Game of Thrones’ sixth season provided what the show sorely needed: Motion

Or: Not <em>all</em> men must die.

Read the whole story

 

[JackBurton1986]

I was really not happy with a lot of this season (oh look, yet another speech by Dany... yawn, Jon's back -- no way, didn't see that coming <smirk>, etc.), but the last two episodes saved the season for me.

And Cersei, damn woman, I may hate your guts, but that was a helluva move you pulled off.. bravo

 

[clives]

Kressilac[/url]":1fpnkk34]"The way the series treats women" is somewhat jarring to me in the review. I get what the author is implying and there were elements of this in the beginning but it is also very hard to ignore that the most powerful characters on the show are mostly female and throughout the show, females have repeatedly had strong characters. In a sense, the female characters have a much higher variability of treatment which seems to include the highs and the lows.

When Littlefinger gets his, retribution for a low has been delivered but what else is left that we see on screen. Sansa in politically more powerful than Cersei even though she's just realizing it. Cersei is the main villain now. Dany, well, she has three dragons. Arya is simply a bad ass and Sam's wife is a good mother to their son. Margery bit it but she was smart enough to see it coming and you always had the feeling that she was playing the Septs game which implies intelligence and cunning. Her grandmother is supposedly very powerful and rich. Dorne is now ruled by women.... Aside from a few brothels and poor life, where women are treated badly, I'm not sure how the show still maintains "its treatment of women". The beginning was questionable but not out of the time period. The end is so far from the beginning that I think we need to let that accusation against the show die. And I forgot to mention Yara.

Agreed.
And the "treatment of women" was not some sadistic plot against women in real life, it was
- a story, about things that actually have happened in real world history ( and are still happening )
- essential in developing the personalities of some of the most important characters.

I'd be surprised if someone hasn't already complained about the treatment of religious types, the treatment of animals, the treatment of the poor, the treatment of homosexuals, etc. It's a story, and stories are not always happy. Also, if something offends you, it's because you let it offend you.

It's a story, and the highs and lows are what make it so compelling.

...Or maybe we should aim for the magical plot that offends nobody while entertaining everyone.

 

[Statistical]

how do we write Tommen now? i dunno, maybe he just walks out of a window.

sometimes the show drags out a point sometimes they write one off too quickly.

His mother murdered his wife and the leader of the religion he suddenly found himself devoted to while he stood helpless and watched. Not a stretch to think he might walk out of a window after that.

 

[Cneph]

There were ships with the Sunspear sigil of Dorne on their sails with Dany's fleet.
It seems most reasonable to assume her fleet was close to Westeros in that scene, rather than Dornish ships sailing half a continent away and that a contingent had been sent out to guide the fleet in through the local waters to harbour.

This delegation could very reasonably have included her trusted negotiator returning to update his Queen with the good news that Highgarden was 'on-board' as well as Dorne.

 

[BioTurboNick]

I came to say I enjoyed this line from the article:

"the six people who live in Dorne"

 

[BioTurboNick]

carcharoth[/url]":2ri6v74k]After re watching this episode

i hope Danny is the main villain, goes insane, and all Westeros has to defeat her

I was actually thinking about that. Are we seeing the first hints of a psychological disorder in how she just didn't feel anything about the guy she was leaving behind? Maybe it's genetic. We've also had quite a few references to her mad father. Foreshadowing?

 

[philhanson]

So, if Jon has Targaryen blood, will he be able to control dragons?

 

[fzammetti]

I'm actually kind of scared for the future of this show.

The last episode set up all the chess pieces perfectly. We know we're gonna have some Danny battles and logically that's got to get concluded just in time for the Walker invasion and war after she (and Jon, one assumes) unite the 7 kingdoms.

Here's the problem though: unless something changes, we've got just 13 more episodes left. That doesn't seem like nearly enough to wrap up both those major storylines in a satisfying way.

I'm worried what we might wind up with is like 8 episodes of the Danny war, then just 2 episodes of the Walker war, one to set up the ultimate battle and then the ultimate battle episodes, leaving a couple of episodes to tie everything up in a bow.

And, if the lead-up to the Walker invasion only winds up giving us 2-3 episodes of that war then that's going to seem VERY anticlimactic. Problem is, I just can't see how we get anything other than that. We could of course flip it and get Danny's war done in a handful of episodes, but even that just feels wrong.

