GAME OF THRONES

[BloodBoal 7,538]

[Marian Schedenig 8,207]

3 minutes ago, Jay said:

Hmmm, I didn't read it as her taking after The Hound.  I mean she, she was ravishing through her food and not showing much emotion, but I dunno, I think that's just who she is now.

 

Stubbornly focusing on eating and drinking in a conversation instead of showing compassion, not making eye contact. Seemed very Hound-ish to me. Which I guess she was close to being, but saved by the news of her siblings having reclaimed Winterfell.

 

11 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

"Cold and villainous"? Never thought of her as any of those. If anything, she's the only ruler actually trying to do the right thing. Of course, that doesn't mean she's doing a good job at that, but still... Don't see how she's cold and villainous.

 

 

The "right thing" for her used to be to seize the Iron Throne which was hers by right and kill everyone who opposed the Mad King. Also to severely punish any injustice, not showing compassion regardless of the context. She's only gradually begun to understand how the world really works, and is still learning. I think this week's Varis scene was the first time she acknowledged that shifting loyalties do not necessarily make you an inherently evil person.

[Bilbo 3,709]

1 minute ago, BloodBoal said:

 

That's a theory many fans believe in, yes.

 

 

Jorah is one of those characters that used to be really cool (awesome voice, great fighting skills...), but suddenly he became dull (basically when he fell in love with Danaerys, with his sad puppy face ...), and I lost interest in him. A bit like Jaqen in Season 6 (an awesome mysterious assassin who suddenly was just a boring priest in a boring temple, spending most of his time washing corpses...).

 

At least we know Beric Dondarion will never get boring!!

[Jay 37,371]

On 7/25/2017 at 9:48 AM, Quintus said:

Emilia Clarke is absolutely gorgeous this year (somehow more than last year), but she's a crap actor isn't she.

 

It seems to be the case, yea.  She was terrible in the Terminator movie and while a lot of her acting in the earlier seasons could kind of be written off as "well, Dany's still coming into her own", I think we're actually seeing that she doesn't have the chops to keep up with all the other top talent she's surrounded with.

 

 

On 7/25/2017 at 3:31 PM, Disco Stu said:

Does anyone foresee any likely ending for Arya that isn't completely fucked up?

 

Yea, I think its possible actually.

 

 

13 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

Random thought of the day:

 

As I was thinking who could possibly kill the Mountain (Ellaria Sand? The remaining Sand Snake? The Hound?), none of the possible solutions seemed likely to me, and then it hit me: could Martin/Benioff and Weiss pull a David vs Goliath situation and have Tyrion kill him somehow? That way, you would have Tyrion "redeeming" himself in the eyes of Ellaria by killing the man who killed her husband (and it'll be a nice callback to the trial by combat), plus having a Dwarf kill the Mountain would make the writers feel smart ("Nobody saw it coming! Haha!"), which is something we know they love!

 

What say you? Aye or nay?

 

I think you're on to something!

 

 

11 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

something I forgot to mention: when Qyburn revealed his weapon to defeat the dragons, did anyone think: "Black Arrow!"?

 

Oh yea, absolutely

 

 

9 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

Remember they also intended to shoot a battle scene back in season 1 with Tyrion and the Mountain fighting side-by-side. It's all leading up to this!

 

Woah, I never knew that before, that would have been cool!

 

 

30 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

Talking about direwolves... Whatever happened to Ghost? Did I forget something, or was his absence never explained (I mean, with an in-show explanation, not the "we don't have enough money to have a CG direwolf around" behind-the-scenes explanation)?

 

I believe Ghost is in Winterfell with Jon and Sansa, and they just haven't shown him lately.

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

They shot a scene of Jon saying farewell to Ghost for this episode, but it got cut.

[Jay 37,371]

Source?

