming from right now.

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You said it. The pauses between the battle in the Blackwater episode involved Sansa, Tyrion, Cercei, Sandor... characters the show has spent time fleshing out. Yes, I completely agree with you on that point. But if you look at this episode as a Jon Snow killing the boy and becoming a man journey, it works, perhaps not perfectly. The action sequences were far more coherent and better executed in this episode than in Blackwater. Overall, I still liked the episode and Kit Harrington is finally beginning to look the part of Jon Snow. Can't wait for his and Dillane scenes next season.

:agree:

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I give it a 7. There was some good action, but I'm not a big action fan. As for good conversations and good acting, very little. Even the nice scene with Maester Aemon didn't really work for me, because they were starting to get deep enough into what I already knew was a 50-minute episode that I was distracted by wondering how they'd get everything in. Turns out they couldn't.



There were definitely some high points. The fire, the scyth, the giants. Alliser humanizing himself a bit and stepping up in the clutch. The night's watch chant in the tunnel. Sam laying a big smacker on Gilly. Harrington is good at sword-fighting. They managed to make it relatively clear that the Wall was being defended from both sides, not so easy in a night battle.



But there were problems, too. Hell yeah, it was anti-climactic. Devote an episode to something, you want to make it a story to itself and I think viewers rightfully expected to get some resolution to the battle. And didn't, not at all. Nobody ever told Jon Snow the Wall was his, and while I'm usually the kind of sucker you throw a cheesy death scene at, Ygritte's was a little too schmaltzy/predictable. The unstoppable giant arrows that just stopped. Obvious technical issues with direwolf-human combat that means the 2 such "battles" we've scene this year both consisted of a direwolf blur steamrolling some guy from the side and wham bam, thank you ma'am, that's the entirety of what you call a human-direwolf fight. And I'd think with 104 guys to defend, somebody in charge would at least be estimating at some point how many had already bitten it and how many were left - I mean obviously, a big chunk of 104 will fight no more just from what we saw on TV. Also, as has been pointed out in this thread with pictorial evidence, Mance Rayder's gigungous wildling army was totally underwhelming. It seriously looked like there were more people attacking with Tormund and Ygritte from the south.



It was pretty good, but a cut below most of what we've seen during this outstanding season.


Edited by Hodor's Dragon
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So long as there's no filler moments next episode, No Ls reveal, and no Eyrie. Then it can be done. One or two scenes for Dany. One for Bran. One or two for Arya. One or two for our long-awaited Stannis (and hopefully not rushed right away in the first five minutes of the episode!) then everything else in KL.

No LS reveal = This forum will explode from the hissy fits!

The LS reveal is the most worthy finale scene, not including it would be madness.

Edited by ~DarkHorse~
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This is what is my main problem. For almost four years, the Wall didn't have its proper moment, Jon's storyline was handled as it is almost secondary, and this year, it showed more than any other. The supporting ensemble in any other subplot, like Bronn, Shae, Brienne and Podrick in KL or Missandei and Greyworm in Essos are all fleshed out. Wall characters simply weren't. There was something lacking in the characterization that would make this episode be as memorable as the Blackwater was.

There was a moment of pure gold in cinematic way when the camera almost flowed through the courtyard focusing on each element of the battle. But, it was too short and not enough... This wasn't nearly as epic as they made it sound.

I agree with most of that, though they did more than one panning shot and on a couple of them people were not doing a whole a lot and that bothers the hell out of me.

Blackwater went some 26 minutes before anyone died. None of this stuff was filler, in this case. Taking time to use Pypar as a focal point for the fear many felt, and as a way to understand how Samwell was dealing with it, and for showing us Alliser Thorne dealing with the tribulations of command, and so on -- they're important when you're putting lives in jeopardy, as they're a way to reinforce whatever connections people may have.Now, that said, had the writers done the smart thing and skipped the Craster nonsense and left Jon and co. at Castle Black, and given us more of a story about the tensions there, about the people there, maybe these pieces of characterization would have been stronger for some, or maybe they wouldn't have needed so much of it (though really, I doubt they were going to make it 45 minutes of non-stop action).

I think leading up to the battle things were going pretty good, I liked some of the quiet tension at castle Black. But did not care for the Gilly scenes and although I have enjoyed Aemon in the series what little of him there has been, I thought that scene was unnecessary. Thought Thorne was good too.