To me, we really need two more full-length seasons, one to get Danny in place by the end with the kingdoms united, then the entire last season dedicated to the Walker invasion. But, as of this moment, that's not what we're getting.

So, yeah, as good as this season ended I'm really kind of worried about how it's all going to shake out if they stick to the 7/6 episodes split they're talking about. I think it's going to feel very rushed and not very satisfying, which will be all the more pronounced because of how good it's been to that point. I do hope I'm wrong of course!

 

[bigstrat2003]

BioTurboNick[/url]":1vhbgiwz]

carcharoth[/url]":1vhbgiwz]After re watching this episode

i hope Danny is the main villain, goes insane, and all Westeros has to defeat her

I was actually thinking about that. Are we seeing the first hints of a psychological disorder in how she just didn't feel anything about the guy she was leaving behind? Maybe it's genetic. We've also had quite a few references to her mad father. Foreshadowing?

It's certainly possible. Dany has been stable, but the Targaryens are (in the books) famously mentally unsound as the result of generations of inbreeding. Wouldn't be too surprising if she got the family curse as well.

 

[pjlahaie]

fzammetti[/url]":32j1pef5]
So, yeah, as good as this season ended I'm really kind of worried about how it's all going to shake out if they stick to the 7/6 episodes split they're talking about. I think it's going to feel very rushed and not very satisfying, which will be all the more pronounced because of how good it's been to that point. I do hope I'm wrong of course!

7 episodes to have Dany conquer the 7 kingdoms and 6 episodes to defeat the Night's King. You don't need tons of episodes to tell the 2nd part. I mean how many times do you need to see a bunch of zombies wipe out a city and turn its citizens into more soldiers? Since the army of the dead don't seem to have any ranged weapon capabilities, the entire army of the dead will be easy pickings for someone with dragons.

That leaves the actual white walkers that will probably need to be dispatched by melee combat using a combination of dragonglass and valyrian steel.

 

[Nostromo21]

matt_w_1[/url]":3g4cvf8u]It was visually, audibly stunning this season. Also, terribly predictable. Being unpredictable is the biggest reason I watched game of thrones so this season was actually kind of disappointment from that perspective.

But my god, the battle of the bastards and the musical score in the finale was some of the best produced TV, no entertainment, I've ever seen.

To be sure, to be sure. This last ep for me brought home Cersei's off-the-cuff from a couple eps ago with a very big bang: "I choose violence" - boy, did she ever!

Hardhome is hard to pass up as one of the, if not the best episode, along with last week's BotBs. Not that GoT is all about action, not by a country mile, but it sure does it in impressive style when it gets it right .

 

[charleski]

philhanson[/url]":1r151b82]So, if Jon has Targaryen blood, will he be able to control dragons?

You don't actually need to be a Targ to be a dragon-rider. I can't remember if this was actually covered in the books, but it's very clear from GRRM's novella The Princess and the Queen. Targaryens are generally more able to tame dragons, but others can do so as well. Of course, things might be different in the show.

 

[Geppeto35]

beeblebrox[/url]":19s2uhf2]

you forgot to add the legend: Cersei, best atheist admin ever.

Let's try to do dat IRL with all extremist religious throughout the world.

 

[DavidG86]

The opening 20 minutes reminded me a lot of the baptism scene from the first Godfather. the way everything was slowly revealed and then POW! I'm probably the only one to think that though.

 

[ascagnel]

ChadD[/url]":nci0gd81]

ascagnel[/url]":nci0gd81]

araemo[/url]":nci0gd81]

(several characters, Olenna Tyrell and Varys in particular, seem to have been outfitted with jetpacks)

Yara Greyjoy as well.

Technically, there are very few time cues, so there's no implausibility here, just not well-landmarked time jumps. It was jarring enough I mentioned it to my GF, and she didn't agree.. glad I'm not alone on that though.

Tommen though.. think about it, even though his brother was a sadistic ass, he probably still loved him.. everyone in his life except his mother has died, including his first and only love. And he's like, what, 15? And probably realized that his mother did it? Doesn't stretch credulity to me.

More to the point, an emotionally distant mother. Since Joffery ate it, Cersei viewed Tommen as a pawn for vengeance rather than her child. She was smirking and drinking wine instead of consoling her son, who just lost his spiritual guide and wife.

