HBO - Game of Thrones SPOILERS INSIDE. you have been warned

[Vllad]

I'm not sure Jon is going to be as "honorable" now that he was murdered by the Nights watch. I think that changes him as well

Jon running off to save his brother and put the battle at risk shows Jon is no different than Rob and Ned.

[strife]

I'm not sure Jon is going to be as "honorable" now that he was murdered by the Nights watch. I think that changes him as well

Jon running off to save his brother and put the battle at risk shows Jon is no different than Rob and Ned.

That's family, has nothing to do with honor.

[Jakensama]

The Iron Fleet got to Mereen pretty quickly considering that they are on the west side of westeros and mereen is on the east side of Essos (and the books claim there is a continent to the east of Essos too so sailing around the other way wouldn't be an option)..

[Dharus]

While I agree that Jon and Sansa are both idiots there were some epic parts to Jon's battle, the scenes with Jon dodging charging horses and lancers was pretty insane. My favorite part was the headless rider that fly's by Jon only to be stomped by Wun Wun. PETA should have a field day with that even if the horses aren't real! Jon ends up killing one of his own men in that scene.

That scene was pretty good. I also liked the trampled and almost buried alive part. A very real thing to happen. I also thought having a giant on your side might actually cause a phalanx to break apart (why does he not fight with anything?!?). Once he went through the first group of spears, it would have be slaughter. Heck, why not use a couple dead horses to make a hole? Overall though that scene I think cements that the lord of light has special plans for Jon. It was like he had a guardian angel.

I had to do a "wha?" when I saw the Greyjoys in Mereen too. That's some pretty fast ships they much have. Tyrion is still the best character and actor in my opinion. I'm glad they haven't F'd him up.

[strife]

That scene was pretty good. I also liked the trampled and almost buried alive part.

I'll be honest, I thought it was a clusterfuck at that time. I had no idea what was going on or who was who.

The best scenes to me were(at least during this battle) the ones where the Boltons surrounded them with the shields and the yelling right as they pushed in every time, I thought that was pretty strong... and then the CG of the Vale's calvary just bowling over everyone. John had some great fight scenes as well.

The best scene of the entire episode to me though was the fucking dragons. They were amazing.

[Vllad]

The Iron Fleet got to Mereen pretty quickly considering that they are on the west side of westeros and mereen is on the east side of Essos (and the books claim there is a continent to the east of Essos too so sailing around the other way wouldn't be an option)..

I am ok with instant teleportation.

I always laugh when people make fun of travel times. Their is nothing entertaining about travel.

I don't want to watch a show where we see the back of a guys head carrying a note on horse back while riding down the road quiet for 10 weeks. Not even George Carlin could make that worth watching. We could go all 10 weeks watching Theon and his sister on a boat talking about tits but their is only so much one can do when it comes to travel.

At least they went from the Iron Islands to Volantis then Meereen. That is about as much transportation and sense that we need.

We are in the transportation business. We know it should not be shown on TV.

They could always do the Monty Python trick and show a guy on a horse in fast motion. However let's reserve that for comedies.

[Vllad]

That scene was pretty good. I also liked the trampled and almost buried alive part.

I'll be honest, I thought it was a clusterfuck at that time. I had no idea what was going on or who was who.

Neither did anyone else. Remember the scene where Jon comes up on two guys fighting and kills them both?

Real battles don't typically turn into a mess like that but some did in Gaul and there were many cases of friendly kills. Obviously B&W must have read up on the battle of Cannae. They recreated it somewhat.

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[Vllad]

I wonder what Kings Landing is going to do about the Starks?

Technically they are rebels against the crown as well as technically the North is an independent nation depending on who took Rob's claim seriously. Is Jamie going to be sent North to deal with the rebels? Last Sunday not only means the Boltons are dead but crowns control over the North is over. Is the war of the 5 kings still alive and well?

[Dharus]

I wonder what Kings Landing is going to do about the Starks?

Technically they are rebels against the crown as well as technically the North is an independent nation depending on who took Rob's claim seriously. Is Jamie going to be sent North to deal with the rebels? Last Sunday not only means the Boltons are dead but crowns control over the North is over. Is the war of the 5 kings still alive and well?

I don't know but its really not the 5 "kings"? That's one of my head scratching things right now. Sansa in the North, Yara Greyjoy for the iron kingdom, Grandmother basically for Highgarden, the Sand Snakes in Dorne, Cersei for Lanisters and somewhat lesser now in King's Landing, and then Dani in the East. It feels like the Game of Thrones is about women in power at this point. Is there some sort of Id coming out from the writers here?

That said, I think King's Landing is headed for disaster. I'd guess that Cersei is gonna somehow kill her last kid probably through the Mountain by some mistake in interpreting "protect me". Then it'll be Tyrell Queen vs the Church in a betrayal and some sort of city civil war ensuing.

[Jakensama]

The Iron Fleet got to Mereen pretty quickly considering that they are on the west side of westeros and mereen is on the east side of Essos (and the books claim there is a continent to the east of Essos too so sailing around the other way wouldn't be an option)..

