Summary: Dany takes control of King's Landing and plans to conquer the world. Tyrion quits as Hand and is apprehended. Jon talks with Tyrion who encourages him to kill Dany. Jon eventually kills Dany. Drogon goes into a rage and urns down the iron throne. Drogon leaves with Dany's body. Jon is taken as a prisoner. The lords of the realm and Tyrion meet to appoint a new king. Tyrion suggests Bran and the others all agree. Bran takes over as king and creates a new small council. Tyrion is taken as Hand. Bran sentences Jon to the Night's Watch. Sansa is allowed independence in the North. Arya sails west on a new adventure.
The Good: The episode started off on the right foot. The opening scenes did a brilliant job of establishing a melancholy and desolate atmosphere, creating a near-perfect tone for Dany's new world that she so violently created. Tyrion and Jon walking through the death on the streets was powerful and nicely set up both characters to oppose Dany later. There were a number of great scenes early in the episode. I thought Dany's break the wheel speech was fantastic and nicely showed us how fractured her mind and goals had become (even if the process to get here wasn't very good at all). Tyrion resigning from his position was a good moment too. Tyrion actually had the best scene of the episode prior to this when he finds the dead bodies of his siblings. It was a sad and tragic end for the Lannisters with Tyrion facing the death of his family. Tyrion and Jon's conversation was quite good too. It was lengthy and I think it was the closest we have gotten to the classic conversations of seasons 1-4 in a long while. Both characters' motives were clear and they had some very good lines. Tyrion finally did something smart for the first time in many seasons, while Jon has finally been given a proper conflict to deal with in this season. There were some good references to the past as well which the show has done well in the last 2 seasons, if a bit too often. Brienne's story ended up being the only one I was actually satisfied with. Her character's arc this season was the only one that felt earned and emotional with great (though not perfect) closure on her character. Having her finish off Jaime's account in The White Book was a great, and fittingly somber conclusion for her relationship with Jaime. Jon actually interacted with Ghost! Yay! The Bad: This ending was underwhelming in a lot of ways and I don't think it captured the essence of the show very much at all. D&D decided to take inspiration from "The Lord of the Rings" for this ending with its many layers and its epic length. I liked it for "Lord of the Rings" because it nicely closed out the characters while offering a very emotional farewell. Yet it failed horribly here because the path to these final scenes was so poor. The scenes dragged on and were more confusing and rushed than anything else. Somehow after years and years of investment, I felt nothing at the end of what used to be one of my favourite TV shows. How has it come to this? Well I believe I've explained why the show isn't as good as it used to be in my more recent reviews (mostly because of writing) and that is a big reason as to why this finale flopped. My immersion and investment had slowly been chipped away since season 5. The writing of the show had hit such a low that I was falling out of love with the story and its characters. Now after this episode, I think I finally hit that moment where I stopped caring after the many stupidities I had to watch in this episode. The fond farewells did nothing for me and I found myself just eager to get this disappointment over with. Rather than relishing my final moments in this world, I just wanted it to be over. And unlike TV shows like "Lost" or "Breaking Bad" which left me feeling sad at its conclusion due to the need to say goodbye to these characters, "Game of Thrones" just left me feeling sad that the show wasn't better than it was. The first half of this episode should have been outstanding and emotional. Dany has gone evil and has killed a ton of people. Now our heroes need to come to terms with themselves and murder her. It's a great story idea yet it doesn't work. Why? Once more it fails because of the writing. The way the show got to this position was so contrived that I found it actually difficult to buy into the story being told. It kept my immersion minimal so I wasn't into the emotions that Jon and Tyrion were feeling as they conspired against Dany. That, coupled with a ridiculously rushed pacing, caused my emotional investment to be low and that prevented the episode from impacting me the way that it should have. Even the Jon/Tyrion scene had issues with it that I immediately noticed. Jon says he won't defend what Dany did, and yet he immediately starts defending her. Why? I can't buy into him still standing beside Dany after this happened. Their romance isn't strong enough of a storyline for this to work. I was upset by Tyrion adding some depth to his decision to kill Varys after the fact. Wouldn't that have been such a great story to watch develop for a few episodes? Instead the show is so rushed that nothing interesting happened when it could have been great. These big problems made me reflect on how disappointing the show has been these past few seasons, rather than reflect on how great the show was. This occurred many more times throughout the episode. Then we get to Jon killing Dany, and it was... disappointing. The scene was so generic with Jon kissing and killing Dany in such a dull and predictable way. It felt so easy and shockingly anticlimactic. I feel like I should have felt so much more here, but with the lame writing and rushed nature of Jon and Dany's relationship, the scene fell flat for me with little emotion. Drogon burning the iron throne and not killing Jon afterwards felt odd and I was left with more questions than answers. It was yet another case of the writers wanting to go for spectacle rather than actual substance. So with Dany dead, you would expect absolute chaos to result. I was much more excited to see what happened following her death than anything else in the episode. But the writers made the boneheaded mistake of ignoring the fallout and doing a lazy timeskip. Well what happened? How did the public react? Did the Dothraki go crazy and kill more? Did Jon's men rise up? Did Dany's death cause riots? What happened to everyone after she died? Did King's Landing get rebuilt? Were there enough people to do this? These questions were all skipped over because the writers were too lazy. It's unbelievable. Continuing on the writers' laziness, I thought it was remarkable that we didn't get proper follow-up on the events of last episode. Nobody tries to make sure that Cersei is actually dead. We don't see if any survivors were found and what was done with them. We don't see what everyone thinks about Dany. We don't even get a scene where people confront Dany for killing everyone after the surrender. Hell, Jon doesn't even bring this up when he talks with her! These are important details, and the lack of these details completely killed my immersion. I was too distracted to care about what was happening in the show. Then we get to the god-awful scene where the lords of Westeros gather to select a new king. First of all, how did this get organized? What was everyone told? Why did they all gather? Was nobody busy? Did nobody care to bring any of their own men with them? Who sent the messages? Whose side are they on? Are there any threats to be worried about? How many men do each of them have? The "Game of Thrones" of old would never have glossed over these details. I've said before how the world of Westeros feels so empty now, and this is one of the reasons why. None of the details are explored. The scene itself is horribly written. It's implied that Grey Worm has power over the city. So did he invite everyone here? They are all meeting in the dragonpit after all. There is literally not a single line of dialogue addressing how this was all organized. Grey Worm is so hostile and seems to want to resolve things himself. So why didn't he care to participate in this discussion? Was Tyrion his representative? No way that's right. Why was Tyrion even allowed to attend anyways? None of these details were touched on and it adds to how poorly the scene is written. There is so much more too that I hated. Edmure is openly humiliated again in an unnecessary scene. I hate that the writers chose to give time to this scene rather than focusing on the details of the world. The comedy in this scene was weak and not needed. I did get a kick out of Yara laughing at Sam for suggesting a vote from the people. Did she forget that the ironborn select their next king in the same way? The decision to make Bran the king was so, so, so stupid. Why would everyone listen to Tyrion, the prisoner, anyways? And why does Tyrion think Bran is a good choice? They have hardly ever talked! Furthermore, Bran's reactions are so bad. Bran has made it clear he doesn't want anymore, yet in this scene he implies that he only came down to King's Landing because he wanted to be king. What awful, awful writing. Plus, why does literally everyone vote for him? Do the others not have their own interests? Plus, half of them have no idea who the hell Bran even is, so why would they vote for him?! It's so dumb. Then Sansa asks for independence, which makes sense. But why didn't anybody else try for independence. How about Yara, who was promised independence back in "The Winds of Winter"? Does she not want it anymore? Or Dorne, who were never ruled by the king to being with? So much for unbowed, unbent, unbroken. Hell, the prince of Dorne didn't say a single word, so clearly he doesn't matter. Also, why is Gendry the official lord of the Stormlands now? Did it only take Dany's word at Winterfell to make it official? Did the people of the Stormlands just accept him without any kind of fight? It's all so unrealistic. The more I think about it, the more holes I am able to poke into the logic of this scene. It's simply pathetic. I hated how the episode treated Jon after he killed Dany. He had little to no focus on his character after this. Nobody vouched for him to be a king even though he is a Targaryen. Why, I will never know. What's worse is that when you look back at it, Jon's lineage had zero impact on the story. All it did was make Dany mad. That's literally it. Such a big twist with limitless possibilities can't possibly have no ramifications whatsoever. That's just poor storytelling. Furthermore, the decision on what to do with him should surely have been given more time. It's a genuine conflict for Bran. But alas, the writers don't care about Bran and Jon's simply banished in one scene. Why is he banished anyways? The only people who want him dead just went away to Naath. So can't they just free him now? Plus, why is the Night's Watch even a thing now? What are they defending against? The White Walkers are dead and the wildlings are allies now. Are they hunting for grumpkins and snarks? Also, what about that gaping hole in The Wall? Is anyone going to be able to fix that? I have several other quibbles. The small council scene was pathetic and just served to remind me of how good the small council scenes were earlier in the series. The patheticness of this scene was just painful for me to experience and it made me crave for the old "Game of Thrones" more than anything. How could it have come to this? Arya's extended screentime in the last episode was quite pointless. She did nothing whatsoever. Hell, she didn't even have a story arc this season even though she killed the Night King. She was painfully bland. The same can be said for many of the characters this season. They were misused and/or given nothing to do. The best examples are Jon, Dany, Jaime, Cersei and Davos, though many other characters had downright bad storylines this season. I'm honing in on Arya specifically because she had so much time on screen. Yet she did next to nothing the entire time. How hard is it to give her a character arc instead of just making her an unkillable assassin? Furthermore, that convenient horse from last episode didn't even get any pay-off. It wasn't symbolism, it was just a way to make Arya survive King's Landing. And damn it, it doesn't even appear in this episode! The presence of winter has been so inconsistent. The scenes flash from summer to winter sporadically and it fails to establish a consistent setting. After hyping up that winter will be coming from the first episode, it hardly even came at all. Even the writers don't know if it's winter or not. Had Jaime or Cersei stood a few feet away from where they were, they would have lived. That's just poor storytelling. The Unknown: Did King's Landing get rebuilt? Or is it still rubble? How many survivors were there? Is Bran actually ruling anything? Why does Bran need a master of whisperers when he knows everything? That's kind of pointless, and besides, who would even be up to the task? Who will be Bran's kingsguard? Will he have any? You would think that the cripple king would need guards more than anyone else. Where has Drogon gone with Dany's body? Valyria? Did Jon join up with the wildlings rather than the Night's Watch? That's a neat development. What ever happened with the Lord of Light? Does he no logner exist? Why did he bring Jon back to life anyways? I find it tough to believe it was just to kill Ramsay and Dany. Best Moment: Tyrion crying over his dead siblings. Character of the Episode: Brienne for having the best character conclusion. Conclusion: This was so disappointing, and I don't think disappointing is a strong enough word to describe what happened here. The finale is enjoyable enough at parts but the writing is so lazy it's absurd. D&D really phoned it in this season and it shows. This is an absolute trainwreck and will go down as one of the worst finales ever. The more I think about this episode, the more painful it gets. At this point I'm not even mad anymore, just in pain. How did such a great story end this way? Season 8 ended up as a pretty looking, well-acted disaster. Outside of episode 2, no storytelling stood out whatsoever and it was nearly impossible to care about anything that happened in the show. The characters were all handled badly, many questions were left unanswered and the ending proved to be absolutely awful. At this point I really don't want to talk about this season any more than I already have. I've written thousands of words on it, and that will be enough to give you an idea of how weak this was. In retrospect, every episode I rated this season was rated too high and should have been much lower, particularly the battle episodes which are fun on the first watch, but disappointingly stale on rewatch. Even "The Bells" feels so much worse after watching how meaningless it all was following this episode. It's amazing how much stink a bad ending will leave on the rest of the show. "Game of Thrones" didn't deserve to go out this way, and I've already rejected this as a canonical ending. I'll just have to wait until GRRM releases the final two books to get the ending we deserve. Score: 35
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Summary: Varys attempts to have Dany poisoned but Tyrion discovers his treason. Dany executes Varys. Jaime is captured in Dany's camp. Tyrion meets with him and ultimately frees him. Arya and The Hound infiltrate King's Landing. Jaime isn't able to get into the Red Keep and has to sneak around. Dany's army arrives outside. Dany arrives on Drogon and burns all of the scorpions as well as the Iron Fleet. Dany destroys the Golden Company and lets her army inside. The Lannister troops surrender but Dany burns them all anyways. The battle continues and Dany slaughters thousands of innocents in the city. The Hound has a final send-off with Arya who chooses to try to escape. The Hound finds Cersei, Qyburn and Gregor. Gregor kills Qyburn so Cersei leaves quietly. The Hound fights his brother. They both die in a fire. Jaime finds Cersei alone. They share a moment together and both of them die in the ruin of King's Landing.
The Good: Like the last episode, this was really strong on the surface, even outstanding at times. The massacre in King's Landing seems to be the ending GRRM had in mind, and it works really well. On paper, everything we see here is powerful and dramatic, and it seems like an ideal final act for the show. I like the idea of Dany going mad. The execution leaves a lot to be desired (see: The Bad), but the idea of having her slaughter all of these innocents after spending so much time freeing innocents in Essos is a tragic conclusion for her character. It's vicious and frightening, and makes me feel uncomfortable for rooting for Dany all this time if this is what she was going to do as a queen. Similarly, I like the idea of Jaime dying with Cersei in the end. Sometimes, characters aren't able to fulfill their redemption, and leaving Cersei behind ended up being too much for Jaime to bear. Having him throw his life away to be with her one last time is a heartbreaking end for a character who was so close to becoming a good man. The final scene between the two of them was well acted and well written, and could have been the episode's finest moment had the build-up been better. I thought the best scene of the episode came early in the episode. It was Tyrion and Jaime's final moments together. They have always had great conversations and they got to add one last one before the series ends. There was genuine emotion here as well with both Lannisters expecting to lose their lives, and Tyrion thanking Jaime for being a good brother to him. Varys' death early on in the episode was good. I like that the show has kept his character consistent as he chose to act against Dany and did so in the deceitful manner he is best known for. His plot to poison Dany using one of his little birds was clever and it made sense that the discovery of this plot would result in his death. Most of this episode centered on the big battle, and it was splendid to watch. The action was good, the editing was great, and the cinematography was even better. The episode looked fantastic and could pass for a movie due to the epic scale, brilliant effects and lovely make-up. The scenes were shot really nicely too, with the despairing tone presented nicely. I loved the way that the editing framed Dany deciding to burn everyone. The bells ringing in her head, mixed with some terrific acting added to the moment, and Cersei's horrified face when Dany took flight once again was an outstanding pay-off. But then the episode became so somber as we see tons and tons of innocents burning, and dying, and running for their lives. It's a horrible scene to behold and it really drives home one of the series' biggest themes: war is awful. Since season 1, we had all rooted for Dany to come in with dragons and burn the evil in Westeros. Well, here our wishes were granted, and in a classic "Game of Thrones" twist, we find ourselves horrified seeing exactly what we had been craving for 7 and a half seasons. The scenes with The Hound and Arya were strong. I enjoyed their final send-off. Cleganebowl was epic, brutal and spectacular in all the right ways, while Arya's escape was horrific, intense and violent. Centering the battle around these two characters ended up being a really good idea and gave the final parts of the episode the necessary focus to succeed in hitting our emotions. I thought that showing Arya's struggle so in-depth was a smart idea. She has never been pressed quite like this, and the ending with her leaving King's Landing on a white horse symbolizing death seems to suggest that she is going to do something about the horrors she had to experience. The Hound's scenes with The Mountain were simpler but still effective. Qyburn's sudden death was delectably ironic and set up the intensity of this fight from the get-go. I loved the callback to The Mountain crushing Oberyn too. The fight itself was very consistent with the revenge speech The Hound gave Arya. The Hound's whole life has been destroyed by revenge, and here he is at his most pathetic state: fighting a ghost of his brother who isn't even alive. It's a pretty depressing place for his character to be, but at least he gets a more positive send-off as he sends himself and The Mountain down to a fiery end, the perfect result of their relationship. The Bad: But like the last episode, the writing let this down. I'll start with the most egregious fault of this episode: Dany slaughtering all of the innocents. Now, I don't have a problem with this being the final act of the story. Having Dany go mad and kill everyone is a strong idea and would have a lot of emotion to it. But it isn't earned. Dany has always gone out of her way to save innocents, only punishing those who deserve to be punished. Hell, it's what she does in this episode when she kills Varys. Yet for some reason, it's framed that she is going mad because of this. Why? Because she executes people? Every ruler executes people, so why is this bad? I'm sure Tywin Lannister would do the same thing and he was a great leader. Hell, even Jon executed people! Are we just going to forget that he ordered the death of a young boy? Does that make him mad too? The portrayal of Dany going mad is too inconsistent. Furthermore, I'm not sure why everyone thinks that Dany grieving her friends is equal to her being mad. After all, I'm sure Jon would have the same reaction and desire for vengeance over Cersei. I'm unsure why everyone thinks Jon would be so much better than her. And why hasn't their been more discussion on a marriage? It was casually dismissed last episode and never brought up since. The actual moment where Dany went mad is absolutely ridiculous. The show treated going mad like flipping a switch. That doesn't happen. There needs to be build-up and troubling signs that lead to going mad. The writers failed to do this for Dany. There were no signs that led to her committing mass genocide. Plus, she had no motivation to do so. I could understand her going straight to Cersei and murdering her in the Red Keep, but also the innocents in the city? There is literally nothing that leads me to believe that Dany would do this, especially since we spent so much time in Essos getting to know that Dany loves the innocents. It's a sudden turn that doesn't feel earned in the slightest. I thought that Varys' death was disappointing as well. His dialogue this season hasn't been good. I've noticed that the show has failed to produce any good new lines for Varys in the past few seasons. He just recycles lines from previous seasons with no creative input being put in for his character. And then he just dies. His death didn't feel anywhere near as significant as it should have been. The show rushed to the moment and failed to examine any repercussions from his death. Killing Varys came off more like the writers checking a character death off the list instead of an actual plot point. Furthermore, I was disappointed that Dany didn't even refer to a prior conversation she had with Varys about betrayal. It should have been brought up and that could have been a good moment. But I guess the writers thought it wouldn't make Dany seem mad so they avoided it. It just goes to show how forced Dany's madness has been int he past few episodes. The battle scenes had issues too. After being the single most useful weapon ever created, the scorpions became absolutely useless in this episode. The inconsistency is ridiculous and gives the universe zero consistency. Also, Euron's fleet was taken out ridiculously easily. All of those boats had scorpions, so how did Dany dodge all of them? The scorpions have magically become completely inaccurate. Then we get to the Golden Company who were a complete waste of time. Why was there so much build-up to these losers who all died in seconds? The biggest fault for me was the size of Dany's army. There should have been far fewer men in her army because so many of them died fighting the Night King. Plus, how the hell does Dany still have more Dothraki? Didn't they all die in that initial charge back in "The Long Night"? Euron's fight with Jaime was a waste of time. Euron was the most pointless villain ever who did very little of note, and his death was suitably lame and disappointing. Then we have Jaime just taking two significant stab wounds and just walking away from it easily. It was like the direct sequel to when Arya got stabbed and just shrugged it off back in "No One". Jaime returning to Cersei felt like character regression. The issue is that the show spent so much time working on his redemption arc, and then spontaneously undid all of the hard work without reason. There was no logical reason for Jaime to decide to return to Cersei and it really hurt his character arc. This was nearly as poor as Dany choosing to kill everyone. The Unknown: So will we never know about the voice Varys heard when he was castrated? I'm glad to see that the show provided a terrific pay-off for all of the time spent building up magic. That was sarcasm. Is Jon going to kill Dany next episode? One terrible ruler replaces another. Who did Varys send those letters to? Will we see reinforcements coming to ally behind Jon? Perhaps Edmure will return? Or Yara? Dany going crazy spells bad things for Tyrion. When Dany finds out that Tyrion let Jaime go, I think it could be likely that she attempts to have him executed. I really hope for Tyrion's sake that he can somehow get out of that situation. The wildfire explosions were intriguing. Were those simply leftover bits of wildfire from Aerys? Or had Cersei placed them there? Best Moment: Tyrion and Jaime's scene was poignant. Character of the Episode: Tyrion. Conclusion: This was a great spectacle as expected and the story that was being told is a very good one. If this is GRRM's ending, it's hard to imagine anybody being disappointed with the route the story went. What is disappointing is how we got to this climax. Had there been better set-up to the massacre we witnessed here, this would have been one of the show's best episodes ever. Instead, this is merely good. Score: 65 Summary: A funeral is held for those who died. Jon is hailed by his men and Dany si notably worried about this. She begs Jon not to reveal his heritage. Jon tells Sansa and Arya anyways. Sansa tells Tyrion who tells Varys. Varys, concerned about Dany's deteriorating mental state, plots to turn on her. Dany marches against Cersei and sends some of her army in a small fleet with the two dragons. They encounter Euron who kills Rhaegal and sinks the fleet. Missandei is captured. Dany meets with Cersei outside King's Landing and tries to negotiate a surrender. Cersei refuses and kills Missandei.
