HBO's Game of Thrones season 6 discussion thread- airing 4/24/16 (No book spoilers)

[DAPUNISHER]

There were a couple of things that I would have liked to have seen handled differently. You have a giant, and no one thought to help him fashion a giant sized war club before going to battle? Of course he would have been able to go full Sauron and destroy 5-10 men with each swing. Which would have broken the shield wall and changed the dynamic of the battle. Sansa repeating what Ramsey said about not feeding the dogs for a week, even though she rode off before he said it. Someone told her is the obvious explanation, but it was sloppy. Made it seem like they forgot they shot the scene that way.

I thought the witty banter every time we were with Tyrion was great.

Finale looks slow in comparison, lots of setup for events starting next season? Red woman gets confronted about burning the princess. Loras gets judged. Danny finally begins to understand the enormity of what she is doing? What the hell is going on with Jamie? Celebrating with the Freys, a bunch of idiots he has no respect for? I wonder if he will drop a bomb in there? Kind of spit in their faces sort of thing. Or if he will play along with a bad taste in his mouth the whole time?

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Sansa must have known Vale army was almost there to join the battle, but withheld the information from Jon's army. Ramsey is a very guarded person, so Sansa knew that Ramsey would retreat back to Winterfell at the first sign of Vale army in the field. Instead, she allows Jon to react to Ramsey's game, and uses his army as bait for Ramsey to commit all of his troop into a single location. The Vale army swoops in, and Ramsey has no troops to defend his castle sealing his fate.

I would say Jon & Ramsey played right into Sansa's hands.

I like your analysis except for Jon playing into her hands. Jon screwed up exactly the way Sansa warned him not to. Jon was feeling pretty badass. Ramsey backing down from him and flattering him about hearing what a great swordsman he is. Going on about how Ramsey is basically child's play after the battles he has been in. Even so, Jon had a sound strategy. Then Ramsey played him precisely the way Sansa warned him he would. Jon rushed in, ruining their entire strategy. He blew it terribly, and would have gotten everyone killed if Sansa had not been hedging her bets.

 

[Artorias]

My only complaint is Rickon running in a straight line........

Other than that it was awesome.

Next weeks preview with Jaime and Frey seems very interesting.

 

[Fire&Blood]

What the hell is going on with Jamie? Celebrating with the Freys, a bunch of idiots he has no respect for? I wonder if he will drop a bomb in there? Kind of spit in their faces sort of thing. Or if he will play along with a bad taste in his mouth the whole time?

I think he'll make a remark if Freys push him but I don't think he would risk the alliance with the Freys. From his perspective, mission was successful, his men get a break after taking the castle without major losses. I would expect him not to be a fan of Edmure's execution, should the Freys decide to kill the last known Tully. Probably object to it but not risk the alliance with the Freys. After all, Jaime is just looking forward to getting back to this:

 

[razor2025]

Even so, Jon had a sound strategy.

Jon's strategy made no sense. Jon's army HAD to attack, since they are the ones that want Winterfell. All Ramsey had to do was wait. They even had the burning effigies lined up to give his archers range markers for more accuracy. Ramsey had the perfect upper hand in a defensive battle (Higher ground, 2x troops size). I don't think Jon executing on his strategy would've mattered at all.

IMO, the only real strategy that actually worked was Sansa's. Which was to bait Ramsey into committing his entire force into an open field battle, where it would've been impossible to retreat back to Winterfell. Ramsey used up all of his cavalry in his opening move (when clearly he had superior spear troops to counter Jon's cavalry). Had he kept his cavalry around, he could've use them as defensive screen while his infantry run back to Winterfell...

But obviously if the battle played out like that the plot wouldn't have progressed, I guess... Let's just say Ramsey would've been a terrible Total War player.

 

[woolfe9998]

deleted

 

[woolfe9998]

Ramsey was eaten by his own dogs. Pretty much made my day :biggrin:

 

[Exophase]

Sansa must have known Vale army was almost there to join the battle, but withheld the information from Jon's army. Ramsey is a very guarded person, so Sansa knew that Ramsey would retreat back to Winterfell at the first sign of Vale army in the field. Instead, she allows Jon to react to Ramsey's game, and uses his army as bait for Ramsey to commit all of his troop into a single location. The Vale army swoops in, and Ramsey has no troops to defend his castle sealing his fate.

