HBO's "Game Of Thrones" Discussion (2011-2019)

[A Sith Lord?]

Originally Posted by Batman90

They didn’t have Ghost after that cause they said it cost millions to have Ghost and dragons in an episode that’s why they’ve never been seen together. Why’s HBO have the people as producers if they are being cheap. HBO should have gotten people who was willing to put some real money in to this show.

Fairly certain this show has been the most expensive highest budgeted TV show in history like the last 3 seasons.

[scifisuperfan]

Originally Posted by DasRetroKid

So after watching this a bunch of times, I think it's pretty clear (at least for me) the NK wanted to watch the dagger hit the floor, look up at Arya's final moments of despair, and then snap her neck.

He did not count on her catching it.

The problem was that the NK only has 2 arms.

I believe he was betrayed by his knights. One of them saw Arya flying but didnt say nothing.

[tjritter79]

So...when they had the scene in the crypts and the dead starting coming out, wouldn't it have been terrifying to have a dead Ned & Kat snarling at those hiding out...and chasing Tyrion & Sansa for a bit.....I think they lost a chance there!

[JamesKurtovich]

Originally Posted by tjritter79

So...when they had the scene in the crypts and the dead starting coming out, wouldn't it have been terrifying to have a dead Ned & Kat snarling at those hiding out...and chasing Tyrion & Sansa for a bit.....I think they lost a chance there!

Imagine how traumatizing a decomposed, headless Ned would have been. Lol

Cat's body was probably never found. She was thrown into the river by the Freys after the RW.

[tjritter79]

Originally Posted by Zvi

That absolutely doesn't explain how did Aria get past the same WWs. It could've been Jon jumping out of nowhere.
Tactics? The whole thing was a giant mess, living being not all that much smarter than the dead as far as those tactics go.
In short, we never got to know/see what "tactic" aria used to get in position. She just jumped out of the thin air. Sure, you can argue faceless men taught her the art of teleportation, but that's rather a stretch.

The other Wight's only react to instruction from the NK. Of course the NK was distracted by Bran and Theon's "good man" charge. Usually the NK is on a hill, a dragon and viewing the battle from above. This time he got so overconfident that he didn't see/hear Arya till she was right there...and we know what happened then!

[DasRetroKid]

Originally Posted by tjritter79

So...when they had the scene in the crypts and the dead starting coming out, wouldn't it have been terrifying to have a dead Ned & Kat snarling at those hiding out...and chasing Tyrion & Sansa for a bit.....I think they lost a chance there!

This possibility had actually been discussed on a few YouTube video's, but the conclusion was that their bodies would have been dust by this point, so there wouldn't have been anything to raise.

Still fun to think about though.

[tjritter79]

Originally Posted by JamesKurtovich

Imagine how traumatizing a decomposed, headless Ned would have been. Lol

Cat's body was probably never found. She was thrown into the river by the Freys after the RW.

I thought there was a line somewhere that their remains were in the crypts.

[Schism213]

Originally Posted by tjritter79

So...when they had the scene in the crypts and the dead starting coming out, wouldn't it have been terrifying to have a dead Ned & Kat snarling at those hiding out...and chasing Tyrion & Sansa for a bit.....I think they lost a chance there!

As I was saying above. So much left on the table.

[Schism213]

Originally Posted by DasRetroKid

This possibility had actually been discussed on a few YouTube video's, but the conclusion was that their bodies would have been dust by this point, so there wouldn't have been anything to raise.

Still fun to think about though.

Ned was just bones when he was returned

[tjritter79]

Originally Posted by Schism213

Ned was just bones when he was returned

Well the horse with the rider a season or two ago.....missing like 2/3 of a leg and a good 1/4 of its body.....still supported a wight rider?

