Dave

If they used Rickon as a prop in this, that's pretty cold blooded. They're basically saying, "hey, if the Stark kid gets skinned, that's OK so long as it leads to our ends".

He's comic relief while being the smartest guy in the room. I think he's a very well drawn character. One of the best on the show.

Who will follow a man who murders his own kin, an unpredictable madman who love to torture and hunt down people for fun? Plenty of people throughout human history. That's the nature of tyrannical dictators. Ruling through fear. Yes, sometimes they are disposed from within and sometimes from without. You're also talking about a people who's entire culture is grounded in the skinning of their enemies.

Eh, they killed Rob's direwolf in Season 3.

Premier was kind of soft, even though quite a bit happened. I think maybe that was a combination of pacing and expectations. The episode kept setting up and knocking down the right pins. Some were expected (spoiler even though it aired, since many DVR here): Others probably not: So there you have an episode that didn't begin until 9:10 PM EST, covered most of the remaining story archs a couple times each, and only hit a couple of surprises, one not till the absolute end. All felt very neat and orderly.

Or, "I'm so excited for my wedding!"

He parses his words so carefully that it's almost the same red herring that was used to lure him out. I'm going to break it down: Not, this is how it is. Just "his understanding". Inaccurate in many ways, but not specifically with his salary for season 6 and beyond. A clear cut answer would have been, "I don't have a contract for season 6.". Things on GOT are seldom what they really are and we always have questions like this. So suddenly the show runners are going to break tradition and tell him this even when the episode showed something with his character that could be a cliff hanger? Then they were also going to have him do a pre-interview with EW that would come out just minutes after the episode's conclusion to confirm his character's death on a show that BENEFITS FROM AUDIENCE SPECULATION BOTH WAYS ON THESE EXACT TYPES OF SITUATIONS? That I'll buy. Is the John Snow character as we know him dead? Sure. I can see that. Has Kit been filled in on his acting future with GOT? Probably not. Probably the writing isn't finished yet. And the entire problem with this "interview". Is Kit talking as Kit or is Kit talking as John Snow? Obviously, there is a huge difference.

Probably John Snow doesn't come back. Could John Targaryen be back? Or maybe Azor Ahai?

Ultimate set up episode.

http://i.imgur.com/GHGGv9l.png

This completely misses the boat on why the Shireen thing was so horrible. It isn't simply the fan's fondness for her character although of course that comes into play, but it's a father and mother (at first) willingly burning their child alive in order to further their own goals. So to use the dog getting hit by a car analogy, this would be the difference between seeing some random dog getting hit by a car verses seeing someone run over their own dog intentionally.

Fantastic episode last night. Definitively made up for the last few set up episodes. Perhaps lost in the epic battle was how good the Tyrion/Danny banter was.

Tyrion was chained because he wasn't there to fight. Same reason Jorah wasn't. He had to get armor on and clean and prepare his weapons. Presumably there was no way to escape except into the fighting pit. Tyrion had a file it looked like to me. Probably to sharpen weapons. I don't know why that guy freed him other than they needed a quick way to advance the story line. Agree about the sex scene with Sam. The scene works without it. John going north is in the books. One of the few things they are sticking to. Not sure where the Sand Snakes stuff is going. Whether it's worthwhile or not remains to be seen. The Ramsey, Reek, Sansa stuff was good. So was the Stanis army scene as far as advancing that story line. And where they are going with Kings Landing works for me. It was a disappointing episode because it was a transition one. Moving pieces on the board. With the number of story lines, it takes almost twice as long to setup conflicts across the entire series. They should try to better balance it even as these types of episodes are sometimes necessary.

I think you'd need to work in some teleportation for the White Walkers though. And wouldn't that be an absolute bitch for John Snow if he went through all he goes through at the Wall, only for the White Walkers to beat him with science and be all like, John Snow you know nothing. Later bastard!

How about this. Stannis and Littlefinger retake Winterfell. Littlefinger makes his move, asking Sansa to marry him. She says no and tells him that she's know he was trying to use her as his pawn for a while. Stanis backs her because it's the righteous thing to do, says something about her brother, John Snow helping him back at the Wall. And of course, the Vale would support her as the rightful heir of Winterfell, especially if she lets it out that Littlefinger pushed Lysa through the skydoor. Brienne stays on as Sansas' protector and Sansa makes Podrick a Knight.

