Television Game of Thrones (TV) • The watch has ended

[NinjaFletch]

Well, they introduced and bigged up the night king on their own (I think GRRM said he's not in the books; and so far he is not), so they alone are responsible for the hollowness of the final confrontation. Him wanting to get to Bran was the premise for the attack of his army on Winterfell, and then there is zero interaction between them, no questions about their connection answered, zip.

Ah, well we're definitely not getting an explanation then – or at least not one that makes any sense.

I'm not particularly sure we can trust GRRM. He's been involved with the show throughout and given direction to where things will go. For a plot point as huge as the others/whitewalkers (which is let's not forget, what both the show and books started with) I find it almost impossible to believe that GRRM didn't sketch it out. The plot lines of the show seem almost certainly to be taken from GRRM's vision, as he saw it at the time, even if the way the show gets there is necessarily different.

If and when he comes to writes the books he might change his mind and go somewhere different with it, but ultimately I think that's the problem: he's still writing the books. He might know where he wants the story to end (although I'm not sure he does), but he has spent 8 years trying to work out the steps to get half way there. I just think he's created too much of a mess for himself.

 

[GhastlyHun]

Ah, well we're definitely not getting an explanation then – or at least not one that makes any sense.

I'm not particularly sure we can trust GRRM. He's been involved with the show throughout and given direction to where things will go. For a plot point as huge as the others/whitewalkers (which is let's not forget, what both the show and books started with) I find it almost impossible to believe that GRRM didn't sketch it out. The plot lines of the show seem almost certainly to be taken from GRRM's vision, as he saw it at the time, even if the way the show gets there is necessarily different.

If and when he comes to writes the books he might change his mind and go somewhere different with it, but ultimately I think that's the problem: he's still writing the books. He might know where he wants the story to end (although I'm not sure he does), but he has spent 8 years trying to work out the steps to get half way there. I just think he's created too much of a mess for himself.

I kind of agree, but that's a discussion for the book thread.

 

[arnie_ni]

Also, the NK being resistant to dragonfire made no f*cking sense whatsoever, just another scene written for the visuals alone.
So we have dragonglass (somehow connected either to dragonfire or at least normal volcanic fire) and valyrian steel (the secrets of which, lost along with valyria, likely involved dragonfire in the forging process), so the two known weapons able to destroy wights and walkers are working somehow because of their affinity to fire of natural or dragon origin.... but then the actual fecking thing does no harm, at all? Come on.

You'll find out his a targareyen by birth or something. He rides and dragon and cant ve killed by fire

 

[dumbo]

0K (little Ice King joke there for ya), so it was good. It was shot really well, visually and narratively. It showed the power of sparsity and subtext when telling a story. There was very little dialogue in the whole episode but I'm guessing most people got what was implied, both broadly in terms of action and the more nuanced stuff between characters. The choreography was great. The scene with the torches was a fecking inspired idea and brilliantly executed. The little girl shouting siege commands was goofy, however what they did to her later was a very bold choice, and it paid off. It's the type of thing they should have been doing throughout the show but noticeably stopped when the writing nose dived. A little sense of peril and unexpected horror can add real spice and help keep an audience on their toes. Generally the whole thing had a quality that isn't usually present in GOT's Ronald Mcdonald soap opera.

Pretty much all the gripes with this episode come from pre-existing plot stupidity, and is presumably the fault of Dim and Dimmer:

• Credit to them for stealing the "not today" moment from Sanka in Cool Runnings.
  
• The battlefield Buddy system is fine to employ, it can work as a brief moment of relief and is a cliche for good reason. But for feck sake not everyone has to have that moment and if you over use it things start to look horribly contrived and stupid. I can't think of a recurring character who was in battle that wasn't saved by their buddy.
• Not sure how it was quite so easy for Drogon to get Lilliputianed, he's a fecking dragon and he's rolling around like a rat in a fire ant nest.
• Arya. Why oh why? Dim and Dimmer have made her the Tracy Flick of dweeb fantasy.
• Night King I hardly knew ye. I had bigger hopes for you and I'm sure GRRM did too, but Dim and Dimmer looked at you like a bad mechanic looks at break cables, deeming them extraneous and clumsily ripping them out whilst in motion. Good Night King sweet Ice Prince.
• Next week looks like some drab bullshit.