[Foggy]

Not a fan of the episode, I know the complaints of the lighting will be doing people’s head in on here, but that first thirty minutes really did suck the momentum out of the event, it’s hard to get involved when so much of it was really cluttered and unengaging imagery and storytelling. By half way through I was just wanting to skip to the end just so I have the key info sorted out of the episode. To be fair, the white walkers have always been the least interesting threat in the show, so I’m glad they’re written off now going into the final stretch, but I had wished they would have factored in deeper to the core story outside of doomsday stakes.

Like there’s s few things I liked about the episode, but considering how masterful the big event episodes have been, and especially how fantastic last weeks episode was, this just wasn’t worth the hype.

[EvaDK]

Originally Posted by bratpack

So what exactly would you want? Movie epics get a trilogy of 3 hour movies and do there lore and battles just fine GOT has had so much content over the last 8 years. How would you propose to extend a battle with an army of the dead once they have broken the wall and are running through everything 1hour 20mins is almost feature length.

All I can say is that I expected this showdown to have a bigger impact on me than it ended up having. A bigger dramatic core for all these characters. If I could change something, I would have expanded this event to two full episodes and fleshed out a lot of character moments more. Given them time to breathe.

Not saying it was bad or going into a 'why did this person live/die' debate. It was just OK and I expected better, considering how much has been invested in this event since the beginning of the show.

[bradnoyes]

Originally Posted by Blu Myers

On my Sony x800e 4K setup I saw everything just fine. But I'm sure my non HDR setup in the other room would have had an issue with it.

The show isn't broadcast in HDR, though. I'm sure that nicer TVs were better able to handle the overly dark scenes in last night's episode, but we all saw it in the same standard dynamic range, unless there's a way to stream HBO in HDR that I'm completely unaware of (which is certainly possible given that I am unaware of many, many things).

[stonecoldjedi]

Originally Posted by LegacyCosts

I assumed Arya infiltrated by wearing a corpse face, she's a master of disguises. Have some fun buddy, its fantasy.

Agreed. You're debating the "How can she do that" about a show in which dragons are real.

Originally Posted by A Sith Lord?

Ive watched this episode about 7 times now.

Although I've rewound the part of Theon's Redemption about 60 times. When the piano starts playing that sad melody and then he starts charging the score is so beautiful.

Some of Ramin's best work.

Originally Posted by The Sovereign

I actually had no problem with the scene itself, but Jon's attack on the Night King reminded me of this, minus the arrival -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHdDxKy2QW0

This. So much this. If someone edits the two together, I might lose it.

[tjritter79]

Originally Posted by Foggy

Not a fan of the episode, I know the complaints of the lighting will be doing people’s head in on here, but that first thirty minutes really did suck the momentum out of the event, it’s hard to get involved when so much of it was really cluttered and unengaging imagery and storytelling. By half way through I was just wanting to skip to the end just so I have the key info sorted out of the episode. To be fair, the white walkers have always been the least interesting threat in the show, so I’m glad they’re written off now going into the final stretch, but I had wished they would have factored in deeper to the core story outside of doomsday stakes.

Like there’s s few things I liked about the episode, but considering how masterful the big event episodes have been, and especially how fantastic last weeks episode was, this just wasn’t worth the hype.

Actually, I think the lighting (or lack of it) added to the suspense...like Doom or Resident Evil, you kinda lose suspense if your vision is totally 100% and how are you going to have wights sneak up on you if you can see them? That's part of the terror.....and maybe, maybe.....covered up some artifacts in special effects that would have been exposed and spoiled the moment had they attacked in dusk (low light as opposed to none). So the "darkness" may have been 50% artistic and 50% necessity.

[fundamentalfred]

Maybe Yara can bring the Second Sons to Westeros as some sort of surprise way of reinforcing what seems to be a severe shortage of troops now to fight Cersei?

[Levon]

Game of Thrones has been a rollercoaster series, we've all been hooked since episode 1. It will likely go down as one of the greatest TV shows ever and it is hard to argue against that, although if you were to ask me I'd answer Deadwood without a second thought, the writing, character development, and dialogue in that show is second to none in my opinion. I think of it as a Shakespearian Western, with regards to its dialogue, and I don't mean the swearing (profanity) the interactions and subtle looks between characters is just, man, amazing.