The Good: The episode started off on the right track with the funeral sequence. It was a sweet farewell to all of the characters who died, and all of the main characters portrayed their sadness nicely. It was clear how badly they were affected by the battle against the dead. I also enjoyed the celebrations afterwards. After all, why wouldn't everyone celebrate surviving certain death? Tormund was a joy to watch and he made me laugh quite a bit. Dany was very good in this episode and Emilia Clarke did a really good job. She portrayed Dany's sadness and anger really well. The few shots of Dany quietly listening as Jon's men all praised him was wonderful. Her sadness, loneliness and jealousy was portrayed so well, and it made her feel a little more relatable as she gets next to no love or glory for pretty much saving the entire world. I get the sense that the show is definitely going the Mad Queen route with Dany, and I like that because it's a good story to tell that opens the door for more interesting conflict in these last few episodes. I enjoyed the episode throughout. There were some other nice moments throughout the episode, even if they didn't stand out too much. Jaime and Brienne getting together was awesome since they have the best and most complex relationship in the show. Arya and The Hound had nice scenes together one again, as did Arya and Gendry. Gendry becoming lord of Storm's End was a nice moment for him too. I also liked Jon's emotional farewells with Tormund, Ghost, Sam and Gilly. I wonder if they all just got written out of the show with these scenes. I'm pretty sure we won't be seeing Tormund and Ghost again, but Sam and Gilly may still return. Tyrion and Varys had some fascinating conversation scenes as usual and I was intrigued by their discussions about Dany. The death of Missandei was good. It gives Dany even more reason to absolutely destroy Cersei at whatever cost and makes us support Dany even more. This should allow for some interesting emotions to be explored during the battle next episode. I expect myself to be conflicted on whether or not to support Dany's vengeance at the cost of so many innocents. The Bad: Unfortunately, the fun nature of this episode was completely ruined by some garbage writing. There is so much here that I took issue with, and it detracted from my experience by a lot. After getting used to the tight writing of seasons 1-4, it's disappointing that the past few seasons have such sloppy writing at times. Where to begin? I'll start with Gendry. Dany hasn't started ruling yet, but she still decides to tackle the issue of the next lord of Storm's End. Why is this a problem? Well, because Dorne and the Reach don't have any successors that we are aware of and Dany doesn't spare a single thought for them. So why did she make Gendry a lord now? Because the writers wanted that Gendry/Arya scene to happen. The writers fingerprints are all over this moment. It's not a huge problem, but in an episode filled with other bigger issues that I'm about to delve into, it's just another disappointing example of the writers thoughtlessness. One final thing about Gendry is that his bastard surname was given as Rivers, even though it should be Waters since he was born in King's Landing. Another sloppy moment. Another small moment that pissed me off was Sansa talking with The Hound. She addresses how without Ramsay and Littlefinger, she wouldn't be the person she is now. What? Do the writers seriously fail to understand her character that badly? So what they are saying is that Sansa shouldn't be credited for her own development and it's the manipulator and rapist in her life that should be thanked instead. What a slap in the face to the character of Sansa. I'm annoyed that everyone is still angry at Dany for some unknown reason. Honestly, why is Sansa still so hateful towards her? It makes no sense and feels so forced. Dany sacrificed so many men and literally saved the North by using her men in the battle. Yet she gets no credit whatsoever, and Sansa even has the gall to suggest that Dany was useless since Arya was the one who killed the Night King. Why should I like this character who is a total prick for no apparent reason? Furthermore, Sansa and Arya claiming that they can only trust family is nonsensical. Are they the Lannisters now? I mean come on, they literally just trusted Theon, a Greyjoy, to protect Bran and mourned his death. How the hell are they too shortsighted to realize that and only trust their family? They will never make any good alliances if this is the case, and the two of them come off as needlessly selfish with a childlike perspective on ruling. What's worse is Jon, who continues to be the biggest idiot in the Seven Kingdoms. Sansa and arya make it clear that they don't trust Dany and believe Jon is doing the wrong thing. Jon should be worried about trusting them since they could easily go against his own plans. So what does he do? He tells them a secret that could completely ruin Dany and expects them to keep the secret. I mean, what the hell Jon? Especially after the shady conversation they just had, how the hell is Jon stupid enough to think that telling them is a good idea? Jon is a terrible leader that makes crap decisions. Honestly, I would rather have Sansa rule the Seven Kingdoms over both Jon and Dany. Then we have that Bronn scene which was god awful. I mean, what the hell was the point of this story? We got no interesting conflict whatsoever from Bronn and the whole story seems like a waste of time since it went absolutely nowhere and was rushed as hell. Plus, why the hell did Bronn go North anyways? I expected him to stay in King's Landing, but instead he goes to Winterfell which could possibly have been swarming with wights had the Night King won. Is Bronn suicidal? Anyways, my prediction from "Winterfell" came true as Bronn could not be trusted with the job Cersei gave him since he caved to Tyrion and Jaime's side instantly. Lastly, the existence of the scene is absurd. How did Bronn get into Winterfell so easily? How did he reload the crossbow so quickly? How did he manage to find the exact room in a massive castle where both Tyrion and Jaime just happen to be sitting alone? Why did Bronn just leave immediately to go back to King's Landing? That's a long, long hike, surely he would want to rest for a bit. That's another big complaint I have about both this episode and the last few seasons as a whole. The world of Westeros feels so much more compact in these last two seasons and it fails to have that expansive fantasy feeling that the first 4 seasons had. When was the last time we saw just a normal person walking down the street? It's just main characters, and main characters everywhere. The world doesn't feel lived in anymore. Additionally, I hate that there are no houses outside King's Landing. It's just a wall and then nothing outside at all. When you combine this lack of world-building with the decreased scope of the show, the world just isn't engaging anymore. Jaime choosing to leave Winterfell was really poor. Did he never realize that Cersei might die in battle before that one moment? Come on, Jaime isn't that shortsighted. His decision to leave is perplexing, mainly because I don't understand why he didn't leave earlier. I can't see why he chose to stay in Winterfell instead of marching to King's Landing. It's just contrived so that we can get the scene where Brienne begs him to stay. That scene is bad too. Brienne openly cries, which is so out of character for her, and the scene is so generic and tropic with the girl crying when the guy leaves. The strategies in this episode were abysmal. Splitting up her already depleted forces is nonsensical. I have no idea why Dany decided that a fleet would be necessary anyways. She has no chance against Euron's fleet, so why would she put her useful men on boats that could easily be sunk by Euron. Furthermore, she makes the same mistake yet again by not scouting ahead to see if there are any threats nearby. She knows Euron is lurking in the waters, yet she makes no attempt to ensure safe passage. It's such bad strategy and shows that she learned nothing from when her last fleet got sunk by Euron. The actual encounter was absolutely ridiculous. How on Earth did Dany not see Euron's army from above? Did she just not bother looking down? Rhaegal's death was extremely dumb. If you can kill a dragon so easily with scorpions, then why are they a threat to begin with? Furthermore, Euron being able to shoot Rhaegal with pinpoint accuracy was absurd. Scorpions aren't that easy to aim, especially with moving targets. Also, what about reloading? Scorpions take a really long time to reload and that is there main weakness. But they are just on rapid fire mode in this episode, and they become the most overpowered weapons in the show, even stronger than dragons. Plus, how did they build so many scorpions so quickly? They only had one in season 7, yet they have like 100s in this season. Is it really that easy to make scorpions? Why didn't they just make more before in season 7 then? Back to Euron, how the hell did he know that Dany would be making a fleet? He isn't Varys, he doesn't know everything. Also, convenient rock to hide an entire fleet behind is convenient. Plus, the accuracy of the scorpions is so inconsistent. They shoot Rhaegal so easily and yet when Dany is flying a much bigger target straight towards the fleet, they miss like 20 shots in a row. Just like the Night King, Euron is only accurate when the plot wants him to be. Terrible writing. Euron himself is a big problem. I really liked his character last season when he was no more than a fun supporting character. But now he is one of the main villains of the show. This one-dimensional, uninteresting dirtbag is one of the main two villains of the series as a whole. Would it kill the writers to make him more interesting? Plus there is literally a much, much, much better villain written out right in front of these guys. I don't like bringing up the books in my TV reviews but I feel the need to about Euron. Book Euron is charismatic, scary, intimidating and mysterious with a crucial connection to the magical aspects of the show. He is a much better villain that is already ready-made for the show. Instead, the showrunners apparently decided that this 1D goofy villain is a much better candidate for one of the biggest villains of the show than book Euron. The climactic scene isn't good either. Apparently Euron captured Missandei which doesn't make sense. He doesn't know who Missandei is, and why would he make the effort to go capture this one person when he was focused on just sinking the fleet in the previous scene. The actual confrontation is ridiculous. Dany is right in front of Cersei with like 12 men and a dragon that appears to be in range of the scorpions. Cersei wants to win the war, right. So just kill them all! It's not hard, just kill them! Cersei comes off as a total idiot for not killing any of them, not even Tyrion who literally made himself a target for no apparent reason. About that point, why the hell does Tyrion believe that Cersei will surrender. Remember when Jorah said Tyrion is smart because he learns from his mistakes? Well here is Tyrion once again being fooled by Cersei, proving that he is as dumb as Jon when the writing is as incompetent as this. Lastly, the show totally dropped the ball on the connection between the Starks and their direwolves. Did Jon seriously send Ghost away like that after so many years of loyalty? And without petting him? This is how to make everyone watching the show despise Jon, by having him throw away a loyal servant with little to no kindness or affection and for no reason. The Unknown: What does Bran mean when he says he lives in the past mostly? Will this go somewhere? I remember the 3EC saying to Bran that spending too much time in the past is dangerous. Are Tormund, Ghost, Gilly and Jon just gone now? Will Dany kill all of the innocents to get back at Cersei for killing Missandei and Rhaegal? She seems ont he verge of going insane. Will Varys turn on Dany? Will he try to kill her? Best Moment: Probably the opening bit for its emotional resonance. Character of the Episode: Dany. Conclusion: This was a fun episode on the surface. But when you go even a little bit deeper, this episode is very poor with very few redeeming qualities. Good writing is essential for TV shows. If there are too many plot holes and inconsistencies within characters, my immersion in the world is ruined, and I believe that good immersion is one of the two essential qualities of good television (emotion being the other). This episode had awful immersion and that hurts it a lot. This episode was a disappointment. Score: 46 Summary: Melisandre arrives and lights the Dothraki arakhs on fire. The Dothraki charge the wights but all of them die. The White Walkers attack and the battle starts. A blizzard arrives. Dany and Jon go out to fight on dragons. Edd is killed. Eventually the main forces retreat into Winterfell and light the trench on fire. The wights still pass through by piling their bodies over the fire and the battle starts in Winterfell. Many people die, including all of the Unsullied and Lyanna. The Night King arrives and battles Jon in a dragon fight. Jon falls off Rhaegal and Dany knocks the Night King off Viserion. Dany breathes fire on the Night King but it doesn't work. The Night King revives all of the dead. The dead Starks in the crypts come to life and start massacring everyone. Arya escapes from wights in Winterfell and is saved by Beric and The Hound. Beric dies. Dany saves Jon outside Winterfell and Jon goes into the castle. Dany is separated from Drogon and is saved by Jorah. During the fight, Jorah takes serious injuries and eventually dies. Wights start attacking Bran but Theon and his men kill them. The Night King arrives and Theon dies fighting him. The Night King advances to kill Bran but Arya comes out of nowhere and kills him. The wights are defeated. Melisandre goes outside and takes off her necklace. She dies.
The Good: This was probably the single most dazzling piece of television I have ever seen. The camera work was lovely, featuring some creative cinematography, the effects looked absolutely fantastic, and the lighting and direction were perfectly done. And I can't forget about the outstanding music. Everything came together to make a stylistically perfect episode of television which was somehow way better than some of the other beautiful episodes of this show. There was almost always something visually impressive to enjoy in every scene. I've heard a lot of complaints about the episode being too dark, but I never had an issue with it. I was able to see everything just fine, so I'm not sure what caused this issue. The episode built up tension remarkably well. I was on edge for practically the entire time throughout the episode. The threat of the White Walkers feels so real, and the episode smartly used this threat in a genuinely frightening way, making me fear for the lives of the characters. The build-up to the battle itself was so atmospheric. The brief opening sequence of the characters silently prepping for battle was really well done and had me sick with tension. The battle itself was damn impressive. It started off perfectly with the execution of the Dothraki. While there were some logistic problems with this (see: The Bad), it started the battle on a perfect note. Seeing all of the fires going out was pretty scary and opened up the battle in a foreboding way. Then the action came forth and it was fittingly messy and chaotic, pitting all of the character in a shockingly intense and fast-paced battle. It was consistent with the way the wights fought back in Hardhome which I certainly appreciated. It would be a monumental task to pace a battle across 80 minutes but somehow this episode successfully did it. In such a fast-paced battle, it would be easy for everything to become monotonous and dull. The episode prevented that by providing some much-appreciated breaks in between the action and some really nice character moments. Tyrion and Sansa had a couple of nice scenes down in the crypts to break away from the action. I really liked the survival horror sequence of Arya trying to stay hidden from the wights since it was completely different from anything else in the episode and it was directed really nicely. It managed to derive fear without the use of jumpscares which makes it immediately better than most horror movies being created nowadays. The scenes with Melisandre were really strong too. I thought that her character was used well and there were a number of lovely scenes of her finally reaching her full potential and regaining confidence in her abilities. I especially liked her lighting the wood on fire in the blizzard. The scene was wonderfully tense as well because I thought she may die performing this feat. Her actual death was fitting for her character even if it was slightly confusing (see: The Unknown). The deaths were all pretty impactful and I enjoyed all of them. Edd suddenly dying was a perfect first death for the episode as it gave us the full realization that people are going to die a lot in the next hour. This first death had no emotion or grandeur to it; it just happened, and that fits in perfectly with what a battle death would be like. Lyanna's death was a little more impactful as she went out killing the giant wight. It was a brutal and heroic death. Beric's death was great too as he got to die as an honourable hero, giving his life to ensure that Arya escapes alive, also fulfilling the purpose that he had been kept alive for. The other two deaths were much more emotional and were probably the best moments of the episode. Theon's death was perfect for his character. I really liked Bran forgiving him and acknowledging that he is a good man even after everything he did. It was a cathartic moment for Theon and a perfect swan song for him as he charges forwards to his death, having finally atoned for his many sins. It was a beautiful moment. Jorah's death was even more emotional since his relationship with Dany has developed since the very first episode of the show. After 7 seasons, I care a lot about them and their relationship. Jorah dying for Dany was always going to happen but that didn't make it any less sad. Dany's tears over his dying body was really sad and delivered a fittingly emotional conclusion to their story. The ending montage was one of the coolest moments of the episode. After so many battles, this show has mastered the ability to show desperation and fear in the battlefield. This expertise was showcased in the montage which elegantly built up the feeling of total despair. Plus we got another epic musical piece to accompany it which I really loved. The Bad: Even though I loved so much of this episode, I'm left conflicted because there was a lot I didn't like as well, especially in the final parts of the episode. But I'll address my other problems first because there is a lot to cover. Melisandre's sudden return didn't feel earned to me. Where has she been? What did she accomplish? Not learning any of this was pretty disappointing. It also left me confused as to how she was able to master her powers offscreen. I would have liked to learn more about how she practices her powers and exactly how they work. Instead, it has all been glossed over, likely due to the rushed nature of the last two seasons. I thought that the logistics of the battle didn't make very much sense. We weren't told much about the strategy in the last few episodes which is a bit disappointing, but it wouldn't have mattered much if the strategy made sense. Unfortunately, it didn't. The Dothraki and Unsullied were sacrificed for some reasons, which was really nonsensical. Surely they are well aware that every dead body means another extra foe to deal with, so surely lives should be valued much more than this. Both massacres were cool moments, but they make no sense logically. The battle tactics disappointed me as well. The Dothraki charge was a ridiculous strategy in every way. Who thought that it would be smart to send all of your cavalry at the enemy head-on when the enemy has 100 times more men? That's a terrible strategy. The flaming trenches ended up being pointless because for whatever reason there were no men stationed behind the fire. Had there been people out there, the body piling trick wouldn't have been so effective. Why were there no men at the crypts to protect the helpless in case wights find their way down there? It's not like the place was guarded at all. Lastly, why on earth would they go through the trouble of using valuable resources to build trebuchets only to station them in front of the infantry line?! That's such a painful waste of a valuable asset. I was also very confused by Dany and Jon riding their dragons to hunt down the Night King. Would they not be more useful killing large numbers of wights outside of Winterfell? Dragons are their biggest asset, yet they were hardly used against the wights. Furthermore, the idea of them to hunt down the Night King contradicted their plan for Bran. I had thought Bran was being used to lure out the Night King. So why didn't Dany and Jon just wait for the Night King to arrive? It makes no sense, even from a writing standpoint. We could have still gotten to the cool dragon fight had the two of them simply waited for the Night King. Speaking of which, I did have a bit of an issue with the dragon fight too. It was really cool to see and used some astounding effects, but I had trouble following exactly what was happening. The many cuts and the similar colours of the dragons made it a little difficult to understand who was who. It's a small nitpick though since I did understand the scene enough to enjoy it. The crypt massacre was a questionable inclusion. There weren't enough scenes there to make the sequence noteworthy. Nobody of note died and outside of one great scene between Sansa and Tyrion, there didn't seem to be anything of significance from that storyline. My biggest issues with the episode are still to come though. First and foremost, I was disturbed by the severe lack of consequences in this episode. Characters would make mistakes yet they were still able to survive because the plot demands it. It was tough enough to buy that so many characters like Sam, Gendry, Brienne and Jaime survived for so long battling the wights. Yet the show took it a step further and made both Jon and Dany somehow survive certain death. Both of them went all in to kill the Night King and failed. The fact that they failed should have meant extreme consequences for both of them yet they somehow got lucky. Drogon should have died after the dragonfire didn't work since he was a completely stationary target right in front of the Night King. Jon should have died when he charged the Night Kign and got surrounded by the wights. There is no conceivable way that both of them could have gotten out of the situation, but plot armour was activated to save them. And don't get me started on how dumb it is that Dany was able to burn all the wights and somehow not kill Jon. The biggest problem I have with the episode is the conclusion. The White Walkers were actually defeated here. That was the biggest surprise for me, since I had expected the White Walkers to win this battle and be a part of whatever happens at King's Landing with Cersei. But instead they died. In one episode. It's taken me a while to gather my thoughts about how I feel about this, and the more time I spend thinking, the worse it gets. We were first introduced to White Walkers in the very first scene of the show. These villains were the endgame since the beginning and they were always the part of the story that mattered, not the eternal squabble over who gets the Iron Throne. To be told here that the White Walkers were just a diversion and Cersei is the main villain is nothing short of disappointing. After 7 seasons of build, this great threat is defeated and the main conflict is human vs human after all. It's a step down and I'm unsure about how invested I will be in this final conflict now. Our protagonists survived the Great War, so why should we fear for their lives against Cersei? I think the writers have chosen the wrong final villain. Furthermore, the decision to kill off the White Walkers so easily is completely against the theme of the show. Even though the show is called "Game of Thrones", the books are called "A Song of Ice and Fire". The point of this show is that the politicking for the Iron Throne is unimportant and that if everyone doesn't band together, they will be demolished by the real threat which nobody is paying attention to. The Iron Throne stuff is all superficial and doesn't really matter. The show has completely failed to acknowledge this theme by centering the final conflict around Cersei and the Iron Throne. Additionally, I have another point which ties in to the lack of consequences I was mentioning earlier. The show seems to be suggesting that Cersei's decision to ignore the dead was actually correct since everything went exactly as she was hoping for. She comes off as smart for what she has done, and faces no consequences for refusing to join up with Dany and Jon. That's just bad storytelling and it fails to stick with the spirit of "Game of Thrones". The Night King himself fell into every villain cliche ever. He becomes suddenly incapable when the plot demands it when fighting Jon and Dany and he is nothing special. Furthermore, he makes the classic blunder of going to kill Bran personally and taking so long to actually kill him, giving the heroes a chance to kill him (also how the hell did Arya sneak up on the Night King, didn't he have like 3 other White Walkers with him that Arya would need to get past as well). Also, the Night King failed as an actual character. In the end there was no extra motive for the White Walkers, they were literally just a bunch of killing machines with none of the hidden depth that had been suggested. With this being the case, the Night King just feels like a convenient way for the writers to kill of the White Walkers easily. If that is the case, then the Night King is literally the sole weakness of the White Walkers, and that makes him stupid for exposing himself so needlessly. The Unknown: What did Bran do when he warged into the ravens? Why did Melisandre die? How did she just kill herself like that? We have seen her take off her necklace before and live. Did Ghost die as well? I don't think we saw him again after he charged with the Dothraki. I hope not because he deserves a much better death than this. Also, did Rhaegal die? I don't think so since there was no reaction and I think he got back up, but I'm not sure. Best Moment: There were so many spectacular scenes but I'll go with Dany crying over Jorah's dead body. Character of the Episode: Arya. It was a pleasant surprise to have her kill the Night King. Conclusion: I have no idea what to make of this episode. On one hand, I loved it. This was the most beautiful episode ever made and it served as a fantastic climax for the White Walkers in terms of providing an exciting and memorable finish. Yet on the other hand, it was flawed and there could have (and should have) been so much more to the White Walkers than what we got. It's so hard to gauge this episode because of my conflicting emotions. After a few rewatches, I eventually settled on a 68. There were too many flaws to give this a well-earned 70. I can see this being possibly the most polarizing episode of the show. Score: 68 Summary: Jaime is taken to Dany, Jon and Sansa to be judged but Brienne stands up for him. Sansa and Jona re willing to give him a chance, so Dany agrees as well. Tyrion and Jaime speak again and reminisce on the past. Jaime asks to serve under Brienne when the battle starts. Dany goes to Sansa to relieve tensions without success. Theon arrives and reunites with Sansa. Beric, Tormund and Edd arrive and warn that the White Walkers are almost there. Everyone enjoys some time to relax before the great battle. Arya and Gendry have sex. Jaime makes Brienne a knight. Sam gives Heartsbane to Jorah. Jon tells Dany who he really is. The White Walkers arrive at Winterfell.