[BloodBoal 7,538]

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

 

[Marian Schedenig 8,207]

4 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

I think "misguided", "ruled by her emotions" would be more appropriate terms than "cold" and "villainous". And since she learned a great deal with people like Tyrion, she tries her best to improve her way of ruling, again, "to do the right thing" ("we will not attack King's Landing because innocent people would die if we did").

 

 

For a time at least, when she was still learning the ropes of ruling, I think she actually deliberately put on a cold face when dealing out judgement, because injustice had been done, and she as the ruler was the infallible and merciless source of justice. She's thawed since then, definitely, but I'm never quite sure how much.

[Jay 37,371]

5 minutes ago, Glóin the Dark said:

 

 

Thanks!

[Wojo 2,453]

Well I finally broke down and bought HBO to keep up with the season. I'll likely cancel in three months if I remember to. 

[crocodile 8,017]

I think the show now moves unnaturally fast. Not as much room for characters, just exposition and plot. Some of the writing is terribly flat as a result. This might be the reason the last couple of episodes, while good, didn't really spark any emotional reaction. I guess we're now moving into the generic fantasy territory. For me, the main attraction was always the rich and textured world and how complex it was (cultures, politics, religion etc). Less interested in white walkers, dragons and big battles.

 

On the other hand, the show never really worked for me on "one episode a week" format. So that might be that.

 

Karol

[Quintus 5,399]

I still think it's daft that the crow is used as such a cheap way of communicating regional communication between the factions. Dany sent a crow to Jon and a minute later (was it even the next scene?) he and Sansa were discussing the crow's message! That's just fucking lazy!

 

I bet Jon arrives at Dragonstone in the next episode, makes that journey look like a hop on pony ride. These people probably think going to Mordor was like knocking on your neighbours door and asking to borrow a cup of sugar.

[crocodile 8,017]

I know that the events portrayed within a single episode are meant to occur over a long period of time but the show communicates the passage of time really poorly. In fact this is its single weakest spot.

 

Karol

[BloodBoal 7,538]

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

3 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

There's definitely a lack of balance between the earlier seasons...

 

Is there really all that much of a difference?

 

In the first season, we see Jaime and Cersei in King's Landing in the first episode; a few minutes later, they are at Winterfell.

 

Ned leaves Winterfell in Episode 2; he's in the Riverlands by the end of the episode, and in King's Landing right at the start of Episode 3.

 

Later in the season, Robb Stark summons his bannermen from Winterfell; later in that episode, the entire army of the North has been mustered and made it to the Riverlands...

[Disco Stu 15,495]

3 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

But I guess the writers would have needed to have the whole series planned out from the very beginning in order to better spread out each event throughout the seasons and thus have the passage of time feel the same way throughout the whole show.

 

I recognize this as almost a necessity to keep the show moving, but I still think they're handling it very clumsily.  Somehow, it feels like the world has been cheapened and therefore the stakes seem lower to me.

 

Like, "Well, whatever we don't need to respect this world that Martin created, we just need these characters in these places we need them to be already!"

 

I don't really know how they could have avoided this though.

[BloodBoal 7,538]

[Jay 37,371]

8 hours ago, Woj said:

Well I finally broke down and bought HBO to keep up with the season. I'll likely cancel in three months if I remember to. 

 

Why 3 months?  The season will be over 4 1/2 weeks from now.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

12 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

Whatever, man! The show sucks now!

 

I have to admit, it's not holding my interest like it has in years past.  Outside of a few standout episodes, the show's been steadily going downhill since the 4th season or so.

[Jay 37,371]

4 hours ago, crocodile said:

I think the show now moves unnaturally fast. Not as much room for characters, just exposition and plot. Some of the writing is terribly flat as a result. This might be the reason the last couple of episodes, while good, didn't really spark any emotional reaction. I guess we're now moving into the generic fantasy territory. For me, the main attraction was always the rich and textured world and how complex it was (cultures, politics, religion etc). Less interested in white walkers, dragons and big battles.

