Game of Thrones (HBO) TV Show • Page 95

Very disappointed in the Blackfish's offscreen death. He deserved a Yoren-like send-off.

 

Pretty sure I saw that chase scene in the new mirror's edge trailer.

 

From the preview for next week, it sounds like Jon challenges Ramsay to single combat. "Thousands don't need to die...just you or me. Obviously not going to happen, but really don't like the idea of them parlaying at all. Ramsay's a shit who would probably just stab him.

 

I having the Hound back.
and I really enjoyed Arya's fight/flight, felt it showed her fighting through her injury well enough.

 

To add fuel to the Cersei wildfire discussion... One of Bran's visions did show what looked like wildfire going off in Kings Landing. While this was peppered with glimpses of the mad king, I don't think there's any mention of wildfire actually having gone off during his time on the throne. That easily could've been a vision of the future.

 

Arya sold that gut wound at the end worse than Roman Reigns

 

I totally mixed up their voices somehow haha, thought it was the other way around

 

Arya's story sucks so badly.

 

Wasn't the majority of the wildfire stored in King's Landing used in The Blackwater?

 

Pod and Bronn scene pretty much confirmed that Pod's going to die this season

 

Loved the Arya scenes to death. Always happy to see Robert Strong kick some ass. Mereen looked so good. I really wanted to yell "no shit!" at Tommen when he said trials by combat are barbaric. Glad someone put that together. But they're so damn fun to watch

 

I haven't seem similar reactions (and it may be that I've been boozing), but I thought this was a really strong episode after a really strong episode last week. You guys said it was by the same director? I like that he has kept a fairly fast pace with substantive dialogue.

Also, I couldn't be happier that the Hound is back. It's not a super challenging role, but I really do love the character for whatever reason. I imagine it's less the portrayal and more the character itself.


I liked the off-screen death of the Waif. I did not like the off-screen (supposed) death of Blackfish.

I would disagree in some regard. Their exposure has been limited, but I think both of them have given two of the strongest acting performances of the season. I think the entire plot has been slowed considerably, yet has inexplicably allowed for almost zero character development. Such is the bane of packing thousands of pages of story lines into a handful of 12-hours increments.

I think one of the biggest sins is that it robs a lot of the characters/actors of range. I don't think, in this entire season, I've seen any array of portrayal except from Dany.

Do you think this precludes Hound v. Mountain?

I think you're forgetting how bad the Dorne subplot was.

You want the good girl, but you need the bad pussy.

Still may happen. I'm fine as long as they don't fuck around with offing the Hound again. Way too compelling a character to take off screen. McCann owned that character and stole the screen from the get go.

 

The direction of the chase scene, mostly regarding the Waif's conduct, was the worst part of the episode. Too cheesy.

The High Sparrow is such an underrated character and portrayal. On screen, he's a naked populist servant, but off screen he has to be a conniving strategist. And the portrayal is genuine in the former, but leaves enough slack to infer the latter.

Right? If we're going to accept the prologue to her exit as being genuine, she's clearly a giant dumbass who doesn't understand the gravity of her training. That's why I was amenable to all those theories about what had/will happen. It's clear now that the end of last week's episode was just fucking lazy.

Watch Irreversible, The Wrestler, Sideways, No Country for Old Men, or the finale of The Sopranos. Some of us find that stuff artful.

I'm actually warming up to Blackfish's off-screen death because of the nature of his character.

Effortlessly sliding down stone stairs, under a barrow, on her stomach, though?

 

Disappointing to see Jamie still refusing to branch out, lol. The thing that was always the most villainous aspect about him to begin with (unnecessary violence carried out for his love of Cersei) revealed itself in full force in episode 8 and will probably catch up with him in the end is my guess. Would have been rad if he teamed up with Brianne and The Blackfish instead of fucking shit up. Oh well, at least his arch was really interesting again for a while.

Dany is back, and there's a battle to be fought so glad to see things finally moving forward there.