I still think that if you get an editor in to look over the last 3 or so seasons and cut out the worst dialogue and fix some of the poorer plot markers, you could retrieve something quite excellent, You might lose a third of the running time and pacing might be tricky but it's a real shame to see such moments of quality buried under a mountain of crap.

 

[Raees]

0K (little Ice King joke there for ya), so it was good. It was shot really well, visually and narratively. It showed the power of sparsity and subtext when telling a story. There was very little dialogue in the whole episode but I'm guessing most people got what was implied, both broadly in terms of action and the more nuanced stuff between characters. The choreography was great. The scene with the torches was a fecking inspired idea and brilliantly executed. The little girl shouting siege commands was goofy, however what they did to her later was a very bold choice, and it paid off. It's the type of thing they should have been doing throughout the show but noticeably stopped when the writing nose dived. A little sense of peril and unexpected horror can add real spice and help keep an audience on their toes. Generally the whole thing had a quality that isn't usually present in GOT's Ronald Mcdonald soap opera.

Pretty much all the gripes with this episode come from pre-existing plot stupidity, and is presumably the fault of Dim and Dimmer:

• Credit to them for stealing the "not today" moment from Sanka in Cool Runnings.
  
• The battlefield Buddy system is fine to employ, it can work as a brief moment of relief and is a cliche for good reason. But for feck sake not everyone has to have that moment and if you over use it things start to look horribly contrived and stupid. I can't think of a recurring character who was in battle that wasn't saved by their buddy.
• Not sure how it was quite so easy for Drogon to get Lilliputianed, he's a fecking dragon and he's rolling around like a rat in a fire ant nest.
• Arya. Why oh why? Dim and Dimmer have made her the Tracy Flick of dweeb fantasy.
• Night King I hardly knew ye. I had bigger hopes for you and I'm sure GRRM did too, but Dim and Dimmer looked at you like a bad mechanic looks at break cables, deeming them extraneous and clumsily ripping them out whilst in motion. Good Night King sweet Ice Prince.
• Next week looks like some drab bullshit.

I still think that if you get an editor in to look over the last 3 or so seasons and cut out the worst dialogue and fix some of the poorer plot markers, you could retrieve something quite excellent, You might lose a third of the running time and pacing might be tricky but it's a real shame to see such moments of quality buried under a mountain of crap.

Agreed.

 

[harms]

The little girl shouting siege commands was goofy, however what they did to her later was a very bold choice, and it paid off

A scene shamelessly stolen from LOTR's Pippin.

 

[Guy Incognito]

Thank god for the lord of light and those dragons breathing fire, it was dark in moments.

 

[R.N7]

Spoiler: just to be sure even though I really don't care:

Pretty lame episode tbh, ridden with big battle clichés. They did a smart job of obscuring it as much as possible. Arya would have been toast there if the show still lived up to it's season 1-2 standards but seeing as it's more a cross between Lost and Vikings these days it's not surprising they went for a Hollywood, all the good guys of importance survives ending. I'm kinda surprised we didn't see Legolas surfing on an elephant.

 

[dumbo]

Agreed.

oh, nice one.

 

[Reapersoul20]

Did anyone else find it very difficult to follow what was going on? I had it on a big 4K TV with perfect quality, and throughout a lot of the battle scenes there was so much ice/dust I could barely see what was happening.

It seemed like an intentional choice, but it was really fecking annoying.

 

[dumbo]

A scene shamelessly stolen from LOTR's Pippin.

Likely. The library was Jurassic Park, there was many a stolen zombie scene of all variation, How to Train Your Dragon, etc. I don't mind too much when it is done well.

 

[Suv666]

They have made GOT into a hollywood CGI spunkfest. Really dissapointed. Yeah the action sequences were great but I dont really care about them, they needed to explain more about the Night King and Bran. Such a letdown. Its just pandering to the Avengers crowd now, CGI, action and fan service. The unpredictability and the brutality of the show is gone now. I suppose the next 3 eps would be endless war sequences and throwback dialogues.

 

[Suv666]

0K (little Ice King joke there for ya), so it was good. It was shot really well, visually and narratively. It showed the power of sparsity and subtext when telling a story. There was very little dialogue in the whole episode but I'm guessing most people got what was implied, both broadly in terms of action and the more nuanced stuff between characters. The choreography was great. The scene with the torches was a fecking inspired idea and brilliantly executed. The little girl shouting siege commands was goofy, however what they did to her later was a very bold choice, and it paid off. It's the type of thing they should have been doing throughout the show but noticeably stopped when the writing nose dived. A little sense of peril and unexpected horror can add real spice and help keep an audience on their toes. Generally the whole thing had a quality that isn't usually present in GOT's Ronald Mcdonald soap opera.

