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

my recollection of the episode when he was at winterfell is that he got a glimpse of how much of a psycho ramsay actually is and was surprised, and i am sure that is the line he is giving sansa in their convo in the preview for next ep, but it fits much better with his character than he knew all along and that the plan was to drop sansa in the shit and then come and 'rescue' her/the north.

his stated motivation was to tie together the north and the vale, which would be a powerful bloc.

xp - long game of course.

So I know this has been the subject of speculation for years, but it seems just as likely that Littlefinger (not Ramsey) sent Jon that letter to ensure that the Wildling army would assist him in an attack on Winterfell

no not really

Matt DC otm, i've always been on board with this show but i'm preferring it now that everyone now has their sights set on either winterfell or king's landing again. the iron islands is doing its own thing right now but i suspect that's just to set up their move back to the center as well. hoping next episode jon snow stops in at a tavern in the north and finds benjen stark, gendry, blackfish, and the revived hound just hanging out sharing a pitcher of ale.

There wouldn't be any reason Ramsey wouldn't send that letter himself, therefore a twist like that would do nothing for the story.

xxp

xxxp Has that letter happened in the books then (to generate years of speculation)? As Jon's story in the books has got no further thannthe point he was stabbed by members of the Night Watch.

The letter was in the books prior to Jon getting waxed.

xxp we are talking about someone who sent a dad his son's dick in the mail.

http://www.trademarkia.com/logo-images/hallmark-licensing/when-you-care-enough-to-send-the-very-best-86559697.jpg

I don't understand why Gendry hasn't been in this fwiw - I'd be much more invested in his story than I am with half the characters here.

they haven't really done anything with him in the books either.

i could see gendry as a character who we only see at the end of the saga as the dust has settled and someone else has taken the throne, with him as the sole living baratheon heir who's been convinced by a small band of believers that the throne is rightfully his and is starting to make his danys-like maneuvers to assemble an army to take the throne back. some circle of westeros life kinda shit.

^I like this

I didn't get why the Dothraki bowed so easily to Daenerys. Don't they dislike magic? Doesn't having powers like this basically make her a witch to them?

(I guess witches are supposed to burn, so maybe not)

good ep though.

Maybe it's just lowered expectations, but so far I'm enjoying this season a lot more than I enjoyed last season. Stuff is actually happening, even if not all of it makes sense.

would be a good thread title

sums up my feelings about it, p much

https://scontent-dfw1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/13227037_10154201737534712_936022238931243333_n.jpg?oh=6abaf6308e57b297ba9cbd9f97cb1e4b&oe=57D60D72

i am SO OVER memes but that's good'un. i lol'd.

i could see gendry as a character who we only see at the end of the saga as the dust has settled and someone else has taken the throne, with him as the sole living baratheon heir who's been convinced by a small band of believers that the throne is rightfully his and is starting to make his danys-like maneuvers to assemble an army to take the throne back. some circle of westeros life kinda shit.

Game of the Wire

you want it to be one king but its another king

lol

with the hilarious opening shot of two members of the new kingsguard buying a staplegun from an earnest tradesman

xpost It's easy to dislike magic, it's another thing to watch this pale little woman go all firestarter, kill every Khal and walk out nekkid engulfed in flames, I guess.

I think I read that in the books or in interviews Martin made a point of stressing that the dragon-people are not fireproof, and that her birthing the baby dragons was a one off miracle. Which sounds kind of dumb compared to, yeah, fireproof. It seems all the people of this world have their distinct powers. Starks can warg,. Dragon-people are fireproof (except her brother). Boltons flay. Iron born are grouchy. Dothraki like horses. Lannister are rich and incestuous.

Liked how this episode has continued the recent tradition of contemporary-sounding zingers and comedic timing.

i would've paid five dollars american directly to GRRM by paypal if she had walked out proudly from the burning tent and caught a spear to the midsection. the dany storyline is the worst of the bunch and lately that's saying something.

What are the odds that next Dani finds a way to cure the Stone Men and add them to her army

I'm looking forward to where her storyline goes next only because of the hypothetical sense that having a Dothraki army suddenly implies a big shake up and momentum again, finally. Hopefully.

Some of the specifics have been botched pretty badly but I have always been a fan of Dany in general, and it makes me a bit sad when people aren't.

I'm not sure the Stone Men are portrayed as anything but mindless zombies, so that seems unlikely.

xp out of curiosity, what do you like about her and her whole shaggy dog storyline? the character has had zero development for about five years.

I know it's been going round in circles for a bit now, but when her story is on point (such as in most of season/book 3) it's the most exhilarating and mythic section of the series. I have no idea why you would say she hasn't developed, although the majority of that development happened in the first three seasons, granted.

Dany's storyline promises big developments, so you watch it in anticipation of her gaining more momentum. When she's stuck in one place for too long it's extra excruciating.

i feel like her "development" stopped right around the time she walked out of the funeral pyre and she has been the arisen imperial one true queen full of haughty impervious attitude ever since.

eh iirc there was a period when the dragons were still pups and she didn't quite believe her own hype and she'd say "I am the mother of DRAGONS" like she was trying to convince herself and more powerful people thought it was cute.

Her transition in the books is a wee bit more nuanced and gradual, so maybe I'm projecting that onto the TV version, I dunno. And I agree that her story's been stalled for the last two seasons, and I don't think Clarke is a particularly good actor. Despite all that im still very fond of the characters and am rooting for her.

Where her character development might not be evolving much anymore, hopefully her storyline does the heavy lifting by finally moving her forward (on the map) again.

i did not read the books so will certainly defer to the likely possibility that she's more engaging there. i find Clarke to be the weakest actor on the show and the symbolism of the great white emancipator to be one of the greatest missteps in the mythology.

Dany's storyline keeps veering between reality of foreign occupation and Neocon fantasies of killing badguy leaders and people falling to knees in awe.

the symbolism of the great white emancipator to be one of the greatest missteps in the mythology.

it's totally problematic, yes, and is kinda shown that way. That's what makes it interesting to me, moreso than some of the more standard medieval fantasy storylines, and especially ... Dorne.

a deposed noblewoman in a foreign country going quasi-native and turning herself into a liberation/cult figure is a cool-ass idea but none of the people writing this shit are smart enough to make it interesting!!

Didn't Heart of Darkness do that already?

sarahell otm

I like the idea of Dany and I do like looking at her but there's also this sense that she's the least intelligent person with any sort of power in Westeros and having her "win" this thing would sort of go against everything the series has set up so far.

was thinking a bit about how the show presents different philosophies of rule and power. almost as if cersei (matriarchal, aggressive, protective of family, self-interested, power as its own legitimacy) and ned (patriarchal, concerned with order and law, hierarchical) represent those two extremes, with other characters with power (Tywin, Dany, Jon) falling along that continuum. Maybe Jon's big flaw is that he's too much like Ned, too trusting of impersonal systems of power at the expense of random, emotional or personal elements (and maybe he's over that now). Dany is parallel to Jon and also seems to be on a narrative that seeks to balance these impulses. Power as Law/Order/Tradition vs Power as something more chaotic but also more substantial, power as Will--one without the other always fails.

she's the least intelligent person with any sort of power in Westeros

she's a teenager! And I would hardly call her the least intelligent, she actually is capable of learning from experience.

http://i.imgur.com/q3i0htD.jpg

^ there's dozens of these to be found

that one bizarrely leaves out cersei!!

as if a 3x3 grid wasn't nerdy enough ...

wtf are these new alignments