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

so about the preview for the next ep, was bran and the 3ec peeping in on ned et al trying to rescue lyanna? does that mean we finally get to meet howland reed? and/or finally some confirmation or about jon's parents?

Most likely!

the sparrows as a protestant reformation type thing which initiates a turn towards modernity would be genuinely interesting but im not sure they've laid enough groundwork for that on the show.

there is some talk of the maesters aiming for a world free from magic/dragons/prophecy/white walkers which might also herald the beginning of the early modern era for our intrepid gang
I believe this hot intel comes from a character called Marvyn the Mage whose arrival we all eagerly anticipate

I think they're laying a little ground work for shift to the early modern w/ Tyrion learning how to govern a city w/o unduly oppressing its occupants

Ramsey seems to represent a more ruthless early medieval or ancient order, where the new king would basically kill all of his relatives to remove legitimacy threats.

that is a funny reading of history you have there

yes it is funny

heh

just referring to the implication that history has been one long march from tyrannical oppression to our current glorious state of liberation

thought this episode was rlly good, lots of shit happened, idk

The title of next week's episode is making me nervous

it doesn't even have anything particularly coherent to say about the nature of power or the pursuit of it either (ie, "power corrupts" or "power is awesome and revenge is totally worth it!" or similar), it just sets these various wind-up mechanisms into motion and then becomes about ways to keep the wheels spinning

tbh i think this itself is a perfectly coherent thing to say about power, i preferred the show when half of it was various obscure schemes grinding together - all those conversations between varys and littlefinger where they dance around each other trying to avoid revealing anything. now that the show's version of power is much more of a blunt object i think it's become less interesting.

the lack of a plot buildup to jon's resurrection was a bit odd, it felt like there were a few directions they could have gone down but instead it was just "it would be good if jon snow wasn't dead, i wonder if that's possible" "eh let's give it a go"

Reading Jon Snow's fate as a plea for Obama to return for a third term now too. I'm sorry.
--human and working on getting beer (longneck)

seems reasonable tbh

The theme police they come to me in my thread

very good

"It" = the show, not power

Xp

i don't remember what is up with the lizard woman but she looks like a doctor who character

So in the "next on..." clips this week, they show a guy (pretty sure it's the lord of House Umber, the other big northern house that was mentioned being allied with the Boltons) telling Ramsay "I've brought you a present" - I guarantee it's Rickon Stark.

the House Umber dude is a captive of the Freys, iirc -- he's a tall gray-haired dude that's played by one of "those guys that are in lots of things". The present giver could be a relative? Don't think it's Rickon unless they're radically changing things from the books again ... which is possible.

Did Benioff and Weiss watch the scene in The Force Awakens where a father and son meet at the halfway point of a narrow bridge above a vast chasm, which ends with the father falling to his death, and think, 'damn, don't we have the same scene in our next season?'

A similar scene, I should say. Brothers, instead of father and son, in GoT's case.

You're right, it's Smalljon Umber, the heir, according to a bunch of GoT wikis. And who is dead in the books, apparently.

i enjoyed this week's ep p well, but i do think this show has prob slid into being a kind of walking dead "why do i watch this" compulsion. last season was p crap as i recall.

max von sydow was good.

i also liked that they put that little shit who stabbed jon snow in the cells.

I think it's pretty obvious why you watch this - to see Ramsay get murked

don't feel as keen for him to die as i did with joffrey. tbh would prefer sam to die.

lol who?

you had me doubting his name was sam there. he is still alive, right? on the way... somewhere, with tilly.

there's gonna be some lol-some dysfunctional Tarley family action

haha yes he's still alive, just hasn't been seen or heard from since Commander Jon sent him to Oldtown to get his PhD

he's headed to Maesterville to figure out if there's a way to defeat the ice zombies and will end up dealing with his overbearing dad

I hope that happens this season, should be pretty cool

Since Euron didn't turn out to be played by Ian McShane, he's got to be Old Man Tarly, which is gonna rule.

nope he's a priest, James Faulkner is Sam's dad

yeah mcshane was in the news a while back dropping spoilers and it is clear from that who he plays. it is only a bit part.

FUCK

McShane is the priest that saves the Hound iirc

Is Richard e grant coming up in this or did I dream that?

I thought McShane was going to be that magic-loving maester that Sam bumps into.

MARVYN THE MAGE

Priest that saves the Hound? Spoiler?

It's just a book theory. People want the Hound to be saved. Nobody knows.

The Hound is dead.

it will be conclusively resolved by the show ala robert strange

*strong

I'm tired

Is Richard e grant coming up in this or did I dream that?

He is - hes the one *I* was hoping'd be Sams dad but apparently his is also a bit part, playing the head of some troupe of fucking travelling mummers, wtf.

i thought common folk having a good time was forbidden in westeros

Well you can have a good time but a resurrected warmonger of one stripe or another will have your brains in the next scene

I did like that peasant guy telling the story about how he got his huge wang out and waved it at Cersei.

Yeah, oddly enough! It was trivial, vile, and stupid, but the actor's plummy delivery actually kind of saved it. I'll wait and see whether that has some kind of orthogonal plot implication for Ser Strong & the King's Landing commoner uprising situation; it could also just have been included just so we have an idea what Strong is capable of, to set up the kingsguard pantswetting scene that followed.

One thing about this show that has changed over the years is that I definitely look for the Chekhov's Gun in every scene. I think that's less a testament to my "plot detective" skills as it is their increasing efficiency at covering a truly massive amount of story information within a different medium and in very limited time.

maybe Thoros of Myr will come across that dude's corpse lying in its own drunken piss and resurrect him, and it'll turn out he really does have the biggest johnson in Westeros, and Azor Ahai, oh my

lol

that's not "plummy"