I would say Jon & Ramsey played right into Sansa's hands.

I was thinking about this and at first I was pretty unhappy that Sansa didn't tell Jon that she summoned the Vale army. If Jon knew they were coming they could have planned a much better strategy.

But then I remembered that she just doesn't really trust Littlefinger. Nor should she. Planning for backup that was never going to show would have been disastrous.

 

[Childs]

Man, WTF, they never heard of serpentine in the GOT universe? lol It should almost be impossible to hit someone running from one archer in an open field. Kinda disappointed the giant died. I thought he had a weapon of some sort. Why doesn't he use a tree trunk or something as a club? And the Jon Snow vs Ramsey battle wasn't anything special, although Ramsey changing his mind on the 1v1 was kinda funny.

The episode was fine, but in a way there was almost no suspense in the episode. You knew the dragons where going to wreck the ships. You knew the Knights of the Vale were going to swoop in and save the day. I even thought long before the episode it would be fitting for Ramsey to die by his dogs, and then knew it when he mentioned he didn't feed them for 7 days. The most shocking thing in the episode was Rickon not doing serpentine or any sort of evasive maneuvers. How odd is it in a show with dragons and magic and giants and zombies that a guy not doing the serpentine is the most far fetched thing so far. And you guys were complaining about Arya taking a stroll through town... :biggrin:

Anyways, even though the episode was somewhat by the numbers, it was good to see all this stuff resolved. They might even be resolving this stuff a little too quickly, but I appreciate the progression. Almost kinda hard to imagine how they are going to spend the next two shortened seasons mostly on the walkers. Feels like the series could be wrapped up in like 4-6 episodes at the pace they are going at.

 

[kt]

My only complaint is Rickon running in a straight line........

Other than that it was awesome.

Next weeks preview with Jaime and Frey seems very interesting.

I told my wife the same thing. WTF, why isn't he running in a random zig-zag?

 

[Newbian]

My only complaint is Rickon running in a straight line........

Other than that it was awesome.

Next weeks preview with Jaime and Frey seems very interesting.

If any rts game has taught me anything it would be this and I was shouting it.

 

[Aikouka]

I thought it was kinda meh overall. The biggest problem is that we all were quite sure that this would be the outcome, and in the past, the show has been pretty good about giving us the unexpected. (If you hadn't read the books, that is!) So, the usual awesome penultimate episode just doesn't feel as weighty as some of the crazy things from seasons past. This was by the same director that did Hardholme last season, and I thought that episode was far better. The lack of an actual book to work off of is still showing in how stuff just "happens" rather than having the usual bit of extra fluff interspersed between things. Hell, even Tyrion seems boring as hell now.

Also great fight scene really tried to capture the confusion of battle.

I thought the battle scenes were the worst part of the episode. Some of the cuts during the fight were so fast that you had no idea what was really going on. You can call this "capturing the confusion of battle", but I just call it messy and a poor decision. It's like saying directors that overuse shaky cam are trying to push the frantic nature of action.

My only complaint is Rickon running in a straight line........

One of these days we'll get a successful graduate of the Prometheus School of Running.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I rarely post and just lurk. F U C K yes!! I will sleep a happy man tonight.

Spoiler

His hounds ate him

hahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahaha

20 minutes searching on how to use spoiler tags and you didn't even see you misspelled the tag twice....

 

[purbeast0]

i think the talk with john and the lady in red played a big part in the way jon fought in the battle and the way they filmed it. she basically told him that he has a bigger role on this planet than he realizes and that he will die when the gods want him to die. i think they tried to portray in the battle that he was about to die like 5 or more different times, but always found a way. i especially felt this way when the archers were firing right into his area but he luckily was being missed by every arrow. and then all of the close calls where someone luckily bailed him out. i feel this is going to play a part in his mind now.

 

[Rhezuss]

How many more seasons are planned until the end of the end? 1? 2? We don't know?

EDIT: Found this:

the show’s producers David Benioff and D. B. Weiss said they would like to see the fantasy drama end after Season 7 or Season 8. Now, however, the subscription cable network is pushing back a little, saying HBO would actually like to see the show on the air for quite a bit longer. Here’s what HBO President Michael Lombardo had to say about the show running for longer than its current renewal cycle

 

[PottedMeat]

RIP Wunwun


by the preview I guess Davos can't just kill Melissandre since she's the only one around that can resurrect people.