But as pointed out by others the Well has been the second class citizen of the series, and they have not developed a lot there with the characters, and have wasted time on things like Crasters. Then they go out and promote it as the most epic battle on tv ever? Seriously just shooting themselves in the foot. As it goes the show goes like this, Tyrion and KL number 1, Dany number 2, Arya number 3, the Wall 4th, Stannis 5th. and when Robb and Cat were alive they were number 2 in the order of importance. At no point have they ever put a lot of stock in the wall so as a viewer why should anyone invest.

Season one episode 9. Baelor the Death of Ned Stark, for fans who had not read the books this was the OMG moment of omg moments.

Season 2, Episode 9. Blackwater, that's all you really need to say. The opening shot blows up a fleet of ships with a giant green fireball. Dink was amazing.

Season 3, Episode 9, The Rains of Castamere, it's the red wedding the entire country was talking about this, well at least inn the states.

Season 4, Episode 9, The Watcher's on the wall. I now see why the title is so appropriate to this episode. The death of Pyp and Grenn, yes thee Pyp and Grenn. And Grenn got the honor of getting done off screen. Seriously I am not a die hard Stan fan, but it really could of used the arrival. Honestly I think casual fan probably saw Jon go out the gate and was like I hope he dies so we don't have to waste any time up following this arc anymore because it's so damn boring most of the time.

Do you think anyone will speak about this episode the way they did about the other 3? And that was not in any way shape or form the greatest anything on tv ever. That skirmish and that's what I call it because that is what it was lacked emotion, energy, action, drama, and investment. And the barrel poking scene? Of all the pathetic things in the world to do. Or the giants at the gate, how the hell do you drop 150 gallons of oil on top of them and they don't get burned at all, The Mammoth got burned and it was 30 ft away, all the men got burned, but the giants? What was this the second miracle, were they hatching dragons eggs?

You know it's fine that Jon says Mance is just testing the watches defenses, that's fine. It was a horrible plan to test a defense but whatever. But they hyped this up as like it was going to be a major battle, sorry but I feel lied too, and even a character on the show basically referred to it as probing. Not to mention the cliffhanger, really what was that? It's not like he got stabbed or anything, he is walking out a door by himself and it's going to last all of a week. Not like anyone is going oh my god they killed off Jon, he's in next weeks episode preview.

Honestly it felt pointless, and to waste 20-25 minutes trying to rush job some character development in the hopes of generating a connection with the general viewing public is a mistake, and something they shoulld have been doing for the last 3.8 seasons. Sorry but I don't need extra Shea scenes or Theon getting fixed and tortured over and over, I don't need to see Ros developed for no reason at all, while actual characters at the wall get shit for the better part of 4 years. They develop pointless crap with non characters that most people don't give to shits about for years and ignore the Wall, really? The god damn wall, Jon Snow and the Watch. I know the first book is called A game of thrones but the actual series is not all about Kings Landing and Tyrion, the series is called A song of Ice and Fire, they got no problem giving us the fire and that's great, but Jesus can I have a little ice in my god damn Kool aid so I can get my inner Jon Snow and the Watch fan boy on?

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Good lord. I can't believe people actually thought this was good. This point in the story hardly meant anything to me in the first place on account of its only importance being the death of Ygritte and the arrival of Stannis (yawn) so I'm not really upset over it but wow... that was bad. Easily the worst episode in the series so far. All I could see was classic Hollywood bullshit. For one, the deaths in this episode were nothing short of comical. Every person who died died as soon as they were touched with a sword (excluding important characters of course). And every death of an extra involved absurd screaming and overdramatic body movements. Love how the watchman who got shot with a giant arrow landed perfectly on the ground 700 ft below. Not. Anyone see that massive, badass scythe thing slice those wildings to pieces?! So fucking cool! Wait. Where the hell did they find time to build something that big? And whose hairbrain idea was it exactly to begin production on an enormous, fantastical weapon which could only be used once and probably had no more than a 1% chance of hitting any climber let alone all of them in one single swing?



Two of the only three deaths in this episode that weren't laughably stupid were Grenn's and Pyp's, and they were horrible as well. What a lousy way to send off two supporting characters who have been with us from the start. I know D&D wanted to add some sort of price to be had for the battle and killing off Pyp and Grenn (even though they're both still alive in the books) seemed like an easy route, but why were their deaths so lacking in quality? One is shot through the neck and dies impassively five seconds later staring into space. The other is just found dead. The best part about it is Sam, who was supposed to be as close a friend as either of them had ever had, displayed no emotion whatsoever concerning their demise. All he responds to emotionally is Gilly and she's pretty much just the Westerosi equivalent of the ugly trailer trash girls who live in my neighborhood.



