sunnygsm Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 Not going to lie, the phrase "subverting expectations" triggers me at this point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seminoles1 Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 53 minutes ago, Heimdallr said: - Brienne, Jaime, Grey Worm, Sam, etc. are shown completely engulfed by wights and looking like they are going to die multiple times. After 1-2 times, the emotional impact is gone and it is meaningless. - Jon sees Sam covered in wights and in desperate need of help, but he makes the choice to continue towards Bran. That has an opportunity to be a huge moment, but instead Sam (and everyone else) is perfectly fine. When decisions like that have no consequences, why bother? - In a single episode they undid years of building Sansa up as a strong character by having her cower and basically roll over. Why not have her struggle and kill a wight or two, or even just be semi-motivational to the people in the crypt? They let Sansa and Tyrion have a really nice moment and act like they are going to do something, but they just hide somewhere else. - They did nothing to explain the NK's motivation or what Bran was doing all battle, and cut one of the most important interactions of the series way too short. Unless they really add a lot more to this story next episode, the whole NK vs 3ER story really fell flat and seems pointless. Bran is one of the most powerful beings on the planet, and does nothing all episode. - The build up the white walkers for 8 seasons, and they do literally nothing, and the mythic antagonist dies in a surprise attack (which they did not explain). No fight, no resolution afterward, it is just over -Agreed. If the show runners wanted them to live then I'm okay with that, but no one outside of Superman could have survived the situations some of these characters were put in. -Huge missed opportunity for an impactful death. You're absolutely right that this show used to have consequences for people's decisions, and that was a perfect opportunity. That would have been a huge character moment for Jon. -I don't agree with this about Sansa. They built her up to be smart, tactful, and stoic in front of lords, but never some strong badass who would stand up in the face of imminent danger. Nothing about her character development would make me think she'd ever want to fight an undead soldier. She could barely even hold it together in a room with her younger sister last season, so no reason to think she'd do anything but hide when zombies are chasing her. *Sidebar: How do skeletons that are hundreds of years old break through stone tombs? -Don't mind the lack of explanation for the Night King outside of wondering why now was the time to start truly gathering forces and want to get south of the Wall. Motivations were clear enough: he's an avatar of death and wants to bring that upon the world. I also thought the interaction was perfect. Nothing needed to be said because both characters knew why they were there and what was about to happen. The Night King can't talk, so what else is supposed to happen there? -Definitely agreed about the White Walkers. How do you have them sit on the sidelines the whole freaking time? Ridiculously underwhelming and disappointing. I'm fine with the Night King wanting to get the final blow on Bran, but not even sending in a couple to clean up the B characters like Tormund and Sam to give one final show of insurmountable strength from your army? Like you might be able to barely survive my wights, but I've still got White Walkers to send in and truly dominate any fight. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skywindO2 Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 9 minutes ago, seminoles1 said: *Sidebar: How do skeletons that are hundreds of years old break through stone tombs? Wood is a stronger material than stone, duh. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jlowe22 Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 1 hour ago, Heimdallr said: For a TV show like this, I don't care too much about deep lore consistency, detailed timelines, etc.. They need to fudge some things to make it entertaining, or make changes as needed (maybe an actor leaves the show, etc.). My issues aren't with "plot holes" in terms of the overall story or realism. What bugs me are just the writing issues that are just objectively bad: - Brienne, Jaime, Grey Worm, Sam, etc. are shown completely engulfed by wights and looking like they are going to die multiple times. After 1-2 times, the emotional impact is gone and it is meaningless. - The fact that none of the major characters is killed or seriously injured makes the whole battle feel sort of hollow. When you show so many characters in terrible situations so many times and nothing ever happens, it just makes me tune out. - Jon sees Sam covered in wights and in desperate need of help, but he makes the choice to continue towards Bran. That has an opportunity to be a huge moment, but instead Sam (and everyone else) is perfectly fine. When decisions like that have no consequences, why bother? - They follow up Theon's redemption (a great moment) with such a boring, pointless death. - In a single episode they undid years of building Sansa up as a strong character by having her cower and basically roll over. Why not have her struggle and kill a wight or two, or even just be semi-motivational to the people in the crypt? They let Sansa and Tyrion have a really nice moment and act like they are going to do something, but they just hide somewhere else. - They did nothing to explain the NK's motivation or what Bran was doing all battle, and cut one of the most important interactions of the series way too short. Unless they really add a lot more to this story next episode, the whole NK vs 3ER story really fell flat and seems pointless. Bran is one of the most powerful beings on the planet, and does nothing all episode. - The build up the white walkers for 8 seasons, and they do literally nothing, and the mythic antagonist dies in a surprise attack (which they did not explain). No fight, no resolution afterward, it is just over. The directing, acting, effects, music, etc. were all some of the best we have ever seen, but there are so many amateur-level writing issues that just don't make any sense. By the end I just felt so disengaged because the main battle was completely meaningless, and the ending was so obvious and poorly put together. I agree with most of this. I'm not complaining, it was a good episode, and better than most everything else on TV, but the writing was pretty bad in spots and there was a lot of wasted potential. I also thought the overall battle was poorly planned out, which is a personal pet peeve of mine. In no way would I call it the GOAT episode or anything like I've heard other people do. IMO, the quality of writing has been steadily getting worse for a while now. Maybe it's because they have diverged from the books, or maybe it's just me. The acting is still top notch though, and makes up for a lot. