Game of Thrones (Season 8 - UK PACE)

[greendemon]

Also there is no way Jon and Dany have any kind of happy ending now that the truth about his parentage has come out. One or both of them will die before the season ends, I suspect. The best outcome we can hope for is that they have a kid together who survives.

[Jordan]

There are no words...


Okay there are, but they can wait until it’s aired in the UK 🤐

[TheThorne]

I've already read 2 spoilers, trolls on Quora posting spoilers in questions, I should have learned to stay away until tomorrow.

[o]

I watched this this morning, excellent as always, talk about edge of your seat! My daughter posted something on an actor's twitter feed, and it then showed it to one of her friends who hadn't watched it, bad twitter!

[Mart!n]

Epic... Fantastic... wow... practically sh*tting in my pants at times all the way... just flabbergasted watched it in pitch darkness... my partner doesn't like the series, hey ho... not going to argue with that. lol

[o]

Loved the Dothraki sword lights going out one by one as they were killed by the undead, and then the swarm of dead as they swamped the Unsullied, and worked their way over the fire pits and up the walls of Winterfell, brilliant. And we did lose some characters, just not the really big ones, but it did look close at times! And poor Lyanna Mormont, tough as old boots right to the end, another House wiped out, Tyrells, now the Mormonts.
Is Cersei not going to bring the battle to the north and finish them off, surely there's no army left to march south and take her on?
Loved it.

[greendemon]

About 90% of the episode was brilliant, tense, fantastic, edge-of-your-seat stuff. Up there with the best battles the show has done.

And then that ending...

The Night King. The actual Big Bad (or so we were meant to think for literally the entire run of the show). Killed by a Valyrian steel dagger by Ninja Warrior Princess Arya, who popped up out of nowhere! Ugh. Really unsatisfying conclusion in my opinion.

[Shireblogger]

What happened ? We sat in the dark, squinting our way through it for an hour and a half, and I'm sure I missed a lot of important stuff. I really hate films and tv programmes which are mostly set in the dark. Sure it adds atmosphere, but you have to work so hard to figure out what's going on.

Which means I have no idea who is dead, who is badly injured, and who is fine. I have no idea of the status of the dragons or wolves. Where are some of the key characters, like Jaime and Brienne ? What happened in the crypt - did any of the second line characters meet their end, or did the undead only kill the extras ? What did Bran actually achieve by dispatching the ravens ? And I agree with greendemon, the assassination of the Night King was deeply dissatisfying.

On the plus side, the sound effects and the music were brilliant. I enjoyed Melisandre's rather pointless appearances, and it was good to see Ser Davos playing an important role. And the Sansa and Tyrion interactions were entertaining.

And the big positive is we can now get back to the inter-house feuds, the politicking, and the intrigue, which is what makes Games Of Thrones so much fun; rather than having to worry about the plot holes and implausible time lines which have always spoiled the show when the Army of the Dead has featured.


Shireblogger episode rating: 3/10

[Jordan]

Most people complaining about how dark the episode was need only increase the brightness of their TV. That functionality is there for a reason.

[Shireblogger]

Apr 30, 2019 9:10:42 GMT 1 Jordan said:

Most people complaining about how dark the episode was need only increase the brightness of their TV. That functionality is there for a reason.

Why should I go to the bother of changing the settings on my tv, which works for everything else ? Surely it is the programme makers' responsibility for lighting their productions properly ?

[Jordan]

But agree with greendemon, it seems rather anti-climatic how the Night King ended - and still feel like there was more that could have been explained. In reality we've only had a couple of sentences from Bran about his motives, and I'm still not all that clear on why he was chasing Bran and what killing him would achieve. On the flip side, I am glad that it increases the threat of Cersei who is the more established villain in the show.

I guess this is Game of Thrones and not A Song of Ice and Fire. I just hope the books don't end this way. I want the dead to make it way farther south than Winterfell.

Still, very good episode.

[Jordan]

Apr 30, 2019 9:12:42 GMT 1 Shireblogger said:

Apr 30, 2019 9:10:42 GMT 1 Jordan said:

Most people complaining about how dark the episode was need only increase the brightness of their TV. That functionality is there for a reason.

Why should I go to the bother of changing the settings on my tv, which works for everything else ? Surely it is the programme makers' responsibility for lighting their productions properly ?

They filmed an episode at night. Do you expect it to be as bright as the day time episodes? It seems common sense to me that it's going to be darker, but clearly not.