 

But they've been doing more world building this year then ever, lots of looking back into the past, and the whole last episode was about the various political ramifications of invading here or there, now or then, etc.

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

15 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

"Well, whatever we don't need to respect this world that Martin created..."

 

I think that position is fair enough; they shouldn't be tied down to any aspects of Martin's version of the world that they don't want. All that matters is that the show's version of the world should be reasonably consistent with itself. They've been sloppy in recent seasons in regard to consistency with the plot, the characters' motivations, etc., but it's harder to identify inconsistencies in things such as travel times, since we don't know what those times are...

[Jay 37,371]

Which characters do you think have had inconsistent motivations?

[Disco Stu 15,495]

20 minutes ago, Glóin the Dark said:

but it's harder to identify inconsistencies in things such as travel times, since we don't know what those times are...

 

Yeah that's my main problem.  We never get any consistent of idea of how long it takes to go anywhere in this show because it changes with plot requirements.  I'll use this word again, it cheapens the world they've created.  Makes it seem less real.

 

It's not a dealbreaker for me, I'm still watching every episode to the end of course.

[Jay 37,371]

It cheapens when characters DO talk about for example how hard it will be for anyone to come to Winterfell once Winter arrives, when we see everyone travel anywhere they need to so easily all the time.

[Wojo 2,453]

1 hour ago, Jay said:

 

Why 3 months?  The season will be over 4 1/2 weeks from now.

 

Because I was calculating based on ten episodes. Clearly I was in error. 

[Jay 37,371]

Ah gotcha.  Yea, only 5 eps left this season, then 6 next year

[Wojo 2,453]

I loved the laugh out loud moment as digging scabs became digging into shepherd's pie. I really liked the change of direction that followed. 

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

5 hours ago, Jay said:

Which characters do you think have had inconsistent motivations?

 

"Motivations" was perhaps not the best choice of term for me to use - the core motivations of the major characters are pretty consistent over the course of the show. I was thinking of the frequent instances of bafflement as to why a character has done a certain thing, or gone about it in a particular way. Often it's possible to concoct an explanation (hypothesising things not shown on screen), but sometimes I'm left feeling that things just don't add up. It's not that I believe the writers need to spoon-feed the audience and spell everything out for us; it's fine that our own neurons should be expected to put in a bit of effort, and there's room for some things to be left enigmatic. But it has often felt as though they're ignoring obvious questions or problems simply for the sake of narrative convenience.

 

Here are just a few examples relating to major story developments (which have likely been brought up in this thread before):

 

Cersei's arrest. What was it that made the High Sparrow arrest Cersei at that particular time rather than earlier? We were apparently supposed to believe that Littlefinger had somehow provoked it (his "handsome young man" gift to Olenna being Brother Lancel with his testimony regarding Cersei's crimes). But Lancel had been in The Sparrows for ages at that point. If he hadn't spilled the beans on Cersei already, or if he had and the High Sparrow had declined to act upon it, how was Littlefinger able to change the situation?

 

Jon's assassination. Why did Alliser Thorne do something so blatantly stupid? The Night's Watch had barely managed to defend Castle Black on the southern side from Tormund's (fairly small) task force during the battle. Now Tormund has thousands of comrades south of the Wall, all of them allied with and indebted to Jon Snow. Maybe Thorne was planning to contact the Northern houses swiftly to enlist their help in dealing with the wildling problem before they found out about the assassination. If so, how did he lack the foresight to put out some guards to prevent any Jon loyalists getting the word out?

 

Jaqen's promise. Jaqen H'ghar told Arya that, as a Faceless Man, she'd be able to cross the names off her list one by one. When she finally takes him up on the offer, she's supposed to forget her list and everything else about her former life, and is only permitted to kill specially designated targets. She is made a target herself for failing to follow their instructions but, when she kills her would-be assassin, is allowed to go on her way with Jaqen's approval. What's going on there?

