That was the exposition and setup episode, with only 5 eps left they really need to the actual action pronto.
My money’s on the Nght King flattening the Stark/Targ/Unsullied/Dothraki/Wildling alliance in the semis at Winterfell, before gong on to take out the Lannisters in the final at Kings Landing.
"If you think this is going to end well for anyone, you haven’t been paying attention’
For what it’s worth I think the quality dropped a long way from season 7 on - it really seemed like they were given notes on the main story beats by Martin and just converted them directly to the screen rather than developing any of the ideas. It’s all felt a lot like A Dance with Dragons to me - long periods of pointlessness followed by either far too rapid (Casterly Rock / Highgarden development in the space of a minute) or utterly stupid (capture a Wight, Arya/Sansa conflict) plot development.
But as long as I’m here: Jon to kill Dany (Lightbringer, Azhor Ahai etc), Jaime to kill Cersei, Arya dies because people like her, and Sam to wind up the hero in beating the white walkers somehow. Jon takes the throne but the petty interhouse wars continue, with Sansa maybe winding up Queen on the North, fighting against Jon. Plus ca change…
“Bittersweet”
So given that this show is a pretty strict adherent to Checkhov’s gun, and Arya’s Needle and new weapon had some close attention in e.p. 1, anyone have any theories as to who’s she going to off with it?
Like a good mullet, this new weapon appeared to be of dual purpose: dragon glass at one end - that’s for your ice nasties - and something else at the other for… surely Cersei?
Looked like a projectile type of weapon imo. Maybe for shooting down an ice dragon.
Veep was quite excellent last night.
I wanted more of Jonah Ryan and received it in spades with this episode.
Some of my theories on how GoT will progress throughout season 8, some perhaps more outlandish than others. Perhaps some of it is just how I would write if I was in charge instead. I will put the spoiler tag up just in case people don’t really want to see it.
Winterfall to be curb stomped by the Night King and his army (perhaps not so surprising). I would expect if anywhere, the likes of Sansa, Missandei and Grey Worm to be killed there. Possibly Tormund as well, as I really don’t think seeing him in the South would suit him at all
An appearance of undead Hodor in the Battle of Winterfell, too
Any survivors of the Battle of Winterfall go south to King’s Landing hoping for aid from the crown, with the Army of the Dead in close pursuit through freezing conditions, low supplies and low shelter
Night King and his army arrive outside the gates at King’s Landing, with survivors of the Battle of Winterfell willing to make a last stand against an overwhelming force that’s converted pretty much everything down to King’s Landing by this point
Sam, perhaps with the help of Qyburn, to help even the odds by bringing some of the dead back to life to fight for the living? Sam’s wish to help with pretty much anything, along with Qyburn’s experience of interesting experiments might just make an odd but very effective pairing (plus Qyburn’s declaration of the dead breaking through the wall as terrible news should be an indication that he will do what’s right, eventually)
During this huge melee, if there’s any wildfire left in King’s Landing, expect Cersei to make sure it all gets deposited into the battlefield via trebuchet, pretty much wiping out both armies and putting Cersei into a clear advantage overall
Qyburn to be immediately executed by the Queen for “treason”
In turn, Drogon (with Dany) and Rhaegal (with Jon) see the carnage and go beserk on the Red Keep and inflict severe damage, in particular to the Great Hall, as has been foreshadowed in previous seasons with a very damaged and cold-looking Iron Throne
Expect a big dragon fight: Viserion vs Drogon and Rhaegal
None of the dragons to survive the engagement, but for Dany and Jon to survive their respective dragon’s downfalls (as does the Night King)
Night King defeated by a combination of Jon and Bran somehow (Bran has to remain crucial somehow, otherwise all his skills he’s established over the eight seasons are for nothing)
Cleganebowl ends with both of the brothers dead … perhaps The Hound kills The Mountain, but soon enough Arya silently kills The Hound to finally rub his name off her list
However, Cersei remains in a position of power, so as a last desperate measure to stop her, Jamie admits to incest with Cersei, thus both are sent to the chopping block and are executed, with Dany, still believing she is the rightful heir, regardless of what she may or may not have been told, will order the execution herself
Jon sees this, realising he has also committed incest, and puts to Dany that they need to do the same if the world is to really become a better place as has been previously suggested. The only thing I really can’t predict here is if Dany refuses and Jon has to kill her, and therefore removing any opposition to his ascension to the Iron Throne (and thus the vicious cycle of fighting for power continues), or if Dany agrees with him, and thus Jon and Dany also go to the chopping block to die together
One way or the other, Jon isn’t surviving this season, foreshadowed by “the lone wolf dies but the pack survives” comment by Sansa late last season
Tyrion to sit on the Iron Throne somehow. Too many people like him for it to happen otherwise
Just finished True Detective season 3. Worth a watch but agree with earlier posts about the mumbling, especially Ray. Half the time I had no idea what he was saying
Always with my finger on the pulse of pop culture, I’ve just discovered “Black Mirror” & having watched Episode “The National Anthem” I think it highly likely I have found something to binge over the Easter break.