Back to Game of Thrones, there was great character interaction when it still had the books for all of its material, sadly, and I suppose you can disagree if you want, but when it got ahead of the books this is an aspect of the show that dropped quite dramatically and it has suffered for it I think. There have still been great moments though and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited for this season but the intrigue and mystery for me slowly started to slip away as I had a feeling they wouldn't give the White Walkers any deeper motivation other than we're bad guys, here to be bad and shit.

A bit disappointed they were dealt with in one episode, even if that episode was an hour and twenty minutes long, but well you know it is what it is I suppose, could have been a lot more and I think it should have been. The battle, when I could actually see bits of it was pretty great though, I thought they built the tension up really really well.

I, as I have noticed, unlike a lot of you (and this is not me being disparaging by the way) am not into comic book movies or anything like that, characters doing something awesome or badass in a kick-ass sort of sense usually washes over me, unless it is earned and has some sense of reality, so the Arya scene for me felt odd and I wasn't happy for her character I felt it was a step too far for her? But if some folk enjoyed it more power to ye, I guess that scene fits in with the badass moment thing people like to see, I guess I can't suspend my disbelief for something like that, which is ironic as I was buying into Ice creatures and whatever. As I said fantastical stuff usually isn't my bag and that was just a step too far.

And edit to say: The reality it has set within the show, yes MovieFanatic2010, there are flying Dragons and Zombies, but if Arya can just slip by them all then what is to stop her killing Cersei and Euron, I mean the White Walkers are the ultimate magical creatures in the show yet she can tip-toe past them? It felt like a step too far where it had abandoned any sense of reality it has set within its fantasy land. I guess you figured that out though, any excuse to use rollyeyes though, right?

Three episodes to go, can't say that I am on the edge of my seat now waiting to see what happens but I will watch them.

The 31st of May, however, cannot come quick enough.

[BLeClair12]

Originally Posted by bradnoyes

The show isn't broadcast in HDR, though. I'm sure that nicer TVs were better able to handle the overly dark scenes in last night's episode, but we all saw it in the same standard dynamic range, unless there's a way to stream HBO in HDR that I'm completely unaware of (which is certainly possible given that I am unaware of many, many things).

There isn't. As noted previously, HBO is among the lowest quality streamers around and terrestrial cable (no matter the provider) is not known for its quality either. I usually watch the show on HBO Go, but found that last night the lighting/detail was slightly better on my terrestrial feed.

I have no doubt that the episode was graded darkly and people are going to complain about it no matter what, but I also believe that HBO's streaming quality, coupled with the number of people watching the feed all at once, probably exacerbated the issue to some extent. Dark scenes are the weakness of any streaming platform on any television.

Take a poor streaming service being hit with tons of traffic and add in dimly lit content and you're asking for a mess in terms of overall picture quality.

[tjritter79]

Originally Posted by EvaDK

All I can say is that I expected this showdown to have a bigger impact on me than it ended up having. A bigger dramatic core for all these characters. If I could change something, I would have expanded this event to two full episodes and fleshed out a lot of character moments more. Given them time to breathe.

Not saying it was bad or going into a 'why did this person live/die' debate. It was just OK and I expected better, considering how much has been invested in this event since the beginning of the show.

Nah, dividing what we saw last night, extending it to two episodes...would have killed built-up momentum the next week I think. Heck, they could have done the same with the Blackwater and Battle of the Bastards...and chose not to. I applaud that...it was what 20-30 mins longer...but still a single episode, not a 2-parter. See you next week, same bat time, same bat channel? Ah, hate that!

[tjritter79]

Originally Posted by Levon

The 31st of May, however, cannot come quick enough.

The last episode is scheduled for May 19th.