 

Brienne's stakeout. Brienne gets word to Sansa to light a candle in the Broken Tower of Winterfell if she ever needs help. It could have been years before Sansa had the inclination and ability to do so, or it might never have happened at all. Were Brienne and Pod going to take turns watching that tower forever? Maybe there was a whole team of volunteers from Wintertown doing the watch on rotation, and it's just that we only ever saw Brienne, and they decided their strategy was still a promising one even after the old woman was caught and flayed. Seems flimsy to me, though...

[Jay 37,371]

Hmmm, I think you're thinking about some minor details of the show too much, none of those things would ever occur to me

[BloodBoal 7,538]

[Jay 37,371]

It does seem to be the biggest thing on the show that will be most completely different from GRRM's version

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

The thing is, any one of those examples that I gave could, on its own, easily be written off; maybe something that's been glossed over a bit, but not an irreparable spanner in the works. But these sorts of issues have become the norm, especially after Season 4, and there are countless other examples that could be given. It's as though there are certain landmark scenes/events that they need to happen, and those things will be shoehorned into place however flimsy the logical basis behind the events that put them there. So what we end up with is a sequence of (often very impressive) scenes, but not really a story.

 

Logic is to a story as gravy is to a pie...no gravy, no pie!

 

26 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

I never bought the fact that Alliser Thorne, as presented in the show, would stab Jon. Sure, he didn't like him, but he later showed respect for him and seemed he would follow him, even if he disagreed with him.

 

It's somewhat tenuous, but I can just about buy it. Jon's argument for allowing the wildlings south was pretty solid, and it's a pity that we didn't get to see any proper attempt to refute it. However, very few of the men at Castle Black have actually seen the White Walkers or their army with their own eyes, so it's credible that they don't have the same visceral appreciation of the danger they're facing. They have good reason to believe that the Wall is a reliable defense against them, and (given their deeply ingrained hatred of the wildlings) may well conclude that thousands of living wildlings south of the Wall pose a greater danger than they would as wights north of the Wall. In that case, one might think that they should have simply refused to allow Jon and his refugees through the gate when they arrived; but we could account for that by suggesting that it was only the disgust at seeing their wildling enemies welcomed into the North that brought Alliser and his co-conspirators to the point where they were willing to commit mutiny.

 

That's a lot of slack given already, but I think it's just about acceptable. But the notion that they would then carry out their plot without, apparently, taking any precautions against the predictable consequences...I just can't that to add up.

 

7 hours ago, Disco Stu said:

We never get any consistent of idea of how long it takes to go anywhere in this show because it changes with plot requirements.  I'll use this word again, it cheapens the world they've created.  Makes it seem less real.

 

True, though I've found that people (reviewers, podcasters, Redditors, etc.), for some reason, talk about this as though it's a phenomenon of the later seasons, whereas, as I was saying earlier, they've been doing that since the very first episode!

[BloodBoal 7,538]

[Wojo 2,453]

What a delightful conclusion to the episode. I've long waited for that to be revealed. 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Definitely an improvement on episodes 1 & 2

[Muad'Dib 1,802]

My favorite episode so far in this season. Lots of on-point humour, found myself laughing out loud a great deal.

[crocodile 8,017]

Much better episode this week.

Karol

[crumbs 14,318]

Cersei is deliriously evil! Very sad to see Olenna go, just a superb performance.

[crocodile 8,017]

Just realised we've got exactly 10 episodes left until the end. 

 

Karol

[Bilbo 3,709]

Best episode for a long long time.

 

Really enjoyed that.

[Jay 37,371]

Game of Thrones 7x03 The Queen's Justice

 

Another fantastic episode; This is shaping up to be the best season yet for certain.