I am ok with instant teleportation.

I always laugh when people make fun of travel times. Their is nothing entertaining about travel.

I don't want to watch a show where we see the back of a guys head carrying a note on horse back while riding down the road quiet for 10 weeks. Not even George Carlin could make that worth watching. We could go all 10 weeks watching Theon and his sister on a boat talking about tits but their is only so much one can do when it comes to travel.

At least they went from the Iron Islands to Volantis then Meereen. That is about as much transportation and sense that we need.

We are in the transportation business. We know it should not be shown on TV.

They could always do the Monty Python trick and show a guy on a horse in fast motion. However let's reserve that for comedies.

I mean I don't want them to *show* travelling, but they could have organized the season a bit better so that some of these things make a bit more sense.

But, I guess by that metric, Dany should have left Essos last season.

[OrsunVZ]

Last we saw Theon and Yara where were they? Volantis? Do we have a sense of how much time passed?

[Vllad]

Last we saw Theon and Yara where were they? Volantis? Do we have a sense of how much time passed?

That's the thing about this story and is the hard part of writing POV stories that got GRRM all messed up.

Tolkien wrote his books from a historical point of view especially the Similrillion. They are laid out in the order that they happen so time has some concept in the story told over 6000 years. The Baggins also wrote their books from a historical perspective not the characters themselves.

Game of Thrones is told from the POV perspective and things are not all happening at the same time even if the chapters or scenes are right next to each other. Their are parts of the story that are told in conjunction that are months apart from each other. (GRRM originally was going to skip a head 5 years between books to tie the ending together while telling the individual story of each character. He said originally he was never going to expand on Meereen and Arya on their growth as characters but for some reason he kept going) I never have heard why.

This got GRRM in trouble since now he had events not in sync and training montages to complete. He never did get it completely right.

So basically the events you see in Meereen could be months later or before the events you see in Westeros. The same goes for even events in Westeros. Time passes way more slowly or more quickly depending on the character and how much he had them do. Basically a chapter on one character may cover 3 months of time and the next chapter on another covers 3 days.

Martin himself thought that the birth of the dragons were born by Danny about the time that King Robert was heading up to see Ned about being the Hand. The story isn't told in that order but the time line in his mind is that way.

The problem comes when you try to connect each story and bring it all together. This GRRM didn't do well. Their are parts of the books that don't sync up and it gets confusing.

The show runs into this same issue but they deal with it by just cutting parts of the story (Bran is not in Season 5 for this very reason) and using instant travel.

Here are some hints to help though.

*The story to date has covered in total a little more than 3 years of Westeros time. Think of the start of the Westeros story as Ned being asked to become Hand up to where we are in Westeros today. The Essos Story has been a little over 4 years. Think of the start of the Essos story as Danny meeting her Dothraki husband.

*Most of the early Danny stuff happened well before Ned became Hand, she is married and pregnant while John Arryn is still Hand of the King. Keep in mind the person whose time jumps the most between telling is Danny. If you think of the early Danny stuff as flash backs up until the Dragons are born it is much easier to grasp the story from a time perspective.

*While Ned and King Robert talk a lot about Danny and her horde husband the intel that Robert has is many months old. Jorah was sending reports 6 or 10 months a part plus the time it takes the intel to get to Robert. Jorah's contacts were at the markets which the horde spent very little time in.

*Never assume the scenes or chapters you are seeing have any time connection to what you have seen before. Each character is on its own time line unless they are together with other POV characters.

*Telling this story from a time-line perspective would suck. Our entire first season and book would be just about Danny for example.

*To answer your question directly about Theon and Yarra, it would take about 75 to 100 days to sail from the Iron Islands to Meereen depending on weather. About the same as crossing the Atlantic.




The moral of the story is NEVER create a POV story from the view of 20 to 30 characters. It is too damn hard! That is why most authors only write POV stories from a single persons point of view.

GRRM has taken a lot of criticism in the past but the reason The Song of Fire and Ice is popular is it is unique in its grand undertaking of trying to tell the story the way it does. Not everyone would attempt to tell a story this way. Simply because it comes with just too many traps. The fact that he got done what he did is amazing. Either that or he was the only one dumb enough to try and write a POV story with this many characters.

I guess take your pick.

[Jakensama]

Nerds have made a good book timeline here: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ZsY3lcDDtTdBWp1Gx6mfkdtZT6-Gk0kdTGeSC_Dj7WM/edit#gid=8">https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... edit#gid=8</a><!-- m -->

My main complaint was that Theon left when they were pretty far down north and then made it to the Iron Island (which was a quite a trek in itself since the Iron Islands were near the bottom of the west coast of the North - something I only realized when playing the game, dont know why I had thought they were east coast.) Then dicked around for the kingsmoot, then sailed a fleet all the way along the rest of Westeros and all the way over to the far side of Essos in the same time the rest of this season progressed. I mean ships of this era probably averaged 5 knots..