Although I am sure he was grieving that loss. I believe it was the realization that his Mother was pure evil that pushed him out the window. I think the High Sparrow had convinced him that his mother could be redeemed, that at her core she was Human. He didn't just loose a wife and friends, he had them taken from him by his own mother.

I read some other comments to the effect of, "not sure what to do with him... kill him off". I think his end was one of the most poignant deaths on the show in some time. It wasn't just a simple Romeo and Juliet can't live with out her choice. His end was far more tragic then that.

Being there would've softened the full-on evil swing to a degree. Or, if Tommen had still gone through with it, Cersei would've had to live with that vision. As it was, Tommen was already lost to Cersei before she thought to blow up the sept.

 

[LingFarmer]

deus01[/url]":in05eu35]

Sure, but parts of Margaery's story were still irrelevant, like whether she was acting about being a true believer in the faith or not. She played a part in the overall story but some of her character development was just meaningless in the end and could have been spent on other characters who sometimes felt rushed.

No, it's precisely because they developed those points of Margaery's story that I was convinced that she would (some how) make it out of the sept alive. I had convinced myself that she would be the downfall of Cersei, so it made her death all the more surprising.

Pretty much everyone knew Cersei would try to blow up the sept with wildfire, so the opening scene is not about surprise, it's about suspense, but throwing Margaery under the bus adds an element of surprise, it's great story telling.

 

[ChadD]

ascagnel[/url]":2e35fhjg]

ChadD[/url]":2e35fhjg]

ascagnel[/url]":2e35fhjg]

araemo[/url]":2e35fhjg]

(several characters, Olenna Tyrell and Varys in particular, seem to have been outfitted with jetpacks)

Yara Greyjoy as well.

Technically, there are very few time cues, so there's no implausibility here, just not well-landmarked time jumps. It was jarring enough I mentioned it to my GF, and she didn't agree.. glad I'm not alone on that though.

Tommen though.. think about it, even though his brother was a sadistic ass, he probably still loved him.. everyone in his life except his mother has died, including his first and only love. And he's like, what, 15? And probably realized that his mother did it? Doesn't stretch credulity to me.

More to the point, an emotionally distant mother. Since Joffery ate it, Cersei viewed Tommen as a pawn for vengeance rather than her child. She was smirking and drinking wine instead of consoling her son, who just lost his spiritual guide and wife.

Although I am sure he was grieving that loss. I believe it was the realization that his Mother was pure evil that pushed him out the window. I think the High Sparrow had convinced him that his mother could be redeemed, that at her core she was Human. He didn't just loose a wife and friends, he had them taken from him by his own mother.

I read some other comments to the effect of, "not sure what to do with him... kill him off". I think his end was one of the most poignant deaths on the show in some time. It wasn't just a simple Romeo and Juliet can't live with out her choice. His end was far more tragic then that.

Being there would've softened the full-on evil swing to a degree. Or, if Tommen had still gone through with it, Cersei would've had to live with that vision. As it was, Tommen was already lost to Cersei before she thought to blow up the sept.

I think that is the tragedy of Tommen. I think he believed his mother could be redeemed. He had a good idea of the depth of the evil acts she had committed. Like Marcella I think he knew who his father was. I saw it as he choose to believe they where things she did due to external pressures mixed with a few bad choices. He believed she could repent, see the light and be saved by their wacked out religion. I think he saw the Sparrow as a way give his Mother, himself and the rest of his clan redemption, a karmic do over if you will.

So when he realized his mother was beyond saving, I think that realization killed him more then anything. That she sent the monster to make sure he stayed in the keep instead of going herself as you say... can be played a few different ways. It will be interesting to see how they deal with that next season. My take is she just didn't have the courage to face him before the dead was done. However they play it I'm sure its going to be heart wrenching on a few levels. The setup is great.

 

[pjlahaie]

ChadD[/url]":3m2uylgn]
So when he realized his mother was beyond saving, I think that realization killed him more then anything. That she sent the monster to make sure he stayed in the keep instead of going herself as you say... can be played a few different ways. It will be interesting to see how they deal with that next season. My take is she just didn't have the courage to face him before the dead was done. However they play it I'm sure its going to be heart wrenching on a few levels. The setup is great.

