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2,371 posts in this topic

1 minute ago, Bosco685 said:

The only thing that scene was missing was Dany peeking around the corner as she whispered, "Shhhh. We shall listen in on Varys to learn his plan. BWAHAAAAHAAAAAA!"

But I really was sitting there wondering if they thought it through all that talk was happening in a very large, echoing room with that side door right behind Varys.

 

To @october's point, none of the actions of any of our "heroes" is crafty, wise, experienced, etc at this point.  All the military and political maneuvering has been dumbed down to its simplest form.  I'm not sure what military commander would initiate a cavalry charge blindly or establish such a poor defense of a castle by essentially sacrificing troops to an oncoming horde.  The strategy was basically "the night king is coming for Bran so lets just hold our positions in a meaningless sacrifice."  The showrunners have removed any original elements from the characters and it's now about "such and such has to happen and everything else is just a means of getting there."

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Is she even pregnant? How much time has elapsed for her brother to get to the north and then an army to cross a continent back south? Certainly long enough for her bump to be visible.

The fast travel has made these sorts of timelines impossible to determine.

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7 minutes ago, ExNihilo said:

To @october's point, none of the actions of any of our "heroes" is crafty, wise, experienced, etc at this point.  All the military and political maneuvering has been dumbed down to its simplest form.  I'm not sure what military commander would initiate a cavalry charge blindly or establish such a poor defense of a castle by essentially sacrificing troops to an oncoming horde.  The strategy was basically "the night king is coming for Bran so lets just hold our positions in a meaningless sacrifice."  The showrunners have removed any original elements from the characters and it's now about "such and such has to happen and everything else is just a means of getting there."

Totally agree. That's where I was going concerning the tactics (if you can call it that) from 'The Long Night'. No experiences battlefield commander is going to have the cavalry just charged off into the unknown. You're going to hold them back until the time is right.

On 5/1/2019 at 7:20 AM, Bosco685 said:

It's a good point about the limited availability of the Dragonglass, no matter how massive a deposit they had found at Dragonstone's cave.

On the cavalry charge, I have to disagree. There's a reason why military leaders reflect on the 'Charge of the Light Brigade'. The cavalry on old battlefields is the most mobile force a commander can deploy. So you want to use them wisely. Add to this the fire trench that was deployed, and you have some smarter defense that could have occurred.

Some fanatical viewers of the show and books created this massive map based on many reference points. So from this, we can zoom in on Winterfell and its surrounding landscape.

Map of Thrones interactive GoT's map

Winterfell01.thumb.PNG.d5015238efc23e04eb2f71fc7a261354.PNG

From a military perspective, knowing there is limited time to prepare you want to spread out observation posts throughout the local area for timely alerts. Plus, at night to spread the word rapidly back to Winterfell of the oncoming Dead Army they could light small fires back to one another.

Then, spread out the cavalry as a shock force when the time is right. Knowing once the Dead Army cross the river it can strike from two different directions, break it up into two massive reaction forces which will react based on the OP alerts. One force is meant to allow the other to follow up in support of the other since cavalry can move so rapidly.

With the fire trench, rather than one close trench which would be danger-close (so ineffective as a primary defense), you create a wave of trenches to break down the attackers. With as many soldiers at Winterfell gathered together, it could have at least targeted this protection as critical. And knowing a bow can shoot 220 meters (722 feet), use those outer OP's to light FW2 and FW3 not only for breaking up the movement of the Dead Army, but also as an early alert to Winterfell.

Signed, General Armchair!

 

And the fire pit right in front of Winterfell has had a few articles mentioning this as a weak story approach. Though I had fun with the episode besides these things, it really felt like more than a few mistakes made. Or lazy writing for the sake of a massive catastrophe requiring Arya to save the day.

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7 minutes ago, Bosco685 said:

Totally agree. That's where I was going concerning the tactics (if you can call it that) from 'The Long Night'. No experiences battlefield commander is going to have the cavalry just charged off into the unknown. You're going to hold them back until the time is right.

And the fire pit right in front of Winterfell has had a few articles mentioning this as a weak story approach. Though I had fun with the episode besides these things, it really felt like more than a few mistakes made. Or lazy writing for the sake of a massive catastrophe requiring Arya to save the day.

I have to wonder, if i'm shackled because I enjoy following military history and have a very (that's an understatement...more like very VERY) basic understanding of Old World defense strategies.  Whereas my co-workers and other viewers don't get so caught up on the minutiae of details because to them, it's all just one battle and they don't care that observation posts weren't established or that the cavalry shouldn't be charging in without the support of archers and/or militia.

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3 minutes ago, ExNihilo said:

I have to wonder, if i'm shackled because I enjoy following military history and have a very (that's an understatement...more like very VERY) basic understanding of Old World defense strategies.  Whereas my co-workers and other viewers don't get so caught up on the minutiae of details because to them, it's all just one battle and they don't care that observation posts weren't established or that the cavalry shouldn't be charging in without the support of archers and/or militia.

With the episode results thus far, the show-runners must know something to keep people coming back.

1) "Winterfell" - 11.76M viewers (USA only)

2) "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms" - 10.29M (USA only)

3) "The Long Night" - 12.02M (USA only)

4) "The Last of the Starks" - 11.80M

But when it comes to portraying these very seasoned fighters after many seasons of being beaten, chased and at times successful, it would be great to see their experiences shown in these remaining episodes. Though again, I'll come back each time.

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2 minutes ago, Bosco685 said:

Though again, I'll come back each time.