Then again, don't try to bring reality to fantasy and you will be much happier

[Vllad]

Then again, don't try to bring reality to fantasy and you will be much happier

True, but I think the show does at least make an attempt to be realistic.

i.e., After Hardhome Jon showed up North of the wall and many geeks bashed the show for not sailing those ships to Eastwatch and walking south of the wall. However in the books Martin has made it clear that the paths south of the wall are full of hills and travel is much slower. B&W have commented on this so even if they fail they at least make small attempts to do it right.


Plus on Theon. We have no idea how much earlier in time Sansa and Theon escaped compared to other parts of the story. For all we know that part makes more sense then the others around it.

[Skelas]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0dA9eUP85s[/youtube]

[Vllad]

hah,

God damn it Leeroy.

[OrsunVZ]

Ugh I wish I'd thought of that ;P instant viral video right there.

[strife]

Well holy shit. I saw the signs that Cersei was going to "burn them all" but I didn't know who "them all" would be. I wasn't expecting Tommen to go out like he did, I though he was going to be poisoned like his brother and sister.

I'm curious to see if Jamie ends up killing Cersei off.

That look between Sansa and Little Finger after everyone declared for the "King of the North" was interesting... curious to see if he turns against Sansa now that that picture in his mind is looking to be even less likely now that everyone has declared Jon the king, leaving Sansa in the background.

I was a little surprised that Arya killed Walder Frey... Jamie's conversation with him kind of had me thinking that he would put him down.

[Zouji]

Once Little Finger realizes that the King in the North wants to send his troops to the wall, he should become less concerned about Jon Snow. Accidents happen all the time. Even more so on a place as dangerous and as treacherous as the Wall.


Also once Little Finger finds out that Daenrys is ACTUALLY invading, he should come in at the last moment and pledge the support of the Knights of the Vale for her.

[Vllad]

I'm curious to see if Jamie ends up killing Cersei off.

I think that is where it is going. I am pretty sure Jamie will see Cersei as responsible for the death of his son. It is very likely we are going to have a Mad King repeat if Cersei knows where more Wild Fire is. Could he save a city from burning a second time from another mad ruler?

I was a little surprised that Arya killed Walder Frey...

Well he is probably the only guy where she knows exactly where he is. She killed not only Walder but his two bumbling idiot sons who couldn't take Riverrun.

That look between Sansa and Little Finger after everyone declared for the "King of the North" was interesting...

Yea, Sansa and Jon can't end well at this point.

Didn't Lord Royce stand up when Jon was declared King? If Lord Royce stays then the Army of the Vale stays. Littlefingers power over Royce is through the little crazy lord of Vale but if Royce decides to stay the Army will stay. Lord Royce may very well have a chance to rid himself of Littlefinger.

Ironically it is now a fact that Jon is not Ned's son. He is a Targaryen and only Stark through Lyanna's side. The only question left is if Jon is a Bastard son of Rhegaer or not. If he is not a bastard he is the true heir to the Targaryen throne not Danny.

If that comes to light Jon will have Walkers bearing down on him from the North and Danny coming for him from the south. Good luck with that.

[Dharus]

I think you're close Vllad. I think Jon will hold the north under siege from the undead and Dani will come to the rescue. I felt a little foreshadowing that Dani will marry someone in Westros and since they marry family, Jon might be that one.

Littlefinger is going to die.

[strife]

I think you're close Vllad. I think Jon will hold the north under siege from the undead and Dani will come to the rescue. I felt a little foreshadowing that Dani will marry someone in Westros and since they marry family, Jon might be that one.

Yea, there are a lot of people that think Jon and Danerys will fight. I'm not so sure that will happen. Just judging both of them on the characters they portray to have in the show, I can't see them fighting each other. They tend to only fight against people with bad character and/or bad moral being.

Jon only fought the Wildlings when he had to. The first chance he got to be friendly with them, he did and basically got them to join his side. Danerys the same way. Yea the Khalasar are evil for the most part, but they aren't under Danerys. As soon as she got control she stopped raiding and was against the raping and all of that.

I think one conversation between the two would be enough to get them to stop fighting each other.

Littlefinger is going to die.

Maybe. I'm still not sure. The show is called "Game" of Thrones... and he plays the game better than pretty much everyone.

[Dharus]

You remember a early (like book 1) conversation between Spider and Littlefinger? It was basically the Spider telling him he's playing the wrong game or how much of a rookie he was. That's Littlefinger. He's smart but too smart by half. You think he believes in white walkers? I think he's still playing the game but isn't seeing the big picture.

[Breand]

I call Littlefinger getting killed by The Hound. It'd be apropos for the guy who has an angle for everything, being killed just for the hell of it by the Hound. Either that or Brienne who will do it in defense of Sansa.

[Jakensama]

Not sure why everyone online is sure he is going to die. GRRM is not going to end it with all the 'good guys' alive and all the 'bad guys' dead. Would be perfectly fitting for him to be in a winning position at the end.

Not seeing the big picture? He's like the only guy who has come out on top consistently throughout the whole series.