And it sets up a potential Queenslayer end to Cersei. She's been indirectly responsible for the death of her daughter, son and father. And she tried to have her other brother killed.

This I believe is the straw that will break the proverbial camel's back.

My guess is also that the Hound will be the one that kills the Mountain. Both as revenge and mercy.

 

[ChadD]

pjlahaie[/url]":71ctdqrb]

ChadD[/url]":71ctdqrb]
So when he realized his mother was beyond saving, I think that realization killed him more then anything. That she sent the monster to make sure he stayed in the keep instead of going herself as you say... can be played a few different ways. It will be interesting to see how they deal with that next season. My take is she just didn't have the courage to face him before the dead was done. However they play it I'm sure its going to be heart wrenching on a few levels. The setup is great.

And it sets up a potential Queenslayer end to Cersei. She's been indirectly responsible for the death of her daughter, son and father. And she tried to have her other brother killed.

This I believe is the straw that will break the proverbial camel's back.

My guess is also that the Hound will be the one that kills the Mountain. Both as revenge and mercy.

Yes the Hound / Mountain battle might be a great bit of development for the hound. He has slowly become at least a little bit more human the last few seasons. Does he just get to the revenge ? Does he take pity ? Does he leave him alive to suffer ? So many great choices for the writers, he can grow, stay true to his nature or find himself somewhere in the middle and it should all work very well as an arc for him.

 

[elpajaro]

Rookie_MIB[/url]":2gqbg0pv]

Jeremy Reimer[/url]":2gqbg0pv]

Season highlights include poor Tommen Baratheon, Rickon Stark, the High Sparrow, Margaery and Loras Tyrell, Walder Frey, the Blackfish, Wun Wun the Wildling Giant, and Ramsay “Dogfood” Bolton, First of His Name.

Note that the Blackfish was killed offscreen, by random guards, and Walder Frey visibly gloated that he was taken out by random guards, so I'm thinking maybe the Blackfish isn't as dead a fish as everyone might think...

Hard to say. It was reported to Jamie Lannister that the Blackfish had died fighting to the last, and the Blackfish himself noted as Brienne and Podrick were leaving that he hadn't had a fight in years... I'm thinking that Jamie - who was specifically tasked to return the Blackfish - would verify his death.

I've come to the conclusion that if you didn't explicitly see a character die, chances are they'll be back

 

[Snarky Robot]

elpajaro[/url]":2uemv9lf]
I've come to the conclusion that if you didn't explicitly see a character die, chances are they'll be back

And even if you see them die, it's a toss-up.

 

[CwickStylz]

I thought the last two episodes of S06 were fantastic, but those 1st 8 episode felt like they dragged on, with no much happening. Then BOOM, they cram so much shit into two episodes it almost felt strained like they decided, oh shit, we need to do x, y, z, but we only have 2 hours to do it...ok teleport here, time lapse there...etc.

I feel like they could have taken the last 2 episodes & made them into 1/2 the season easily...

 

[VexedMama]

I find it interesting that many commenters have said that the rising female stars of the show are "pandering to feminism." The author did not state that THIS season there was mistreatment of women, but said that he was almost done with it due to previous seasons portrayal of women on the show. You're right that many of the people killed on the show have been men, but the people we've seen graphically tortured and raped have been almost exclusively women with the notable exception of Theon who was castrated (and thus no longer a man by some people's definiton) very early on in his time with Ramsay.

Children have risen repeatedly to high places on the show, but I've never heard it claimed the writers were pandering to children. Homosexuals have been in strong contention for the throne, but it's not pandering to homosexuals. Hell, incest has been a theme throughout the show but it's not pandering to incestuous couples. Why is it pandering to women? Most of the men are dead by virtue of the fact that they fight in most of the wars. It seems a logical outcome of the many bloodbaths we've seen that there are very few strong males left in contention for the throne.

 

[MCYL]

bigkoss[/url]":npipev2e]I'm so ready for Jaime to kill Cersei for pulling off what he killed the Mad King for threatening to do. He endured a lifetime of scorn and derision, all for nothing.

I'm just interested to see how he's gonna choke Cersei with one working hand.

