HBO's adaptation of Game of Thrones - Thread 2. There are a lot of nerds.

xxp -- i agree re Ice Queen Sansa, also Tormund.

didn't theon's dick get cut off?

i just assume everyone on this show had their dick cut off

if helps assign character motivation

I assume all the characters have had their genitals violently removed offscreen unless it's explicitly stated otherwise

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQIqq81YOJJIo7T9CZKek_eyS12Y00guEwW6JAHnYf4yrdNFMie

sick of all this "paring off"

Castration pun?

If you're off'er-ing, sure.

male characters with removed genitals: Theon, Varys, Grey Worm
male characters whose dicks definitely work as of Season 8: Tormund, Gendry, Euron

good sans-serif fonts for headings: Theon, Varys, Grey Worm
good serif fonts for body text: Tormund, Gendry, Euron

anyone else notice the moment in this episode where Davos ends up talking to the little girl who wants to join the battle, and she has facial scarring that's reminiscent of Stannis's daughter who was sacrificed?

not sure if it was just an emotional callback for his character or if he's going to end up confronting her again after something goes down in the crypt

felt mostly like the former

Both if he is tasked with burning her

rumor has it the little girl is melissandre in disguise

poor davos--they keep talking about all the battles he's survived so far, makes me think he's a goner

Tuomas at 9:24 16 Apr 19

Maisie Williams has had to carry a lot of the narrative load and i think she's done a great job.

Agreed. She should have a great future ahead of her, though I really hope that her height and older-than-she-looks-like appearance won't doom her into being typecast kid characters, or eternally young ones (like she did in Doctor Who), for the next 15 years.

Me at the end of this episode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otptS-eOXvI

As for the pairing of characters, that didn't really bother me at all, because it makes sense that if you knew you were likely gonna die tomorrow, of course you would want to explore previously unaddressed affections, and/or look for solace and warmth in others. And all these bondings had been heavily hinted at in the previous seasons: Arya's infatuation with Gendry, the unspoken platonic romance between Brienne and Jaime, whatever it is that's going on with Sansa and Theon...

What I don't like, though, is if all of that is used as cliched emotional irony, as a way of marking who's gonna die in the battle next episode. So if Missandei and Grey Worm talking about their future in her homeland, Arya and Gendry having sex, Jaime and Brienne expressing their feelings between the lines, and Sansa and Theon forming a deeper bond means that one in each of those pairs is gonna get killed next, that's just cheap.

Brienne and Grey Worm are toast for sure

What I don't like, though, is if all of that is used as cliched emotional irony, as a way of marking who's gonna die in the battle next episode. So if Missandei and Grey Worm talking about their future in her homeland, Arya and Gendry having sex, Jaime and Brienne expressing their feelings between the lines, and Sansa and Theon forming a deeper bond means that one in each of those pairs is gonna get killed next, that's just cheap.

I don't think it's meant to foreshadow who will die--rather, it acts as a way of removing as much plot armor as possible so that it seems that anyone COULD die during the battle. Some won't, some will, but the point is that it obfuscates it. I think you might be able to argue that it's just a cheap way of raising the emotional stakes for the viewers, and I get that. But like I mentioned earlier, I enjoyed it and it made me feel emotional before going into the battle, so I'll take it.

That all being said, it's probably an unwelcome departure in a lot of peoples' eyes--specifically that the story didn't used to care who was at a narrative end to their arc or not. Apparent plot armor or not, everyone was fair game. Now they're ditching a lot of plot armor to up the suspense (i.e., they're trading shock for suspense).

How are people seeing romance between Sansa and Theon!? Their looks/reunion is one of two people who went through hell at the hands of the same man (Ramsay) and surviving it.

to some, the public eating of beans is a "pairing ceremony" that establishes shared romantic intentions

i'm shipping sansa/brienne now

next ep preview all but confirming some hijinx via an attack in a different direction/via the crypt/thirty minutes of zombie stand up comedy

to some, the public eating of beans is a "pairing ceremony" that establishes shared romantic intentions

aaaand there's my new DN

bless

that knight eatin beans

hahhaha yes

I kinda liked the episode.

That is all.

i enjoyed this week's episode just for re-establishing a lot of relationships, and the "biding time" dialogue was immeasurably better than similar scenes involving Tyrion, Grey Worm, and Missandei over on the other side of the sea. A low bar to clear to be fair...

Theon and Sansa have more chemistry than Daenerys and Jon, i'll say that much.

I'm trying to figure out not so much who is going to die as who seems likely to survive. I feel pretty safe in predicting Sansa and Arya to be safe. They're not going to kill all the Starks except one, and Bran isn't even a Stark anymore i guess.

I've gone many seasons now not knowing who Edd is or where he came from but here we are

I assumed Tormond will die just so they can resolve his love interest in Brienne easily and with dignity. but I guess Brienne dying would do the same.

https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/something-bads-going-to-happen-in-that-crypt-huh-1834224453

They've "hidden spoilered" it so much that I almost wonder if they'll pull a cheeky bait and switch and *not* have Sean Bean playing the headless zombie Ned Stark that gets raised from the Winterfell crypts to feast on his surviving children

He was magnificent as the statue of Ned at the end of the previous episode

Wait wait... where is Cate buried? Is she in the crypt? Will we finally get zombie Lady Stark!?

Arya be like... #GameofThrones pic.twitter.com/QxvaZrBXIo

— Chris Masi (@chris_masi) April 22, 2019

she’s got a second list of dudes

my outlandish crypt theory is that the night king isn't the only one left in westeros who can raise the dead.

that's not bad - it would at least explain how Uncle Benjen came to be

No I mean there’s a red woman out there who’s def anti-night king and has to return at some point.

ha, duh that makes sense

OK that then goes along with the "that little girl with the burnt face is Melisandre" theory.

(which Mandee posted upthread)

How are people seeing romance between Sansa and Theon!? Their looks/reunion is one of two people who went through hell at the hands of the same man (Ramsay) and surviving it.

Because their bonding over those traumas was already addressed in the previous couple of seasons, so giving them two emotionally loaded scenes seem to be hinting at something else rather than just replaying those same sentiments. Though of course it's quite ambiguous, and there might be no romance at all. And since Theon is probably the most likely main character to die in the battle for Winterfell, so he can redeem himself of past sins against the Starks, we'll probably never find out.

I quite enjoyed the sense of freezing dread about the whole episode, it's probably the last chance we'll get to spend time with a lot of these characters so give them all their moment I guess.

Still, no way have they kept Gendry around all this time and re-emphasised the Baratheon bastard thing just to kill him off now, although you never know.

We probably need a Game of Thrones Death Pool thread by now right?

Gendry and Arya for King and Queen?

I’ve given up trying to make predictions - I’ll just sit back and enjoy the ride/make petty criticisms like wtf was Davos doing serving up soup in a castle full of servants?