Bronn has no purpose to the story anymore at this point, although he could in the future one supposes. At the same time, he does have tremendous value from an audience stand point. He's a character you can really get behind and he's been acted phenomenally well. I would imagine his death would be near the top of fan favorites getting the ax to this point. Less shocking than Rob or Ned, but I don't think either of those two had the audience connection that Bronn does.

Then that's her own stupidity. She knows that this kid's father double crossed her family, helping kill her mother, brother and sister-in-law. Did she think that the wedding wouldn't get consummated? Or that maybe she'd have the romance she's always dreamed of? No. She made a calculated risk and this is the price. We'll see if it pays off in the end. This is the "Old woman and the snake" otherwise.

Nice catch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lm8FQKS4EnM"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lm8FQKS4EnM 1:55 in. Appears it was Bronn, right before the fight is stopped. And I can't help but agree with you. Having that be the only damage anyone faces, having it seem so mild considering and it happening a split second before the fight is stopped seems too coincidental.

But why? Is it just because Ramsey is a despicable character while Sansa isn't? Not enough for me. And if it was, did he also rape the girl who's been playing games with Sansa? And if so, where was the outrage? I think this is just a case of a character people don't like being judged because of their interaction with a character people do.

Not all rough sex is rape. Was it inconsiderate? Sure, given that he knew it was Sansa's first time. But consummation of the wedding was expected, surely Sansa knew that it was at least a likely possibility when she agreed to marry Ramsey. So them having sex, given that she did not decline, in and of it self isn't rape. Or do you think someone has to explicitly verbalize consent not just to the act but also to the style of the act?

Why is this being called rape? Sansa agreed to marry him, Littlefinger had given her the option to not go to Winterfell at all. She had to know there would be a bedding after the marriage. The sex might have been a little rough, a little kinky with Reek watching and certainly not what Sansa probably envisioned her first time, but she never says no, never asks or indicates he should stop, doesn't try to resist at all. He doesn't over power her. The closest to a threat was when he asks, connected to telling her to get undressed, "Do I need to ask a second time? I hate having to ask a second time." If anything, Reek got raped in this scene, not Sansa. Maybe not in a traditional sense, he was threatened into participating into a sexual situation. Wedding through the end. Jump to around 3:00 if you want to just see the lead up to the consummation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BXMPInWum8

Still too many story lines, but at least each that got covered advanced significantly. It's also pretty refreshing to have it stray so far from the books. Now book readers can join those who haven't in not really knowing what will come next in a lot of the story lines. And even the ones more true to the books, you never know when something will suddenly stray. I think that's what having Barristan Selmy die did. Makes you realize that either the books have been abandoned for a different version of the overall story or those who ultimately won't be completely vital for the story are now fair game. The Sansa story line for example, I was expecting maybe Reek to kill Ramsey or else for war horns to blare as Stannis attacked to save her maidenhood. Neither happened, but it was good to have the possibility from a book reader's standpoint.

They are running into the problem created by the vastness of the books. Even with characters stories combined and some eliminated completely, too many different story lines makes it very difficult to advance each sufficiently for me. I think that's what is happening with Dany's line right now. They're even leaving off story lines from episodes because there is just no room. That last episode ignored King's Landing, Jamie/Bronn and Aryia completely, I believe. And it still felt thin. Not sure what the solution is either. It's just a massive amount of movement necessary for each line given the 1 hour they have each week and a 10 episode season.

I think if I didn't watch the finale first, I might not have stuck with this as it does start very slowly. It was an excellent ride through the three relationships as the season heated up though. Alison being sort of unveiled as things moved along was done really well, as are the two perspectives. I'm guessing the nuanced differences between the two stories are going to be what gets Noah tripped up. You at least get the sense that Alison is more cunning than he is. I was confused, watching the finale first it seemed like based on the tow truck driver scenes, I thought all along it was the Darren (the Diner owner) who was killed, not the brother. Not sure why he was paying off the tow truck driver, unless I completely missed something.

Yes, and then HBO will be free to finish things up in the few seasons they have left, and RR can continue on his pace, resolving the books possibly in a completely different fashion sometime in 2118.