 

[nsomniture]

The scene where Sam and Gilly get dropped off outside Oldtown shows the white ravens departing to announce the official arrival of winter. Winterfell's raven arrives later in the episode, implying that a substantial amount of time passes during the events in the episode. Would people have preferred seeing "three weeks later..." in text at the bottom of the screen? There are no jetpacks required here.

 

[Einbrecher]

Something I think the series struggles with is a year between seasons != a year in the show. The actors are aging much faster than their characters, so it makes them seem more mature in the show than they actually are in the book.

For characters like Jon, Sansa, or Dany - who are in their teens - it's not that bad. But for characters like Tommen (who's 8 or 9, but looks 13-14), Bran (who's 9, but looks 15-16), and Rickkon (who's 4, but now also looks significantly older), I think it's the most jarring aspect of the TV show.

I was firmly rooted in the "Why can't you zig-zag?" crowd when Rickon was shot, but I had to remind myself that in the story he was at most 5. A 5 y/o would not have known or even thought to do it. Tommen was an emotional, impressionable young boy whose only pillars of support were Margery and the High Sparrow - both of whom were just killed by his mother. As soon as that camera sat on the window I knew the next thing to go out it was him. Meera (16) should still have no trouble lugging Bran (9) around - not ideal (poor Hodor), but still possible. On screen it looks pretty ridiculous now that it's just those two given how big the actor has gotten.

I'm not a fan of recasting actors for roles, but I think a lot of the subtleties of the series would have been portrayed much better had they done it for the younger ones.

 

[Adonis91]

pjlahaie[/url]":2owhtfp4]

ChadD[/url]":2owhtfp4]
So when he realized his mother was beyond saving, I think that realization killed him more then anything. That she sent the monster to make sure he stayed in the keep instead of going herself as you say... can be played a few different ways. It will be interesting to see how they deal with that next season. My take is she just didn't have the courage to face him before the dead was done. However they play it I'm sure its going to be heart wrenching on a few levels. The setup is great.

And it sets up a potential Queenslayer end to Cersei. She's been indirectly responsible for the death of her daughter, son and father. And she tried to have her other brother killed.

This I believe is the straw that will break the proverbial camel's back.

My guess is also that the Hound will be the one that kills the Mountain. Both as revenge and mercy.

Maybe (Jaimie killing Cersei), but a lot of people were complaining that Arya's training with the faceless men was overdone and all things considered rather pointless. But we know that Cersei and the Mountain are on Arya's kill list, and given their proximity to the throne (now Cersei sits on it), and given that Arya's identity is well known, it makes sense to me that she received special training that would allow her to disguise herself so that she can set herself up to be in a position to kill them. She was also trained by Tywin to be a cupbearer...

 

[MCYL]

bigstrat2003[/url]":1ih1s5fz]

BioTurboNick[/url]":1ih1s5fz]

carcharoth[/url]":1ih1s5fz]After re watching this episode

i hope Danny is the main villain, goes insane, and all Westeros has to defeat her

I was actually thinking about that. Are we seeing the first hints of a psychological disorder in how she just didn't feel anything about the guy she was leaving behind? Maybe it's genetic. We've also had quite a few references to her mad father. Foreshadowing?

It's certainly possible. Dany has been stable, but the Targaryens are (in the books) famously mentally unsound as the result of generations of inbreeding. Wouldn't be too surprising if she got the family curse as well.

I'm sure many a woman has dumped a dude and felt less than she anticipated. Hell, IRL some seem to lure then dump men just for album material.

 

[nsomniture]

I'm just interested to see how he's gonna choke Cersei with one working hand.

She'll be wearing a choker. Bit on-the-nose, but it works.

 

[ChadD]

nsomniture[/url]":2jngj5e0]The scene where Sam and Gilly get dropped off outside Oldtown shows the white ravens departing to announce the official arrival of winter. Winterfell's raven arrives later in the episode, implying that a substantial amount of time passes during the events in the episode. Would people have preferred seeing "three weeks later..." in text at the bottom of the screen? There are no jetpacks required here.

No need for the text , you just have to get into Martin mode... they where true to the books in that regard. Fans of the books got used to waiting years for a book only to realize once you where a good way in, the story was going back in time and telling the story from another angle. You want confusion and annoyance, most readers got 3/4 the way through the 4th book before it became clear the book didn't have Jon or Dany in it at all. At least there isn't 5 year gaps in the release of this telling.