The Good: I loved this. It's like the episode writers read my review and decided to correct all of the issues I had with the season premiere. The dialogue was back up to the show's lofty standards, the scenes were given time to breathe and develop that spark, and the threat of the White Walkers loomed over every single scene, giving this episode the atmosphere and urgency that I was expecting from the last episode. Each of these improvements made this episode substantially more enjoyable than the first. Jaime is one of the show's best characters and he shone here. It was refreshing to separate him from Cersei and he ended up being terrific in this episode. I really liked the scenes early in the episode where Jaime is forced to confront everything he has done and face up to it as a better person. I liked him standing up to Sansa accusing him of attacking the Starks, and even more than that, I liked him apologizing to Bran for the one truly terrible thing he actually did. Jaime and Brienne's relationship was developed heavily throughout the episode which was great. They have had one of the best relationships in the show, so it isn't a surprise that an episode centered around them is so successful. They had a number of great scenes outside of Brienne standing up for Jaime. Jaime wanting to serve under her in the battle was a wonderful moment, showing how much respect the both of them have for each other. Better yet was Jaime knighting Brienne, finally giving her the recognition that she has been craving for so long. It was fantastic to see her so happy afterwards, providing a sweet culmination to her story. It's a shame that certain death is looming over everyone right now. The threat of the White Walkers is what makes this episode so powerful. This episode works so well because it serves as a reminder of how much I care about these characters. Seeing them interacting, resolving storylines and joking around is a perfect way to get the maximum emotion out of reflecting on the show. It's so much sadder when you realize that a whole ton of these characters won't be making it out of the series alive. Knowing that makes me appreciate these scenes a whole lot more and makes the episode stand out in an emotional way. Arya and Gendry's scenes were really strong in this episode. Their moment in the last episode felt a little strange and only offered some callback lines which made the scene feel a little shallow to me. The dialogue was much better here and it felt like organic talk from two old friends, while also incorporating the threat of the White Walkers. I like the idea of them hooking up but I have some nitpicks about the pacing of this development (see: The Bad). Sansa and Dany's relationship advanced nicely in this episode. I liked Jorah advising Dany to calm the waters between them and I liked the way that the two of them engaged with clearly forced pleasantries to kick of their conversation. I thought the theme of manipulation throughout their conversation was terrific and it nicely echoed where this conversation was ultimately going. Dany was trying to manipulate Sansa into joining her cause, but Sansa, ever so smart now, refused to give in, exposing the fundamental problem with the Jon/Dany alliance. I really liked the scenes of everyone waiting out the night, expecting the battle to start any second. Arya sitting briefly with The Hound and Beric was a nice moment. Jon, Edd and Sam reflecting on their time in the Night's Watch was spectacular, and it even allowed a chance for Edd to show some personality (he is allowed much more time to shine in the books, and I'm glad to see that personality coming out in this scene). Plus we saw Ghost for the first time in ages, which I was really glad about. The scenes with Tyrion, Pod, Jaime, Brienne, Davos and Tormund were all excellent. The interactions were fantastic, the jokes were all hilarious and it all culminated wonderfully in Brienne becoming a knight. As a plus, we also got a hilarious backstory from Tormund and a brand new Westerosi song sang by Pod. I thought that Jon telling the truth to Dany lived up to my expectations of how the scene would go. Dany's surprise made sense and I thought her response fit her character. Even though she loves Jon, she feels immediately threatened and tensions instantly arise. Dany is obsessed with getting the throne now, so the presence of a competitor with a better claim than her makes her feel uneasy and sets up some tensions between Jon and Dany. The timing of the reveal was excellent, since they were interrupted by the White Walkers and it seems that they will have to resolve this after the great battle. There were a few other smaller scenes that were just as great. Tyrion and Jaime had a few really great moments of reflection together, similar to their great scenes back in season 4. I liked the callback to how Tyrion wants to die. Sam giving Heartsbane to Jorah was another nice scene, paying off of Sam's gratitude towards how Jeor made him a proper man. Davos' scene with the little girl was a sweet reminder of his time with Shireen which I thought was nice. I also loved Theon and Sansa's reunion which was a good way to bring Theon full circle by having him choose the right family this time around. Tormund's jokes were as funny as ever. The Bad: Bran's reveal that the Night King was coming for him felt really tacked on. He finally got some motives, and it feels so out of left field. This should have been established earlier, perhaps back in season 6 when all of this information was being given out. Furthermore, the development that the Night King can always track Bran makes me question why he didn't kill Bran when he was being pulled by Meera all alone in season 6. If he knows where Bran is, killing him back then should have been easy. How did Tormund, Edd and Beric get to Winterfell before the White Walkers? These guys are slow as hell, since they take forever to get everywhere for some reason. Arya and Gendry having sex feels strange for me because they still seem like strangers. Gendry still seems to view Arya as a little girl, and we haven't really seen much about what Arya wants. That makes them hooking up seem a little strange, and I wish that they had reunited a little earlier so that they would have more time to understand each other before this scene. The Unknown: I'm interested in where Tyrion goes from here after all of his mistakes. The story could just have him redeem himself, but that would seem very anticlimactic since this story has been in the works since season 6. He has had more of a presence this season, so perhaps there is more to his story. Apparently Cersei's baby is real. So why does she not tell Euron about it? How will Dany deal with Jon's reveal? Will she turn on him at some point? What happened to Melisandre? Will we see her again before the end of the series? Who is going to die in the coming battle? I suspect that a lot of characters will die here. I'm betting that Gendry, Beric, Grey Worm, Jorah, Pod and Edd will die, but I wouldn't be surprised if some of them make it out and other characters end up dying instead. This battle is so exciting because it feels like anybody could die. Best Moment: Jaime knighting Brienne was a fantastic moment. Character of the Episode: Brienne. Conclusion: This was an awesome episode which focused on all of my favourite aspects of the show. The episode had several emotional moments while setting up the upcoming battle in terrific fashion. I'm very excited to see how this whole thing wraps up. Score: 74 Summary: Jon and Dany return to Winterfell where Sansa takes an immediate dislike towards Dany, unhappy with Jon abandoning his crown. The others in Winterfell are similarly skeptical. Arya reunites with Jon, Gendry and The Hound, while Tyrion speaks with Sansa. Dany and Jon go dragon riding and enjoy each other's company. Dany tells Sam the fate of his family. Sam tells Jon about his heritage. In King's Landing, the Golden Company arrive and ally with Cersei. Cersei follows up on her end of the bargain with Euron, allowing Theon an opportunity to rescue Yara. Bronn is sent to kill Jaime and Tyrion. Jaime arrives in Winterfell and is immediately greeted by Bran. The White Walkers have gone through Last Hearth, killing everyone there.
The Good: Season 8 had been hyped up as being move-quality for all six episodes, so my expectations were quite high for the presentation of the show. Impressively, the show met and ultimately exceeded my expectations with some astonishingly nice visuals. The episode started on the right foot with the lovely new credits sequence. It was a refreshing change that immediately established the impressive scope of the season. The rest of the episode follows up on this terrifically, with some really impressive details. There were more extras than usual, wider shots of Winterfell, making the castle feel more alive, and some genuinely epic shots while Dany and Jon rode dragons. That last sequence was really nicely shot and would have fit in seamlessly in a "Harry Potter" movie. It was that well done. Like much of season 7, this episode had plenty of character reunions. There was a nice sequence early on where Arya got to see a bunch of familiar faces arriving in Winterfell before enjoying some reunions later. Her scene with Jon was sweet and well-acted with some nice subtext from both characters. The scene with The Hound was short but sweet, and probably the best-written of the bunch. The scene with Gendry was filled with nice callbacks and continued their dynamic nicely. There were a few other interesting reunions too which had a little bit more story relevance, so I'll get into those later. There were other callbacks outside of the reunions. The episode opened with a lovely sequence of a boy climbing the walls to see the king arrive. The scene paralleled Bran watching King Robert arrive from back in "Winter is Coming", even going as far as to play the same exact music. Though with the show's wildly increased budget, this arrival felt so much more grand and impressive. Sam had most of the episode's finest moments. John Bradley gave a great performance and his emotions were very clear throughout the episode. I really loved the scene where Dany told Sam the fate of his family (see: Best Moment), and John Bradley did a great job of portraying how a character like Sam would react to this news. It was a tough episode for Sam who had to go tell Jon about his lineage immediately afterwards in another great scene. Sam brought up some great points to Jon, who now has a very exciting conflict to deal with. There were a number of intriguing scenes between other characters that caught my attention. Sansa and Tyrion got to see each other for the first time since Joffrey's death, and the scene was great. Their interactions were as awkward as ever and did great things for each character. It continued to show us how Tyrion has fallen from being one of the smarter men in Westeros which is very interesting (see: The Unknown). But more importantly, it brilliantly showed us how much Sansa has matured and how intelligent she has become. She dismisses Tyrion's opinions on Cersei immediately, relying on her own experience with Cersei, and she also sees through Jon's facade, exposing his real feelings about Dany. The end of the episode was really good. It's nice to see Jaime arriving in Winterfell as well, and seeing Bran actively waiting for his return was a really cool moment and Jaime's reaction was perfect. This reunion was one I never really thought about, so I was pleasantly surprised by it. This should lead into a great arc for Jaime. The scenes in King's Landing were pretty good. Cersei's disappointment in the Golden Company was consistent with who she is, and I liked her zeroing in on the lack of elephants. I enjoyed all the scenes with Euron. He is still a fun and interesting character in his scenes with Yara and Cersei. I particularly liked him inquiring about how he was compared to Robert and Jaime, it was a nice little bit of character for him. I also liked Bronn being given an interesting conflict this season, even if I have some issues with it (see: The Bad). Also, did we just get an update on the fate of Ed Sheeran's character (the ginger Eddie)? If so, that's a nice bit of continuity. The scenes at Last Hearth were pretty good. Tormund's eyes always being blue was funny, and I liked that he, Beric and Edd got more scenes. I liked how frightening the scene was, and Ned Umber's scream was pretty scary. This was a fantastic way to establish the wrath that the White Walkers were leaving behind, building up the fear for what is coming later in the season. There were some nice moments of dialogue. It seems that Varys and Davos exist to provide us with some great dialogue. The Bad: I loved the presentation, but was disappointed by the writing. Not all of the dialogue in the episode was as great as the scenes which I enjoyed. This show has always been carried by dialogue and most of the best scenes of the show comes from two characters simply talking. There were many opportunities to cover similar scenes here, but the writing failed to accomplish that. At times the dialogue felt clunky, and there was never more dialogue given to scenes than what was needed. While this is efficient to accomplish a lot of different things, it also means that each individual scene doesn't really stand out much. In an episode which is entirely built on scenes of characters talking, this is a problem. The other issue with the dialogue came from how the episode handled its exposition. A lot of scenes were rushed to get to plot details, such as Sam's reunion with Jon which was rushed through so that Jon could learn about his heritage in a moment that didn't feel as important as I was expecting. It wasn't the content of the scene, but rather the execution that gave me this feeling. My biggest problem with the episode was its pace. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for slower episodes and I respect the decision to start the season out slowly, but this did not feel like an appropriate time to do this. The White Walkers have broken through the Wall and death is literally incoming. Yet we are sitting around to watch characters talk and ride dragons. Really? The destruction of the Wall should be a much bigger moment than this, and there should be a real sense of urgency in this episode as everyone prepares for battle. But we don't get that, and I was left confused as to why nobody was doing anything. To add salt to the wound, everyone knew the Wall was destroyed and they simply treated it as just another thing that happened. Seriously? This should be an earth-shattering moment, yet it is treated like no big deal. Furthermore, why gather everyone at Winterfell? Surely the Wall should be incorporated into their plans as it is an important asset. Speaking of making plans, why was nobody doing anything to prepare for battle here? Instead the main source of conflict was that people of the North didn't like Dany and they don't want to fight with Lannisters. Seriously? With certain death marching in, why does anyone even care about this? I don't buy that people would ignore the White walker threat to worry about bending the knee to Dany, especially since the Wall has fallen. Furthermore, this led to one of the dumbest scenes in the show. Sansa brings up a huge problem: food. There is a massive new army to feed and there are no ways to feed them. So how does everyone react to this? They never bring it up again and Dany dismisses it with a crappy one-liner about dragons. Yikes. Who would trust Dany as a queen after this? The dragon riding scene was a spectacle, but it was really unnecessary. Why the hell would Jon risk riding a dragon when he didn't know he was a Targaryen? Dany doesn't have total control over them and it's foolish of him to try. What if he died? Everybody would freak out and nobody would trust Dany! That would ruin everything and it seems like a ridiculous risk to take. Furthermore, Jon flies right next to Winterfell. What kind of a message is he sending to his people by doing this? Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if his people decide to assassinate him again with how stupid he is being. Once more the show has fixated around a shouting fest between Sansa and Jon. Are we seriously still on this storyline? It's been going on forever and has been resolved so many times. I really don't care to see it yet again this season. Also, Sansa's distaste for Dany feels so forced. They talk for like one brief 20 second scene and then all that everyone talks about is how Sansa doesn't like her. What? Did I miss a scene or something? Show me that she doesn't like Dany, don't just make people claim that she doesn't like her. Bronn's scene had some problems. First of all, it was a pretty forced way to get some boobs in this season. Do we really need this nudity? Secondly, why is Cersei trusting him to kill Jaime and Tyrion? Of all the people she could send, I would never send Bronn who knows them well. What if he decides not to do it because of his attachment to them? It would be so much easier to just send some other sellsword/assassin. Theon getting Yara back was rushed and ridiculous. It's crazy how easy it was for Theon to infiltrate and escape Euron's fleet. The quick and flippant way that Theon rescued her was an unsatisfying end to that storyline. All of that build up for the story, and this is the climax. Why is Bran not more freaked out that everyone is going to die? Surely he would try harder to get everyone to focus on the main threat. The Unknown: Will Sansa's distaste for Dany lead somewhere? I definitely think so. Is it possible that she can drive a wedge between Jon and Dany this season? What will Jon do now that he knows who he is? I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't do anything with the information for now, considering his character and love for Dany. Who will he reveal his lineage to? Will Bronn go through with killing Tyrion and Jaime or will he ally with them instead? I'm interested by Tyrion continually being looked over as an intelligent man this past few seasons. Could the popular theory of him betraying Dany have some merit to it? What about Cersei's pregnancy? She doesn't seem to say anything about it to Euron? Is she pretending not to be pregnant? Or was she never pregnant to begin with and just lied to Tyrion? What is the weapon that Arya asked Gendry to forge? What does she need it for? Best Moment: Dany comes to Sam to thank him personally for saving Jorah. She wishes to reward him, yet her good intentions end up bringing Sam nothing but pain as she reveals what happened to his father and brother. It's a heartbreaking scene and John Bradley's acting was damn good. Character of the Episode: Sam. Conclusion: A bit of a mixed bag of a premiere. I enjoyed a lot of the individual scenes and I thought there was a lot to like about this. Unfortunately, the lack of urgency, rushed writing and fan service detracted from the episode. Score: 59 Summary: Dany's army arrives at King's Landing. She has the meeting with Cersei and frightens her with the wight. Euron decides to go to the Iron Islands and stay there. Cersei is on the verge of accepting the treaty but refuses when Jon reveals his alliance with Dany. Tyrion speaks with Cersei and convinces her to help out. Danya nd Jon take their armies to Winterfell. Cersei reveals she doesn't plan to cooperate and has sent Euron to get the Golden Company. This causes Jaime to abandon her cause. Theon decides to go save Yara. Sansa frames Littlefinger for his crimes with evidence from Bran. Arya kills him. Sam arrives in Winterfell and talks with Bran. They discover that Jon is Rhaegar and Lyanna's son and that he is actually legitimate and not a bastard. The Night King arrives at Eastwatch with his army and his ice dragon. He uses the dragon to burn a hole in the Wall and the army advances.
The Good: I appreciated the amount of focus this episode put on the meeting with Cersei. It was treated like a big moment and so when it happened, it felt like a significant scene with a lot of stakes. That's a good achievement when you consider how poor the set-up for this has been. The scenes in King's Landing were strong with a number of great scenes between characters. I liked Tyrion and Pod reuniting, The Hound and Brienne talking about Arya, Tyrion and Bronn being hilarious once again and the tease of Cleganebowl. I liked the actual meeting too. Euron was a standout again and I like that he was the first to speak before the meeting officially started, addressing Theon directly and taunting him to get him away from Dany. His character has been pretty enjoyable thus far. I also loved his reaction to the wight demonstration. I loved the idea of him just leaving after seeing a terrifying threat even though it was revealed to be a fake move. The demonstration itself was good and I was pleased to see the wights return to being scary and frighteningly fierce creatures. Last episode severely dampened their threat value but it was re-established here. Cersei had a couple of great scenes with her family where emotions came bubbling out. The scene with Tyrion was electric as it was the first time they had interacted since season 4. The two of them got to let out their frustrations at each other which was fascinatingly undercut by Tyrion's other motive to bring Cersei to a peace offer. Cersei's scene with Jaime was great too. They were building up to a breaking point for a long time and we finally got it in a memorable scene. Having Jaime finally stand up to Cersei and tell her what he should have told her 2 seasons ago was satisfying. Theon's story in this episode was good too. I liked his scene with Jon due to the performances from both actors which made it feel meaningful even though Theon hasn't really done anything to gain Jon's approval at this point. It was a good set-up for Theon finally embracing himself and finally making the right decision in the next scene as he goes to save Yara. The wedding reveal was pretty good and shakes up the story in a nice way regarding Jon and Dany's future. This could lead to them coming into conflict which I would like, but I am worried that it will just serve to have a "perfect Targaryen marriage" to end the series. I hope that doesn't happen and I'll optimistically assume that this reveal will take us somewhere good. More than the reveal, I enjoyed Bran and Sam's interactions since it's rare for both of these characters to interact with people outside of their specific storyline. They had a fun conversation with well-written dialogue. Littlefinger's death was a satisfying moment. While I don't like how we got there (see: The Bad), the moment itself was glorious. It was certainly cathartic to see the instigator of this entire war on his knees begging for life as Arya walks up to him to stab him in the throat. The Bad: While this did a lot more things right than the last two episodes, it felt a little disappointing as a finale. This was purely set-up for next season and closed very few storylines. Plus, the storylines it did resolve were done very poorly. Littlefinger's death is the biggest offender for this. His death went exactly as I expected it to go which was extremely disappointing. There was nothing enthralling in the build-up to his death and I absolutely hate that the scene in the great hall was played entirely for surprise instead of any meaningful storytelling. All of the crap at Winterfell we had to sit through in the past few episodes was all so we could have the surprise "Lord Baelish" moment. The worst part is that we never actually learned what Sansa and Arya's plan was and how they set Littlefinger up. There was no explanation or anything, so when rewatching we have to sit through Arya threatening Sansa and wonder why it is even happening. Couldn't Sansa just claim that it happened when it actually didn't? It's not like Littlefinger is Varys who learns anything and everything. Unfortunately Littlefinger's death scene was hampered by poor writing too. Bran's sudden presence comes out of nowhere with all of his accusations against Littlefinger which he apparently went through in detail with Sansa offscreen (ugh). It was an attempt at another surprise which was completely unwarranted. Littlefinger's reaction to being called out is unbelievable. He immediately admits guilt to killing Lysa even though there is no proof. Surely Littlefinger can easily turn the tables on Sansa by mentioning how she lied to the lords of the Vale and is likely making this up because she doesn't like Littlefinger anymore. If I was a lord of the Vale, I would logically believe Littlefinger's story. Furthermore, can't he just claim how awfully convenient Bran's "powers" are and throw some suspicion on him? Spreading suspicions is what Littlefinger has done for the entire series. But instead of cooking up a story, Littlefinger goes from master manipulator to bumbling buffoon in an instant just so we can have his satisfying death. And that death loses the impact it might have had because the story of his downfall is badly written and tedious to sit through. The Cersei story sadly lacked tension because it was obvious that she would never ally with Dany. And in the end... she doesn't and is planning her own scheme. And somehow Tyrion does not see this coming. This really goes to show how awful of a plan it was to capture the wight as it failed to change Cersei's mind which I predicted the moment Tyrion brought it up. There was one other major issue with the Cersei meeting and that is Jon's reveal that he is allied with Dany now. This isn't because he didn't lie (that makes sense due to him being Ned's son), but because of his decision to join Dany in the first place. I mentioned how forced it felt in the last episode, and this episode makes it even worse. It's painfully clear here that the only reason he bent the knee was to stir conflict with Cersei making the decision blatantly something that had to be done for plot, opposed to actual character development. Things like this are why I find it hard to believe that this is the same "Game of Thrones" that I fell in love with back in season 1. I wasn't happy with the Night King bringing down the Wall. First of all, the destruction of the Wall should have felt more frightening and scary yet it didn't capture those emotions for me. The Wall never felt like an obstacle and was only treated as a minor roadblock for the White Walkers which is stupid because it is a 500 foot Wall with only 3 tunnels to get through. Surely the Wall should have been considered in Jon's plans a little more as it's certainly the easiest place to form a defense against the White Walkers. Instead it seems like the characters just say that "oh yeah the Wall is going to come down somehow so we will wait at Winterfell instead". It's very badly done. My point is proven further by the method at which the Wall comes down. Don't get me wrong, it's a cool moment but it raises one very important question: what the hell were the White Walkers going to do if the implausible wight capture plan never happened? They wouldn't have had an ice dragon to bring down the Wall. Were they just going to stand next to the Wall and look intimidating? If that's the case, then just leave them alone and everyone survives. The White Walkers aren't even a problem. There were some other little things that bothered me. Theon getting kneed in the groin would still hurt even if he is a eunuch. To pretend that it won't is just silly. The boatsex scene was hurt by the fact that it was interwoven with the Rhaegar/Lyanna wedding reveal. It's almost like the writers just wanted to gross us out with incest. Also, Bran says Jon's real last name should be Sand when talking to Sam. Except that's wrong and his last name should be Targaryen because he's legitimate! What a silly failure of an error that makes Bran look like an idiot. Lastly, I don't like what has been done with The Hound. He is being used as "funny guy that says offensive stuff" instead of a character which is a shame. It's funny and entertaining, but I will take the complex man from seasons 1-4 over this caricature. The Unknown: How will the Golden Company come into the story? What does Cersei plan to do with them? What will come of Cersei's pregnancy? I thought she couldn't have another child due to the prophecy. Apparently the show has forgotten and Cersei too. Are Tormund and Beric dead? I hope not. Best Moment: Cersei and Tyrion's conversation was really good. Character of the Episode: Cersei. Conclusion: This episode had some strong moments, but it was still brought down by the usual lazy writing that has plagued this season. In the end, season 7 was disappointing. It started fairly strong, but the rushed nature of the season and distracted focus of the showrunners made the final three episodes poorly written and disappointing, failing to give me hope that the show will end in strong fashion. This season did provide one great thing with the episode "The Spoils of War" and I'm thankful for that. Unfortunately it also gave us "Beyond the Wall", the show's worst hour thus far in exchange. It's remarkable how different this season felt from the rest of the show and I can sense a clear disconnect with the showrunners and the story they are trying to tell. I guess we may as well wait for GRRM's final two novels to get a satisfying end to this epic saga since this season gave me no hope for the future. Score: 60 Summary: Arya confronts Sansa about the letter she wrote to Robb. Sansa goes to Littlefinger for advice. Sansa sends Brienne away. Beyond The Wall, the fellowship of the throne are attacked by wights. Thoros is wounded and eventually dies but they capture a wight. The army of the dead chases them and surrounds them on an island. However, Gendry runs back to Eastwatch and sends a raven to Dany. The wights attack the group on the island but Dany arrives with her dragons to save them. The Night King kills Viserion in the ensuing chaos. Everyone leaves but Jon is left behind. Benjen saves him but dies in the process.