Pretty much all the gripes with this episode come from pre-existing plot stupidity, and is presumably the fault of Dim and Dimmer:

• Credit to them for stealing the "not today" moment from Sanka in Cool Runnings.
  
• The battlefield Buddy system is fine to employ, it can work as a brief moment of relief and is a cliche for good reason. But for feck sake not everyone has to have that moment and if you over use it things start to look horribly contrived and stupid. I can't think of a recurring character who was in battle that wasn't saved by their buddy.
• Not sure how it was quite so easy for Drogon to get Lilliputianed, he's a fecking dragon and he's rolling around like a rat in a fire ant nest.
• Arya. Why oh why? Dim and Dimmer have made her the Tracy Flick of dweeb fantasy.
• Night King I hardly knew ye. I had bigger hopes for you and I'm sure GRRM did too, but Dim and Dimmer looked at you like a bad mechanic looks at break cables, deeming them extraneous and clumsily ripping them out whilst in motion. Good Night King sweet Ice Prince.
• Next week looks like some drab bullshit.

I still think that if you get an editor in to look over the last 3 or so seasons and cut out the worst dialogue and fix some of the poorer plot markers, you could retrieve something quite excellent, You might lose a third of the running time and pacing might be tricky but it's a real shame to see such moments of quality buried under a mountain of crap.

Agree with every word

 

[Raees]

"How did you sneak up on me like that".. missed that reference to Jon foreshadowing Arya's kill.

 

[rollingstoned1]

0K (little Ice King joke there for ya), so it was good. It was shot really well, visually and narratively. It showed the power of sparsity and subtext when telling a story. There was very little dialogue in the whole episode but I'm guessing most people got what was implied, both broadly in terms of action and the more nuanced stuff between characters. The choreography was great. The scene with the torches was a fecking inspired idea and brilliantly executed. The little girl shouting siege commands was goofy, however what they did to her later was a very bold choice, and it paid off. It's the type of thing they should have been doing throughout the show but noticeably stopped when the writing nose dived. A little sense of peril and unexpected horror can add real spice and help keep an audience on their toes. Generally the whole thing had a quality that isn't usually present in GOT's Ronald Mcdonald soap opera.

Pretty much all the gripes with this episode come from pre-existing plot stupidity, and is presumably the fault of Dim and Dimmer:

• Credit to them for stealing the "not today" moment from Sanka in Cool Runnings.
  
• The battlefield Buddy system is fine to employ, it can work as a brief moment of relief and is a cliche for good reason. But for feck sake not everyone has to have that moment and if you over use it things start to look horribly contrived and stupid. I can't think of a recurring character who was in battle that wasn't saved by their buddy.
• Not sure how it was quite so easy for Drogon to get Lilliputianed, he's a fecking dragon and he's rolling around like a rat in a fire ant nest.
• Arya. Why oh why? Dim and Dimmer have made her the Tracy Flick of dweeb fantasy.
• Night King I hardly knew ye. I had bigger hopes for you and I'm sure GRRM did too, but Dim and Dimmer looked at you like a bad mechanic looks at break cables, deeming them extraneous and clumsily ripping them out whilst in motion. Good Night King sweet Ice Prince.
• Next week looks like some drab bullshit.

I still think that if you get an editor in to look over the last 3 or so seasons and cut out the worst dialogue and fix some of the poorer plot markers, you could retrieve something quite excellent, You might lose a third of the running time and pacing might be tricky but it's a real shame to see such moments of quality buried under a mountain of crap.

Almost as though you can tell when they ran out of the original source material to borrow from and the show and it's writing started going massively downhill. It hasn't been anywhere near as good since S5 at least and it has for all intents and purposes become a TV fantasy flick like the Avengers which we still continue to see just because of how much time we have invested in it.
This episode was engaging but Arya killing the NK felt anti climactic at this stage of the season and really, the guy is just a caricature villain as of now whom we know very little about. Most of the episode other than that was just pixelated darkness with some bits of walking dead and Metal gear solid thrown in.

 

[GBBQ]

Did anyone else find it very difficult to follow what was going on? I had it on a big 4K TV with perfect quality, and throughout a lot of the battle scenes there was so much ice/dust I could barely see what was happening.

