Okay, NOW Have We Seen The Most Wildly Unrealistic Thing Ever on GoT???

[Cron]

16 minutes ago, Meera of Tarth said:

Yeah, I kind of appreciated that they gave him a heroic scene and proper death scene (if only Benjen's had also been as good), although he deserved more. I also prefer the direwolves, but I love the dragons as well, and we had seen him since he was a little lizard. Now I won't see him as the same dragon, but I was also kind of thrilled with the spoiler of him being a wight. I said to myself, at least a proper death scene, and it happened.

However, I thought the wight scene would be better,I was loooking forward to how would it be....It's a great twist after all. but Felt like when Daeneerys was leaving Meereen, everything was great until Varys appeared, the chains had the same weird effect.

Here is a sincere question that I'm wondering if you, or anyone else here, has some input on.

When Gendry ran south, WHY did the rest of the Wight Hunters go NORTH?  Or even stay in the general area, as opposed to at least trying to go south?

Was it their plan to get to the big rock, with the belief that the wights would not be able to cross the ice without it collapsing?  Or were they intending to try to fend the Army of the Dead off and try to buy time for Gendry to get help?

I've seen the episode several times now, and I admit that if the answers to the above questions are clear, I must have missed them.

[Makk]

I think there have much worse aspects of respecting the passage of time in the past. Years and years of travel time have passed and Gillys baby hasn't grown for instance.

And what has Benjen actually been doing since he disappeared and what was, presumably, his (final?) death. We know he helped Bran briefly, but what else?

[sweetsunray]

6 minutes ago, Cron said:

Here is a sincere question that I'm wondering if you, or anyone else here, has some input on.

When Gendry ran south, WHY did the rest of the Wight Hunters go NORTH?  Or even stay in the general area, as opposed to at least trying to go south?

Was it their plan to get to the big rock, with the belief that the wights would not be able to cross the ice without it collapsing?  Or were they intending to try to fend the Army of the Dead off and try to buy time for Gendry to get help?

I've seen the episode several times now, and I admit that if the answers to the above questions are clear, I must have missed them.

I can't think of any other reason than D&D wanting them in that location so they could have a battle on an ice-lake, with holes in it, and flaming swords, and a burning man against an army that in numbers should beat them. (which meta-plotzee of the predicted Battle of Ice by Stannis against Freys - see Night Lamp Theory by Cantuse).

In world it makes no sense whatsoever why they wouldn't try to run in the direction south and higher ground. Make no sense to race into unexplored terrain before the army of the dead even arrives. Makes more sense to run to terrain that you know and have been to in order to prepare a strategy. Guess now we know why Jon was never a candidate to become a ranger

[Meera of Tarth]

Just now, Cron said:

Here is a sincere question that I'm wondering if you, or anyone else here, has some input on.

When Gendry ran south, WHY did the rest of the Wight Hunters go NORTH?  Or even stay in the general area, as opposed to at least trying to go south?

Was it their plan to get to the big rock, with the belief that the wights would not be able to cross the ice without it collapsing?  Or were they intending to try to fend the Army of the Dead off and try to buy time for Gendry to get help?

I've seen the episode several times now, and I admit that if the answers to the above questions are clear, I must have missed them.

no idea. Ot maybe BC they thought the wights would see a group of 10 people running but not one? That was my take.

[Yoren Luck]

1 hour ago, Lord Okra said:

I haven't had to suspend my disbelief.

Jon wants the entire realm's forces.  Dany sees that if she is the only one to take her army north then she'd be leaving the south wide open.  They'll be asking for not only a truce but all the armies of all the kingdoms at the meeting.

It is beyond a truce request really.  But it doesn't matter now, Dany is in.

I get this point.  My point is there really are no other forces in the realm.  Let me explain:

The Lannister army just crushed the Tyrell army and rest of the forces at Highgarden.   Highgarden was taken and plundered, and the Tyrells are a vanquished house.  A number of their bannermen including the Tarlys had already defected.  Their remaining forces were wiped out in the battle for Highgarden.  This removes the kingdom of The Reach from the story. No more armies in The Reach.