The Good: The production in this episode was great. Everything looked really good throughout the episode. As a big "Lord of the Rings" fan, I did like the idea of making a "Game of Thrones" fellowship and I thought the character interactions in the first half of the episode were pretty good. Tormund and The Hound were consistently entertaining in their roles and their conversations with each other were good. I especially liked Tormund talking about Brienne to The Hound. Jon and Jorah had a pretty good scene as well and I'm pleased that they touched on Longclaw in their conversation. I liked Tyrion's worries about succession regarding Dany. With her unable to reproduce, it makes perfect sense for Tyrion to put some thought into Dany's future and things that he may need to take care of. Having the Night King kill a dragon was smart. Now Dany doesn't seem quite as invincible and the White Walkers are even scarier than before. The addition of an undead Viserion is bound to lead to some exciting moments down the road. The Bad: Unfortunately, this was easily the worst episode that "Game of Thrones" has ever done. There was an unbelievable amount of plot holes, clichés and gaps in logic which just added up more and more as the episode went on. While I liked the idea of the fellowship, the idea of it is in total contrast with everything I loved about "Game of Thrones". The very existence of a group of heroes going on a quest is not in the spirit of the show and shows that the writers and showrunners and losing sight of what this show is all about. The polar bear fight was very poor. First of all, the whole battle was practically pointless as it accomplished nothing and existed solely because the showrunners wanted a zombie polar bear (they actually said this on camera). Furthermore, the logic surrounding the battle was baffling. First things first, who were those redshirts that were killed? Were they people who joined up with the fellowship? I swear we have never seen them in any other scene. Or were they just random people who happened to be around? It's so forced and makes little sense. Furthermore, why did nobody do anything while Thoros was fighting the polar bear. The Hound was petrified, but what about everyone else? Were they too busy sipping on tea as they waited? Lastly, the polar bear wight was killed by a stab to the head. A polar bear WIGHT was killed by a stab to the head. If the dagger was dragonglass, then fair enough. But how would anyone be aware that dragonglass kills wights along with the White Walkers? They haven't done it ever before, so surely they should at least react to the bear getting killed by the dragonglass. Furthermore, Tormund attacked with his axe and it did nothing. Why would he refuse to bring a dragonglass weapon when it's the only weapon that would work? Same goes for Gendry's hammer. This takes me to Thoros' death. Talk about a meaningless death. Deaths in this series have all existed for a purpose, but this one felt more like a "someone needs to die on this mission and we pick him" kind of death. I expect things like this from "The Walking Dead" not "Game of Thrones". The next action scene was the scout party battle, and it was still terrible. First of all, the actual idea of a scout party is beyond stupid. What the hell are they scouting? There are pretty much zero people beyond The Wall currently, and the only reason Jon's crew were there was because they are idiots going on an idiotic mission. So why would the White Walkers need a scouting group. I'm fin with Jon killing the White Walker, but I'm not fine with every wight dying except one. How convenient!! How implausible is it that every wight doesn't die and that just one survives for them to take? It's downright unbelievable. Then we get into the group running when the army of the dead comes after them. My first question is, what the hell was their plan of getting away going into this? Did they not plan any of this out? Did they seriously just charge an army of thousands of wights with no plan to escape? What a terrible plan. Logically, they should have had a method to get a wight and get out of there immediately. Yet they don't do this. They just waste time until the cold comes and then they run. But they don't even try to run back to where they came. They send Gendry to Eastwatch and everyone else just goes somewhere else for some reason and they get trapped on a frozen lake like incapable idiots. Why didn't they all run with Gendry and only send him ahead when it was clear that all of them were dead? Also, I think Dany would figure out they died when no word comes back from them, so Gendry running back should hardly be a concern for them. But nope, Gendry has to run back so that Dany can come back and save the day, so he just has to go regardless of how it makes no sense. The actual retreat to the lake was really poor. First of all, the idea that the ice would break in a perfect circle around the island is dumb and extremely convenient for everyone to survive. Next, is the idea that the wights would surround the group. We haven't seen any intelligence from these things before, and they have only ever charged their enemy with intent to kill. Yet for some reason, these guys now have the wits to surround them on the lake before attacking them? That's inconsistent. Worse yet, are their random showings of intelligence later. They are too stupid to dodge a rock that The Hound throws, yet they are smart enough to notice that the way is clear for them to attack? What the hell. Also, why didn't all of the wights attack after that? Just one went out after seeing the frozen ice. Were the others just daydreaming? The writers weren't even trying to be consistent with wight intelligence. The actual battle on the island was terrible, even worse than the polar bear fight. It was awfully nice of the wights to go like 5 at a time to the island while all of the others waited around. Whatever happened to the terrifyingly quick and vicious wights that were at Hardhome? Those wights would have crushed these guys in like 2 minutes. But we can't have that happen, so all of the wights are suddenly less threatening because the plot says so. Maybe you can make a case and say that the wights were smart enough to realize that the ice would break again if they charge, but that once more highlights the inconsistent intelligence flaw. The tease of Tormund's death was poor because the moment he went down, he should have died. But the wights have become incapable now and they don't kill him so he can be saved. I guess the wights just got tired from walking all the way to The Wall. The biggest issue with this battle was that it had zero tension. We were obviously killing time for Dany to come in for the save so that's what I was waiting for the entire time. Dany's attack did nothing for me and also managed to piss me off by being totally ridiculous. First of all, I don't have any emotional reaction to seeing dragons burn stuff so it has already lost my interest. The showrunners apparently think that we enjoy this show because dragons not because of all the other stuff that we actually watched the show for in the first four seasons when dragons weren't doing much. So I was pretty bored by the whole dragon attack scene, but then the boredom eventually turned to anger due to how dumb everything got. The Night King killing a dragon was cool, but why did he attack Viserion? Drogon was literally totally still on the ground but the Night King instead attacks the difficult target for some reason. Why would he not go for Drogon? Killing Drogon will also prevent any of the others from leaving which would cause all of them to die. Plus then the Night King gets a bigger dragon. It's a win-win for him to target Drogon. Also, if he is accurate enough to hit Viserion from that distance while he moves, that makes it even more ridiculous that he would miss Drogon when Drogon flew away. Also, if the Night King has such accuracy with these spears, why didn't he just rain them down on Jon's group on the island while they slept? They wouldn't be able to do anything about it and the Night King would save himself some trouble. Suddenly, the Night King has gone from terrifying villain to another idiot of a villain who is only terrifying and smart when the plot demands it. Also, I was displeased that the dragons never even attempted to attack the White Walkers with their fire. Shouldn't Dany really go after the main threat instead of the random army? Furthermore, it would be way more satisfying if the Night King killed Viserion while Viserion was trying to attack him. The end of the battle was one of the worst conclusions I have ever seen. So Jon decides to fight the wights because... I have no idea. What was he trying to accomplish? What could he have done? Nothing! So just get on the dragon Jon, you idiot. I was downright angered by this decision because of how stupid, needless and out-of-character it was. Jon is supposed to be a heroic and selfless person not a suicidal fool. The save from deus ex Benjen was ridiculous too. Nice of Benjen to get under two minutes of screentime for him to provide the convenient save and die. That's just bad writing. Furthermore, that makes two deus ex machinas in one episode of this show. Let's not forget that this show was all about avoiding popular fantasy clichés in the first four seasons. To put so many cliches in this one episode is a literal spit in the face of George RR Martin as the poor man has to now watch his masterful works get slandered in the hands of incapable showrunners who have no clue how to provide a satisfying conclusion to this epic franchise. And of course, I can't forget to mention the ridiculous time jumps that happened in this episode. Just how long were these guys on the damn island? Gendry pulled an olympic marathon by running to Eastwatch, recovered, sent a raven to Dany all the way on Dragonstone which is extremely far away, Dany read it, contemplated what to do, decided to help, flew north on dragons and found the exact spot where the group was. That must have taken several days of time due to the ridiculous distances that would have to be covered, and this entire time the group was just sitting on the island? That's extremely bad. The ending of the episode with Dany and Jon left me annoyed and disappointed. First of all, I was disappointed in Dany's reactions to the dead army and the death of Viserion. Surely we deserved more of a surprised reaction from Dany when she first saw the army and the Night King. But the biggest offense here is her reaction to losing Viserion. She has commonly referred to the dragons as her children but she doesn't have a motherly reaction to her child's death. Instead she seems more saddened by Jon's apparent death which is just wrong. Furthermore, I was confused by Jon sayign he will bend the knee. Why? What changed from before that forced him to bend the knee now? He has no reason to do this and it's just as stupid as his decision to stay behind to fight. Now on to the end of the episode. The chains came completely out of nowhere. Where did the White Walkers get them? More importantly, how the hell did they get them onto Viserion? Do not tell me the wights did it, because they were unable to go into the water 20 minutes before this scene. The most annoying part is that this seems like such an unnecessary plot hole to include. How hard is it to just make the Night King raise his arms again and have Viserion burst out from under the ice? Hell it would have made for a better reveal anyways, especially since I immediately figured out that Viserion was coming back as a wight after I saw the chains pulling him up. And to think that I have written this many complaints without even getting into the Winterfell story. That one is just as bad as this. The showrunners are blatantly setting up for Arya and Sansa killing Littlefinger but they are doing it in a stupid way. They want us to be surprised so they are making it look like Littlefinger is playing Arya and Sansa against each other so that we can be surprised when they turn on him. It's too predictable and that makes it really tedious to watch. The issue of course comes from the fact that they don't appear to be faking it in their scenes. Why is it necessary for them to fake it anyways? In case Littlefinger has spies? If that's the case, how did they communicate this plan without him knowing anyways? The story is very poorly thought out. It's even worse if it turns out that the two aren't faking it and are genuinely at odds. I didn't wait for them to reunite only for them to start fighting each other. There are so many other conflicts I would rather explore over a Stark family dispute. Furthermore, both characters come off poorly in this conflict. Sansa is foolish for confiding in Littlefinger and sending Brienne away. Arya is totally out of her league and unsympathetic for getting mad at Sansa over something so trivial. Her entire argument makes it seem like she never really grew up past her hate of Sansa at all. So either way this goes, the result is going to be unsatisfying. And it has to be resolved next episode where it will likely be rushed. How did this show come to this? The Unknown: Is Littlefinger being set up or is he actually playing the Starks against each other? What will Cersei's reaction be when she sees the wight? I highly doubt that she actually helps Dany and Jon. Having The Hound use the word "dick" was odd. I don't believe that word has ever been used before so I'm not sure that it exists int his universe. That could be a large inconsistency which perfectly highlights how sloppily the show is being written now. However, I may be wrong so I'm leaving it in The Unknown. Best Moment: Tormund and The Hound talking about Brienne was entertaining. Character of the Episode: Tormund. Conclusion: This was an illogical, stupid and downright insulting episode. The show has fallen off a cliff in the last two episodes and no longer resembles itself. This episode was downright painful and sad to watch because it showed us how far the show has fallen. Score: 36 Summary: Dany burns Randyll and Dickon when they refuse to bend the knee. Jaime is alive and returns to King's Landing. Dany returns to Dragonstone. Tyrion hatches a plan to bring a wight from the North to convince Cersei they exist. Jon goes on this mission himself along with the newly returned Jorah. Davos takes Tyrion to King's Landing to propose a truce with Cersei via Jaime. Davos meets with Gendry and brings him back to Dragonstone. Gendry joins Jon's group. Jon's group goes to Eastwatch where they encoutner the Brotherhood. The two groups unite and go beyond The Wall. Sansa appears to have a brewing feud with Jon. Arya investigates Littlefinger's chambers and finds a message but Littlefinger is aware of this.
The Good: This was mostly enjoyable from start to finish with a few good scenes but a vast array of flaws that hurt this (see: The Bad). I really liked Dany's decision to burn Randyll and Dickon. It seems harsh and cruel, but such is the way of war. Dany will have to make tough decisions which polarize her followers and this is one of them. I really like that Varys and Tyrion are unsure of what to make of Dany doing this and are beginning to trust her a little less. Tyrion's reunion with Jaime was another excellent scene. I thought that the emotions were conveyed well from both men with Tyrion desperately trying to explain himself and Jaime expressing his anger. I also enjoyed Jaime telling Cersei that Olenna was responsible for Joffrey's death. I thought the reintroduction of Gendry was well done. His interactions with Davos were good and I like the idea of him teaming up with Jon as two bastards with fathers who were friends. I was entertained by the scene with the two guards encountering Davos' boat. The Bad: Sadly this had too many issues and that ruined any chance of this episode being satisfying. I thought it was a poor follow-up to one of the show's best episodes. I was extremely unsatisfied with Bronn and Jaime escaping so easily. First of all, there is no logic to any of it. Apparently Bronn swam for what looks like a good mile with Jaime, coated in armour and with one hand. I can't buy this would happen at all. Furthermore, it feels like a cheap way to have Jaime escape from Dany's clutches. It's annoying to see the show stage an epic battle last episode only to wuss out on dealing with the consequences of a Lannister defeat. Speaking of consequences of the battle, I was displeased for all of the logistics glossed over. How many casualties were there and how big of a loss was it? The only answer we got was "there wasn't a full accounting". What a cop out. Also, apparently the gold somehow got to King's Landing before this which we should have been told in the previous episode so we could understand the stakes better. I wasn't pleased with the scenes on Dragonstone either. Jon touching the dragon is cool, but also stupid. Jon should be afraid of dragons at this point, so I find it impossible to believe that he will take the risk of touching the dragon. That Daenerys lets him do so is even stupider, as she surely wouldn't risk her dragon accidentally roasting the King in the North. I didn't like Jorah's return either as it was rushed and that robbed us of the emotional reaction I was expecting. Furthermore, Jorah immediately leaves Dany again which makes no sense to me. Tyrion's plan with the wight capture has to be one of the dumbest things this show has done. Not only is it a tremendous risk to meet the undead army head-on, but the plan is so unlikely to actually work. First of all, risking the King in the North for this mission is just inexcusably stupid and I'm sure it's a forced way to get Jon to encounter the White Walkers again. The actual plan is idiotic because it counts on Cersei being reasonable enough to take the threat seriously when there is proof that it exists. The issue of course is that Tyrion of all people should know more than anyone that Cersei will not listen to reason and will likely try to stab Dany in the back anyways. It's inconsistent and stupid. Lastly, what is keeping Dany from going on this mission? Is it so important to her that she keeps her base on Dragonstone? It's unexplained why she can't leave. While I liked the scenes in King's Landing, they were implausible to the highest degree. The first issue coems from the time jumps that are made here. Apparently Davos can row to King's Landing and back before Jon even leaves for Eastwatch which is incredibly dumb. It took Stannis a long time to make the trip with large ships, so it's inconsistent for Davos to go back and forth so quickly. Furthermore, the idea that Bronn would risk everything for Tyrion by having him meet Jaime is extremely stupid. How did Tyrion get in contact with Bronn anyways? It's poorly written. Furthermore, the guards scene was unfortunately quite pointless and it feels like a waste of time in an otherwise packed episode. I didn't like the Winterfell story either. I have no interest in watching Arya and Sansa come in conflict after spending years apart. Both women come off as petty and annoying as they come at each other's throats. Of course this may all be a plan to frame Littlefinger, but if that's the case, Sansa and Arya are way too good at acting. Naturally the writers don't care about that though and they just want to surprise us when they turn the tables on Littlefinger. Lastly, I was unsatisfied with Arya following Littlefinger. She can wear faces, so why isn't she using that power more? It is literally perfect for this situation. The Unknown: What will happen beyond The Wall? I get the feeling that the plan won't go as expected. Apparently Cersei is pregnant now. How will this come into play? Didn't Cersei's prophecy say that she would only have 3 children? The clever show decided to reveal some essential information through Gilly. Did we just get confirmation that Rhaegar and Lyanna were in a loving relationship? Apparently Rhaegar annulled his relationship with Elia judging by what Gilly said, which is very interesting. Does this mean that Jon is a legitimate Targaryen? Where will Sam go now? Back to Jon? What was written on Littlefinger's letter? What is his plan for Sansa and Arya? Are they aware of what he is doing? Best Moment: Tyrion and Jaime's conversation was the most emotional part of this episode. Character of the Episode: Gilly. Conclusion: This was a fun episode to watch but there were so many flaws, it's almost hard to believe. There is a good story in this episode somewhere but the execution was very poor and failed to capitalize on any of the story's potential. This was a disappointment. Score: 51 Summary: Arya returns to Winterfell and meets with Sansa and Bran. Littlefinger tries to win Bran's trust but Bran reveals he knows the things that Littlefinger has done. Bran thanks Meera and she leaves. Dany and Jon grow closer as Jon shows her some cave paintings of White Walkers. Theon returns to Dragonstone and reunites with Jon who is suitably angry. Dany takes Drogon and her army and attacks Jaime and Bronn's group on the Roseroad. Bronn injures Drogon with Qyburn's scorpion. Jaime tries to attack Dany and is nearly killed. Bronn saves him and throws him into a lake.
The Good: This was an outstanding episode. There were a number of strong scenes throughout the episode culminating in one of the show's very best battles. The scenes at Winterfell were all extremely strong. Arya's return was genuinely emotional especially since she had spent 3 entire seasons wandering Westeros in an attempt to go home. Now she is finally back and it feels really good. I love the callback to season 1 with Arya having to get past two guards who don't believe that she is who she says he is. It was a nice way to bring everything together. The reunion with Sansa was a lovely moment. I love that they were both able to cast aside the past where they always bickered with each other and viewed each other as fully grown women, and most importantly, as family. I also love Arya mentioning her kill list which Sansa didn't believe only for Bran to reveal the truth. Speaking of Bran, he's more interesting than he has ever been. I thought the scene with Littlefigner was terrific. I really like the idea of Littlefinger trying to win over Bran since he is the technical heir to Winterfell now. I was intrigued by the scene all the way through, and I was genuinely surprised when Bran quoted "chaos is a ladder". Bran is a total wildcard now and I'm excited to see what else he knows. The ensuing scene with Meera was terrific too. His cold goodbye to her was sad and did a good job of demonstrating how much Bran has lost himself after last season. I also really liked Bran's awkward attempt at kindness when he gave Arya the dagger. Arya and Brienne's spar was really enjoyable. It was choreographed nicely and was a good way to show us how much better Arya has gotten at fighting after her training in Braavos. It also helped present a very real threat to Littlefinger, who may have to do something out of the ordinary to survive (see: The Unknown). The scenes at Dragonstone were also very good. I'm interested by this apparent Jon and Dany romance which was slightly hinted at last episode but I wasn't sure that they were heading in that direction. Now it seems very apparent that they are heading towards a romance. I thought the cave scene was done very well and it was nice to get the characters to bond. The reunion between Jon and Theon was very good. This season has been filled with reunions and they are all great. This one wasn't a heartfelt one but was instead very tense. Jon had plenty of reasons to be angry at Theon and it was good to see him let out the anger. I also liked Davos talking with Jon about his relationship with Dany. The "good heart" joke was funny as he is very clearly attracted to Missandei. This takes things to the battle at the end of the episode. And what a battle it was. First of all, it looked spectacular as expected. The dragon assault was awesome and the CGI looked absolutely incredible. The cinematography was wonderful too throughout the episode. I especially liked the longshot with Bronn as he struggled to get to the scorpion. It was like Jon's longshot only even more intense and chaotic. The battle works so well because there are tons of characters we care about involved. I was extremely worried that Dany, Bronn or Jaime were about to take heavy losses or even die in this battle. It had me on the edge of my seat the entire time and ratcheted up the tension to an insane level. Bronn firing at Drogon and Jaime charging at Dany had me speechless and completely invested. I also thought the emotions of the battle were really well done. Bronn deciding to risk his life, Tyrion watching his men die and Jaime make a foolish decision and Dany fearfully riding the wounded Drogon were all powerful moments that got a reaction out of me through all of the intense action. The Bad: I forgot to mention this in my last review, but it doesn't feel right that Tyrion was outsmarted by his siblings. After all, he has always been the smart one while Cersei has been positively stupid at times and Jaime is no genius tactician. The ending cliffhanger is a bit annoying with Jaime sinking. It's obvious he won't die from drowning. Like every battle, there were a few logic gaps here. I don't have an issue with Dany finding the army. After all they are travelling in a long line from Highgarden to King's Landing. She would be hard-pressed to miss them. The issue I do have is on how she got her army to the mainland. Yara's fleet just got decimated by Euron. So how did Dany transport an army to the mainland without boats? That makes no sense. The next major issue comes from the battle itself. I thought it was incredibly stupid that Dany burned all of the gold and the food. Logically, she would take it for herself and use it, but instead she burns perfectly good supplies. If she attacked with only a dragon, burning the supplies would be smart. But since she totally outmatched the Lannisters army, surely she would just kill them and take the food for herself. The Unknown: What happens to Jaime and Bronn now? Will they be prisoners? Perhaps Bronn will be executed? Will this Dany and Jon romance become a full-on storyline? What does Littlefinger do next? I suspect we may be hearing that he has some urgent business in The Vale that he must attend to now that he is surrounded by threats in Arya and Bran. Best Moment: There are so many moments to pick in this episode. I'll go with Jaime's final charge towards Dany. I really feared that he was about to die there. Character of the Episode: Dany. Conclusion: This episode was excellent. Tons of powerful moments capped off with a spectacular battle made this a true series highlight. Even though the way this show works has changed over the past few seasons, this episode proves that this series can still be incredible. Score: 81 Summary: Jon arrives on Dragonstone and meets with Dany. Dany doesn't believe Jon's claims and Jon refuses to bend the knee. News arrives of the destruction of Yara's fleet. Euron returns to King's Landing and gifts Cersei her vengeance on Ellaria. Bran returns to Winterfell and reunites with Sansa. Jorah is cured and leaves while Sam is allowed to stay. The Unsullied attack Casterly Rock but the Lannister army is gone. Euron's fleet attacks them. The Lannister army takes Highgarden. Jaime allows Olenna to die through a painless poison and in exchange Olenna reveals that she murdered Joffrey.
