HBO's adaptation of Game of Thrones - Thread 2. There are a lot of nerds.

Or Cersei is the real Winter.

Cersei *is* an anagram of "Ser Ice", after all.

I like the idea of Arya leaping out of nowhere and killing a major baddie at the end of every episode. Like Cato in the Pink Panther movies.

I hope there's still a chance that the end of this battle will influence what happens with the next one. That is, Sansa and Bran and Arya have shown their worth, while Dany and Jon mostly just flew around and didn't know what to do. Arya seems much more like a promised prince than either of them.

Is Jon not able to make the dragon breathe fire? I notice he didn't do this and kinda seemed pointless him riding around on it as a result.

lol Dany forgot to teach him "Dracarys"

Jon, I quite like book. Just reading the first one (and hopefully the others.) why did you dislike it? Too plodding?

arya has devoted her life to being a murderer, which I do not find endearing

I don't know how they cld have better dealt w the white walkers really. someone has to kill them and another big battle wld be a slog. I do not care for ppls normative ideas abt writing and plotting but I love a bit of juicy bathos & it wld suit GoT tho idk how much we'll get.

anyway we can shut down Twitter now, it's done

Valar Morghulis
Valar Dohaeris
Valar my ragtime gal

— 🌹🏳️‍🌈 Kissinger for the Hague 2019 🏳️‍🌈🌹 (@InstantSunrise) April 30, 2019

xxxpost How did Sansa show her worth in battle? Hiding well?

Between Bran and Dr Strange I’m frustrated by seers as characters. They’re terrible for plotting, boring to watch in action, eliminate all possibilities for suspense, and create far too many “well if [x] could see the future then why not [y]” after-impressions

arya has devoted her life to being a murderer, which I do not find endearing

on Twitter the term "Mary Sue" was trending due to people accusing Arya of fitting that description which obviously makes no sense and comes down to standard-issue sexism. but then Sonia Saraiya said it was a better fit for Samwell Tarly and a whole other set of people got offended (with at least one person accusing her of "hating fat people", sigh); to be honest, I think she's right, in the sense that having him hold his own as a fighter through the long night didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. I thought it undid the nice scene where the people headed to the Cyrpts dealt with their guilt over not fighting, and there was some talk about having the courage to know when and where you're needed and not needed. In general, though, it fit the wider pattern of equating the ability to kill and perform acts of violence with virtue, exalting fighting ability as the highest virtue there is. I think it's too bad they didn't let Sam just be an incredibly useful scholar and a voice for the power of knowledge. Isn't that enough?

I kinda think it's Sams scholarly achievements that are most Mary Sueish. Him easily curing greyscale and finding a wedding document nobody else has ever found was pretty bad. But I think it's mostly an effect of the show not bothering that much with Oldtown and the Maesters.

How did Sansa show her worth in battle? Hiding well?

did you miss the earlier scenes where she took out a couple dozen of the wights using her nifty spear (with removable dagger head) weapon? she fled through the library only when she was overwhelmed and seemingly the only one left

Wrong Stark :)

But Sansa showed bravery along with Tyrion. She was calm, stayed out of the way, then was brave when it mattered. And then the show didn't have time for more, because we needed to see Brienne just about to be killed a few dozen times more.

sorry, brain fart

really appreciated Sansa's "maybe we should have stayed married" line to Tyrion

how exactly did Grey Worm survive

Some Twitterites are saying he didn't? I couldn't say either way.

― chap, Tuesday, April 30, 2019 7:34 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

He definitely survived because considerably more marginal characters got the gushy sad music treatment when they died. He might be gravely injured I suppose.

Still, excellent defensive enforcer, the kind every fan would want on their team. 8/10 performance even if Arya takes home the match ball.

― Matt DC, Tuesday, April 30, 2019 7:39 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

He's fine! They showed him plenty of times fightin' along with all the other named characters inside the walls late into the battle.

No offense to anyone here or on twitter or whatever but sometimes I feel like I'm one of the only people who apparently is able to follow the entire episode clearly? Granted in this case the broadcast of this particular episode was apparently extremely dark for most people. Just saying sometimes I'm surprised at the confusions that come up overall.

yeah, it was fine for me--on HBO Go and on a big screen tv.

lol this is why I don’t watch this in a room full of people, too many damn questions .xp

I watched the HD broadcast and it was really dark at times. Kept changing light levels in the room to see if it would help. Going to try watching it on HBO GO later this week to see if I notice a difference.