The same Lannister army that took Highgarden then got crushed by Dany at the battle of the Loot train, and she forced all the survivors to convert to her side.  That army was the 10,000 Lannisters from Casterly Rock (Kingdom of the Westerlands) minus a small contingent that they had left at the Rock to fight the Unsullied, plus whatever forces the Tarlys commanded.  they are all gone or defected to Team Dany.

Those Lannister forces left at Casterly Rock have been all killed by the Unsullied.  The Westerlands is therefore without a Lannister army.

The Riverlands is basically without leadership now that the Tullys and Freys are gone.  If there are armies here, it is the scattered remnants of Lannister and Frey forces following the previous war between Stark and Lannister.  In other words, it is a small contingent of soldiers who are merely holding the castles/keeps.  No large standing army is here anymore. The reason we know this is because it has been established that you don't need a large army here to protect yourself from the north because all you really need is a force large enough to sustain a siege at the Twins.  We also know the Riverlands were ravaged by war so supporting a large army there in perpetuity is impossible right now. Plus we haven't heard of any sizable Lannister or pro-Lannister forces there in ages.

So at this point in the story, Dany/Jon alliance control the armies from North and the Vale and have removed the Westerlands from the story (via taking Casterly Rock). Dorne is established as out of the contest, but even if they aren't, they were already aligned with Dany and not Cersei.  The Reach is done.  The Stormlands haven't been mentioned in seasons but House Baratheon is vanquished so there are no armies left here.

Cersei sort of controls the Iron Islands through an uncertain alliance with Euron, and has a grip on the Riverlands.  She also controls the Crownlands, although Dany has Dragonstone and a massive army with dragons at her doorstep.  The Lannisters have no army left, which is why they are trying to hire sellswords.  

I'm sure the show runners are going to have invented a 50,000 strong Lannister Army conveniently chilling at Kings Landing for the next episode because that is how they fill plot holes, but in reality, Cersei has no army left to speak of.  Jon can want all the realm's forces, but through the alliance with Dany, he basically already has that...All except for maybe a small contingent of lannister/tarly forces in Kings Landing (at most), small remnants of Riverlands forces, and the Ironborn (who aren't really fully aligned with Cersei until Euron gets his marriage proposal).

After reading this, please explain to me exactly how many soldiers Cersei controls in the North, the Vale, the Riverlands, the Iron Islands, the Westerlands, the Crownlands, the Stormlands, the Reach, and Dorne that Jon is going to win over through an alliance with Cersei?  Now explain to me how Cersei is such a threat right now that they needed a wight hunt to convince her to join their side?  

What they needed was some clever planning by Varys and Tyrion to reallocate the Iron Bank's finances from Lannister to Targaryan following a discussion they should have had in which they realize this is Cersei's only option for continuing the war.  But you know, political intrigue and clever planning to outmaneuver your opponent is not a hallmark of this show anymore.  No, we get contrived wight hunts to convince a non-factor in Cersei that fighting an army she isn't going to care about is more important than the only thing in the world she has ever cared about (the iron throne).

Just the fact that I have to spell out for you that there are no human armies left in westeros aside from what Dany controls is a testament to how poor the writing is this season.  In the past, you'd have at least one or two lines from Tywin talking about how fucked they are.

[Cron]

1 hour ago, sweetsunray said:

I can't think of any other reason than D&D wanting them in that location so they could have a battle on an ice-lake, with holes in it, and flaming swords, and a burning man against an army that in numbers should beat them. (which meta-plotzee of the predicted Battle of Ice by Stannis against Freys - see Night Lamp Theory by Cantuse).