The Good: This was a very strong episode with a number of great scenes. The big one was Jon and Dany's first meeting. The moment felt appropriately significant and was very fun to watch. The initial introduction was hilarious as Missandei spewed Dany's 500 titles and Davos responded with "this is Jon Snow... he's King in the North". The ensuing conversation was really strong and both characters stuck to their morals while conversing. Both went in with their own ideals, Dany wanted Jon's loyalty and Jon wanted Dany to fight the dead. Dany pleasingly didn't believe Jon's claims as they do sound rather insane and Jon pleasingly did not kneel to somebody he didn't even know. Both characters are asking for things we want to see happen, but thankfully the writers show restraint and now we have to see both Dany and Jon win each other's trust. Tyrion was excellent in this episode and had several strong moments of dialogue. Tyrion and Jon's scenes were terrifically written and served as a strong reunion between two friends. I appreciated Tyrion honestly telling Jon what he thinks about the White Walkers threat, and it does a good job of making me anticipate a team-up from these characters. I enjoyed the scenes in King's Landing. Euron feels incredibly out of place in this show but I enjoy his charismatic personality too much to be bothered by it. He had some great moments in this episode too and has been one of my favourite aspects of this season. Cersei's vengeance on Ellaria was really good. I'm pleased that we weren't given any gratuitous violence surrounding how Cersei tortures Ellaria and we instead got to focus on the emotions of the scene. Cersei enjoyed getting revenge and Ellaria suffered watching her daughter get a death sentence and those were thankfully the moments we focused on. The ending strategy sequence was conveyed pretty well. I liked Tyrion talking through the plan to take Casterly Rock as it happened and the sequence was crafted well. The twist that it was the trap was pretty good and caught me by surprise. I was surprised to see Dany lose practically all of her allies in two back to back episodes but I think it is a good development overall. This forces Dany to respect Jon and win over his trust as he is her only hope for an ally now. The final scene with Jaime and Olenna was awesome (see: Best Moment). I thought Olenna's last scene was executed very well as she got a death fitting of the title "Queen of Thorns", pricking Jaime for showing her a little bit of mercy. I also appreciate the irony of Olenna dying via poison, the same way she murdered Joffrey. A few other scenes were done very well too. I was really happy with Sansa and Bran's reunion. It was a sweet moment, but it was quickly spoiled by the fact that Bran isn't himself anymore. His scene with Sansa at the Weirwood was really creepy and did a great job of making Bran feel like a more interesting character. He has been stale for a long time so this new change actually feels refreshing. The Archmaester's reaction to Sam's operation was good too. I appreciate that he gave Sam credit for performing an extremely tough operation but still punished him for breaking the rules. The Bad: Dany is too rude to Jon for my liking. Surely she understands that he is a King and should be treated with more respect than he is. Yet for some reason she slanders him at every opportunity and he sometimes does the same to her. Robb was much better at the young king business because at least he tried to carry himself like royalty while also respecting his allies. Jorah's Greyscale ended up being a bit pointless. It accomplished nothing important and only served to be a delaying tactic so he doesn't get back with Dany so quick. It's a shame as I saw some potential in that storyline. This episode really suffered from the 7 episode season. The developments all felt extremely rushed and a whole ton happened here with little time to breathe. The ending sequence felt like it could have happened over two episodes but we got it all in under ten minutes which is crazy. It wasn't a huge problem since this episode was very good overall but it could lead to issues later on. Also, Highgarden was weirdly easy to take. No siege or anything and Jaime practically just walked right inside. The excuse that Tyrells suck at fighting is nowhere near good enough to explain this. A bunch of nitpicks again with the writing. How did Euron know the method of Myrcella's death which he referenced to Cersei? There is no way he would have received word about it. Tyrion's reference to Bronn felt like blatant and unnecessary fanservice. Euron made it to Casterly Rock at a shockingly fast rate which shouldn't be possible. I was confused why everyone at King's Landing were cheering on Euron. I thought they hated Cersei. Did they already forget that she blew up the Sept? The Unknown: Has Melisandre seen her own death? Apparently she has seen Varys' too. How do they die? Will it be significant? Will Dany and Jon end up forming an aliance? Best Moment: Jaime is a good man and he showed mercy to Olenna. A kindness that Cersei never would have given. And despite that, he still ended up suffering as Olenna thanked him in the most brutal way possible. I guess showing mercy will be another mistake for Jaime to learn from. Character of the Episode: Olenna. Conclusion: This was very good. There were a lot of good scenes and the story progressed in good ways even if it felt a little rushed. This was a good return to form after the previous episode. Score: 69 Summary: Dany decides to trust Varys but lets him know that she will kill him if he betrays her. Dany meets with Ellaria and Olenna and prepares a strategy. Grey Worm and Missandei openly admit their feelings. Yara and Theon take Ellaria back to Dorne on their fleet. Sam realizes that Jorah is a Mormont so he decides to help him cure the Greyscale by performing a forbidden operation. Arya runs into Hot Pie who tells her that Jon took Winterfell. Arya heads North instead and she briefly encounters Nymeria. Jon receives an invitation from Dany who wants him to bend the knee. Jon decides to go meet her and leaves Sansa in charge. Yara's fleet is attacked by Euron. The Sand Snakes are killed and both Yara and Ellaria are taken captive. Theon escapes.
The Good: I enjoyed Dany's conversation with Varys. Varys' true loyalties have always been murky and I'm glad that Dany didn't just blindly trust him. While she decides to let him live and serve her, she certainly doesn't trust him. The conversation was really strong. I also liked seeing Dany form her strategy with Olenna and Ellaria, as it was necessary to understand what she plans to do next. I appreciate that Dany doesn't intend to play to Cersei's game by attacking King's Landing and having the people of Westeros turn on her. And on the other side of that, I appreciate that Cersei and Jaime are using the foreigner card on Dany to get the people of Westeros to remain loyal. I enjoyed Sam's story on the surface. His interactions with the Archmaester remain fun and I like that the Archmaester sticks to his beliefs despite what Sam wants. I also appreciate that the Archmaester is aware of everything Sam brings up, which makes sense considering his title. I liked the idea of Sam deciding to help Jorah upon discovering his family name as Sam is still loyal to Jeor. Also, the cut from the operation to pie was terrific. Arya's storyline was really good. I was glad to see her run into Hot Pie again and it served as a good way for her to set her sights towards Winterfell instead with the intentions of reuniting with her siblings. Let's hope they aren't dead when she arrives like everyone else. The ensuing reunion with Nymeria was also great. I really liked the storytelling. After Nymeria rejected Arya, she realized that Nymeria has changed. The irony is that Nymeria likely rejected Arya because she knew she had changed as well. I am pleased with the development of Jon going to meet Dany, which should be a fantastic moment to behold even if the way to get there is a bit illogical (see: The Bad). The Sand Snakes are dead! Thank god for that, and also thank you Euron. I continue to like him and taking out the show's worst characters certainly helps with that. The Bad: Unfortunately the sea battle was very poor in my eyes. Not only did it subject us to more Sand Snakes, but the action was no good. It was hard to get engaged since we could never focus on characters we care about. And since everything was so dark and the camera cut too much, it was nearly impossible to figure out what was actually going on. Which of course makes this entire battle illogical anyways. Euron being able to locate Yara's fleet in the pitch black is simply ridiculous and a battle like this would never happen at night. It's a bit convenient that Sam can learn an advanced procedure to cure Greyscale over night with no medical experience whatsoever. Also, I wish we could learn more about what Sam is putting on the line by doing this. Has he learned enough at the Citadel? Does he care if he's thrown out, which he probably will be? We need to know what kind of consequences Sam will be facing for his decision to do this to have any drama. I wasn't happy with the Grey Worm and Missandei scene either. With only 7 episodes in this season, it feels like we really shouldn't be spending so much time with these two. If they provided something more than the required quota of nudity I would be fine with it, but there really wasn't much to see here. There were some other illogical moments here as well. So Dany decided not to talk with Varys about his loyalties until arriving in Westeros. Why wait so long? Also, Dany's plan is a little odd. Apparently she is sending her men to Casterly Rock by boat. If you look at a map, this makes no sense and a fleet would take ages to get all the way over there. I could buy into Euron getting to King's Landing if only because there was a notable timeskip between seasons, but this will take forever. Lastly, Jon's decision to meet Dany in person makes no sense. A King would never go to a meeting himself and would usually send somebody else. Jon has Davos who is literally made for a job like this, but instead he is going himself for some reason. Jon already approached Sansa about questioning him in front of everyone and yet she does it here again. To make matters worse, she stops talking once Jon gives her power like it's all she wanted by questioning him. It is actually annoying how much she pesters Jon and it doesn't fit with her character at all to behave like this. Sansa has been a character I always sympathized with, and the show is making me dislike her. Furthermore, it isn't only Sansa who is being treated poorly as a character but Littlefinger too. His conversation with Jon was so stupid and I can't imagine what he thought to accomplish by telling Jon he loves Sansa. For a master manipulator, he is uncharacteristically poor at getting people to trust him. The Unknown: Will Randyll choose to join with Jaime or will he remain with Olenna? How will Theon survive now that he is stranded in the water? Was Euron's attack intentional or did he just happen to run into Yara's fleet after leaving King's Landing? If it was intentional (which makes no sense since he wouldn't know where Yara was), does he plan to use his hostages as Cersei's gift? Best Moment: I'll go with Arya reuniting with Nymeria for its story value. Character of the Episode: Euron. Conclusion: This was an average episode with ups and downs until the final battle which condemned this episode as a weak one. But despite that, this episode feels more like a bump in the road than something genuinely concerning. Score: 55 Summary: Arya uses Walder's face and poisons all of the Freys, destroying their house. Arya heads towards King's Landing next. Bran passes through Castle Black. Jon Cersei forges an alliance with Euron, who Jaime doesn't trust. Sam adjusts to life at the Citadel which isn't treating him well. Sam sneaks into the restricted section to read books about the White Walkers. Jorah is in the Citadel. The Hound and the Brotherhood seek shelter at a house. The Hound recognizes the location from his time with Arya and is disheartened to see the family dead. Thoros shows The Hound a vision in the fire. Dany arrives on Dragonstone.
The Good: This was a solid season premiere which set up the story for the season really nicely with some welcome developments and strong moments. While this episode wasn't as skillfully written as most of the series and had inconsistencies, there were no major problems. Arya's storyline was pretty solid here. I really enjoyed the opening scene as it was a more enjoyable version of Arya's revenge on the Freys that what we got last season. It was a strong way to kick off the season and I appreciated the twist that Arya used Walder's face to kill the Freys instead of it being a flashback like I had initially expected. Arya's scene with the soldiers was a good way to give us more insight on what is on her mind now. We got a nice moment of her reflecting about Ned, while also showing how she has grown and letting us know that her current plan is to murder Cersei. It was a great showcase for Maisie Williams who conveyed these emotions spectacularly. Jaime and Cersei's scene was really good as it finally allowed Jaime to face the person Cersei has become. Cersei's lack of regard for Tommen's death was unsettling and was what I expected from her now that she has seemingly lost sight of the person she used to be. I liked the use of the floor map to serve as a quick recap of Cersei's position, and it showed that Cersei has a serious disadvantage despite being Queen. I thought the desperation of Cersei's situation was conveyed well and I bought into the idea that Cersei would turn to Euron for help. As for Euron, I really liked him in this episode. He didn't get a chance to show off his personality much last season, but here he was given the opportunity. He seems like a fun character with little regard for others and a hidden agenda of his own. I got a good laugh out of some of his taunts to Jaime. I'm very excited to see what kind of a role he will play in the show as his motives remain mostly unclear for the moment. I really liked Sam's time at the Citadel. The poop montage that opened up his storyline was tremendous with some great editing to give us an idea of what training to become a Maester is like. I also liked Jim Broadbent as the Archmaester and I like the possibly intentional Harry Potter reference with Jim Broadbent being asked about the restricted section in the library. I did like Sam making the decision to put matters into his own hands when he realized that the Maesters were not going to be of any help to his cause. Now it remains to be seen if Sam will be caught and ejected. I also loved the addition of Jorah to the storyline as it seems logical that Jorah would go to the Citadel in an attempt to find a cure to his Greyscale. The Hound's storyline was the strongest here. I loved the callback to season 4 when he encountered the father and daughter who he declared would be dead by the winter. Now he gets to see that they actually did die and in a very depressing way. It was powerful and served as a good way to show us how The Hound has matured from his time with Septon Ray. I also really enjoyed his ensuing conversation with Beric and Thoros. Beric revealing that he still has no idea why he is being brought back over and over is really good and helps put us into the mind of this seemingly immortal man. Also, Thoros introducing The Hound to the wonders of R'hllor was awesome. The Hound has always been a very pragmatic individual so to confront him with definitive proof of the supernatural in the presence of his one true fear was very smart and I thought Rory McCann did a stellar job of showing the surprise that The Hound was feeling. I also really enjoyed the artful final sequence of Dany arriving in Westeros. The sequence appropriately captured the emotions Dany would be feeling as she is finally back to her home and also did a great job of making the moment feel as important as it is. It was a great showcase of the visual production of the show too. Back in season 2 the production was never budgeted enough to showcase the beauty of Dragonstone, but now the budget is there and I really enjoyed seeing the brilliance of Dragonstone. The Bad: Most of the issues I had with this episode were just little nitpicks and inconsistencies with every storyline. First up, I was annoyed by Edd asking if Bran was a wildling, as if he wasn't going to let him through if he was. There is peace now between the Night's Watch and wildlings, so this was an illogical bit of dialogue to add unnecessary drama. I wasn't a fan of Sansa questioning Jon in the middle of everyone. Surely she would at least talk to him in private about this instead of undermining him. Having lived in King's Landing, she should certainly understand that having your men believe in you is important, yet she encourages Jon's men to question his leadership through her actions. The dragonglass discovery that Sam makes is stupid and certainly shouldn't be of any use. Why? Because Jon is with Davos who has lived on Dragonstone for years and most certainly knows about the cache of dragonglass! Also, I forgot to mention this in "The Winds of Winter" but how is Varys with Dany again when he was just in Dorne like two minutes ago? He can teleport! Finally, showing the Lannister soldiers as kind was a bit odd since all soldiers in this show have been portrayed as Some people will certainly take big issue with Ed Sheeran in this episode. Personally I don't mind it too much since he didn't really detract from my experience watching the show. Ed Sheeran was treated as just another guy and never took the focus away from the story being told. If that is the case, then it is a relatively harmless addition to the show that I certainly won't oppose in its entirety. But, I don't like the idea of celebrities being placed into TV dramas like this, regardless of what their role is. Even though Ed Sheeran didn't detract from the story, he became a major factor of discussion which is annoying. When discussing "Game of Thrones" I want to talk about the show, not Ed Sheeran. The Unknown: How do Arya's abilities work exactly? Apparently wearing a face actually gives you their vocal ability which is interesting. I would like to learn more about how these powers work but I don't think we will get an answer. I was about to put this next part in The Bad, but I had second thoughts as this may be an intentional detail. Apparently Cersei knows that Tyrion has been named as Dany's Hand. How? This may be another story inconsistency, but perhaps there is a proper answer to this. Does Cersei have a spy in Dany's group? Could Varys be loyal to her somehow? I'm not sure how that would make sense but it's possible. Who else could it be? What gift does Euron intend to bring Cersei? What does The Hound's vision mean? Will the White Walkers simply walk around The Wall? That is certainly a possibility if they freeze the sea and walk over the ice. Does that arrowhead mountain have any significance? Will Jorah find a cure in the Citadel? Will his interactions with Sam go somewhere? Best Moment: The Hound seeing the family dead in the corner was really powerful. Great storytelling. Character of the Episode: The Hound. Conclusion: While the show has certainly changed over the past few seasons, I can't deny that it is still compelling. This episode provided some very strong set-up for the season while having some powerful moments to boast as well. Score: 66 Summary: The High Sparrow, Kevan and the Tyrells gather in the Sept of Baelor for Cersei's trial. Cersei blows up the Sept and kills all of them. Tommen commits suicide in grief. Sam arrives in Oldtown. Davos reveals what Melisandre has done and Jon banishes her. Jon is declared King in the North. Bran visits the past and discovers that Jon is actually the son of Lyanna and Rhaegar. Dany secures allegiances with Dorne and Olenna. Tyrion is named Hand of the Queen. Dany finally heads towards Westeros.
The Good: This was a great season finale with a number of stand-out moments which delivered. It's a big step up from the debacle that ended season 5. The destruction of the Sept was a stellar sequence. As this show has gone on, the production has gotten better and better. With the spectacle of the previous episode and now the fantastically artistic sequence in this episode, it seems hard to imagine any other show ever pulling of cinematic feats like this. I appreciate that so much attention was given to this one moment as it was a massive event which changes the story significantly as Cersei has suddenly put herself in a position where she holds all power, getting sweet revenge on all of her enemies by blowing them up. Except Septa Unella, who she has much "better" plans for. It was in-character for Cersei to do something as crazy as this and it provided a fitting conclusion to the Margaery/Cersei feud. Margaery was great at playing the game, so to beat her Cersei destroyed the game. It's a great bit of storytelling. Also, I thought the musical piece composed specifically for this sequence was superb and darkly beautiful. Finally, I'll spare a thought for Pycelle who died a brutal death which was a long time coming. The fallout of the explosion was handled well too. I appreciated seeing Jaime come back to Cersei sitting on the iron throne, having murdered many innocents with wildfire. She committed the very crime that Jaime sacrificed his honour to prevent and I'm sure that this will lead to some big conflict between them. I enjoyed Jon's storyline too. Davos exploding at Melisandre was terrific and I really felt something for him, brought forward by Liam Cunningham's outstanding performance. He was so good here that it makes me genuinely confused why he wasn't given more time to mourn Stannis and Shireen's deaths last season. Hopefully there will be more for Davos to do next season but I'm not too sure where he goes from here. Jon being crowned King in the North was a great moment and a nice callback to Robb earning his men's loyalty back in season 1. Speaking of Jon, we finally got to know who his mother was! Of course it wasn't a particularly big surprise as many people had already pieced it together, but I still really appreciated the reveal. The cut to Jon's face with a music cue was a tremendous way to give us this reveal without saying a word of expositional dialogue. I have been hard on this show for the past two seasons for being weaker in the details, but I admit that this was exceptionally well done. I'm glad to see that Dany has made some allies in Westeros. Naturally, Cersei being on the throne has angered some of the kingdoms and so they have thrown in their lot with Dany. Gaining the allegiances of Dorne and the Reach is very big for Dany, and I look forward to the strategies which will be involved in her inevitable clash with Cersei. Also, we got some nice scenes of Olenna being Olenna which I will never complain about. I'm beyond pleased that Dany is finally heading to Westeros, and I can't wait to see what will come next season. Sam's story was brief but very good. It was nice to finally see Oldtown and the Citadel, plus it gave the show another reason to show off its lovely special effects. I really liked Sam's glee at finally having access to the library and I got a laugh out of him trying to say something to Gilly, only to excitedly shuffle away to the library. The Bad: I thought Tommen's death was a sad and powerful moment, but it was hurt by a weak follow-up to it. Namely the fact that Cersei didn't really react at all to his death. We know that Cersei values her children above everything, so why didn't we get more? Surely that story warranted a bit more focus as it could have led to a great realization for Cersei as she faces the consequences of her actions. Instead, we have been given the story that she no longer cares and appears to have completely lost it. I am fine with that story, but it needed to be built up in prior episodes, more than just some moments of foreshadowing. I wasn't happy with Dany making Tyrion her hand. What reason has Tyrion given to her for her to award him this position? Tyrion failed to rule Meereen while she was gone and caused a siege, so why does she put her faith in him? If Tyrion had been more successful and had the two of them shared more than three scenes together, this may have had greater impact. For example, if Jorah was in this scene instead it would be very emotional. Instead, we get Tyrion being made Dany's hand simply because it's a cool moment. I did not like Walder Frey's death at all. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad to see him dead but the way it happened was extremely unsatisfactory. It's very disappointing that the two men responsible for the red wedding, Frey and Roose, both died lame deaths. The problem with this death is that it made no sense. Arya left Braavos two episodes ago. Yet somehow she made it all the way to Westeros and crossed half the continent to get to The Twins. And after that she was able to easily infiltrate the place with her new abilities and murdered the Freys and took out Walder with total ease. Why should we care? This doesn't feel like a character journey for Arya at all. She just killed him and there was nothing to it. No relief, no specific satisfaction for Arya after a executing a tough job. All we are left with is "oh good Walder Frey is dead". That is nowhere near enough for the man responsible for one of the most brutal moments in TV history. Cersei was told to confess as soon as she was thrown into her cell. Did Loras not get the same option? He was broken a long time ago, so why didn't he just confess back then? The Unknown: What will Sam learn at the Citadel? Where will Melisandre go now? To Cersei? Dany? Perhaps she will secure an alliance with Dany. How will Jaime react to Cersei's actions? Best Moment: The entire 10 minute sequence of the destruction of the Sept was outstanding. The production made this really feel like one of the great TV moments. Character of the Episode: Cersei. Conclusion: This episode delivered an explosive ending to the season which changed the story in big ways and sets up season 7 very nicely. There were some issues with this, but as a whole it was tremendously exciting and exceeded my expectations. This season was thankfully a big improvement over the last but it still feels like something is missing from the show that was there before. This season was consistent and aside from "No One", there wasn't anything particularly bad about it, except the obvious flaws for each individual episode. However, the show does feel changed. This was perhaps the most eventful season to date, yet it was my second-least favourite. I believe this is because the show has run out of book material to adapt, and without GRRM's impeccable writing, the storylines have become simpler, less poignant and at times rushed. However, none of these flaws feels like they ruin the season. The biggest blessing for this show is that it has already invested me in its characters and storylines. Because of that, I still get a lot of enjoyment from these 10 episodes, and while it doesn't live up to the high standards of season 1-4, I can still say it was a good, fun season. Now with 13 episodes left, its time to see if "Game of Thrones" can have a final act that lives up to the high expectations. Score: 72 Summary: Dany attempts to get the masters to surrender. They refuse so Dany unleashes the Dothraki and her dragons on them. Tyrion brokers a peace agreement, killing the 2 head masters in exchange. Dany meets with Yara and Theon. They form an alliance. Jon and Sansa make final plans before battle. Both armies confront each other. Ramsay kills Rickon which infuriates Jon. The battle starts and Ramsay quickly gets the advantage. Littlefinger arrives with his army to turn the tables. Ramsay retreats to Winterfell but the door is broken by Wun Wun who dies. Jon defeats Ramsay and takes Winterfell. Sansa lets Ramsay's hounds eat and kill him.