It seemed like an intentional choice, but it was really fecking annoying.

I am sure that rendering a big CGI battle in pitch black night time is a lot easier on the budget and more forgiving visually.

 

[Wednesday at Stoke]

D&D are just regular run of the mill TV blokes with a mega budget without GRRM's material.

 

[dumbo]

Agree with every word

Good stuff. I guess this beats posting some stupid shit and having everyone hate me.

 

[Cheesy]

Turns out the White Walkers are Liverpool: quite menacing due to their impressive history, from a barren wasteland, and full of promise of victory every season but eventually defeated quite easily with half the season to go because of some dodgy defensive errors at the back.

 

[Gambit]

My god some of you are spoiled shits. That was an amazing episode.

 

[Djemba-Djemba]

Well I thought it was brilliant.

It was very hard to make out what was happening in some scenes, but other than that it was great.

 

[GhastlyHun]

You'll find out his a targareyen by birth or something. He rides and dragon and cant ve killed by fire

I read that theory, but it's complete bullshit
The Night King was created, as depicted in the show, by the children of the forest to stop the first men from eradicating them from Westeros. The Targaryens or any other of the dragon lord houses of valyria are not native to Westeros. The NK must have been one of the first men, and not a Targaryen.

 

[dumbo]

Arya is the prime example of the way they've mishandled some of these characters. A young girl living under a patriarchal chivalric system, subjected to the trauma of growing up and the trauma of war, a misfit inversion of her model sister struggling to find her voice. She was the most interesting character and my favourite for a long time. They were given gold.

 

[Beachryan]

Died as he lived. Off-screen.

Ha, strong!!

 

[HTG]

When will they release the version where you can actually see shit? This was shot so damn dark, at times it was difficult to follow.
Otherwise it was a series of tremendously shot clichés. Was fun to watch but better not think about the story.

 

[do.ob]

The writing just feels so stupid.

Why hide in the crypts against the dead?
Why stand outside the walls of Winterfell against an overwhelming enemy?
Why does half the army charge alone into pitch darkness before the battle even begins?
Why do both dragon riders wait for Brienne to cry in pain before burning the dead?
Why light the firewall after your defenses have been broken? Why not split the enemy?
Why can Melisandre light thousands of Swords like it's no big thing, but struggles with firewood?
Where were the dragons while the army of the dead just AFK'd at the firewall?
If Bran was your bait why leave him with just a couple of Ironborn?
Why doesn't Sansa know how daggers work?
Why does Dany's dragon just keel over when a couple of Zombies attack it?
How does Arya get past all the dead and WW to land the blow?
Why is the NK immune to dragonfire but shatters against "dragon steel"?

Answer: because the writing isn't about telling a coherent story, it's about creating iconic badass moments and a rollercoaster between "oh yeah" and "oh no" moments, everything in-between and logic are secondary to that.

 

[dumbo]

Oh yeah and what the hell was Jon doing at the end there? Did he really think that he could use his dragon powers to command the animated cells of a dead dragon, despite it being abundantly clear that the essence of said dragon had long departed? It was that bygone Cartesian view of our beastly brethren that ruined the whole show for me.

 

[golden_blunder]

Spoiler

Well safe to say it's been a Stark weekend . First Tony and now Arya

Thanks for that - I haven’t seen avengers yet

 

[Moonred]

Night is full of darkness and pixels. Please, some brightness next one. Also people who could see the end coming (NK getting defeated), well done for seeing the obvious.

 

[Cheesy]

I don't really mind them surprising us with a quick defeat of the WW's and then focusing on the human conflict for the main conclusion, but it's surely unrealistic at this point for Cersei to stand any chance against them? Without some major plot contrivances they should be able to roast her 10 mins into the next episode.

 

[fallengt]

What a clusterfeck of a episode. It has epic moments but none of them makes sense, considering the fact that they had 7 seasons buildup for this single episode.
Every character has plot armor just to advance the plot and.. to create "epic scenes" purposely. For a stand-alone movie, it's probably fine by itself but for a soft-conclusion of the "greatest TV show of all time" It's bad, terribly bad. And why couldn't Lord of the light make the episode brighter.

Writers literally don't care anymore, they just want to be done with it.

 

[Fingeredmouse]

The writing just feels so stupid.

