Game of Thrones [SPOILERS]

[Tale]

As for Davos...

[eldaec]

One thing did bother me, that interpretation depends in Davos knowing Stannis is dead.  How does he know Stannis is dead? Did he read the script?

While we're at it, how did Melisandre reach Castle Black in a day? And why did she go to Castle Black? I originally thought she would have figured out Jon is Azor Ahai, but her general demeanor suggests not.

I'm finding this sort of thing doesn't bother me as much this year, last season lowered my expectations sufficiently for me to be happy with tits and dragons.

Found this episode a bit flat. Mereen remains dull - felt like the tv writers can't think of anything for Varys and Tyrion to do. Liked the sequence on Pyke. Winterfell was ok, but killing Roose makes me wonder if the show writers have enough pieces left to write an interesting scene there.

[Khaldun]

Seems to me Davos could go right back to smuggling pretty well. Though it's a long way home unless the writers need you to be somewhere, in which case you just hop on a horse and you usually make five hundred miles in a day. But he's been convinced about the Long Night (on no particular evidence, mind you, other than having witnessed magic and met sincere people who seem convinced).

[Merusk]

It occurs to me that these gaps have always been there, but until now we've had book-readers to infill backstory and motives. Lacking that foundation it becomes apparent how little you can convey in 5-10 minute vignettes when trying to avoid (s)exposition.

It also makes it apparent why a soap opera takes 2 years to tell a simple story between 3-4 people.

[Speedy Cerviche]

Winterfell was ok, but killing Roose makes me wonder if the show writers have enough pieces left to write an interesting scene there.

I feel like this gets wrapped up quickly since it is now pretty straightforward. Everyone has converged at Castle Black vs Ramsey who is all alone, and they have a large army (Wildlings). I'm guessing Ramsey marches on the wall in short order as he mentioned he wanted to do, before killing Roose, and gets slaughtered (probably betrayed too in the process, as would be poetic).

[Khaldun]

I'm also really sure that maybe even this season

[Speedy Cerviche]

Heh that's kind of cartoonish but seems to be the direction things are trending. Let's just hope there's no rubble surfing scene.

[Khaldun]

Kind of like this scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeLqsvFO31o

[Merusk]

Kind of like this scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeLqsvFO31o

That scene has always bothered me because the warp core is nowhere near the saucer, yet the saucer blows-up while the rest of the hull remains intact.

[Sir T]

If it had blown up at the proper place the ship would have been blown in half and you wouldn't have this lovely scene where it dove into the atmosphere for whatever reason. Well, maybe the saucer could have, but would it have still looked Enterprizey then? vOv

[K9]

The main thing that I don't get about Ramsey:

[Samwise]

I was really happy to see Lyanna show up in the flashback at the start of the episode.

Also, good god did they cast young Hodor well.

Also, the Karstarks/etc were totally cool with the Red Wedding.  They're clearly playing for whatever team they think will win and fuck your "honor".

[Speedy Cerviche]

Probably that young Karstark there figures he's already in deep with Ramsey, as you mention especially after the red wedding, no point in second guessing him now.

[eldaec]

The main thing that I don't get about Ramsey:

Possibly I'm carrying too much book knowledge over, but the North is balanced between the Bolton faction and the Stark loyalist faction. The Karstarks are still pissed about Robb executing their Lord and wouldn't be trusted by the Stark faction. Ramsey is their only option.

[Samwise]

And we've seen how well crying "NO FAIR" after an unexpected betrayal tends to work out for surviving allies of the betrayee.   You're either on the bus or you're off the bus.

[Khaldun]

There's that whole weird dinner scene in the books where you think somebody's gonna get poisoned only nothing happens, but it does give you some sense that the North is pretty much either "Waiting for the Starks, and/or waiting to kill Boltons and Freys the first good chance we get" and "Fuck the Starks, and I guess the Boltons will do for now".

[Hoax]

There's that whole weird dinner scene in the books where you think somebody's gonna get poisoned only nothing happens, but it does give you some sense that the North is pretty much either "Waiting for the Starks, and/or waiting to kill Boltons and Freys the first good chance we get" and "Fuck the Starks, and I guess the Boltons will do for now".

Missing out on all the stuff with Lord Manderly will make it almost impossible for strictly TV people who actually get wth is up with the North.

[Morat20]

The main thing that I don't get about Ramsey:

[Khaldun]

Just rewatched end of Season 5. Everybody's right--Davos doesn't actually know what happened at the battle. As far as he knows, Melisandre is the only survivor of a catastrophic defeat, and she's not said anything to change that impression. Makes you wonder if Davos will ever learn the truth.

[Teleku]

There's that whole weird dinner scene in the books where you think somebody's gonna get poisoned only nothing happens, but it does give you some sense that the North is pretty much either "Waiting for the Starks, and/or waiting to kill Boltons and Freys the first good chance we get" and "Fuck the Starks, and I guess the Boltons will do for now".

Very minor book spoilers:

[eldaec]

There's that whole weird dinner scene in the books where you think somebody's gonna get poisoned only nothing happens, but it does give you some sense that the North is pretty much either "Waiting for the Starks, and/or waiting to kill Boltons and Freys the first good chance we get" and "Fuck the Starks, and I guess the Boltons will do for now".

Missing out on all the stuff with Lord Manderly will make it almost impossible for strictly TV people who actually get wth is up with the North.

To be fair, they did the thing the TV show has done every episode of season 5 and 6, they had Roose stand in the middle of an empty room and flat out tell Ramsey, "Everyone except the Umbers and Karstarks hate us".