The Good: Visually speaking, this was the most impressive episode that "Game of Thrones" has ever done. The assault on Meereen and the titular battle were shot spectacularly with gorgeous special effects and cinematography. I have never seen a TV show come as close to producing a movie-quality hour as this one episode. It is a tremendous feat. The spectacle in Meereen was pretty neat to watch. I will admit that it is extremely satisfying to see Dany finally living up to our expectations and conquering a city with fire and blood, which has been hyped for a long time now. I've been annoyed that Dany has taken so long to start conquering, but the wait has somewhat paid off because the moment feels much sweeter than it would have if it happened back in season 3. On the other side of the episode, the chaos of the central battle was superbly conveyed. The whole thing was an entertaining and jaw-dropping fight scene which delivered an appropriate amount of thrills and brutality. I especially loved some of the cinematography done in this battle. I really liked the camera following the arrows as they flew through the air into the battle. The sound effects were just as superb as the visuals. Better than that were the artistic shots to take us through the battle. The longshot showing Jon fighting is the battle was incredibly well done and left me really impressed at the co-ordination that it must have taken. The scene itself did a fantastic job of showcasing the brutality of battle by having Jon encounter many close calls while viciously fighting anyone that he could. The other scene I want to point out is when Jon was being trampled by his own army. It was a horrific thought conveyed perfectly as I legitimately felt claustrophobic because of the way the camera constantly showed us the rapidly moving army from the eyes of Jon who was suffering beneath all of it. The conclusion of the battle was pretty good as well. It was great to see Ramsay get his comeuppance and his brutal death was fitting for his character. It's good to finally be rid of his vile and torturous attitude. I got a laugh out of Yara subtly hinting at enjoying a wedding with Dany. A lot of the dialogue between Dany and Yara was pretty well written. The Bad: Unfortunately I found a lot of this episode to be lacking in substance. Sure, it was very pretty and exciting to watch, but there were many gaps underneath the surface. The first issues come from Meereen. The problem is that I wasn't very invested in Dany conquering Meereen. The set-up to this final confrontation was quite poor and I was never once excited for this big upcoming climax in the previous episodes. It just sort of happened, and then Dany came back to clean it up. It was cool, but what was the purpose of it? No character arcs were furthered and there was no development whatsoever. It was a fun scene but it lacked emotion and depth. Sadly it was not memorable and a few days after watching the episode, the scene has not stuck with me at all. Surely a climax like this ought to have resonated more than it did? The dealings with Yara and Dany were fine but it had one really dumb moment, and unfortunately that moment is central to the whole scene. That moment was Yara agreeing to abandon her entire way of life to suit Dany's needs. She has lived with the Ironborn her entire life yet for some reasons he thinks they will just agree to stop raiding and pillaging. Has she met them? No way that any of them agree to this. Yara would be kicked off of the salt throne in mere minutes if she goes through with this. Before I get to my qualms about the battle, I have to address the problem which has plagued this whole season. That problem is that the show has taken a liking for paint-by-the-numbers fantasy cliche scenes. The first four seasons would never have indulged in any generic scenes but this season has been full of them. It's worth noting how extremely basic this season has felt and the show has lost that morally grey feeling it had done such a great job exploring in the first four seasons. This is evidenced in this battle which is more good vs evil than any other human drama the show has done until this point. Where is the complexity of the Battle of the Blackwater or the Battle of Castle Black? I think that complexity helped make those battles feel more pivotal and special than this one. I did appreciate the dichotomy shown between Jon and Ramsay, but things like that have never been the reason why I liked this show. I don't watch this show to see a good vs evil battle, I watch it for the complex human drama conveyed through a variety of different characters in a medieval world. Speaking of generic scenes, one of the biggest ones in this episode was the Jon/Sansa shouting fight. Instead of staying true to these characters, their scene together features forced drama as both of them argue about the upcoming battle. It's hard to buy into Sansa being the one to do this with Jon considering her character arc and her lack of history in warfare, something the episode even acknowledges. Another generic scene was Sansa telling Ramsay he will die before just riding off. Such basic storytelling. This show is above things like that. The kick-off of the battle with Rickon dying was really bad. Rickon died and it left me feeling absolutely nothing. They didn't even try to make us sympathize with him or care for him. Hell he didn't even get a single line of dialogue this season! To do that and expect us to care for his death is ridiculous. And I caught the writers resorting to surprise to get a reaction out of us again to try to get us to feel something for Rickon. As I've said for the past season and a half, surprise is not an effective way of getting us to care about the scene that is being presented. We need emotion for that. Of course, Jon reacts very poorly to Rickon's death and stupidly compromises his entire strategy by charging Ramsay alone. What a stupid battle plan. Some moments in the battle didn't impress me. I was extremely displeased by Littlefinger's sudden arrival (oh look another "surprise!" moment). I hate the idea that Sansa knew about this yet she didn't tell Jon about it. Why on Earth would she keep it secret? Surely she would tell Jon and they would implement Littlefinger's army into their battle plans. It's a key asset, so use it. But instead we need a surprise, so she keeps it secret. Even dumber is the fact that Littlefinger got to Winterfell undetected. Did Ramsay leave no scouts from Winterfell to Moat Cailin? It's dumb enough for him to leave Moat Cailin unguarded, but to have no scouts whatsoever is the height of stupidity. Why should I fear this man who is a total dunce at strategy? The shield wall was a good visual moment but a very impractical one. Are we supposed to believe that every guy in Jon's group just gathered together and allowed themselves to be surrounded? Something like this would never work in real life. Men on foot would never be quick enough to surround an army. Ramsay killing Wun Wun with one final arrow was such a cartoony moment. We get it, Ramsay is evil. The Unknown: Will Yara betray Dany eventually? I sincerely hope her agreeing to Dany's terms is just to secure the alliance and not to actually follow through with it. Has Davos figured out what happened to Shireen? Maybe we can finally see him express some emotion regarding Stannis and Shireen's deaths. Best Moment: Jon being trampled by his own army was excellent. The suffocation was conveyed magnificently. Character of the Episode: Jon. Conclusion: This was one hell of a spectacle which was extremely enjoying from start to finish. But under the surface of the brilliant action, this was a poor episode filled with dumb moments and a basic layout which dampens the score significantly. Out of respect for the way this episode was put together and the fact that it was pretty fun, I won't give this a bad score but I feel like this could have been much, much better. Score: 65 Summary: Jaime speaks with Brienne who wants to get Blackfish to surrender. Blackfish refuses to do so. Jaime sends Edmure into Riverrun, who convinces the soldiers to open the gates. The Lannisters take Riverrun and Blackfish dies. Brienne escapes. Tommen decrees that Trial by Combat is no longer a valid trial to Cersei's detriment. The Hound meets up with the Brotherhood and joins up with them. The masters attack Meereen with their forces but Dany returns in the nick of time. Arya goes to Lady Crane to heal. The Waif kills Lady Crane and chases Arya. Arya manages to kill her and finally escapes Braavos.
The Good: Some developments were really good. I liked The Hound reuniting with the BWB. We haven't seen Beric and Thoros in ages, and it's nice to catch up with what they have been up to. Presumably they will have a large role to play as the series approaches its climax. The dialogue between them and The Hound was really good as expected and I like that The Hound chose to join them, having lost his purpose when Septon Ray's community was murdered. A lot of the scenes during the Riverrun siege were very well done. I liked Jaime and Brienne's conversation as they interacted as both friends and enemies in battle trying to follow their own paths. I liked their conversation even though it didn't really amount to much (see: The Bad). Better than that was Edmure and Jaime's conversation. The acting was stellar from Nikolaj Coster Waldau and Tobias Menzies who both put in great work with the dialogue they were given. I thought that this was a terrific scene for Jaime who once again reverted to being the man he pretends to be in order to come off as cold and menacing instead of the good man that we know him to be. I like that Jaime turns to this personality to get what he wants and it was a good way to show that Jaime doesn't care about what other people think about him. He will do the right thing in whatever method necessary no matter the cost, just like he did when he killed the Mad King. Some other small things were pretty good. Tyrion's jokes were pretty funny and I liked that we got some jokes which are specific to the world of Westeros. I also loved the callback to Tyrion getting interrupted at the Eyrie back in season one. The reveal that Trial by Combat is banned is a significant development that puts Cersei back in danger which adds more drama to the King's Landing storyline. While I didn't like how it happened, I'm glad that Arya has finally left Braavos. That story was starting to drag after taking nearly two seasons to resolve itself. I like Blackfish's armour. It looks like fish scales which is really cool. The Bad: Arya's storyline in Braavos was terrible television. I felt like I was watching a really bad action movie throughout all of it. To start, The Waif is out of character and stupid as the villain. I forgot to mention this in the previous review, but The Waif's method of attacking Arya was stupid. Instead of slitting Arya's throat and quickly killing her, The Waif lets her suffer which is exactly what Jaqen ordered her not to do. Then she somehow knows that Arya survived the stabbing, which is totally implausible. And then after that The Waif slowly goes after Arya, losing sight of her and refusing to kill her like an incompetent murderer, not a trained assassin. As ridiculous as that is, nothing is dumber than Arya somehow moving around so easily despite having been stabbed multiple times in the last episode. It's implausible, unrealistic and saps the scenes of any tension they could have had. It's genuinely terrible. Worse than this is how it makes the Faceless Men appear like an idiotic organization. Arya used her wit to kill The Waif, yet somehow in Jaqen's eyes that makes her no one? Really. Then what was the point of all the other training she was doing if all she had to do was murder The Waif. Also, Jaqen looks like a fool for investing so much time in Arya only to let her leave without a fight or anything, allowing her to do what she pleases. He even smiles! It's beyond stupid and undermines any credibility the Faceless Men had. Tyrion's story has been really disappointing this season. I have enjoyed the dialogue, but I'm incredibly disappointed that it all led nowhere. The Tyrion/Missandei/Grey Worm stuff has led absolutely nowhere and failed to pay off of the time spent on it. Furthermore, I was really annoyed by Tyrion being wrong about the masters. If he can't do his job right, what is the point of him even being there? The whole storyline felt like a waste of a great character. The end of Riverrun's siege ended up being underwhelming too. While it led to some good scenes, nothing really happened. Nothing has changed for any character and the whole storyline feels like filler. Jaime, Brienne and Bronn did nothing productive at all and we learned noting new. The only thing that happened is Blackfish died, but he hadn't done anything since season 3 so his death made hardly any difference. The fact that such a big siege happened and had no bearing on anything is really poor. Tommen's motivations are bizarre. Why would he make life so difficult for Cersei doing a trial? He does realize that if Cersei is guilty, Tommen's claim to the throne is gone right? Surely Margaery wouldn't allow him to do this either as it will make her lose all of her power. The Unknown: Where is Varys going? What did Cersei have Qyburn investigate? Apparently there was more than she expected which is likely good for her. It's just a question of what she is referring to. Where are the BWB heading? What is their current goal? I've noticed that the nature of the show has changed this season now that they have left the books behind. The show doesn't feel quite like itself anymore and it feels like there is much more treading water in the plot than there used to be. Because of that, the show doesn't grip me the way that it used to. I won't call it bad because I'm still enjoying the show and I think this season has been better than season 5, but it is something I've noticed. Best Moment: Jaime and Edmure's conversation was great. Character of the Episode: Jaime. Conclusion: Some things were good in this episode, but other things were really bad. Sadly, the bad outweighs the good for this episode. However, things are still looking good for the final two episodes, and hopefully this season won't end in total disaster like season 5. Score: 55 Summary: The Hound has survived and is part of a community led by Septon Ray. Ray tries to get The Hound to enjoy a peaceful life, but that is ruined when Ray and his community are murdered by thugs from the Brotherhood. The Hound seeks vengeance. Margaery is still loyal to her family and sends Olenna back to Highgarden for her safety. Jaime confronts Blackfish and wants a parley. Blackfish refuses the offer. Theon and Yara arrive in Essos on their way to meet Dany. Jon, Sansa and Davos travel around the North recruiting the loyalty of the smaller houses. They end up with less men than they were hoping for. Arya tries to flee Braavos but is surprise attacked by The Waif. Arya escapes but is mortally wounded.
The Good: This was another strong episode of set up and things are now very nicely placed for the end of the season. Last season was pretty rushed by its end with too many things to accomplish by the season's end and that resulted in the season ending in a total whimper. This season didn't over-extend itself like the last and looks to be heading towards a much more focused and satisfying conclusion. The story of The Hound's return was really well done and carried this episode. I thought the opening teaser was very well done and made for a terrific reveal of The Hound. I wasn't expecting anything like that this late in the season, so it delighted me and got me excited to see how his character will return to the overall story and who he would side with (see: The Unknown). Though the story could have used a few episodes to have a greater impact (see: The Bad), I thought it served its purpose well as a small self-contained story of how The Hound almost got to live out his days quietly, only for the cruelty of other's to bring him back to his violent nature. The story was told well and the presence of Ian McShane as Septon Ray added some extra charm to it. I was glad that there were several lengthy scenes dedicated to The Hound's return, making his story arc feel worthwhile whereas a rushed storyline would just come across poorly. The scenes in King's Landing were very good once more. It was good to get a better idea of how Margaery planned to go about her future. She hasn't abandoned her family and clearly still cares for Olenna and Loras, but she is still bent on climbing her way back up the ranks before she does anything to remove her enemies. I was glad to get plenty of Olenna in this episode, as she was as terrific as ever in two excellent scenes with Margaery and Cersei. Jon and Sansa's storyline was really good too and they made something special out of their attempts to gain the loyalty of the other northern houses. Jon's awkwardness was great as he had never been groomed to do any of this "lord" business being a bastard. He was simply improvising using experience from the Night's Watch and failed to be convincing on a number of occasions. Sansa had more promise, and I particularly loved her sternly reminding Lord Glover of his loyalties, showing that she has learned at least a little bit about getting people to do what she wants. But both of them were evidently quite poor at doing all of this, and so the much more experienced Davos had to step in to assist them by doing what he's best at. I loved the way he played to Lyanna Mormont's character and managed to convince her to send her men to Jon's cause. Speaking of which, I thought that Lyanna Mormont and Lord Glover were very good side characters. They had specific personalities and made logical decisions when accepting/refusing Jon's request for loyalty. The Riverrun scenes were pretty good. Jaime shined as we got to see a combination of the kind-hearted man we have come to know and the witty prick that he pretends to be. His leadership was great and I appreciated his attempt to get Blackfish to parley only for Blackfish to put him in his place and refuse to surrender. Theon and Yara had a really good scene as well. I was glad to see that Theon is still struggling to find himself after everything Ramsay did, and I liked seeing Yara help him return to the man he used to be. Theon's discomfort in the brothel was exquisitely acted by Alfie Allen and conveyed his struggle in a way that made it very easy to sympathize with him. Theon's like a recovering alcoholic now, a man who is suffering but knows he has to go through it to get better. Lastly, I like the development that Theon and Yara are heading to meet with Dany. It's a rare treat for us to see Dany interacting with Westerosi characters. Let's hope Theon and Yara make it to Meereen alive. The Bad: The Hound's story would have been better if we had an episode or two before he lost his new home. With it being a single episode story, it feels like almost unnecessary and doesn't carry the emotional weight it could have had otherwise. I found Arya's stabbing to be quite poor. Surely she would be a bit more careful knowing that the Faceless Men would be after her to kill her. But instead she walks around without a care in the world and gets stabbed for her foolishness. I can hardly buy that Arya even survived that (a similar stab wound almost immediately killed Talisa), but to have her jumping into the water, swimming and then walking around while bleeding so heavily is just absurd. Did none of the lords bring up how odd it that Jon is even int heir presence to begin with? Surely they would be more suspicious about why the Lord Commander of the Night's Watch suddenly deserted his post. Or do they know that Jon came back to life and they just don't care, because nobody else seems to be acknowledging how insane that is. The Unknown: Why is The Hound alive? Does he actually have a purpose for being back like Jon, or is he just lucky? Who will he side with now that he has nowhere to go? What is Margaery's plan? Does she plot to take out the sparrows? Take out Cersei? Both? Or does she plan to cement her position a little more first? Will Dany accept Theon and Yara's proposal or will she refuse them? Best Moment: I really liked Sansa reminding Lord Glover of his pledge of loyalty, only for Lord Glover to rebuke her viciously. Character of the Episode: The Hound. Conclusion: This certainly won't be remembered as one of the show's best episodes, but I thought this was pretty good with several stories getting the time they needed to deliver. Another solid episode. Score: 66 Summary: Bran and Meera are saved by an undead Benjen in their escape. Sam takes Gilly to his family's home. He tries to keep Gilly's wildling heritage a secret but it gets out. His father tells him to leave and that he will never be allowed back. Sam prepares to leave and decides to take Gilly with him at the last moment. Arya follows through with assassinating Lady Crane but stops at the last second. Arya escapes and tries to leave. The Waif reports this to Jaqen who is disappointed. Jaime and Mace confront the High Sparrow to stop him from going through with Margaery's walk of atonement. However, the High Sparrow reveals he never intended to since Margaery converted Tommen to the sparrows' side. Jaime is relieved of his position in the Kingsguard and sent to besiege Riverrun. Drogon arrives at Dany's location, completely winning the loyalty and support of the Dothraki.
The Good: It was nice to see Sam's family. The scenes were good for the most part and I was pleased that Randyll Tarly lived up to being the monster that Sam said he was. The conclusion of the storyline was pretty great as Sam continues to showcase his newfound courage by escaping with Gilly and taking the family sword along with him in hilarious fashion. I really enjoyed the developments in King's Landing. The reveal that Tommen had joined forces with the sparrows was a legitimate surprise to me and I thought it was a terrific twist. Margaery is extremely charming and opportunistic, and she saw an opportunity to gain even more control. After some well-timed moves she has gained total control over Tommen and the sparrows, while also being beloved by the people. She has made the best out of a bad situation and positioned herself to be more unstoppable than ever. It was a perfect example of the political scheming that made me fall in love with this show to begin with. I'm really excited to see how the sparrows will be stopped since they have gained an insane amount of power. Arya's storyline was really good and it appears that her Faceless Man training has ended. Arya tried to swallow her emotions and kill Lady Crane, but she failed. She saved Lady Crane but it appears that she may pay the price for this. Even though she has escaped, Jaqen has sent the Waif against her, and with her face-changing abilities, you get the sense that Arya will never be safe no matter where she goes. This should lead to a really exciting and tense cat and mouse game to span out the rest of the season. I was glad to see Walder Frey again. I had almost forgotten about his awfulness. He has sat in power for a long time, and is still abusing his children unsurprisingly. I do hope that the siege of Riverrun goes badly and that Blackfish marches straight to the Twins and executes him but that may be hoping for too much. I am intrigued by Edmure being brought back into the story. Would the Tully heir be enough for Blackfish to surrender to the Freys? Also, Jaime is heading to Riverrun, so this siege may end up being more important and climactic that it initially seemed. I am excited to see what happens. The final scene with Dany rallying the Dothraki was pretty good. It wasn't anything new, but it was good to know that the Dothraki know exactly what they are getting into by supporting Dany so they aren't just blindly following her. Dany's speech was very good and it made sense that the Dothraki would follow her after that. The Bad: I'm still annoyed that we haven't been given more information about the sparrows. Apparently they have the support of the people, which doesn't make sense to me at all. last we saw, they were ransacking the city in search of sinners, so how did the people start supporting them? We need to see developments like these occur instead of having the people be loyal to whomever when the plot demands it. We spent a bit too much time with Sam for my liking. His story didn't need to get so much focus, especially since we didn't learn anything important by seeing the Tarly household. It's a fine side story, but it shouldn't be given more time than every other storyline in the episode. It's awfully convenient that Dany says she needs 1000 ships an episode after Euron announces that he will make a thousand ships. The Unknown: What were Bran's visions while Meera dragged him away? I saw the Mad King in there which is interesting. What will Bran learn next in the past? Also, we finally saw Benjen! He was apparently made into an undead by the Children, and has resided beyond The Wall. What is his purpose? Does he fight the White Walkers? Where does he live? How does he survive? Cersei's trial is coming and Jaime has left. While Cersei has The Mountain and is confident, this show has trained me not to expect that to go well. I get the sense that something is going to happen to prevent Cersei from using The Mountain in her trial. But now the question is, what will happen? Best Moment: The reveal that the Faith have allied with the Crown was really well done and caught me off guard. Character of the Episode: Margaery. Conclusion: While this was a really quiet episode, the developments were good and there weren't any major issues with this. It was an enjoyable episode throughout. It was around this time that season 5 started to sharply decline in quality. This season has had very strong set-up, so hopefully we can have a stronger climax this time around. Score: 66 Summary: Sansa meets with Littlefinger and refuses to accept his help out of anger. Jon, Davos and Sansa plot to turn the Northern houses against the Boltons to gain an army. Arya gets a second chance to prove herself. She discovers the woman she has been assigned to kill. Theon supports Yara in the Kingsmoot. Euron suddenly arrives and wins the approval of the Ironborn, becoming king. Theon and Yara escape with a fleet. Jorah reveals his Greyscale to Dany who orders him to get better. Jorah leaves to find a cure. Bran uses his powers alone and accidentally gives the Night King access into the cave. The wights attack and the Three-Eyed Raven and the Children all die. Hodor holds a door so Meera and Bran can escape. In the past, Hodor interacts with Bran and witnesses his own death, rendering him unable to speak anything other than "Hodor" a slur of "hold the door".