HBO Go seems to throttle the quality a little at really high-demand times but it's still not nearly as bad as the compression cable/satellite companies throw on there

I hate to weigh in on pedantic image quality junk but this episode is going to look a lot better on blu-ray/digital download

Same! But I'm speaking sort of broadly about general character mix-ups and weird scene misreads that have generally followed almost every episode. There's definitely a lot of characters and places to keep track of, though.

xxxp

iirc those misreads were what led to the creation of our long-standing Sean Bean casting joke

Only thing I couldn’t follow this episode was the specifics of why Bran was warging but it makes sense now. I was able to follow all the characters well.

he was busy flap-flap-flapping his way into the Night King's heart

Only thing I couldn’t follow this episode was the specifics of why Bran was warging but it makes sense now.

saw more than one person joke on twitter today that he was watching avengers: endgame.

irl lol

confusion over what bran was up to is pretty universal. maybe on a binge watch more people would remember the scene where NK spots a bird-warging Bran.

We watched it on a pretty good screen and I still saw somebody who looked like Grey Worm and somebody who looked like Gilly being killed.

confusion over what bran was up to is pretty universal.

From that lol reddit link:

https://preview.redd.it/kslke5z4h8v21.jpg?width=640&height=853&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=61947039dd1756787bf4b1c75adc2f59fc6b7ac5

Be funny if the next three episodes are just them all sitting down and writing a constitution.

I wish they'd had the white walkers not entirely destructible by both dragonglass and valerian steel. Like although both may be capable of blowing them to pieces it depends on their purity or something and in many cases it merely incapacitates or paralyses them more like a poison, just to keep everyone guessing.

No offense to anyone here or on twitter or whatever but sometimes I feel like I'm one of the only people who apparently is able to follow the entire episode clearly? Granted in this case the broadcast of this particular episode was apparently extremely dark for most people. Just saying sometimes I'm surprised at the confusions that come up overall.

― Evan, Tuesday, 30 April 2019 15:15 (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

OK so what's your take on where the budding Sansa and Theon romance plotline goes from here

it's a love triangle with Bran now iirc

love this: https://mashable.com/2016/05/03/game-thrones-heir/?europe=true#feTYi625sZqU

I suppose if GoT were to end on a cyclically cynical note Dany could end up on the throne and then eliminate all other claimants, including Jon and Gendry-- with pregnant Arya going into hiding in Essos

How does succession work on this show? Who is actually the rightful heir at this point? Gendry because he's Robert's actual son? Not that any of them care at this point about how things 'should' go.

at this point, might makes right

according to the mashable link, the actual rightful heir, if one goes by typical rules of succession, is...cersei

actually it would be Tyrion, they kind of hand waved him away.

Jon is rightful heir, unless you accept Robert's rebellion, in which case it's Gendry.

Gendry would have to be legitimized, and seeing as Robert's in the ground, few people who have the authority AND inclination to legitimizing him.

OK so what's your take on where the budding Sansa and Theon romance plotline goes from here

― Dadjokke (Sgt. Biscuits), Tuesday, April 30, 2019 11:42 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

His heart was broken, coldly.

Gendry would have to be legitimized, and seeing as Robert's in the ground, few people who have the authority AND inclination to legitimizing him.

― Perfect Leee Cromulent (Leee), Tuesday, April 30, 2019 12:01 PM (five minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Cersei could legitimize him as her heir, which could sow a bit of discord among the happy northern family.

well, i guess never mind, cause if cersei legitimizes him, he's the king and she's not queen anymore

xxp a belly full of promise beans and spear

I've done the very smart thing of never watching game of thrones and then starting with the last 3 episodes. i enjoyed the most recent one, yes it was dumb in lots of ways but not any dumber than say a LOTR movie, and only a third of the length!

now gone back to the start and watched the first 5 episodes. i like this ned stark fellow, looking forward to following his adventures

on Twitter the term "Mary Sue" was trending due to people accusing Arya of fitting that description which obviously makes no sense and comes down to standard-issue sexism.

Here’s one thing you should know, and it’s no spoiler: the actor that plays Ned Stark also plays literally every other role!

Also GRRM has admitted that Sam is essentially his self insert character but again the show takes it a lot further.

I'm not wild about Arya either but she's spent most of the show training and then killing things. Her continuing to be good at killing things is simply not a Mary Sue situation.

I mean, if you think the level of plot armour is realistic, sure I guess. Character who can do everything and is super special + no flaws = typically where people accuse them of being a Mary Sue. And the show has barely explored anything of what all this has changed Arya to be, instead people just think it’s all cool?