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heimdallr Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 11 minutes ago, seminoles1 said: Don't mind the lack of explanation for the Night King outside of wondering why now was the time to start truly gathering forces and want to get south of the Wall. Motivations were clear enough: he's an avatar of death and wants to bring that upon the world. I also thought the interaction was perfect. Nothing needed to be said because both characters knew why they were there and what was about to happen. The Night King can't talk, so what else is supposed to happen there? Unless there is some MAJOR twist (like Bran being the real bad guy, or the NK not actually being dead), the entire 3ER story has been a complete waste of time. Both the NK and Bran/3ER did absolutely nothing. Hiding some sort of twist is the only reason it would make sense to minimize Bran and the NK's death in the way they did. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heimdallr Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 Just now, Jlowe22 said: I agree with most of this. I'm not complaining, it was a good episode, and better than most everything else on TV, but the writing was pretty bad in spots and there was a lot of wasted potential. I also thought the overall battle was poorly planned out, which is a personal pet peeve of mine. In no way would I call it the GOAT episode or anything like I've heard other people do. IMO, the quality of writing has been steadily getting worse for a while now. Maybe it's because they have diverged from the books, or maybe it's just me. The acting is still top notch though, and makes up for a lot. I think it is a fairly common/consensus opinion that the writing went downhill since after they ran out of source material. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LeeEvans Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 1 minute ago, Heimdallr said: I think it is a fairly common/consensus opinion that the writing went downhill since after they ran out of source material. Which, to be fair, I can completely empathize with them on that. They signed up to adapt a book to screen not write an ending for a series that the writer apparently has no interest in doing. They're way out of their depths in terms of what they signed up for. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blackstar12 Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 I think they missed a chance to have undead Stannis fight Brienne at least he's still alive in the books. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jlowe22 Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 Just now, LeeEvans said: Which, to be fair, I can completely empathize with them on that. They signed up to adapt a book to screen not write an ending for a series that the writer apparently has no interest in doing. They're way out of their depths in terms of what they signed up for. I can understand that. I can give them some leeway, but some of the issues like what Heimdallr brought up are just amateurish. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunnygsm Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 I feel GRRM just said "Erm I'm not sure how it ends. The Night King will be defeated and then they fight Cersei." I think that's about as much insight that he gave them on the endgame. Glad to see all that dragonglass came in handy. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LeeEvans Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 Just now, Jlowe22 said: I can understand that. I can give them some leeway, but some of the issues like what Heimdallr brought up are just amateurish. Oh for sure. This show has taken a MAJOR downturn in the story department since season five. The writers seem to be more interest in create shock and unexpected outcomes than anything else and that kind of rubs me the wrong way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PARROTHEAD Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 Hottest Reddit topic about ASOIAF going. The show has finally become the fairytale it tried to subvert https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/bipfrd/spoilers_extended_the_show_has_finally_become_the/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunnygsm Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 2 minutes ago, PARROTHEAD said: Hottest Reddit topic about ASOIAF going. The show has finally become the fairytale it tried to subvert https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/bipfrd/spoilers_extended_the_show_has_finally_become_the/ I'm holding out for the one that theorizes that the 3ER is the real big bad. Won't happen, but my imagination can dream. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seminoles1 Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 Is the North going to be able to convince anybody they actually beat the White Walkers and the army of the dead? Like is everyone else just supposed to believe them and that the whole thing was real? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunnygsm Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 1 minute ago, seminoles1 said: Is the North going to be able to convince anybody they actually beat the White Walkers and the army of the dead? Like is everyone else just supposed to believe them and that the whole thing was real? Offer free rides to Winterfell? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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