The Good: This was an excellent episode, focusing on just 4 primary locations which allowed each of the storylines enough time to breathe and get the most emotional impact out of what happened. Sansa's confrontation with Littlefinger lived up to my expectations. I'm really glad to see that Sansa despises Littlefinger for what he did and that she is smart enough to not fall for his tricks again. I liked the contrast with the last time Brieen, Sansa and Littlefinger met together as Sansa is now in full control and firmly trusts Brienne as opposed to Littlefinger. This time it isn't Brienne who is threatened, but rather it's Littlefinger, which is a good way to show progress in Sansa's story. I also like the idea that Jon, Davos and Sansa are turning to getting loyalty back from the North in order to get an army to defeat the Boltons. It makes sense and should lead to some good development as Jon and Sansa will get a good chance to prove their mettle as leaders by attempting to gain fealty from the other houses. Arya's story in Braavos was really good and allowed us to realize that Arya will never properly be no one as aspects of who she was will always haunt her. The play showcasing the War of the Five Kings was a great way to show this as she is visibly upset by the portrayals of Ned and Sansa which remind her of her past and her desire for vengeance. She has swallowed those emotions for now, but they will never truly be gone. I really enjoyed that play as well. It was a perfect example of Medieval comedy which provided a very enjoyable and jokey retelling of the war that has happened. The Ironborn have never been more interesting than they were in this episode. The Kingsmoot was very enjoyable to watch and I liked that the Ironborn followed power, sort of like the Dothraki which fits what we have learned about them over the seasons. I appreciated Yara's claim to the throne and I thought Theon's conflict was staged terrifically. He could have tried to claim the throne for himself and people would have followed him, but he finally makes the right choice and stands by Yara's side. But naturally Euron had to come and ruin everything as he took total control by using his experiences around the world as an advantage. I liked the crowning quite a bit. We have seen precious little of how the Ironborn operate, so to learn more about their religion and the Drowned God was very welcome. I thought Euron's "rebirth" to become king fit the religion very well and was a lovely bit of world-building. The few scenes across the Narrow Sea were pretty good. I really liked Kinvara's appearance. She hinted at the truth about Varys' mutilation which really interests me (see: The Unknown), and also allowed Varys to display his hate for magic again. Dany's farewell to Jorah was a touching scene and it effectively conveyed all of the emotions we should be feeling about Jorah with his Greyscale. Bran's story was the best part of this episode. The set-up for the wight invasion was really tense, particularly with Bran walking through the army of wights. It became genuinely scary when the Night King noticed his presence and the wight army all started looking at him. After that, the wights arrived surprisingly quickly, so fast that it totally caught me off guard. This led to the extremely exciting ending sequence as the wights raided and the situation looked extremely dire. The action was great and the scene had me at the edge of my seat the whole time. Then there was that heartbreaking ending sequence which delivered in a big way. Hodor's death was really surprising and I was downright stunned by what caused him to say "Hodor" for the rest of his life. The concept that Hodor had his whole life ruined by Bran because Bran needed him to keep a door closed to save his own skin is an awful fate, and to live one's own life whilst knowing how they would die is a real curse. The reveal of the origin of Hodor's name combined with his tragic death made for a really emotional gut-punch to end the episode. The final sequence had to be one of the very best moments of the show, and certainly the saddest. The Bad: Littlefinger can apparently teleport now. How did he get to Molestown so quickly when he was in the Eyrie an episode ago? Also, how did his army set up camp at Moat Cailin? Did Ramsay stupidly leave the place undefended? That's downright unbelievable. The reveal that the White Walkers were made by the Children is really significant. But it was so rushed and didn't seem to serve much of a purpose aside from providing an explanation, and a vague one at that. I want to learn more but I don't think we will which is really disappointing. Furthermore, the Three-Eyed Raven was a total disappointment. We spent seasons building up to Bran meeting him and he really didn't do much. He was just a device to get Bran to gain the time-travelling ability and immediately afterwards he was killed. The Unknown: I have tons of questions from this episode. Will Blackfish enlist his army to help Jon? Will he be able to head north in time? Hopefully he doesn't simply teleport like Littlefinger. Euron's decision to go after Daenerys is a huge deal. Will she accept an alliance with him? She has been looking for friends in Westeros so Euron's offer may entice her. But I can comfortably say Euron is not a good person, so is he trustworthy? Will he betray her? Also, I'm curious about Euron's crowning ceremony. Has a king ever died in that ceremony before? Where are Theon and Yara going to go with their fleet? So what was the voice that talked to Varys? What did it say? Is this important? I sure hope it is. I want answers. So it's been confirmed that Bran can interact with the past. What else has he actually done? I'm sure that Hodor isn't the only instance of Bran interacting with the past. What other significant events has he been involved in? Will the wights still catch up with Meera anyways? Hodor can only hold them off for so long, and Meera can't possibly be as fast as Hodor was at pulling Bran along. Best Moment: The final scene inter-cutting between Hodor's death and Wylis having a seizure was extremely sad. Heartbreaking stuff. Character of the Episode: Hodor. Conclusion: This was a terrific return to form. A strong episode with good storylines focused on character which was capped off by a tense climax with a heartbreaking ending. What more can you ask for? Score: 76 Summary: Jon prepares to leave Castle Black but is stopped when Sansa arrives. Sansa tells Jon that they need to get the Boltons out of Winterfell but Jon is skeptical. He changes his mind when he receives a letter from Ramsay who lets him know that he has Rickon and wants Sansa back. The High Sparrow allows Margaery to visit Loras. Tommen tells Cersei that the sparrows plan to make Margaery do the walk of atonement. Olenna and Kevan ally with Cersei and Jaime to take out the sparrows. Littlefinger returns to The Vale and gets Robin to send his army to help Sansa. Theon wants to help Yara claim the throne. Ramsay kills Osha. Tyrion strikes a deal with the masters at Meereen but Grey Worm and Missandei aren't pleased. Dany murders the Khals at Vaes Dothrak, gaining the respect of the Dothraki.
The Good: Jon and Sansa's reunion was awesome. It's hard to believe that there hasn't been a single reunion since season 1, and I think the extended time that the Starks spent apart from each other helped make this moment mean an absolute ton. It was genuinely heartwarming to see Jon and Sansa with family again, and their interactions as they caught up with each other again were terrific. Tyrion's story was great as usual. I really liked him treating with the masters of Yunkai and Astapor in peaceful ways, trying his best to come to a mutual understanding, something which Dany never even considered. It's a good way at showing how useful Tyrion would be as an advisor as his experience helps him understand that to rule a kingdom, you need to make peace and not war. I appreciate that Missandei and Grey Worm don't agree with Tyrion's mindset as they have no reason to trust him and their character arcs have given them no reason to have a desire for peace with the masters. I like the conflict between them and I'm excited to see where the storyline goes, and if Tyrion may end up making enemies in Meereen. Dany's storyline was very good for the most part and it was the best way to end a storyline which didn't really serve too much of a purpose. Jorah and Daario infiltrating Vaes Dothrak was a fun storyline carried by the characters' interacting with clever dialogue and the tense scene of them dealing with the Dothraki who discovered their presence. I also really like the way Jorah accidentally revealed his Greyscale to Daario. The final scene was pretty good and was a strong moment for Dany who proved to understand the Dothraki really well as she killed their Khals, leaving them no choice but to follow her after this great display of strength. It was great to see Littlefinger again after a pretty lengthy absence. I really enjoyed the way Littlefinger turned the tables on Lord Royce by accusing him of betraying them after he was threatened for giving Sansa to the Boltons. Littlefinger continues his reputation as a great manipulator in impressive ways. I also love the detail that Littlefinger has charmed Robin so much that Robin will just listen to every word that he says. The scenes in King's Landing were very good. I liked the High Sparrow's speech to Margaery as he revealed more of his backstory and how he began to embrace his sin. It was a powerful speech and continued to characterize the High Sparrow in good ways, as he remains a decent man despite the terror his sparrows are causing. Margaery's moment alone with Loras was pretty chilling as Loras clearly hasn't had it as easy as her due to the nature of his sins. Loras' tears was a good moment and continues our hatred of the sparrows. The other storylines were fine. I liked Ramsay's swift murder of Osha, a refreshing change from his usual ways. I appreciate that Ramsay recognized a threat in Osha and dealt with her immediately instead of leaving her alive. Additionally, I like that the writers recalled how Theon would likely have told Ramsay about Osha, which was a very good reason for him to not trust her. Yara and Theon's reunion was pretty good and I like that Theon wants to help her get the crown after Balon's death. The Greyjoy storyline is set up well, so let's hope it ends up being better than the debacle that was Dorne. The Bad: There were some missed opportunities at The Wall. I was disappointed that we didn't see Sansa learn about Jon's resurrection. I was also perplexed by the idea that Sansa wouldn't really care about the fact that Jon died and came back. She has never seen any magic before now, so surely she would be more shocked. I also thought that Brienne's reveal that she killed Stannis was a bit awkward and out of place. It didn't lead to anything and there was something a bit odd about the way she was written that didn't sit well with me. I also feel that the Davos and Melisandre scene should have happened much, much earlier as Davos has now spent a long time seemingly ignoring the fact that Stannis died. The coming war against the Faith Militant hasn't engaged me in the way that it should. This is because we have absolutely no idea how big of a threat they are. I was under the impression that they weren't too big of a problem, but the meeting in this episode apparently suggested otherwise. It also makes Olenna and Kevan look foolish for not cooperating with Cersei if the Faith were such a big threat. Well whatever way it is, the issue still stands because I still don't know how much of a threat they are. Do they have friends in the capital? How many are there? How much control do they have? How many forces do Olenna and Kevan have? We need answers to these questions for the coming drama to mean anything. This next paragraph isn't a knock on this episode specifically but on the show as a whole. I've wanted to delve into Ramsay's insufficiencies for a while now, and I think now is a good time to tackle it. Ramsay has disappointed me so far and I really feel like I have to get into why he isn't delivering for me as much as Joffrey did. For one, Ramsay is too shallow. Joffrey had more to him than his sadistic ways, and he was so loathed due to the fact that he was weak and never deserved his position of power. The horrible thing was that anyone could kill Joffrey, but nobody did because his position of king saved him. That increased our hate of him exponentially. Ramsay does not have these layers. He is just a generic bad guy who happens to torture people. And the torture isn't effective because it is shown too much. I have grown almost numb to torture in this show and that prevents me from hating Ramsay like I should. Joffrey's sadism was shown in bursts, making it effective in disgusting me, but Ramsay's villainy doesn't exhibit this trait, and it exhausts me instead of disgusting me. Furthermore, Joffrey's acts were never done solely to make us hate him more. It accomplished other necessary story beats while also making us despise him. So many things have been done with Ramsay with the sole purpose of making him more vile, including sacrificing entire characters and storylines to just make us hate this guy even more. It's not effective storytelling and makes hate Ramsay's character. I loved to hate Joffrey, but I just want Ramsay off my screen. Iwan Rheon's great acting is being wasted on his character. It was awfully convenient that Ramsay declared war on Jon right as he decided to stop fighting. It was a bit too easy of a way to get Jon to go to war against the Boltons. Dany's Khal murder was played for surprise, which unsurprisingly didn't please me. I've been vocal on my displeasure with the show's drift towards wanting to shock us and I stand by that here. I think it would have been more dramatic for us to see Dany set up for this murder instead of it just happening suddenly. I don't know how Dany was able to sneak flammable material into the building with nobody knowing. The Unknown: Does Tormund like Brienne? Oddly enough, I have no problem with that. Best Moment: Jon and Sansa's reunion was very emotional and satisfying. It was a scene six seasons in the making. Character of the Episode: Dany. Conclusion: This was flawed, like all the other episodes this season. However, there was plenty to enjoy here and I think a lot of the scenes delivered to make this a really good episode. Score: 66 Summary: Jon wakes up, stunning Davos and Melisandre. He has those who stabbed him executed before declaring his watch has ended. Edd is now in charge of Castle Black. Sam gets seasick on the way to Oldtown. He reveals to Gilly that he plans to take her to Horn Hill. Bran visits the past and watches Ned fight Arthur Dayne. Varys gets more information in Meereen. Qyburn tries to get allied with Varys' little birds. Cersei and Jaime force themselves onto the small council but still don't get any information. Tommen tries to get the High Sparrow to pardon Cersei but fails. Arya's training continues and she gets her eyes back. Ramsay is given Rickon as a gift.
The Good: This was a stronger episode that did a good job of setting up the story for the rest of the season without indulging in the show's worst habits. Bran's story was the most intriguing in this episode. I really liked the swordfight showcasing Ned vs Arthur Dayne. It was really well done and was probably the best choreographed swordfight in the show. I really enjoyed that aspect, but I also loved the idea that honourable Ned only won the duel when Howland Reed stabbed Arthur Dayne in the back yet got praised as a hero for it. That was a signature "Game of Thrones" moment which I really enjoyed. Furthermore, I like the development with how attached Bran has become with visiting the past. The explanation that it is the only time he can walk makes perfect sense so we can understand why Bran has such a hard time going back to the real world. I really liked the amount of information we got on Varys in this episode. I enjoyed seeing him getting information by being kind and rewarding people as opposed to torture. It's fitting for his character and a breath of fresh air after we have been subjected to Ramsay for so long. I was pleased that the show actually addressed how Varys' little birds work. The idea that they are a connected network of little children who casually listen in on conversations and report information is impressively brilliant and a logical way to explain how Varys is able to obtain so much information. The small council scene was terrific. I really like that Cersei and Jaime are still failing to achieve anything as they get completely beaten by Kevan and Olenna who refuse to do their dealings with them. It's great to see Cersei continue to fail in her assertion of power which is realistic for somebody with little leverage on their side. Furthermore, Tommen isn't particularly useful for Cersei either as he is still young, so he falls prey to the wisdom of the High Sparrow who dissolves his anger in impressive fashion. Tommen isn't as vile or stupid as Joffrey so he isn't able to get what he wants in the way that Joffrey did. As an aside, I got a good laugh out of Pycelle insulting The Mountain unknowingly and immediately regretting it. His slow and terrified walk past The Mountain was pretty great. Arya's training continues to deliver. The montage in this episode was really well done and was put together with expert editing. I really enjoyed seeing Arya's improvement in her training as she gets her vision back and may be back to doing assassination missions once more. The other odd scenes were enjoyable. Tyrion's scenes were tremendously fun as always. He didn't do much more than make funny conversation in this episode, but I enjoyed it a lot. Poor Sam is seasick on the way to Oldtown. I appreciate that the show may actually be showing us his family to deepen the world a little more. I look forward to that. The execution of Alliser and Olly was a powerful moment. I thought Alliser's final words were very good and consistent with his character. The Bad: I was disappointed by the reactions to Jon's revival. Davos and Melisandre were fittingly surprised but everyone else hardly reacted at all which was bad. Tormund's joke was funny but his reaction was nonsensical. Jon just came back to life and he doesn't even seem to care! Furthermore, Alliser's final moments were ruined by the fact that he didn't even seem to address the ridiculousness of the idea that Jon is alive again. This is a big deal and I'm annoyed that the show doesn't seem to be treating it as a significant event which it certainly is. Does Jon really have the authority to just leave now? I would have liked more time to see more people discuss this rather than Jon suddenly leaving without a care in the world. Arya's training has been a bit repetitive this season. It's not a big problem as I have enjoyed the way the scenes are constructed, but it could become an issue if we don't get anything new for her. I hope that we don't have to sit through Ramsay torturing Rickon now. Please don't do that, it's not needed. The Unknown: What happened in the Tower of Joy? Was Lyanna in there? What happened to her? Also, did Ned actually hear Bran? What does that mean? Can Bran interact with the past? Could this become a big part of the story later? What are Tyrion and Varys planning? What is the message? I recall Beric saying that he lost a little bit of his mind every time he came back to life. Will Jon be affected in a similar way? What will Ramsay do with Rickon and Osha? Best Moment: The swordfight was very good, my favourite moment of the episode. Character of the Episode: Varys. Conclusion: This was a better episode with some good set up and it could have been even better had Jon's resurrection been treated appropriately. Aside from that, this was a solid episode. Score: 65 Summary: Bran is with the Three-Eyed Raven and is learning to visit the past with his powers. Tommen prevents Cersei from attending Myrcella's funeral as the sparrows would take her into custody again. Jaime confronts the High Sparrow who threatens him with his power. Ramsay kills Roose, his wife and his son to take control over Winterfell. Tyrion tames Dany's dragons to ensure that they can be used as assets. Sansa and Brienne head to Castle Black while Theon chooses to go home. Euron Greyjoy returns to Pyke and kills Balon. The wildlings come to Davos' aid. Alliser is thrown in a cell. Davos has Melisandre attempt to bring Jon back to life. Jon wakes up.
The Good: It was great to see Bran again after he was absent for an entire season. His new ability to visit and interact with the past is a really exciting development and opens up the story in a big way. I expect that we can get some big reveals about the past through Bran and I can't wait to see what the story has in store for us. Tyrion talking to the dragons was a fantastic scene. Tyrion's character has always been a ton of fun, and his tongue is his strongest aspect. To have him play off of this aspect by speaking with dragons was creative, tense and exciting in a way that Tyrion's story hasn't been in a while. I am looking forward to seeing Tyrion attempt to repair Meereen, and I hope that it can be somewhat similar in quality to Tyrion's time as Hand of the King in season 2. I am intrigued by the new Greyjoy storyline. I like that we finally caught back up with Balon who finally died (the leeches took their sweet time didn't they), and his death has been used to introduce a new character. Euron is interesting and I suspect that he will become a major player in the story. It's about time that the Greyjoys become a central point in the story once again. Jon waking up was a good development and a huge moment. I really hope that his relationships with everyone are radically changed now that he has come back to life and I'm excited to see what this will lead to. Furthermore, I am looking forward to seeing Melisandre's reaction to realizing that she actually succeeded in bringing Jon back to life. This could be a huge moment for her character as well, and I'm quickly becoming more invested in her. There were a few other moments I really liked. The arrest of Ser Alliser was a great moment, and I like the development of the wildlings taking control over the Night's Watch, highlighting that Alliser didn't make a smart move by killing Jon but rather an idiotic and prideful move. I really liked that one guy who was bragging about what happened with Cersei. Of course some people would make stupidly fake rumours about what happened and I thought it was a lovely bit of detail. Having The Mountain kill him was pretty satisfying too. Lastly, I appreciated Brienne telling Sansa about Arya. While Sansa hasn't really cared for Arya in any of her scenes, it's a good way to demonstrate how much she has grown by having her reflect about Arya as much as she does. The Bad: There were some big problems in this episode which was disappointing. The sparrows remain too murky to pose a real threat. We have no idea about their numbers, who has sided with them and how much control they have over the city. This makes the High Sparrows threat to Jaime lack impact because we aren't sure how much power these people actually have. If I can't figure out how much of a threat they pose, the drama created from their story is lessened. I did not like Ramsay killing Roose at all. Roose orchestrated the red wedding, yet this is how he dies? It's very unsatisfying to see him die such a lame death with no impact. I suppose it's sort of fitting that he died similar to how he killed Robb, but to have Ramsay do it was just ridiculous. Furthermore, I hate that his death had the sole purpose of making Ramsay even more despicable. We already hate the guy, so this was completely unnecessary. I'm annoyed that Ramsay has been prioritized over the more interesting Roose. Then we had to sit through Ramsay killing Roose's wife and kid. This show has lost all of the restraint that it used to have. We didn't need to see this scene for any reason. Additionally, having Roose get killed in a similar way to Balon in the same episode was a bad idea. Theon's redemption wasn't as good as it should have been which is disappointing. I wish he was exhibiting more trauma from his time as Reek, but instead he is behaving like a clichéd hero which is not who Theon was. The show has always been good at portraying gray characters and Theon was always one of the best. As such, it's disappointing to see his character go in such a bland, stereotypical direction. There were some issues with the story at Castle Black. The main one is the predictability of Jon's return. It took away any surprise from the moment and made every scene in this episode feel like it was just building up for Jon's return, preventing the moments from standing on their own. Another issue is the entirety of Davos' character who is behaving in quizzically. As I said in my review of "Mother's Mercy", Davos should be much more affected by the loss of his entire cause, yet for some reason he hasn't even addressed it. Apparently he is just loyal to Jon now and has completely abandoned his attachment to Stannis. I can hardly buy his desperation to get Melisandre to bring Jon back to life, and I feel like he should have been more worried about what happened to Stannis instead of focusing on saving Jon. The Unknown: What happened to Hodor? Why is he simple? It feels like there is an actual story behind his character which is very interesting. It isn't a story I was expecting, but if there is a reason behind it, I'm curious to learn what it was. What else will Bran find in the past? Surely there is a reason he has been given this power, and there will be some important things for him to discover. What is Euron up to? Is he trying to become the Salt King? What are his goals? Will he make the Greyjoys relevant again? Will he raid The North like Balon did? How will everyone treat Jon when he makes his revival known? What will Melisandre's reaction be? How will her powers be affected by this? Best Moment: Tyrion talking to the dragons. Even as this show stumbles, I still love Tyrion. Character of the Episode: Tyrion. Conclusion: This was a decent episode with some big developments but a consistent amount of flaws in its stories. Like in the last episode, the good and the bad cancelled out and I was left feeling neutral towards the episode. But the story is picking up, so let's hope that there can be better stuff in the later episodes this season. Score: 60 Summary: Davos, Edd and a few stragglers discover Jon's body and lock themselves in a room with him. Edd goes to secure some help from the wildlings. Ramsay's men track down Theon and Sansa but Brienne arrives to save them. Sansa accepts her service. Arya continues her training blind. Tyrion and Varys survey the conditions in Meereen. Dany is being taken to Vaes Dothrak after she reveals to be a khaleesi. Ellaria kills Doran and the Sand Snakes kill Trystane. Melisandre is using magic to make herself not age.