I enjoyed it perfectly fine anyway by increasing the brightness a tad. It took about 4 seconds to do, which I'm assuming is a lot less than the amount of time you just spent typing up that complaint

[greendemon]

I didn't mind the darkness - it did make it quite difficult to tell what was going on on the battlefield, and particularly the scenes with the dragons, but it was in keeping with it being a night battle. I just wanted so much more for the Night King/WW threat than what I got like Jordan I'm hoping it plays out differently in the books!

Arya being the one to do it left me a little cold - I've never really been taken in by the huge swell of love there seems to be for that character both among the writers and the fanbase in general - but I think I wouldn't have minded as much if they'd played out the threat for one more episode. Sigh.

Like Shireblogger I am hoping we will now get a more interesting conclusion to the series although I'm not sure quite what they are going to do for three 70-minute episodes (apart from the next battle which I guess is episode 5 as that's the next one Sapochnik is directing...)

Oh and for SB and anyone who couldn't tell who died:

SPOILER: Click to show

Dolorous Edd, Lyanna Mormont, Beric, Theon, Jorah, Melisandre... think that's it? I thought Ghost and Rhaegal too but it's not clear.

RIP House Mormont Fierce bears, all.

[Jordan]

I'm pretty sure you can see Rhaegal in the trailer for episode 4, and possibly Ghost as well (although they really didn't make that clear. They'd have been better off not showing him at all!).

As much as I'm not massively pleased it was Arya who laid the final blow, the call-back to the Eyes conversation between Mel and Arya all those seasons ago was pretty epic. I've never even thought to think anything of that comment, but now it seems so obvious. Also I guess it does kind of make Arya's whole arc relevant and round it off nicely. Does this make her the prince that was promised though?

Now I'm just hoping it isn't Arya who also kills Cersei (if she dies at all). I really won't be pleased if she finishes off both main villains.

[greendemon]

Ah, I hadn't seen next week's trailer yet. That's good news that both Ghost and Rhaegal are still alive.

You're right that the Melisandre stuff with "blue eyes you'll shut forever" was good. At the time though I didn't think "oh sh!t she's gonna kill the NK" I thought "that makes sense as she is killing a bunch of blue-eyed wights". The more I think about it the more I'm coming round to the idea of Arya killing the NK (and saving Bran's life with the dagger that was meant to kill him) but I still HATED the way it was done.

[o]

I think the ending was brilliant, her whole arc is she trained to be an assassin to get revenge on those that wronged her, but she used those skills to save her brother with the knife that was used to kill him. And like has been said elsewhere, Joffrey lopping off Ned's head has led Arya to this path, that didn't happen, this wouldn't have. Oh and did we want Jon killing the NK, that would have been oh so predictable, and him being trapped was ramping up the tension brilliantly! And yeah the Blue eyes comment by melisandre all that time ago, great connection and writing.
As I've said all along Jaime will have to kill the mad queen as he did the mad king, I'm sure Arya's arc may be concluded now.
And yes it was dark, but I just closed the curtains and found a position where my eyes could see what was going on, it was difficult, but I got there, and didn't miss a thing as far as I remember.

[greendemon]

I didn't particularly expect or want Jon to be the one to do it either but I really didn't think it would be so simple as stabbing him with Valyrian steel. I still maintain that having Arya pop up out of nowhere like a superhero felt ridiculous.

[Shireblogger]

Moving on from the dark / light argument, what does everyone make of the multiple meaningful looks exchanged between Jon & Dani while they were riding around pointlessly on their dragons, leaving all their minions to be slaughtered?

Also, given the Night King wasn’t consumed by dragon fire, does this also make him a Targaryen ? Is he Jon’s Dad?

[TheThorne]

Apr 30, 2019 10:54:39 GMT 1 Shireblogger said:

Moving on from the dark / light argument, what does everyone make of the multiple meaningful looks exchanged between Jon & Dani while they were riding around pointlessly on their dragons, leaving all their minions to be slaughtered?

Also, given the Night King wasn’t consumed by dragon fire, does this also make him a Targaryen ? Is he Jon’s Dad?

I think most of those looks were about ' I thought you were in charge of military strategy?' ' No I thought you were!!'

As that battle was a shambles so many dumb decisions.

Just as well we had Theolas with his super speed arrows to keep Bran safe for the last few moments.

[Jordan]

The final shot of Mel walking out of Winterfell was beautiful as well. Very sad to see the end of her character, I think she brought a hell of a lot to the plot.