 

[JuicyAphid]

gpsxsirus[/url]":1bz5gkv9]

Spoiler

Kressilac[/url]":1bz5gkv9]"The way the series treats women" is somewhat jarring to me in the review. I get what the author is implying and there were elements of this in the beginning but it is also very hard to ignore that the most powerful characters on the show are mostly female and throughout the show, females have repeatedly had strong characters. In a sense, the female characters have a much higher variability of treatment which seems to include the highs and the lows.

When Littlefinger gets his, retribution for a low has been delivered but what else is left that we see on screen. Sansa in politically more powerful than Cersei even though she's just realizing it. Cersei is the main villain now. Dany, well, she has three dragons. Arya is simply a bad ass and Sam's wife is a good mother to their son. Margery bit it but she was smart enough to see it coming and you always had the feeling that she was playing the Septs game which implies intelligence and cunning. Her grandmother is supposedly very powerful and rich. Dorne is now ruled by women.... Aside from a few brothels and poor life, where women are treated badly, I'm not sure how the show still maintains "its treatment of women". The beginning was questionable but not out of the time period. The end is so far from the beginning that I think we need to let that accusation against the show die. And I forgot to mention Yara.

You also forgot one of the most badass women on the show. Lady Mormont! The 10-year old girl who made a bastard a king.

Lady Mormont gets my vote for Hand of the King in the North.

 

[Voldenuit]

typhoidtimmy[/url]":2nqqaq9z]

gpsxsirus[/url]":2nqqaq9z]
You also forgot one of the most badass women on the show. Lady Mormont! The 10-year old girl who made a bastard a king.

God, I love that kid. When she dressed down all the lords for not supporting Stark, it was like punches in the gut. I would give anything to see her go toe to toe with Dany or Cersei. Hell, you want to see the verbal match of the century, have her go against Tyrion in playing the Game.

Screw all the main characters, put that little firebrand in the Iron Throne. The undead king and his minions would be a trifle.

Lyanna Mormont vs Olenna Tyrell. Battle of the champions. Opening act: Cleganebowl.

JuicyAphid[/url]":2nqqaq9z]
Lady Mormont gets my vote for Hand of the King in the North.

More like Smackdown of the King. Amirite?

 

[Studbolt]

ED(I)[/url]":29hlxbtv]The whole season has felt like a trailer for a better show. Everything was rushed.

The Arya plotline stands out as pointless and very low quality when compared to the plots people made up for free on Reddit. I liked some of Masie's acting early in the season and the play, but that was it. The Frey pie punchline was completely out of place.

I don't get why Daenerys is supposed to like Tyrion, let alone making him Hand when they have shared what four scenes.

This season was better than the fifth, but not by much.

I think reviewers are only enjoying the spoilers.

So...

- Who exactly is attending Cersei's coronation after all the nobility in King's Landing went up in flames? And who put out the fires? And why did the people forgive Cersei so quickly for blowing up the Great Sept of Baelor, considering that everyone was afraid of the High Sparrow because all of the people of King's Landing are so devout?

- It's good that Jon can get over the fact that Sansa never told him about Littlefinger and his extra forces arriving, thus costing close to 2000 lives. But maybe he's still wondering how he could possibly have forgotten to give Wun Wun at least a small tree to carry into battle, rather than making the very last of the giants fight with his bare hands. Sheesh. No wonder Sansa doesn't trust him. How often she must think to herself, "You're a complete idiot, Jon Snow".

- Jon has said himself that he ate at the Stark table. He was only ever asked to eat with the servants once. But maybe it's because he somehow has a messed up Yorkshire accent, when all the other Starks have a regular Western accent. Poor Jon can't pronounce any of his consonants.

- Did Arya murder a serving girl to get a new face? How did she fly across the sea and then Westeros to get to the Riverlands? Exactly how did she have time to hunt and kill Lothar and Black Walder, and where did she butcher their bodies and make them into a pie? Why was the entire hall empty except for Lord Frey, when shortly before it had been crowded with Freys and Lannisters and their bannermen, servants, etc?

- Those Dothraki sure did get to be good sailors in a hurry, didn't they? Not too shabby for guys who previously were just a bunch of primitive horse-mounted reavers. "Wooden horses" aren't too different from the real ones, I guess.