The Good: This was a fine season premiere. Like most season premieres, the plot was pretty much stagnant here and the story was just inching forward and setting things up. The fallout from Jon's death was really good. The situation that Davos and Edd found themselves in was extremely tense as they were essentially trapped in a single room with enemies everywhere outside. The fear in their situation is really well executed, making this the most intense storyline in the episode. Furthermore, I was really impressed by Alliser's speech to the men of the Night's Watch. It makes him more than a cookie cutter villain as it proves that he believes he did the right thing by killing Jon. A speech like that was very necessary to keep this story realistic and I'm glad we got it. Furthermore, I'm glad that there was unease over Jon's death and that everyone didn't immediately side with Alliser. Roose and Ramsay's scene was pretty good. Roose is still fantastic and I love how he subtly threatened Ramsay for his mistake. This scene was effective at making me think for a little bit that Sansa would actually get brought back to Winterfell. I was getting ready to vent about that, but of course that wasn't the case. Brienne came in and saved Sansa, and due to the Ramsay/Roose scene, the moment had more emotional impact as it meant that Sansa likely wouldn't be going back to Winterfell. The fight itself was good and I especially liked Pod fighting and killing. The ensuing moment with Sansa accepting Brienne's service was a really great moment as well (see: Best Moment). The other scenes in this episode were good but unspectacular. Varys and Tyrion continued to be great as they walked around Meereen, exploring the chaos that Dany has left behind. Their conversations were really well done as always. I was pleased to see Arya continuing her training, and the idea that she had to do it blind is a good way to escalate her training. The final scene was interesting and fairly surprising. I wonder what the significance of Melisandre's true form is (see: The Unknown). The Bad: This episode was stuck cleaning up the mess that Dorne created last season. The deaths of Doran and Trystane were practically meaningless and dull due to how sloppy the Dorne story has been. Let's hope that we can be done with these characters for now. Dany's story is pretty much treading water in this episode. The whole Dothraki subplot is hard to care about since we spent so much time with them in season 1 and know almost everything about them. I don't care to explore more about the Dothraki and I feel like we are just biding time until Dany inevitably wins them over for her army. As evidenced by the short length of this review, not much happened here. Even compared to other season premieres this episode was slow and didn't accomplish much of interest. There wasn't much that was bad, but there wasn't much that was good either. The Unknown: What does Ellaria do next? Does she have a plan for what comes next? Will she take on a larger bearing in the plot? I hope not. Will Edd get the wildlings in time? I wonder if they will even come to help Jon if he's dead. Also, is Jon coming back then? The fact that his body is still there seems to suggest that he may be coming back. I suspect that Melisandre will probably be the one bringing him back. What was with that final scene? How can Melisandre use magic to make herself so much younger? I'm very interested in her magic and I would love to learn more about how she obtained this magic power. Furthermore, what is the significance of this? Is Melisandre immortal? Will this come into play later? Why show it to us now? I hope that this means Melisandre will become a more significant character going forwards. Also, does this mean all of the red priests are immortal? Does that include Thoros too? Best Moment: Sansa accepting Brienne's service with vows was pretty emotional. I also liked that Sansa couldn't remember all of them and needed some help getting through them. It's a good reminder of how young she still is. Character of the Episode: Sansa. Conclusion: This was a fine season premiere to set up the season. Nothing of importance happened here but there was nothing particularly worrying either. Hopefully this season can be better than the last. Score: 60 Summary: Selyse commits suicide and half of Stannis' army leaves. Melisandre returns to Castle Black. Stannis attacks Winterfell anyways and is destroyed. Brienne arrives to kill him. Sansa escapes her cell and Myranda threatens to maim her. Theon kills Myranda. He jumps off Winterfell's walls with Sansa. Arya violently murders Meryn. Jaqen punishes her by blinding her. Jaime leaves Dorne with Myrcella but Ellaria poisoned her and she dies. Tyrion reunites with Varys and is tasked to keep Meereen safe. Dany lands far away and Drogon is tired. She ventures out and is confronted by a khalasar. Cersei confesses to her crimes and is forced to walk naked through the streets of King's Landing to get to the Red Keep. Sam goes to Oldtown to become a Maester. Jon is betrayed and killed by the Night's Watch.
The Good: Cersei's walk of atonement was fantastic, one of the show's finest moments. To make us feel so much sympathy for such a despicable character is undoubtedly brilliant, providing a ton of conflicting emotions from within yourself as you are left trying to figure out how to feel about this character. It's great, deep storytelling which adds an extra layer to Cersei's character. Furthermore, Lena Headey delivered her best performance so far as she begs to the High Sparrow and portrays Cersei's pain during the humiliating walk. This wouldn't have worked without a tremendous performance, and Lena Headey knocked it out of the park. I thought Jon's scenes were very good. Sam's departure was a nice moment and I really appreciate the idea of him going to Oldtown to become a Maester. It's also a good storyline to show us more of the world of Westeros and has potential to provide us with a lot of history which I'm always excited for. The final sequence was dampened a little by the rest of the episode (see: The Bad), but it was impactful for the most part. After this season had failed at combining surprise and storytelling in almost every way, it finally succeeded here. This scene was Jon's red wedding as he pays for the mistakes he made as Lord Commander by dying a brutal and painful death, fitting of what has been presented in this show. Jon kept Alliser at The Wall, he didn't do enough to ensure the loyalty of his men while accommodating the wildlings and practically walked straight into his terrible fate. Of course there are some questions to be asked (see: The Unknown), but even if this isn't Jon's true death, it's powerful. It's hard to watch Jon gutted by his own brothers, and is a sad culmination of all of Jon's efforts to save Westeros from the White Walkers. The Bad: Unfortunately everything else has to be in The Bad because this episode did not deliver. There were so many climaxes in this episode, and almost all of them (barring Cersei) felt rushed and squeezed into an already busy episode. Because of that, the writers once more played these scenes for surprise over emotion, and that meant that all of these scenes fell flat and didn't feel like a climax worthy of the stories being told. The Stannis storyline was a colossal failure. With him dying so anticlimactically without accomplishing much, it makes his entire storyline pointless. And to clarify, I don't mean his story this season, I'm referring to his entire storyline since the Battle of the Blackwater. Think about it, had Stannis died at Blackwater Bay, would any of these characters be in a different place emotionally? Would the plot be any different? The answer is a resounding no, which is really poor. If we are getting an entire story for Stannis, there needs to be a purpose to it, and sadly there wasn't here. Now I just feel like the past three seasons of Stannis were a waste of time with absolutely no pay off from a lot of interesting story building. But the fact that the Stannis storyline is meaningless isn't even the worst part here. The biggest offense was this "climax" of his story. Everything was so rushed. It was almost comical how swiftly Stannis kept getting bad news before he was staring death in the face. The pacing was so rushed that it didn't allow any of these moments to stick. Stannis loses his wife and his men and we hardly get any time to see how he feels about this. Without moments showing us how a character reacts to a big event, that event means nothing to us. Everything that happened to Stannis ended up meaning nothing, which is astoundingly disappointing. All we needed were some moments for Stannis to reflect and realize the destruction of everything he held dear and to show some actual emotion. Just putting on a frowny face and telling Brienne to "do her duty" is not how to make us feel emotion for this character. It's all done wrong, and it causes me to feel nothing even though I just watch a character lose absolutely everything. So many other great TV shows have understood that its not the event which causes the emotion, it's the character's reaction, so why can't this one figure that out this season? Also, Brienne's kill of Stannis is really bad. Again, I have to ask where is the emotion and drama? Brienne did nothing to earn her reward of killing Stannis which makes his death just feel like another moment and not like the culmination of an entire revenge arc for Brienne. All we needed was for Brienne to overcome some obstacles to earn her reward, it's basic storytelling. But just like how the show failed to understand that reactions cause emotion, it also failed to understand that characters need to earn their rewards just like how they deserve their deaths. Because of these fundamental failures at writing, Stannis' storyline, character, and death are all ruined in this episode, continuing the downwards spiral that "Game of Thrones" has been experiencing this season. Theon finally abandoning his Reek persona failed because of similar reasons. This storyline was three whole seasons in the making, yet the big moment where Theon finally acts against Ramsay is rushed into a two minute scene. Once more, the drama is lacking and I never feel anything for Theon which is awful considering how much his storyline has done. The stupidity of this show has led to Theon's return to form to be played for surprise instead of emotion, ruining any impact the moment could have had. Where was Theon wrestling with the decision of what to do before he killed Myranda? He just killed her for the sake of surprise, creating another unintentionally funny moment when Myranda died. We really needed to get a "Darth Vader saves Luke" moment here. And I'm not talking about Darth Vader killing the Emperor, I'm talking about Vader looking between the Emperor and Luke as he makes his decision. That scene was dramatic and emotional because we got to see Darth Vader wrestling with a decision. Had he just killed the Emperor out of nowhere, it would have been flat and disappointing, just like how Theon's sudden choice was flat and disappointing. An how about that final moment? We are left with a cliff-hanger that Theon and Sansa jumped out and we don't see their fate. What? Are we supposed to believe that they died? Because that is an awful cliff-hanger to manipulate our emotions like that. Even if we weren't supposed to think that, it's an awful ending. Those walls are huge and snow will never soften a 40 foot fall like that. Sansa and Theon are fatally injured at the very least, so an escape can't be possible. Something like this is a perfect example of how bad this show's writing has gotten. Even Arya's story was wasted, this time by the show's tone-deaf will to just provide the viewers with horrific experiences. Where is the restraint? Did we need to see Meryn torture and beat minors? No, but it was shown anyways because... just because! Hell, even Meryn's death was robbed of any satisfaction as it was also painfully brutal to an extent that it was uncomfortable. If only this show would make these moments of brutality few and far between, it would mean something when it actually happens. Instead, the show opts for providing us with endless misery and brutality instead of telling us an actual story. Furthermore, it's this endless misery which took away from Jon's death as well, making that scene just feel like another empty piece of despair in a show which seems to have forgotten that brutal moments have to be presented for a reason just like any other moment in an episode. Thankfully, Jon's death had the appropriate storytelling to make it overcome this flaw. It's clear that his death, along with Cersei's walk, was taken straight out of the books since it wasn't butchered badly on the show. I'm sure that the fall of this show has been brought on by the departure from the books. Speaking of a departure from the books, Dorne was awful once more. The story ended in such an underwhelming and disappointing way. So Myrcella died. Who cares? We hardly know her and the writers once again opted for torture porn as Myrcella gets to have a sweet moment with Jaime before dying in his hands? Why was this necessary? Because misery and pain! It hurts me so much to see what was once one of my favourite show's stoop down to bad television like this. The entire existence of Dorne seemingly served no purpose. Jaime and Bronn didn't go through any kind of story this season and I learned nothing new about their characters. No new characters from Dorne made an impression either, so I really am not interested in seeing more from them. Some of the dialogue between Bronn and Tyene was absolutely atrocious.\ Even the scenes in Meereen were poor despite nothing particularly bad happening story-wise. The writing of the characters was just ridiculous. Tyrion doesn't even sound like himself anymore due to some weak dialogue. Apparently Tyrion wants to fight now, which is nothing like the character we knew before. Tyrion never liked fighting, so what value would he see in going to bring Dany back? The fact that Daario had to take the wise guy role to convince him to stay behind was out of character for him. Furthermore, what was with the verbal sparring between Tyrion and Jorah? It was petty which is insulting to their intelligence, calm demeanour and wisdom. Lastly, I think I found the one moment that perfectly encapsulated the failure of this season finale. That moment is Davos learning about Stannis and Shireen's deaths. He was given maybe 5 seconds to react to this. Then he was gone. Where was the emotion behind this? The sadness? This man just lost everything he was fighting for and yet we didn't get to spend a single minute to see how he processed this. The pacing is all wrong and the emotion just isn't there, just like the rest of the episode. Awful. The Unknown: Did Sansa and Theon survive the fall? I hope they did and I would be surprised if they didn't. Don't put it past this show to "surprise" us by having them die though. If they do survive, where do they go? Who can they go to for help? Stannis is dead and so is Jon. Where would they find help? Arya's blinding is a really odd moment. I know it's meant to be that way, and I think the scene was nicely put together. But what does it all mean? Why was Arya blinded? Did Jaqen do it or was it actually the faces? Also, who was it that actually died? Was it the Waif? Was it all just an illusion? I'm not sure what to make of this. What happens to Dany now that she has been found by a khalasar? I presume she will recruit them to her army. Is Cersei's new bodyguard the reincarnated Mountain? What did Qyburn do to him? How has he been changed by this? Is Jon actually dead? I know it seems like an odd question, but hear me out. I get the sense that Jon is too important of a character to die. Will he be brought back to life? Melisandre just arrived at Castle Black, so would she bring him back to life? Beric's resurrection was an important plot point that hasn't paid off since it has been introduced. Is this the moment it pays off? Best Moment: Cersei's walk of atonement was fantastic, a rare scene that I actually enjoyed in this episode. Character of the Episode: Cersei. Conclusion: This was a pile of garbage with one shining jewel inside of there. Cersei's fantastic moment prevents this from being one of the worst episodes of television I have ever seen, and coupled with Jon's death brings this episode to a slightly more respectable score. But this still wasn't good. It hurts to see this great show derail in quality and the fact that I love this show makes this episode even more painful than it already is. This episode had so many fundamental flaws. A lack of emotion, rushed pacing, no drama and senseless brutality should be avoided by any good TV show. The fact that this episode was a victim to all of these makes it excessively bad. The season as a whole has to be looked at as a massive disappointment. It's a sharp drop-off in quality following the fantastic season 4, and I'm left scratching my head and wondering what happened to this show. It started off fine with some good set-up but then the middle of the season started to lose focus. I was expecting this to just be some stumbles on the way to a great conclusion, but that wasn't the case. The story worsened to an extreme amount afterwards and it all culminated in a season finale which failed in pretty much every possible way of providing a fitting climax to the season. It was genuinely painful watching some stories get built up really nicely only for the pay off to fall flat, character arcs to be ruined, and twists to be meaningless. But, I will give credit where credit is due. "Hardhome" was awesome and is this season's sole saving grace. I shudder to think about how terrible this season would look in hindsight without that episode. I am extremely disappointed by where this season went and I desperately hope that season 6 can put this show back together. Score: 41 Summary: Jon returns to Castle Black with the wildlings. Stannis' camp is sabotaged by Ramsay. Stannis gives in to Melisandre's suggestion and burns Shireen despite his wife objecting. In Dorne, Jaime and Bronn are allowed to leave with Myrcella and Trystane if Trystane is allowed a place on the small council. In Braavos, Arya doesn't kill the gambler after having her focus distracted by the arrival of Meryn Trant with Mace Tyrell. Arya follows Meryn and plots to kill him. In Meereen, Dany watches the fighting pits. Jorah wins his melee. Suddenly the Harpies attack and murder Hizdahr. Drogon arrives to save Dany and burns the rebels. Dany rides Drogon away to escape.
The Good: The most I enjoyed from this were short scenes. I thought Jon's scenes were very good. I liked the tension presented between Jon and Alliser at the gates. I appreciated that Alliser didn't openly rebel by leaving Jon beyond The Wall, but you have to get the feeling that there is more to this conflict. I also liked the Night's Watch gawking at the giant as it walked through Castle Black. Arya's storyline was the only complete story that I entirely enjoyed. I thought that Meryn's arrival was a terrific moment to get us some inner conflict for Arya who hasn't done all that much this season. She is unable to leave the past behind and is still herself despite all of her training so far. I thought the sequence of her following Meryn was really tense, and I was especially nervous when I saw Meryn notice her several times over. I think Arya has figured out how to kill him (see: The Unknown) but I don't imagine it will be easy for her. Things are set up really nicely for the season finale in Arya's story. Some other odd scenes were really good. Davos and Shireen had a touching scene, made sadder by what happened later in the episode. It should be impactful to see Davos' reaction when he learns that Stannis burned Shireen. I thought Mace Tyrell's singing was really funny and a good bit of continuity with his character. Bronn's punishment being that he gets smacked hard in the face was pretty funny and fitting of what we know of Dorne. The spectacle of the ending scene was really well done. Dany riding Drogon was a fantastic moment and an exciting ending. The Bad: Unfortunately, "Game of Thrones" couldn't keep the momentum from "Hardhome" and this was another poor instalment that did very little to get me excited for what happens in the next episode. Ramsay conveniently being able to quickly burn Stannis' supplies didn't work for me. I was annoyed that we didn't see how he pulled it off as it left me with too many questions. How did Ramsay locate Stannis so easily? If the answer is that he was just on the Kingsroad, surely it would have been harder for Ramsay to sneak up on his camp. I can't buy that Ramsay and his men not only slipped past the guards somehow, but also lit fires at the exact same time before escaping the camp without being detected. It's an impossible feat which only happened because the plot needed it to happen. The excuse that "Ramsay is a northerner so he has the advantage" is so stupid. It has been summer for 10 years, so how on Earth does Ramsay have more experience in winter combat? As such, I can hardly buy that as a credible excuse. The rest of Stannis' story didn't deliver either as it was unfocused and downright lazy. Stannis chose to burn Shireen and the scene happened, yet I hardly felt anything. Sure I was horrified by the fact that Shireen was being burned, but that was it. Surely I should be feeling more from a dramatic moment like that but I really didn't. I'm not sure how Stannis felt about this, so I'm not sure how I'm supposed to be feeling about this. Plus, the whole story has been horribly rushed and there haven't been enough scenes to give Stannis time to make this decision. And unfortunately we didn't get enough time to see how Stannis felt about this decision either. Is he heartbroken because of this? Is he conflicted? Is he scared? Confident that it will work? I have no idea, and that is preventing me from getting emotionally invested with what is going on. The scenes are fine on paper, but in execution they are sorely lacking. I've already complained enough about the show being too focused on horrifying us without much substance, and this continued to do that. There were no other emotions being offered other than "wow that was messed up", and that is far too simple for such a disturbing scene. This show used to expertly make scenes like these feel impactful and earned, but this season hasn't done that. What has happened? And to make it worse, immediately afterwards a man get decapitated and it's played for laughs. The show has gotten completely tone-deaf and, like I claimed in "The Gift", is just trying to play up shock value at the sacrifice of storytelling. Unfortunately, Dany's story wasn't any good either aside from the final moment. First of all, Jorah should be dead right now. It's amazing how convenient his survival was, as his opponents were vicious and merciless until they just inexplicably let him recover in time to kill them in a "surprising" way. Ugh. Then we have another "surprising" reveal as the Harpies reveal themselves and attack. Yet for some reason they do not swarm Dany and waste time murdering innocent civilians, which seems completely at odds with what I know of them so far. The whole scene felt over-dramatized to make it more exciting. Furthermore, why didn't Dany have more guards? She is the queen and there is an obvious threat from the Harpies in the city. The Dorne scenes feel utterly pointless and dull. I'm not sure what they are going to accomplish and I honestly don't care at all because they are boring. I have no reason to care about any of these new characters, so this storyline has failed in an extremely basic way. I swear, if Myrcella or Trystane "surprisingly" die in the season finale as the big pay-off for this story, I won't be pleased. The Unknown: Where will Dany go now? What will happen with the Harpies? Will they be defeated next episode? What will happen now that Shireen has been burned? Will the Lord of Light save Stannis' army somehow? Or will Roose and Ramsay die somehow? Perhaps Theon will regain his identity and kill Ramsay? Does Arya plan to pose as one of the girls to please Meryn in order to kill him? I imagine she will. Will Meryn remember that he saw her before? I think he will and that it will lead to a much more intense confrontation for Arya to extract her revenge? Best Moment: Nothing really stands out. Probably Davos and Shireen's final scene. Character of the Episode: Arya. Conclusion: Sadly, the outstanding work done in "Hardhome" was undone this week. This was a big disappointment of an episode. This had several similarities with "The Gift" as both episodes didn't do anything particularly awful, as the main issue was just a weaker, unfocused execution of the story. This season has fallen apart after a strong start and it is disappointing to see a great show make some boneheaded decisions to ruin what could have been another awesome and engaging season. Hopefully the season finale can provide a fitting conclusion, but after the show has presented its two weakest episodes thus far, I'm not getting my hopes up. Score: 54 |
Aaron DhillonJust a university student who loves to watch TV. And analyze it way too much. Archives
February 2024
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