Yeah, but you (and me) and everyone else (who's critical of these episodes) coming back has more to do with the fact that there's only two more episodes left and we just want to see how it ends.  It's about a general curiosity to see how the time we've invested to this point pays off.  It doesn't have as much to do with the quality of the shows.  Take The Walking Dead as an example.  It was easy to just stop watching the show because there was no end in sight.  As opposed to the final season of How I Met Your Mother, as soon as they announced the end, it was like "okay, I can stomach one more season to see how this ends."  2c

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4 minutes ago, ExNihilo said:

Yeah, but you (and me) and everyone else (who's critical of these episodes) coming back has more to do with the fact that there's only two more episodes left and we just want to see how it ends.  It's about a general curiosity to see how the time we've invested to this point pays off.  It doesn't have as much to do with the quality of the shows.  Take The Walking Dead as an example.  It was easy to just stop watching the show because there was no end in sight.  As opposed to the final season of How I Met Your Mother, as soon as they announced the end, it was like "okay, I can stomach one more season to see how this ends."  2c

Walking Dead really burned me out dragging the Negan story too far. But before that, what a wild ride.

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12 minutes ago, PunisherPunisherPunisher said:

Latest episode was very rushed, sad because it would usually take 2/3 episodes to do that 1 episode

Everyone wants to rule except Jon Snow, once Sansa finds out Tyrion is a Targaryen, she will be running back to him.

 

I'm confused by the Tyrion/Targaryen rumors.  Tyrion shares the same mother with Cersei right since she died giving birth to him and that's why Cersei hates him.  Is he not Tywin's son?

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12 minutes ago, Bosco685 said:

Walking Dead really burned me out dragging the Negan story too far. But before that, what a wild ride.

I just got sick of the cyclical nature of the story.  Find a good place to live.  Bad humans come to destroy it.  Rinse and repeat.  That and the realization that the show could go on forever because there's no end in sight for the zombie apocalypse and i just realized that it wasn't my cup of tea anymore.  (shrug)

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35 minutes ago, ExNihilo said:

I have to wonder, if i'm shackled because I enjoy following military history and have a very (that's an understatement...more like very VERY) basic understanding of Old World defense strategies.  Whereas my co-workers and other viewers don't get so caught up on the minutiae of details because to them, it's all just one battle and they don't care that observation posts weren't established or that the cavalry shouldn't be charging in without the support of archers and/or militia.

But getting back to this, I think just allowing the characters to convey the characteristics we have seen developed and portrayed over 7 Seasons before now allows all that foundational storytelling to pay off.

Think about the patience Varys has learned to apply over many years of pain and learning. We saw this on display in Season 3. It took him years to get to the level he had achieved, to the point he could finally reach out and capture his previous torturer.

That's a person that will ensure to always keep his wits about him, and use those very same skills to achieve his desired ends. Including cautiously sharing his thoughts with anyone.

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7 minutes ago, ExNihilo said:

I'm confused by the Tyrion/Targaryen rumors.  Tyrion shares the same mother with Cersei right since she died giving birth to him and that's why Cersei hates him.  Is he not Tywin's son?

It’s been hinted in the show.

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Actually I've been lost ever since season #1 when Jon and Ned took the wrong turns on the King's Road.

Ned turned NORTH and Jon turned SOUTH on the King's Road as evidenced in this scene (Winterfell, which is to the west of King's Road, is behind them):

latest?cb=20110305210409

 

Edited by jcjames
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10 minutes ago, ExNihilo said:

I'm confused by the Tyrion/Targaryen rumors.  Tyrion shares the same mother with Cersei right since she died giving birth to him and that's why Cersei hates him.  Is he not Tywin's son?

 

2 minutes ago, Catwomancomics said:

It’s been hinted in the show.

Good point. HN Entertainment covered some of the theories out there concerning his origin. His real origin. And this has come up more than once. Especially when at Meereen he went down in the pit and released the dragons without being killed.

 

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56 minutes ago, Broke as a Joke said:

Season 8 Episode 4 was ok until that final scene.  Why would they all be there just to have Cersei say no to surrender?  Also the last dragon was just laying there on the side and Cersei has all those scorpions ready to go.  Made no sense.

Yep.

I suppose they wanted to give Cersi one last chance to avoid killing her own people in the coming dragon-siege of the red keep.

But why did Cersi not just end it right there? 

It's POSSIBLE that Drogon was far enough away from the scorpions, but certainly all the archers could have easily taken out dany and Tyrion right there. 

And how did Tyrion and the unsullied get to that location? They had no horses or ships. And more importantly, where do they go from there? 

 

 

Edited by jcjames
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3 hours ago, skypinkblu said:

Jon's also been dead already, so he's on borrowed time. 

I agree about Tyrion being a Targaryen, it makes sense. I've thought that since the dragons didn't eat him. Also if Tywin knew who his father was and it was the King, then he'd have been forced to accept him (but not necessarily like him.)

@zhamlau I think Arya is the Azor Ahai  because 

A. B, and C it would be non traditional for it to be a woman and this series is non traditional, but also because she killed the Night King, she's been tied to the sword since she was a small girl and because of what she told Gentry when he asked her to marry him. She was not meant to be a "lady", she has a different path. So while she didn't forge her sword by stabbing him in the heart, in a way she kind of did, and she told him she has another path.

Lastly because of her relationship with Mellisandre.,

Forgive my spelling, I had my eyes dialated a few hours ago and I'm guessing a lot while typing;)

 




See, I think its Jon. I think infact Dani is going to be the source of evil Jon will have to kill in the end.

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21 minutes ago, zhamlau said:

See, I think its Jon. I think infact Dani is going to be the source of evil Jon will have to kill in the end.

If you are thinking that way, don't forget Jamie. He is already a Kingslayer and if he kills Cersie it will follow more than one path of the legend.

It's interesting to think about.

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