In world it makes no sense whatsoever why they wouldn't try to run in the direction south and higher ground. Make no sense to race into unexplored terrain before the army of the dead even arrives. Makes more sense to run to terrain that you know and have been to in order to prepare a strategy. Guess now we know why Jon was never a candidate to become a ranger

Yeah, thanks for the thoughts.

I was baffled, and I guess I still am, perhaps b/c there is no good explanation.

I was honestly wondering if it was just me, like maybe there was something I wasn't seeing or grasping.

[Cron]

1 hour ago, Meera of Tarth said:

no idea. Ot maybe BC they thought the wights would see a group of 10 people running but not one? That was my take.

Just bizarre.

I'll add it to my long Master List of things that don't seem to make sense regarding the Hunt for the Wight, starting with the moment Tyrion first proposed it at Dragonstone, and ending, I suppose, with Dany waiting at Eastwatch to see if Jon would show up rather than HOPPING ON A  DRAGON TO GO LOOK FOR HIM AND MAYBE HELP HIM.

[Iron Mother]

A song of the Phantom Menace?

This idiot show now has told us you kill the white walker who turned wights and all the wights fall.  The same assholish plot that saw 8yo Anakin Skywalker accidentally up on the base ship and as if he is playing WoW goes shooting up everything and blows up the base ship and ALL the turd drones fall down in front of Jar Jar who kicks one and proclaims "it broken".

So now the white army is so less impressive since you just kill the main Walker and all of the rest will fall to pieces.

EVERYONE loves fantasy but few will admit the best (the only) good part of Phantom Menace was Darth Maul.

This is what we have now.  Not an army, but an inserted plot where you kill one and they all fall down.

http://cloud.foodista.com/content/images/8d715222016d54c156880a7ebd7d5bfa602758b3_607x400.jpg

[Darkstream]

3 hours ago, Lord Okra said:

The show is killing it.

Yes, GRRM's world, and intelligent well thought out story telling.

3 hours ago, Lord Okra said:

You'd never know if you visited this forum which is a tragedy.

The main difference, the average viewer comes in without any idea of how they think it should go while those on this forum read the books and come into every viewing with an idea of how it should be so they constantly bring the book this or that into their perspective.

 The shows issues have nothing at all to do with deviating from the books.

3 hours ago, Lord Okra said:

The regular Joe viewer is just watching the show and taking what is presented.  They don't have 16 reasons in their mind why Eastwatch is too far cause they don't think it should be 2500 miles away because in the show it isn't 2500 miles away.....and they are clueless to that so the narrative works for them.  They don't confuse the books for the show constantly.

Only it doesn't matter whether Eastwatch was 2500 miles away, or if it was 25 miles away because either way, no one should have survived that encounter.

Oh, what a dire threat the NK poses to all of humanity when a friggin little pond stops him and his army of the dead in their tracks. Sooo threatening. What a joke. I'm supposed to believe that all of mankind is threatened, when the NK can't even take out seven men stranded out in the middle of nowhere (the NK's home turf non the less - you know, the frozen north minus one small pond) for...well, however the hell long they were supposed to be out there for. Who knows, every show defender has their own fan-fic theory and explanation.

3 hours ago, Lord Okra said:

You have to take the show as stand alone.  Average watchers do that because the show is all they know so they really enjoy it because it is awesome tv.

Too bad the show doesn't stand up on its own. It doesn't stand up season to season, episode to episode, or even within a single episode itself. Its mind boggling the amount of contradicting, illogical and unfeasible moments d&d squeezed into just one scene this episode. This show wouldn't stand up to the standards of an eighth grade creative writing class.

The average watcher enjoys the show because: "kooool, tits and dragons and awesome battle scenes."

[sweetsunray]

1 hour ago, Cron said:

Yeah, thanks for the thoughts.

I was baffled, and I guess I still am, perhaps b/c there is no good explanation.

I was honestly wondering if it was just me, like maybe there was something I wasn't seeing or grasping.