Well I watched episode 2 of Season 8 Game of Thrones.
I feel like it was a farewell episode for a lot of characters
Might not be a bad idea to speculate as to who those characters might be. I’ll have a go, as well as who I think will definitely survive. I’ve put it into a “Hide Details” thing as for the life of me I just cannot figure out how the hell to use the spoiler with any accuracy.
Sansa
Gilly and the baby
Missandei
Just about anybody else unable to defend themselves in the crypt
Grey Worm and probably the rest of the Unsullied
Edd and the rest of the Night’s Watch
Theon and his little band
The Mormonts
Tormund (I’d say this one is more certain than any of the others on this list)
Brienne
Gendry
Davos
Beric (for the last time)
Jon
Dany
Tyrion
Arya
The Hound
Jamie
Probably Sam as well, as i don’t think he’s done yet in the story
Certainly, the list of main characters still alive is going to be smaller than the list of main characters who die in the battle. Not unexpected, but some of the deaths are really going to suck.
The only way they have any chance of getting their plan to work is for Bran to warg into Viserion and force the Night King to the ground. that way Otherwise the plan makes no sense whatsoever, but neither did many of the things last season.
Game of Thrones
With next week seemingly devoted to the battle at Winterfell and only three episodes after that I’m a little concerned that the plot resolution is going to be pretty perfunctory. With every major character but Cersei now in one place, all we have left is beat the white walkers, resolve the Dany / Jon conflict and work out whether Cersei is beaten. It’s pretty amazing that in two hours of TV the only plot development has been that Jon and Dany now know the truth about Jon.
It’s also a little bit disappointing that it seems so many characters are just going to be killed by zombies. For all its supposed brutality, the series has always been smart about killing characters in ways that relate to flaws in their behaviour or values. Characters dying trying to save the world against an impossibly strong malevolent force is certainly ‘realistic’ but it’s not very interesting.
I think the survival lists above are pretty sensible, but I don’t think any top level characters will die in the battle, which basically means I think Sansa will survive it. My guess is that she’s either going to be left alive as leader of an independent North fighting against whoever wins the Iron Throne, or Dany will kill her before Jon kill Dany. Either way I think zombie death is only coming for supporting characters.
I edited your spoilers to make them work, you can’t have line breaks or para breaks within a spoiler so I tagged each para separately
The first two episodes of the final season seem to be good examples of everything GRRM was railing against when began writing the books. And still I turn on the TV every Monday evening as soon as I get home from work to find out what happens next.
Game of thrones question (Bear in mind i binge watched the whole lot over the last month so there is a good chance i missed the explanation)
How did the white walkers get the dragon out of the lake when they cannot go in or on water?I’ll ignore the fact they had some very large chains but actually getting into the water seems like a fairly big plot hole
My thoughts on said question:
MrRooney, there is no explanation that I’ve seen in the show or elsewhere. I’m just going to go with my original feelings about that episode, that it was so bad it was actually harder to miss the plot holes than to find them. It was by far the worst GoT episode and it really made me doubt where the series was going. Benjen appearing out of nowhere to save Jon, only to die about 20 seconds later topped it off for lazy writing and total convenience. I really hope Battle of Winterfell doesn’t suffer a similar fate because I will be fucking pissed if that’s the case, after it being so hyped and even me getting pretty excited about it.
Was it ever stated that the wights cant go in water?
Another stellar episode from Veep. Such a good show.
Thanks - i’ll ignore it, for now…
They’ve basically decided to invest everything (money, quality) in the big set-piece battles for a few series now. But the best thing about the books and the show itself that we all fell in love with wasn’t ever really the battles was it? Basically it’s just become normal TV.