That final showdown between Arya and Waif was downright poetic. Trained (rather brutalized) while in total darkness (her blindness) at the start of the season. The final strike of blind justice in retaliation to save her life begins after slicing the light out of the room while moving into a fighting stance taught to her by Syrio. Fucking beautiful.

All dat unexpected humor in the Hound's revenge scene, hahahaha.

And calling it now, the next episode will be the most epic one yet.

 

Except for the fact it was super expected and unrealistic? The fact that she healed after all the stabbings, after falling to the ground, the fact the waif just even stopped running when she could easily have gotten Arya...it's like they tried to make it super exciting, sacrificing any sense. It reminded me of archer in that way lol.

So we're saying a physically fucked up Arya took out the Waif in combat? Even though she's never shown any ability to ever do that before? And we never even saw how it happened? even though really there was no way it could have really ended any differently, it felt ridiculously forced. Bad scene

 

She was able to beat her bc of the time she spent blind

 

Only if we assume that Tyrion found all of it, and not just a single cache.

I have laughed quite a lot in the middle episodes of this season. Lots of wonderful dialogue.

In each previous instance, Waif had an undeniable advantage over Arya. In total darkness though, that playing field was quickly equalized if not shifted ever so slightly in Arya's favor.

As far as Arya running and escaping, and Waif's pursuit... I don't think its entirely unrealistic. Waif is cocky, arrogant, and wants to make Arya suffer. Slowly following and toying with wounded and scared prey is adding psychological warfare to the physical.

Lastly, as far as Arya's ability to maneuver and run/jump/roll/fight with her injuries, we were set up with an out for this before that scene even took place. Lady Crane specifically talked about "being good at patching up holes", and then it was very deliberate that we saw Arya take "milk of the poppy", or in other words: OPIUM. She was absolutely jacked up on an intense painkiller during the Waif fight.

 

yeah, we've never seen Arya stand her own against the waif before.....

 

I just watched the scene in season 2 when the pyromancer shows Tyrion the wildfire and I think he said something like 7000 caches they had.

I went back to that scene because of the rumour Cersei had Qyburn check and it turns out she was the one who had the pyromancers make the wildfire in the first place.

 

Yes there is definitely still wildfire in Kings Landing, I have a theory that Bran somehow communicated with the mad king, and told him to make so much.

The Arya stuff was a Lil cheesy but nowhere near as bad as most of Danys stuff this season, also I'm glad those brotherhood members were just renegades and it was good to see Lord Beric.

 

Are we supposed to believe the Waif had no training in the dark? Arya had stab wounds and just took a tumble down flights of stairs that should have rendered her incapacitated. Cutting the candle was a cool set up and everything but I still never felt like Arya had an advantage. The Faceless Men (is there just one now?) in the show are kind of pathetic. Arya truly becomes noone just by killing the Waif? Even aside from the fact that the Waif proved to be rather awful at being an assassin, it makes no sense at all. Ultimately Arya's two seasons of training advanced her very little and rendered the Faceless Men uninteresting, which should have been pretty hard to screw up. To me that shows how much the show can suffer from not having GRRM's narrative.

 

Yup. going along with this
also the big chase through the city was so unlike what a Faceless Man should be like.

 

The Arya stuff, like with her entire story in Braavos on the show, was bad. I can't bring myself to watch it again. She spent the majority of last season just learning how to lie before getting her first mission (which she neglects in order to kill Meryn Trant). Then all she does this season is train with then Waif and was given the Lady Crane assassination, which she botches once again.

18 episodes since she left for Braavos and this is what we ultimately got. What a waste.

 

it sucks how they can botch one of the most interesting character's plots so badly. hope it doesn't go the same way in the book, but based on the preview chapters it doesn't seem that way entirely

 

I was going to say, wasn't Cersei the one who commissioned the Wildfire in the first place and that is where Tyrion got the idea to use it from?

The Waif wasn't a Faceless Man yet, though. Wasn't she essentially in training, like Arya? Also, the Waif herself went against the teachings/rules/Jacqen's instructions in her attempts to kill Arya.