I can see their need to separate from Gendry and wanting to choose a spot to make a stand against whatever's coming: since they're carrying a wight resisting his wight-napping and Jon doesn't want to lose it. They can't hope to outrun and turn their back on the enemy. But you don't choose it on unknown terrain, but terrain you just spied from and walked through. 

And clearly they had not yet been at the ice lake, or it wouldn't have taken them by surprise they were walking on "thin ice" right there.

Was a cool spot though: props for the set makers. Thumbs up on the location, but again makes no sense.

[darmody]

4 hours ago, Cron said:

Here is a sincere question that I'm wondering if you, or anyone else here, has some input on.

When Gendry ran south, WHY did the rest of the Wight Hunters go NORTH?  Or even stay in the general area, as opposed to at least trying to go south?

Was it their plan to get to the big rock, with the belief that the wights would not be able to cross the ice without it collapsing?  Or were they intending to try to fend the Army of the Dead off and try to buy time for Gendry to get help?

I've seen the episode several times now, and I admit that if the answers to the above questions are clear, I must have missed them.

You've touched upon what I referred to in another thread as this episode's Fulcrum of Stupidity. There's absolutely no reason why the Snowicide Squad shouldn't run back toward the Wall along with Gendry. The only explanation I can think of for them running the other way is Jon read the script. 

There's no indication they knew the lake was there. They seem surprised when the ice starts cracking beneath them. Without thin ice, why would the rock be any use at all? Even with thin ice, what guarantee was there that the zombies would be stuck a safe distance from the rock? None. 

We must assume Jon intended to either fend off the Army of the Dead--which is a stretch even for someone who knows nothing--or to find some other place to wait it out. A competent writer would have them serve as a diversion while Gendry took the zombie back to Eastwatch. Failing that, have Tormund say before Gendry departs, "Look, there's a cave over there!" Jon tells Gendry to run for the Wall while they take refuge. They don't find the lake until after they get driven out of the cave shortly before Dany shows up. (That solves the teleportation issues, too.)

I realize they've already shown a merry band getting driven out of a cave-type structure by the Night King, but I'm taking over the story in the middle of the white hunt. Cut me some slack. 

[darmody]

3 hours ago, Makk said:

And what has Benjen actually been doing since he disappeared and what was, presumably, his (final?) death. We know he helped Bran briefly, but what else?

Moreover, what exactly was Benjen? Why was he still "alive?" Where has he been? What purpose was he supposed to serve, besides saving his nephews?

We'll almost certainly never be told. I doubt Jon and Bran will even mention him. (Or Rickon.)

[darmody]

3 hours ago, Meera of Tarth said:

no idea. Ot maybe BC they thought the wights would see a group of 10 people running but not one? That was my take.

Why would it be better for them to see the 10? Gendry alone is meaningless. They need either Gendry and the 10 to make it or just the 10. If Gendry alone makes it, who cares?

His purpose is to get a message to Dany so she can retrieve the zombie. The zombie is their entire purpose for being beyond the Wall, and he's staying with the 10. There's no way the 10 can fight off the dead. So what is the point of distracting the dead with the for Gendry's sake?

This is why I say it would've made more sense for Gendry to take the zombie. It'd slow him down, but then Jon would have a purpose in going the other way. It would be a suicidal diversion for the sake of the mission. Maybe he tells everyone else to go with Gendry, but one by one they say they'll kill themselves, too. 

We still have the time problem, and that's why I throw in a cave or something better than an unseen lake to hide in. There's less ridiculousness to the scenario when Gendry sending the raven to Dany is a side concern. "Dear Dragon Queen, I have the wight safe and sound at Eastwatch. If you care about the King of the North or your elderly gentleman-friend, go see if they're still alive. Last I saw they were running toward the Army of the Dead, which I know you're also interested in seeing. Love, Clovis."

That way the entire plan isn't to get Dany up there with a dragon to save the zombie in the middle of a lake no one knows is there three days later. 