Despite all that, there are so many things about the battle which simply didn't make sense. That little skirmish at Castle Black should have been over in less than five minutes. It dragged on forever, like there was an infinite amount of soldiers on both sides killing each other relentlessly. The scythe thing, as I mentioned before, was an idiotic conception. And the door to the tunnel, by all rights, should have been rendered completely inoperative after the shit those giants and their pet mammoth subjected it to. Lastly, the writing was just utter shit. No memorable lines whatsoever and every time an attempt at comic relief was made, it came off as stale and awkward. What did it all lead up to? An entire episode dedicated to some insignificant event in the books? Jon walking outside to meet Mance. Would it have killed them to shorten up all the lame fights scenes and tie everything up with Mance and Stannis? They only had an entire fucking hour. If this is the kind of shit most people on the forums consider to be good, it's no wonder I hardly ever agree with anyone here. Sheesh.


Edited by Gregor's Nancy Boy
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5/10, which I believe is the lowest rating I've ever given an episode (it may be a tie though, not sure).



There was lots of action, but it just felt hollow. I was always concerned about making the battle a full episode, much less an episode 9, and those fears were justified. The entire episode was a long tease, where the Watch never felt in much trouble, and the whole thing ended anti-climatically. I'm also rather concerned now about just how much is okay in the finale now. Sure its 66 minutes, but it still needs to have:



-Jon with Mance, and Stannis arriving


-Bran meeting Bloodraven


-Tyrion's escape


-Dany's season conclusion


-Arya's season conclusion


-Brienne's season conclusion



And I don't see how that's done. Jon, Tyrion, and Dany's stories look like they each need at least 15 minutes, Bran and Arya at least 10 minutes, and Brienne at least 5 minutes. That's 71 minutes, and from the preview it looks like there's still going to be some at least some other scenes, like a Tywin-Cersei one. This episode went short, they should've included Stannis' arrival in it; it would've helped two episodes.


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5/10, which I believe is the lowest rating I've ever given an episode (it may be a tie though, not sure).

There was lots of action, but it just felt hollow. I was always concerned about making the battle a full episode, much less an episode 9, and those fears were justified. The entire episode was a long tease, where the Watch never felt in much trouble, and the whole thing ended anti-climatically. I'm also rather concerned now about just how much is okay in the finale now. Sure its 66 minutes, but it still needs to have:

-Jon with Mance, and Stannis arriving

-Bran meeting Bloodraven

-Tyrion's escape

-Dany's season conclusion

-Arya's season conclusion

-Brienne's season conclusion

And I don't see how that's done. Jon, Tyrion, and Dany's stories look like they each need at least 15 minutes, Bran and Arya at least 10 minutes, and Brienne at least 5 minutes. That's 71 minutes, and from the preview it looks like there's still going to be some at least some other scenes, like a Tywin-Cersei one. This episode went short, they should've included Stannis' arrival in it; it would've helped two episodes.

too bad they can't make the finale an extra 30 min that would be epic

Edited by TheNorth's1stKnight
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No LS reveal = This forum will explode from the hissy fits!

The LS reveal is the most worthy finale scene, not including it would be madness.

They have a whole season 5 to deal with LS. Tyrion's actions and the outcome of the battle at the Wall are the real turning points of the story. Everything changes from there. LS would be great but at this point I rather have them concentrate on the important stuff instead of cramming everything together, which might ruin ALL those great moments. And they're already pushing it.

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9/10



The reason I thought that Stannis would arrive in this episode was that having that epic scene in the start of an episode didn't make much sense to me.



I guess that this will mean that I will just give episode 10 a higher rating instead


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6. I was gonna give it a 7 while I watched it, but I wasn't that impressed. Yeah, I know, they did the best with the budget they had, but I just wasn't very excited. I never felt like there was any tension, and the deaths didn't have any emotional impact on me (except making me happy that Ygritte is finally dead).



There were some cool moments, sure, and I was never bored. I really enjoyed the Sam/Aemon chat, but I would have preferred it was in episode 8, maybe, instead of, you know, NO FUCKING STANNIS ARRIVAL.



I checked, and this has been the shortest episode of Game of Thrones ever. They had ten minutes already left to put Jon's meeting with Mance and the arrival of Stannis, and they could have taken out the dumb Jon/Sam talk about sex. That would have given them almost fifteen minutes extra time! I understand that the battle spans over more than one night, but when you spend eight bloody episodes building UP to the battle, I expect that was done so the episode could be a complete package, not have some cheap and lazy cliffhanger at the end. The battle ended suddenly, and there was no proper climax.