 

Jon, Daenrys, Davos, Varys, Melisandre - I really liked everything about Jon and Dany meeting; The beach arrival, Jon and Tyrion's reunion, the passage up the stairs with the dragons flying by, and ultimately their back and forth discussion.  Everything they said was so completely logical; They basically went into the meeting and came out of it unchanged, with their goals each being the same after as they were before.  It's no surprise that it was Tyrion who talked to them both later and got her to give him what he wanted.  I was a bit surprised, though, that after she told him he could mine the dragon stone, she didn't follow it up with "IF, you are willing to" ___ whatever, come to my aid when I call, or something like that.  If anything, it shows how much faith she puts into Tyrion's advice more than anything else, which is kind of funny considering that his advice has now led to her losing her naval fleet, Casterly Rock, and Highgarden!

 

Melisandre and Varys' conversation was interesting, I didn't think beforehand that she wouldn't actually want Jon to see her there.  So, she's going back to Essos... interesting, I have no idea what she'll get up to there (nor do I expect the show to even show us her journey there).  The way the scene ending, with her telling Varys they'd both die in Westeros, was pretty ominous and cool.

 

Euron - I like this guy!  His parade down the street with his prisoners was fun, and his conversation with Jaime about what she likes in bed was hilarious!  They are making him be extremely powerful on the show, in 3 episodes he's destroyed both halves of Daenerys's fleet, captured Cersei's big enemies, and practically shut off Daenery's army from any support.  I loved Cersei's empty promise of marrying him when the war is over; Surely he realizes she'll never follow through with that (if they even both survive the war), but I have no clue what he'll do about it.

Jorah and Sam - For the life of me I still can't figure out what role Jorah is supposed to play in the end game here.  He didn't seem to have learned anything about his disease, made any new allegiances, or come across anyone that will help out in any way.  He seems to be off to Dragonstone now, but for what?  The only think I can think of is that since all of Tyrion's advice has led to them losing every battle, he'll have some kind of strategic mind that will give them a win or something?  I dunno.

 

They are really making Sam out to be a major character finally.  He's been in every episode this season, and for a good duration of each one.  Now that he's copying all those old books over, I figure he's going to learn some other piece of information that will be helpful somehow.

 

Sansa, Littlefinger, and Bran - I liked Sansa's scenes this week showing her to be a good leader or winterfell.  Though, my favorite Sansa moment was probably actually Tyrion's analysis that she knows more than she lets on, and Jon's retort that she's beginning to let on  Anyways, her scene with Littlefinger was good, his little doctorine about how you must imagine all possibilities of every event so you are never surprised made so much sense for his character... and sure enough, we got the return of Bran this week, whose role on the show now seems to be the one that sees everything that happens!  I liked their brief reunion when he first arrived, but their later scene under the tree was weird.  He seems to have lot touch with how to be a person the way he brought up her wedding to Ramsay (dude!).  Anyways, I liked the bit where he said he needed to talk to Jon (to tell him his heritage) but shouldn't he tell Sansa what he knows now in case something happens to him?  I suspect once Sansa understands better Bran's powers, she'll take Littlefinger's advice and Bran's powers to see outcomes of possibilities and plan for some battle some way, or something.

 

Cersei and Jaime - Cersei seems to be this season's cruel villain (after Joffrey/Frey/Bolton/etc).  Her scene with Ellaria and her daughter in their cell was kind of just her scene with the nun lady that Shamed her in her cell with The Mountain all over again, really.  It was so good though, that just when you really start to wonder why Jaime is OK with everything she does, he has that great scene with Olenna when she realizes he's so in love with Cersei she can do anything and he won't change.  I have to expect that won't last forever though, and at some point she'll go too far and he'll kill or or try to or whatever.  I can't imagine what that line could be, however, since their entire family is dead.

 

I thought the scene where she led a new handmaiden character see them in bed together was kind of interesting, not sure if that's a setup for some future thing, or just to show that she truly believes she can literally get away with anything now.