 

[Iron Mother]

1 minute ago, darmody said:

Moreover, what exactly was Benjen? Why was he still "alive?" Where has he been? What purpose was he supposed to serve, besides saving his nephews?

We'll almost certainly never be told. I doubt Jon and Bran will even mention him. (Or Rickon.)

This is a fantasy show dude.  Books aside -- They erased 3 whole "kingdoms" or "houses" in 1.5 episodes.  Where is Rickon?  In Dorne... or, rather the Dark Dimension, where things go to make the script easier.  Benjen is/was a Skrull and had been working with Heimdall in Asgard to see the nephews and using the Tesseract to come down and save them at the appropriate moments. 

In the end, Thanos will be revealed with the Reality Gem and has been working behind the scenes (sending parts of Westeros to the Dark Dimension) and Doctor Strange is trying to find them.  Ultimately, The Avengers will swoop in and Captain Marvel will make her first appearance to dispatch the Night King.  Jon will be given a new cloak and modified sword specially assembled by Stark Industries to join The Avengers next Spring in the new movie.

The World of Ice & Fire is just another planet in a star system being monitored by Nova Prime.

GOT TV series has been part of the Marvel Universe this whole time.  How could we all have been so dumb?

[Being Daenerys Targaryen]

16 hours ago, Ser Gareth said:

If the NK had been planning this for a while (quite possible) he would have hundreds of years to obtain a chain.  As it happens he didn't need to wait hundreds of years.  He only needed to steal the ones used by the Wildlings in their failed assault on the Wall.

Oh yeah... That chain? Then Where did he get it? Where was that chain? Hardhome?

[Being Daenerys Targaryen]

14 hours ago, Lord Okra said:

It is funny.

We need to wait two episodes before we return to that beyond the wall expedition!!!!!!

Let us go check in on the Unsullied.  We can do a 10 minute scene of them deciding whether to stay in Casterly Rock or start marching......cut to Theon sobbing........back to Jon sitting on a rock up north.........cut back to the Unsullied who decided to start marching and now debate where to best cross a river.......back to Theon sobbing.......cut to Yara in a dungeon eating maggoty bread........

Sounds riveting.

Yeah you're right...

[Being Daenerys Targaryen]

16 hours ago, S. OF HOUSE STARK said:

Oh, no, I definitely agree that there wouldn't have been one without the other. The wounds he suffered weakened him to the point that he couldn't withstand the cold like the others. His body wasn't up to that fight. My original point was more along the lines of "hmm Beric, Thoros isn't looking too good, if only there were some fire around here to make him feel a little more comfortable wink wink nudge nudge"   

Yeah... You're right...

[Being Daenerys Targaryen]

8 hours ago, Lurid Jester said:

You were totally right. I totally missed the part with the ravens leaving Winterfell and flying to the Wall. I must have been looking away, or something.  I thought for sure Bran was just warging ravens already north of the wall.  

"You have to see it to believe..."

From Winterfell to that Lake where Jon and Co were... The NK is standing on the Island where Jon was... It can also show us how much time it takes to a raven to fly from eastwatch to dragonstone... I don't know...  

[Being Daenerys Targaryen]

14 hours ago, plastic throne said:

Like, Bran telling Sansa "you were beautiful that night" then Sansa looking at his crotch, replying in shock and her mouth wide open "OMG Bran... Are... Are you hard?"

Haha! this is funny! 

[Being Daenerys Targaryen]

12 hours ago, Illiterati said:

What they should have done is aired everything up to the standoff in 705, started with an Arya and Sansa scene in 706, then move Dany, then another of the Arya Sansa scenes, then Dany arrives.  Or Jorah could have said "It's been a week, Jon.  We're going to freeze.  and the lake is freezing."  Or Jon could have said, It takes a raven 3 days to get from Eastwatch to Dragonstone.I would guess it would take a day for Dany to fly here.  she should be here any time now."

 

Anything to show that time has passed.  In a 24 hour twilight, they aren't going to be able to do it with lighting.

Good one...