- I'm sure that Jon and all the lords of the Northern houses will eventually remember that both Bran and Sansa have precedence over him when it comes to Winterfell. Jon does know that Bran's alive. Maybe he just forgot while he was banishing Melisandre as the new lord of, oh, wait, that was before he had been hailed as king. Huh. And maybe, when their memories come back to them, the Stark bannermen will also remember that Sansa and Littlefinger rescued what had turned into a complete rout of Jon's army, Sansa the rightful heir, that is.

- Sansa's pretty forgiving. She sits next to Jon and doesn't say a thing when every lord in the North forgets she's the rightful heir. And she seems to have forgiven Littlefinger pretty quickly for forgetting his vision of himself on the Iron Throne with her at his side and dropping her off with a known psychopath to get raped, instead. Well, maybe that's the one time Littlefinger forgot his lifelong plan.

- I wish the writers could explain why Sam shows up at the Citadel to begin his Maester studies with a girlfriend and a baby. That's kind of like showing up at the Vatican with...a girlfriend and a baby.

But overall, I'd say the viewers are even more forgiving than anybody.

 

[Studbolt]

Einbrecher[/url]":11ek8ci8]

I was firmly rooted in the "Why can't you zig-zag?" crowd when Rickon was shot, but I had to remind myself that in the story he was at most 5.
.

It's been several years since Bran was pushed out the window. It takes months for all those armies to move around.

 

[Studbolt]

JackBurton1986[/url]":2bw6a4fh]I was really not happy with a lot of this season (oh look, yet another speech by Dany... yawn...

"We're gonna make the world a better place!"

 

[Studbolt]

Statistical[/url]":2h34mn0v]

how do we write Tommen now? i dunno, maybe he just walks out of a window.

sometimes the show drags out a point sometimes they write one off too quickly.

His mother murdered his wife and the leader of the religion he suddenly found himself devoted to while he stood helpless and watched. Not a stretch to think he might walk out of a window after that.

Not to mention a few thousand people (or however many people fit into the Great Sept), anybody in King's Landing who couldn't fake pneumonia. Luckily, all of those people made soft landings into the Blackwater Bay so they could attend Cersei's coronation a few days later.

 

[groghunter]

Studbolt[/url]":2bcrmf32]

Einbrecher[/url]":2bcrmf32]

I was firmly rooted in the "Why can't you zig-zag?" crowd when Rickon was shot, but I had to remind myself that in the story he was at most 5.
.

It's been several years since Bran was pushed out the window. It takes months for all those armies to move around.

I could see a year or two, but several? isn't the coming of winter mentioned in the first book/season? long seasonal cycles, true, but I don't have the impression this has spanned more than 3 years, max.

 

[Einbrecher]

groghunter[/url]":203zltvv]

Studbolt[/url]":203zltvv]

Einbrecher[/url]":203zltvv]

I was firmly rooted in the "Why can't you zig-zag?" crowd when Rickon was shot, but I had to remind myself that in the story he was at most 5.
.

It's been several years since Bran was pushed out the window. It takes months for all those armies to move around.

I could see a year or two, but several? isn't the coming of winter mentioned in the first book/season? long seasonal cycles, true, but I don't have the impression this has spanned more than 3 years, max.

If you go by the appendices in the books, they span about 2 years (ignoring the fact that the books are terrible as well when it comes to time landmarks). That means Rickon, who was 4 in the first book, was 6 when he was killed. Tommen, who was 7 in the first book, would be 9. Bran, who was also 7 in the first book, would be 9. They're all still young children as far as the story is concerned - significantly younger than they appear on screen, which, in lacking that context, only makes their choices/behavior even more confusing.

By comparison, the actor portraying Tommen is 18, Bran is 17, and Rickon is 14.

 

[groghunter]

JuicyAphid[/url]":3gvrsvr7]

gpsxsirus[/url]":3gvrsvr7]

Spoiler

Kressilac[/url]":3gvrsvr7]"The way the series treats women" is somewhat jarring to me in the review. I get what the author is implying and there were elements of this in the beginning but it is also very hard to ignore that the most powerful characters on the show are mostly female and throughout the show, females have repeatedly had strong characters. In a sense, the female characters have a much higher variability of treatment which seems to include the highs and the lows.