 

Olenna - The whole ending of the episode was great.  I loved the pairing of Tyrion's narration of how the takeover of Casterly Rock  was supposed to go, combined with the footage of it basically going that way, but in the end no one being there and their rations gone as well.  And using Casterly Rock as a decoy to actually go and take over Highgarden was just really smart planning on Cersei (and Jaime?)'s part.  The final scene with Jaime and Olenna was the highlight of the episode.  I loved how even in her death, she got the upper hand on Jaime, and Cersei.  I wonder if Jaime will even tell Cersei that it was Olenna that killed Joffrey; She was so set on Tyrion being the culprit since Joffrey died.  I suppose even if Jaime tells her, she won't really care / it won't change how she feels about Tyrion at all (he did still kill their father after all).

 

Diana Rigg will be missed!

 

No Arya or The Hound this week

[Disco Stu 15,495]

1 minute ago, Jay said:

 I was a bit surprised, though, that after she told him he could mine the dragon stone, she didn't follow it up with "IF, you are willing to" ___ whatever, come to my aid when I call, or something like that.  If anything, it shows how much faith she puts into Tyrion's advice more than anything else, which is kind of funny considering that his advice has now led to her losing her naval fleet, Casterly Rock, and Highgarden!

 

Yeah, all of Tyrion's strategies are falling apart.

 

2 minutes ago, Jay said:

Euron - I like this guy!

 

Really?  He bores me.

5 minutes ago, Jay said:

Olenna - The whole ending of the episode was great.  I loved the pairing of Tyrion's narration of how the takeover of Casterly Rock  was supposed to go, combined with the footage of it basically going that way, but in the end no one being there and their rations gone as well.  And using Casterly Rock as a decoy to actually go and take over Highgarden was just really smart planning on Cersei (and Jaime?)'s part.

 

Agreed.  Very smart strategizing on their part.  Very dumb of Tyrion not to think that Highgarden would need extra protection.

 

5 minutes ago, Jay said:

No Arya or The Hound this week

 

I didn't watch the "next week on" segment, but I'm willing to bet Arya will arrive at Winterfell next episode.

[KK 3,307]

I don't know. There were some good moments, and the plot is clearly moving, but it just kind of struck me how stale this show has gotten. We're basically watching a bunch of non-characters spewing out cool one-liners and snippy dialogue. Even visually, the show is not as intriguing as it used to be. At this point, the only real reason I'm still watching is to get the narrative checkpoints out of the way.

 

And its a shame, because some of these characters used to be quite interesting (ex. Cersei, Tyrion, Littlefinger, etc --> all of whom now become dull plot devices).

 

Maybe I just had a long day.

 

P.S. It seems ridiculous how amateurish and poorly thought-out these war stratagems have been on Daenerys/Tyrion's part. Shoddy writing.

[Jay 37,371]

I was just talking to a coworker about the war plans of Cersei and Daenyrs this season.

In hindsight, it seems to blatantly obvious that of course Cersei would send an army to take Highgarden over, and that Casterly Rock isn't actually important.  But I never considering either of these things beforehand (and apparently Tyrion didn't either).

After episode 1 and half of 2, it seemed like Daenrys really had the upper hand, and all these great plans to take over Westeros without just burning King's Landing down.  But 1 1/2 episodes later, it's actually Cersei's side that was much, much smarter.

 

In hindsight yea, absolutely as soon as Olenna Tyrell joined up with Daenerys's side instead of Cersei's, as soon as Dany's army hit the ground, thousands of men should have marched to Highgarden to protect it.  In hindsight, of course Casterly Rock isn't actually worth occupying if their armies can just march somewhere else with their rations, and all the gold is gone (did Tyrion not know it was gone?  He was the master of coin for a while, so he should have known).  In hindsight, once Euron seemed to magically know where Yara's fleet was (and which boat she was on, somehow), he would surely be able to magically know where the rest of her fleet was too    Etc

I guess its time for Daenrys to "be a dragon" now!