The Winterfell scenes would definitely have benefited from at least some hint of what the Northern factions are up to. I get why Manderly was cut if they wanted to do Feast and Dance in ten episodes, but at least a couple of Northern houses joining Stannis or showing up at Winterfell to seethe in the corner would have been a help.

It doesn't compare very well with the scenes Robb had dealing with the Northern houses during the war, or any of the court or council scenes in Kings Landing prior to season 5, or even Tyrion or Tywin ruling from the Hand's solar. Bran had better scenes being a Lord than Roose has had - he was even seen in more than one room of Winterfell.

[eldaec]

Just rewatched end of Season 5. Everybody's right--Davos doesn't actually know what happened at the battle. As far as he knows, Melisandre is the only survivor of a catastrophic defeat, and she's not said anything to change that impression. Makes you wonder if Davos will ever learn the truth.

Melisandre doesn't even know what happened bar any hints from the flames.

So the most charitable interpretation I can put on Melisandre is that she realised Stannis isn't AA after the burning, but more importantly, also that she'd left her phone charger 605 miles to the North at Castle Black, so somehow rode there in a day because she is Gandalf. Seeing Jon is dead is no big deal because she still can't find her charger, those meaningful stares last season were just because he has a cool beard, she clearly doesn't think he is anything special because she hasn't been able to shut up about the prophecy over five and a quarter seasons and nonetheless doesn't think it worth mentioning to Davos now.

[Khaldun]

Time and distance are a really annoying thing to me in these kinds of stories. They really do need to be taken seriously rather than just seriously when the writers need them to be and ignored otherwise. Every once in a while Thrones characters do comment on the length of time the story's been going on--Sam says something to Jon like, "We've known each other for years", which in a world where the seasons last for years seems like it could be right. So sometimes the stuff that seems to take a few days could arguably have taken longer and we just didn't get the dull parts. Say the opening journey of the Stark-Lannister entourages to King's Landing from Winterfell, which was still in summer. 

But leaving Stannis about a day's march on foot (!) from Winterfell (that can't be more than 20 miles from the place, really) and getting back to Castle Black without any muss or fuss just doesn't seem quite right.

[Ruvaldt]

Just rewatched end of Season 5. Everybody's right--Davos doesn't actually know what happened at the battle. As far as he knows, Melisandre is the only survivor of a catastrophic defeat, and she's not said anything to change that impression. Makes you wonder if Davos will ever learn the truth.

Melisandre doesn't even know what happened bar any hints from the flames.

So the most charitable interpretation I can put on Melisandre is that she realised Stannis isn't AA after the burning, but more importantly, also that she'd left her phone charger 605 miles to the North at Castle Black, so somehow rode there in a day because she is Gandalf. Seeing Jon is dead is no big deal because she still can't find her charger, those meaningful stares last season were just because he has a cool beard, she clearly doesn't think he is anything special because she hasn't been able to shut up about the prophecy over five and a quarter seasons and nonetheless doesn't think it worth mentioning to Davos now.

She mentions in the first episode of this season that she saw Jon Snow in the flames and he was fighting at Winterfell (at about 5:50 if you rewatch it).  That's the reason she went back to Castle Black, and I think she was surprised to see him dead, which led to her final scene in that episode which was a kind of crisis of faith.

[eldaec]

Time and distance are a really annoying thing to me in these kinds of stories. They really do need to be taken seriously rather than just seriously when the writers need them to be and ignored otherwise. Every once in a while Thrones characters do comment on the length of time the story's been going on--Sam says something to Jon like, "We've known each other for years", which in a world where the seasons last for years seems like it could be right. So sometimes the stuff that seems to take a few days could arguably have taken longer and we just didn't get the dull parts. Say the opening journey of the Stark-Lannister entourages to King's Landing from Winterfell, which was still in summer.  

But leaving Stannis about a day's march on foot (!) from Winterfell (that can't be more than 20 miles from the place, really) and getting back to Castle Black without any muss or fuss just doesn't seem quite right.

Fwiw the people who construct entire wikis from the books claim it's now about two and a half years since the GoT prologue.

[Setanta]

I must admit that they DON'T respect travel time in the TV series. If they did then we'd be exposed to a lot of drek that Martin dragged us through in the books.

People complain about padding on TV... that is nothing to the sheer boredom in the books

[Threash]

The travel portions are about the best writing Martin has done.  If you think that is padding you really don't like books.

[Khaldun]

Sure, I don't want the equivalent of a thousand-page river voyage while Tyrion mutters about whores. It's just that it's hard to have characters worried about the vast distances they might have to travel one minute and then in the next minute be totally casual about the idea of walking five hundred miles by tomorrow.

[Hoax]

The travel portions are about the best writing Martin has done.  If you think that is padding you really don't like books.

The padding is in the meals. He's such a fat fuck about describing every aspect of every course of every meal every chance he gets. Once you notice it its painfully obnoxious.

[Merusk]

Yeah, he's to meals what Jordan was to clothing and furnishings.

[Khaldun]

Well, that was one of the most inconsequential and dull episodes on the heels of one of the more consequential ones. Boring.

[Rendakor]

Looks like another good week for Stark's Sixth Sense.

[Chimpy]

Going to be a shitty points week :(

[Khaldun]

"Oh, sorry, did you want to see what really happened, Bran? It will have to wait. Now we need to look at the balance sheets kept by the Hand of the fourth Targaryen king, in specific, the purchase of wines from Pentos over a roughly ten-month period so we can determine the labor outputs of the Essos hinterland over a thirty-year interval."

[Rendakor]

Going to be a shitty points week :(

For me too. Maybe I'll get some status handouts for Ramsay and/or some wit from the High Sparrow, but I'm not holding my breath.