When Littlefinger gets his, retribution for a low has been delivered but what else is left that we see on screen. Sansa in politically more powerful than Cersei even though she's just realizing it. Cersei is the main villain now. Dany, well, she has three dragons. Arya is simply a bad ass and Sam's wife is a good mother to their son. Margery bit it but she was smart enough to see it coming and you always had the feeling that she was playing the Septs game which implies intelligence and cunning. Her grandmother is supposedly very powerful and rich. Dorne is now ruled by women.... Aside from a few brothels and poor life, where women are treated badly, I'm not sure how the show still maintains "its treatment of women". The beginning was questionable but not out of the time period. The end is so far from the beginning that I think we need to let that accusation against the show die. And I forgot to mention Yara.

You also forgot one of the most badass women on the show. Lady Mormont! The 10-year old girl who made a bastard a king.

Lady Mormont gets my vote for Hand of the King in the North.

No way, she just put a Targaryen on the throne of Winterfell!

Speaking of, Jon may very well have trouble holding the North together, & or keeping his position, when that info inevitably slips out. Should have put Sansa on the throne after all.

 

[pjlahaie]

Studbolt[/url]":32c1k0as]
- Who exactly is attending Cersei's coronation after all the nobility in King's Landing went up in flames? And who put out the fires? And why did the people forgive Cersei so quickly for blowing up the Great Sept of Baelor, considering that everyone was afraid of the High Sparrow because all of the people of King's Landing are so devout?

The nobles were still around. Not all of them would have attended the trial. The fires (ancillary) were probably put out by peasants. The wildfire was most likely left burning (it was still burning when Jaime arrives). And how would the people know that Cersei blew it up? Most rumors would probably point to Tommen.

- It's good that Jon can get over the fact that Sansa never told him about Littlefinger and his extra forces arriving, thus costing close to 2000 lives.

She indirectly told him. We need to have more men. Jon insisted on "it's now or never". But like Sansa says "Only a fool would trust Littlefinger", she probably wasn't sure he was going to follow through.

- Did Arya murder a serving girl to get a new face? How did she fly across the sea and then Westeros to get to the Riverlands? Exactly how did she have time to hunt and kill Lothar and Black Walder, and where did she butcher their bodies and make them into a pie? Why was the entire hall empty except for Lord Frey, when shortly before it had been crowded with Freys and Lannisters and their bannermen, servants, etc?

Many months have passed since we last saw Arya in episode 9. She probably brought the face with her. The party with in the hall was long over by the time she kills Lord Frey. Once again, several weeks have passed between those scenes.

- I'm sure that Jon and all the lords of the Northern houses will eventually remember that both Bran and Sansa have precedence over him when it comes to Winterfell. Jon does know that Bran's alive. Maybe he just forgot while he was banishing Melisandre as the new lord of, oh, wait, that was before he had been hailed as king. Huh. And maybe, when their memories come back to them, the Stark bannermen will also remember that Sansa and Littlefinger rescued what had turned into a complete rout of Jon's army, Sansa the rightful heir, that is.

Seeing as "no queen has ever ruled the seven kingdoms" it seems like the lineage rules follows many medieval rights of succession rules. The next closest male heir is the king. Sansa would not have precedence. And if you discard the fact he's a bastard (which the northerners have done), Jon is the oldest male Stark. Either way, as the son of Lyanna Stark, he would be the 2nd in line to the throne after Bran (which would have to abdicate because he's now the 3-eyed raven)

- Sansa's pretty forgiving. She sits next to Jon and doesn't say a thing when every lord in the North forgets she's the rightful heir. And she seems to have forgiven Littlefinger pretty quickly for forgetting his vision of himself on the Iron Throne with her at his side and dropping her off with a known psychopath to get raped, instead. Well, maybe that's the one time Littlefinger forgot his lifelong plan.

In an earlier scene, she even tells Jon that her parents bedroom should be his. As for Littlefinger, she seems to have accepted that Littlefinger was a fool for not knowing who Ramsey was. She also needed him.

- I wish the writers could explain why Sam shows up at the Citadel to begin his Maester studies with a girlfriend and a baby. That's kind of like showing up at the Vatican with...a girlfriend and a baby.

Which I'm sure will be addressed in the next season.

EDIT: Fixed totally broken quotes