 

[Kev]

I told my wife the same thing. WTF, why isn't he running in a random zig-zag?

Or just run backwards and appropriately move out of the way when he shoots.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Wunwun should have had like, a rock on a rope. Or a burning tree limb. Hell, he could have stolen two of those pigstickers the phalanx troupe was using and just started skewering people. Someone dropped the ball on that one.

Thoughts on possibility of every male in a potential leadership role ending up as a ruler, per the tagline of 'All Men Must Die'? Danny takes the throne, sand snakes in the south, Yara on the islands, Jon dies leaving Sansa/Arya in Winterfell (maybe Sansa goes to vale to marry LF, kills him, takes the vale for herself?).

 

[MongGrel]

My only complaint is Rickon running in a straight line........

The wife was even yelling "why isn't he dodging."

But he saw John coming, and was just trying to reach him at that point.

RIP Wunwun

"We have Winterfell, they don't have the men for a siege, all we have to do is wait ..."

Knock, knock, Ramsey.

 

[K1052]

The preview of Walder Frey quoting Roose Bolton at the Red Wedding to Jamie seems like trouble. If Walder plans on going back on whatever Jamie promised Edmure to get into Riverrun I think he's got another thing coming.

 

[geecee]

Or just run backwards and appropriately move out of the way when he shoots.

Or at least run behind one of those flayed men displays that were on fire.

 

[JEDI]

im guessing ep10 will be closure on Kings Landing/sparrow arc and setup for the major White Walker arc for next season.

Now that Dany controls Maureen and the 3 former slave cities, how will she keep them AND still take Kings Landing?
she has 100k dorathi Calvary, 8k unsullied, 2k 2nd Sons mercs, 100+ ships, and 3 dragons.

the ships, calvary and dragons are coming with her to Kings Landing.
unsullied/2nd sons to keep control over 4 cities?
but those same 10k men failed b4 and lost 3 cities.

and who will rule these 4 cities while Dany is across the sea?
same triumvirate of tyrion/Grey Worm/nice tits?

 

[Homerboy]

Incredible episode. Probably the best and most "realistic" medieval battle scene I've even seen. I think the bodies piling up was a little silly, but the chaos, the noise, the confusion. Just incredible. John almost getting crushes was riveting and brilliant. Ramsay was Ramsay until the bitter end -- everything he did was awesome.

Danny and the dragons was pretty solid too. I thought the meeting between Danny and the Greyjoys was perfectly executed as well. Two strong women realizing they were very similar and respectful of each other. Loved that Yara kept sliding little lesbian comments in there and made Danny blush. They are a going to make a formidable pair and with Theon should be able to join forces with Starks now.

I thought it was silly/too perfect that Davos just happened across the pyre that Shereen was burned on and that her wooden stag survived the fire. I guess he had to find out somehow and this made as much sense as anything. Red witch is a goner I'm sure.

The Vale coming to the rescue was a given. Though did I miss why John didn't even think of asking the Vale for help all along? Was it ever discussed? I mean it's the largest standing army in Westeros and is/was loyal to the Starks (not to mention family) and I don't recall much of any urgency from John to get them to fight with him?

 

[Charmonium]

How many more seasons are planned until the end of the end? 1? 2? We don't know?

EDIT: Found this:

Contract negotiations. It doesn't matter though. Whether GoT gets renewed beyond season 8 or not probably doesn't matter since HBO will no doubt commission a spin off. The only question would be if they can do the spinoff with just the consent of Martin or if the current producers have intellectual property in some of the characters and would need to be bought off.

Show makes too much money for HBO to just drop it after x seasons. And Martin must be getting used to those trucks full of cash backing up to his front door - beep, beep, beep.

 

[K1052]

The Vale coming to the rescue was a given. Though did I miss why John didn't even think of asking the Vale for help all along? Was it ever discussed? I mean it's the largest standing army in Westeros and is/was loyal to the Starks (not to mention family) and I don't recall much of any urgency from John to get them to fight with him?

The Vale had been content to sit out the recent wars behind their near impregnable defenses. They did not come to Rob's aid when requested either. There would be little reason for Jon to appeal to them as he had no relationship. Sansa played her association with Littlefinger close to the vest knowing that Jon probably wouldn't approve if her knew the whole story.