Why hide in the crypts against the dead?
Why stand outside the walls of Winterfell against an overwhelming enemy?
Why does half the army charge alone into pitch darkness before the battle even begins?
Why do both dragon riders wait for Brienne to cry in pain before burning the dead?
Why light the firewall after your defenses have been broken? Why not split the enemy?
Why can Melisandre light thousands of Swords like it's no big thing, but struggles with firewood?
Where were the dragons while the army of the dead just AFK'd at the firewall?
If Bran was your bait why leave him with just a couple of Ironborn?
Why doesn't Sansa know how daggers work?
Why does Dany's dragon just keel over when a couple of Zombies attack it?
How does Arya get past all the dead and WW to land the blow?
Why is the NK immune to dragonfire but shatters against "dragon steel"?

Answer: because the writing isn't about telling a coherent story, it's about creating iconic badass moments, everything in-between and logic are secondary to that.

There's very little on your list that is incoherent or illogical.

Can you really not get why you might, for instance, hide people in a secure underground structure in your fortified building when being attacked by an army? I'm not sure why you think using the firewall to try to stop the enemy getting to the walls is illogical and surely you're just being obtuse regarding the Sansa comment? As for Arya, and this criticism has come up a few times, I'm not sure why the magic, shape changing, super assassin stealth attacking someone is surprising people so much.

I do think the dragonfire resistance was pretty inconsistent against internal logic, but they do have something of an unconvincing (It's magic!") get out card. That's not how I'd have used a cavalry, but it's not inconsistent with standard Dothraki "run at them like a lunatic" tactics I don't think.

The writing has certainly had its flaws for some time, but I think a good chunk of your points above are a little unfair.

 

[Skills]

I don't really mind them surprising us with a quick defeat of the WW's and then focusing on the human conflict for the main conclusion, but it's surely unrealistic at this point for Cersei to stand any chance against them? Without some major plot contrivances they should be able to roast her 10 mins into the next episode.

Isn't half their army dead?

They've lost the dothraki cavalry, the unsullied look fecked and she's down to 1 dragon. Plus the northerners probably aren't interested in the battle for the iron throne.

 

[Gambit]

I love how everyone gets upset at the logic side and characters acting irrationally. On the one side they were fighting a large scale battle at night tired and defeated, how any of them in that situation would have a chance to think instead of just reacting is beyond me. If that's still isn't enough or you that they weren't thinking cleverly and acting smart and it was unrealistic to you. It's a show about dragons fighting zombies for fecks sake.

 

[Cheesy]

Isn't half their army dead?

They've lost the dothraki cavalry, the unsullied look fecked and she's down to 1 dragon. Plus the northerners probably aren't interested in the battle for the iron throne.

Even with one dragon they should still be able to roast Cersei pretty quickly. You'd think people would be fairly receptive once they realise they've killed the dead.

 

[Ødegaard]

Speculation

Spoiler

Anyone think Mountain kills (or more likely is about to kill) Arya, and that gets Hound extra motivated?

I know he doesn't need any motivation, that's all he wants to do. It's just the way he lost all hope today, but 'woke up' for Arya.

Other way around.

 

[Gambit]

Even with one dragon they should still be able to roast Cersei pretty quickly. You'd think people would be fairly receptive once they realise they've killed the dead.

Spoiler: Rhaegal (Jons Dragon) fate

Rhaegal is alive, you see him in the promo for the next episode
What state he is in, is another matter.

 

[stepic]

given how hyper important the NK is (literally everyone dies if he does), i did think it's a pretty shit strategy him risking being anywhere near the action. he should have been standing back the whole time, and just keep resurrecting his army until literally every last soul was dead besides bran. then have his guys bring him to him. he shouldn't be involved in the action at all, he shouldn't have risked Theon running at him at all. he is insanely hyper critical ffs.

 

[Skills]

Anyone else found the NK resurrecting the dead quite annoying. I thought the whole burning them would put them away for good.

Its not as if he needed more troops and a final battle of the remaining dead lead by all 10 WWs would've been even more formidable.

 

[Ødegaard]

Anyone else found the NK resurrecting the dead quite annoying. I thought the whole burning them would put them away for good.

Its not as if he needed more troops and a final battle of the remaining dead lead by all 10 WWs would've been even more formidable.

He resurrected the dead "good guys" though. Not the dead dead.

The point of it was to not risk a duel against someone with the means to kill him.