Now the result of this dumb decision is that Stannis' most heroic and cheer worthy moment will just be an afterthought, quickly wrapped up so we can get more Khaleesi and the funny dwarf, cause gods forbid Stannis gets any meaningful time dedicated to just him.



Seriously, sometimes the decisions this show makes just piss me off, I'm sorry.


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I agree with most of that, though they did more than one panning shot and on a couple of them people were not doing a whole a lot and that bothers the hell out of me.

I think leading up to the battle things were going pretty good, I liked some of the quiet tension at castle Black. But did not care for the Gilly scenes and although I have enjoyed Aemon in the series what little of him there has been, I thought that scene was unnecessary. Thought Thorne was good too.

But as pointed out by others the Well has been the second class citizen of the series, and they have not developed a lot there with the characters, and have wasted time on things like Crasters. Then they go out and promote it as the most epic battle on tv ever? Seriously just shooting themselves in the foot. As it goes the show goes like this, Tyrion and KL number 1, Dany number 2, Arya number 3, the Wall 4th, Stannis 5th. and when Robb and Cat were alive they were number 2 in the order of importance. At no point have they ever put a lot of stock in the wall so as a viewer why should anyone invest.

Season one episode 9. Baelor the Death of Ned Stark, for fans who had not read the books this was the OMG moment of omg moments.

Season 2, Episode 9. Blackwater, that's all you really need to say. The opening shot blows up a fleet of ships with a giant green fireball. Dink was amazing.

Season 3, Episode 9, The Rains of Castamere, it's the red wedding the entire country was talking about this, well at least inn the states.

Season 4, Episode 9, The Watcher's on the wall. I now see why the title is so appropriate to this episode. The death of Pyp and Grenn, yes thee Pyp and Grenn. And Grenn got the honor of getting done off screen. Seriously I am not a die hard Stan fan, but it really could of used the arrival. Honestly I think casual fan probably saw Jon go out the gate and was like I hope he dies so we don't have to waste any time up following this arc anymore because it's so damn boring most of the time.

Do you think anyone will speak about this episode the way they did about the other 3? And that was not in any way shape or form the greatest anything on tv ever. That skirmish and that's what I call it because that is what it was lacked emotion, energy, action, drama, and investment. And the barrel poking scene? Of all the pathetic things in the world to do. Or the giants at the gate, how the hell do you drop 150 gallons of oil on top of them and they don't get burned at all, The Mammoth got burned and it was 30 ft away, all the men got burned, but the giants? What was this the second miracle, were they hatching dragons eggs?

You know it's fine that Jon says Mance is just testing the watches defenses, that's fine. It was a horrible plan to test a defense but whatever. But they hyped this up as like it was going to be a major battle, sorry but I feel lied too, and even a character on the show basically referred to it as probing. Not to mention the cliffhanger, really what was that? It's not like he got stabbed or anything, he is walking out a door by himself and it's going to last all of a week. Not like anyone is going oh my god they killed off Jon, he's in next weeks episode preview.

Honestly it felt pointless, and to waste 20-25 minutes trying to rush job some character development in the hopes of generating a connection with the general viewing public is a mistake, and something they shoulld have been doing for the last 3.8 seasons. Sorry but I don't need extra Shea scenes or Theon getting fixed and tortured over and over, I don't need to see Ros developed for no reason at all, while actual characters at the wall get shit for the better part of 4 years. They develop pointless crap with non characters that most people don't give to shits about for years and ignore the Wall, really? The god damn wall, Jon Snow and the Watch. I know the first book is called A game of thrones but the actual series is not all about Kings Landing and Tyrion, the series is called A song of Ice and Fire, they got no problem giving us the fire and that's great, but Jesus can I have a little ice in my god damn Kool aid so I can get my inner Jon Snow and the Watch fan boy on?

I could care less about episode 9 being the best episode. All that matters is how they finish this season off in the finale. The last episode will be the best this season unlike in previous ones when it was the 9th.

Edited by makchamp
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5 no stannis they can't put him in the beginning of next ep that's BS he should have had his triumphant episode ending moment now it's just gonna be a scene no one talks about because of all the other stuff that will happen in episode 10.

Yep especially after Tyrion does his deed with Tywin. It looks like the show producers are trying their best to spoil the image of Stannis among the unsullied.

Edited by Purple Wedding Crasher
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