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

It's hard to judge how much negligence was involved in the loss of Highgarden, since the show has done almost nothing to inform us of the state of affairs in The Reach regarding the loyalty or otherwise of the Tyrell bannermen (in fact, it hasn't even bothered to account for who the official head of the Tyrell family is after the death of Mace and his children). All we've seen is Cersei and Jaime persuade Randyll Tarly to join their cause. It's possible that Daenerys's side had reason to believe that the security of The Reach was assured, though that would be more convincing if the Tarly betrayal had been less easily engineered.

 

17 minutes ago, Jay said:

...all the gold is gone (did Tyrion not know it was gone?  He was the master of coin for a while, so he should have known).

 

The Master of Coin is in charge of the Crown's finances. I don't know of any reason to believe that he would automatically have access to all information about the Lannisters' private fortune, especially given that the apparent exhausting of their gold mines was a secret closely guarded by Tywin. I do wonder, though, that it was seemingly unknown to Varys...

[Jay 37,371]

"The Tarly betrayal"?  Oh wait, so you're saying that Cersei wouldn't have tried to take over Highgarden before, because Tarly's men would have come to their rescue and protected them, but that meeting last week where Cersei talked to all the lords made Tarly switch sides?

 

As for Varys knowing about the Lannister forture, I mean sure he has spies everywhere, but its reasonable to assume every single person allowed inside Casterly Rock / or at least inside the mines was fully vetted by Tywin first.

 

Also Glóin, what role do you think Jorah will play in the show here?  I have yet to come close to figuring out why they've dedicated so much screentime to him this year.

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

9 minutes ago, Jay said:

"The Tarly betrayal"?  Oh wait, so you're saying that Cersei wouldn't have tried to take over Highgarden before, because Tarly's men would have come to their rescue and protected them, but that meeting last week where Cersei talked to all the lords made Tarly switch sides?

 

Yeah, that's essentially what I'm suggesting. If Olenna was the de facto ruler of The Reach, and was conspiring to side with Daenerys in the war, then she surely ought to have taken steps to ensure that all of the lords sworn to her in the feudal hierarchy of The Reach would be on board. It would be their responsibility to see to it that their province was not invaded by an army loyal to the Lannisters. The idea in the show seems to be that some of those lords were persuaded to turn against the Tyrells and side with Cersei, thereby allowing the Lannisters to take Highgarden. Of course, there are a lot of other major Houses in The Reach, and it would probably take more than one of them to turn against the Tyrells for this to work; I guess, for the sake of simplicity on TV, Randyll Tarly is used as a representative for the whole bunch of them.

 

22 minutes ago, Jay said:

As for Varys knowing about the Lannister forture, I mean sure he has spies everywhere, but its reasonable to assume every single person allowed inside Casterly Rock / or at least inside the mines was fully vetted by Tywin first.

 

I guess so, though the Lannister gold mine operation seems like a very big enterprise to be free of leaks. They must have got Scaramucci in.

 

24 minutes ago, Jay said:

Also Glóin, what role do you think Jorah will play in the show here?  I have yet to come close to figuring out why they've dedicated so much screentime to him this year.

 

No idea! Obviously the default assumption is that he'll go back to working for Daenerys, as she requested. But what function will the greyscale subplot have played in the long run?

[Jay 37,371]

Yea, that's a big question mark for sure right now!

I thought for sure her sending him off to "find a cure" would lead to him finding a group of other grayscale people and they learn their grayscale kills White Walkers or something but..... nope.

 

 

 

EDIT:


I just read that HBO's servers where hacked last night and hackers got 1.5TB of data including full episodes of Ballers and the scripts for GOT season 7

 

http://www.slashfilm.com/hbo-hack-game-of-thrones-episodes-scripts/

 

Guess I have to avoid googling anything about the show for 3 1/2 weeks then...

[Glóin the Dark 1,222]

I was hoping that Jorah would become learned in medical lore, with sufficient expertise to stop the progression of his disease but only after it had covered his entire body, so that we'd get to call him Doctor Living Stone. Alas, it wasn't to be.