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This is the best episode in a long time even if it is ultimately just fanservice before the doom. Feels like the last chance to breathe before going off to fight the end boss.

Is this the first episode that’s taken place entirely in a single location? No Wall, no Kings Landing, 100% Winterfell.

There were times during this episode where I was glad this season has only 6 episodes.

I mean I liked it, and its still better than most other shows airing right now, but I’m ready to let go of these characters and the show as a whole.

I wasn't expecting another "nothing really happened" episode, but I enjoy fanservice as much as anyone.

Here is my theory for the next 4 episodes.

Episode 3: Undead fight part 1.
Episode 4: Undead fight part 2.

The end result is maybe 2 or 3 white walkers die and it takes out a large swathe of the undead army. But they do not get the night king. The survivors retreat south and the night king reinforces his troops off the dead, but now there are less white walkers to kill. The Ice dragon might die here but at a major cost.

Episode 5. Retreat South, reinforce at Kings Landing. Cersi gets her come upins.

Episode 6: Final Battle against the dead at Kings Landing.

The crypt is apparently going to be important enough given how much it was referenced.

Definitely a victory lap episode though. Big celebration of the show before the end.

Yeah, the idiots who live there think the safest place is a tomb full of corpses. The Night King is going to raise those corpses and they are going to be looking at an attack from inside the walls.

If they had just rushed into the battle and people being killed then there would have been a lot of whining. There's now whining either way, but at least we are getting to spend some last moments with these characters before they start getting smacked left and right. I'm okay with a slow burn, but it looks like next episode it will start to pay off and we'll hopefully be more invested in these characters.

We get exposition, each of the main character gets their own screen time.

As a show where anyone can die at any time, it’s nice to see we’re reminded of who’s who, and to whom, before a likely massacre next week.

Roll on the third episode.

Yeah, they Definitely said the crypt is the safest place Way too many times in that episode.

I hope Sean Bean is in the next episode as zombie ned stark. That gak would be great.

Based unhinged Dany.

This episode kind of made me rethink Jaime actually.I think we've had our Jaime & Brienne moment in the Knighting scene.

I don't know whether the crypt is a double bluff. The tombs will be quite heavy and the wights possess any kind of super strength that they could lift the stone lids. They might start screeching or perhaps banging which could cause a panic.

It looks like Berric and the Hound are searching through Winterfell at the same time Arya seems to be fleeing from something. I assume they'll meet each other here. It also seems like Dany is on Drogon here, perhaps searching for Viserion.

What I think they did get over is that none of the characters particularly expect to survive the coming battle. And from there, a genuine sense of ‘well, we might as well all get along as best we can, despite 7 seasons of scrapping’.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
What I think they did get over is that none of the characters particularly expect to survive the coming battle. And from there, a genuine sense of ‘well, we might as well all get along as best we can, despite 7 seasons of scrapping’.

Spoiler:

Felt a bit weird watching Arya and Gendry’s scene though. Perhaps it’s because Maisie Williams hasn’t physically grown much since the start of the series. Narratively it made sense like. Just ‘but aren’t you 14 or something!’.

I'm being a little bit pedantic here, but...

I do get you, but



Probably just me being a bit weird, but I still found it a surprisingly scene.

This episode was phenomenal, like watching a good Bioware game.


As one poster said in reddit:
"You also need to feel the people again before they start dying. This episode was a masterclass in getting us to “feel” invested in people we really haven’t spent too much time with over the past several seasons.

Plus, not all the things that were left unknown were battle related. There were a lot of intra-personal relationships that were just kinda left out there. This gave us a ton of closure on those relationships. For those of us who like character building and friendship/enemy building, this was a great and very necessary episode - before half of them die."

I’d agree entirely with that.

I didn't think the dialogue was particularly amazing (the conversation between Jon and Daenerys felt awkward, and not in an in-universe way), but overall the episode was a reminder that the show was at its best when characters interacted. Rather than being a torrent of BIG! STUFF! HAPPENING!

I still look forward to next week's big stuff, although what they seem to be setting up is incredibly obvious and a potential versimilitude-buster, even in the context of a fantasy show. I mean, did you know that the crypts are the safest place to be? For realz. EVERYONE should go there. Because they're safe. SO safe.

I hope that either the obvious doesn't take place, or that there's an interesting twist (and there could be, since the crypts are a mysterious and interesting place). Because otherwise...someone really would have thought of that. But this show has disappointed me a lot in recent seasons.

As others have said, the tombs themselves are likely quite secure. And from what we’ve seen of the Night King, raising the Dead appears to be a conscious effort, rather than one purely of relative proximity.

However, I’m wondering if there’s going to be a digging effort by the dead, break in through the crypt?

But.....

I don't like being so negative, but the past few seasons of the show have been about big dramatic flourishes rather than internal logic and sense. Dead Starks busting out of tombs would look cool and spawn many OMGs on social media, so I expect that's where we're headed. *shrug* I'm still hopeful that they'll surprise me, but I suspect that the story will proceed in a fairly straightforward manner from here on out.

Regarding who 'wins'...

I have a feeling they're gonna kill off Dany, dunno why. Been coming off as a little power mad in a passive aggressive kinda way. I can almost see her wanting to take a sneaky shot at Jon if things keep progressing.

I wonder how many D&D DMs are suddenly gonna have potions of strength made out of giant's milk now?

They seemed to set up a scene where Danny lets Jon die or fails to come to his aid.

 Lance845 wrote:
Here is my theory for the next 4 episodes.

Episode 3: Undead fight part 1.
Episode 4: Undead fight part 2.

The end result is maybe 2 or 3 white walkers die and it takes out a large swathe of the undead army. But they do not get the night king. The survivors retreat south and the night king reinforces his troops off the dead, but now there are less white walkers to kill. The Ice dragon might die here but at a major cost.

Episode 5. Retreat South, reinforce at Kings Landing. Cersi gets her come upins.

Episode 6: Final Battle against the dead at Kings Landing.

I totally agree with this cadence. I was a little shocked at the obvious "the crypts are safe!!!" and especially the Arya/Gendry scene... But, good for her! She has played such a boy role in her character and it was a shock to see her become a woman. The lead to was there with the obvious flirting and always a bit of happiness in characters is a good thing. Arya has been one of the more intriguing characters and Maisie is great in the role; however,

 MDSW wrote:

Spoiler:

Why was she staring off when Gendry was sleeping sound? Does this portent she did this for another reason?

Since we're doing things with spoiler tags for some reason;

 LunarSol wrote:
They seemed to set up a scene where Danny lets Jon die or fails to come to his aid.

Yeah, I suspect it'll be something like that until



If the showrunners stay predictable, what follows will probably look like this:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 MDSW wrote:

Spoiler:

Why was she staring off when Gendry was sleeping sound? Does this portent she did this for another reason?

Since we're doing things with spoiler tags for some reason;

Spoiler:

I took it that she's just reflecting on the wars to come. For as cocksure as she's become, facing the reality of your own mortality can still be a lot to take in, even for No One.

Why else use spoiler tags? Peeps won’t have seen yet, so it’s a protection for the incautious reader.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 MDSW wrote:

Spoiler:

Why was she staring off when Gendry was sleeping sound? Does this portent she did this for another reason?

Since we're doing things with spoiler tags for some reason;

Spoiler:

I took it that she's just reflecting on the wars to come. For as cocksure as she's become, facing the reality of your own mortality can still be a lot to take in, even for No One.

Why else use spoiler tags? Peeps won’t have seen yet, so it’s a protection for the incautious reader.

The post title says “spoilers” in it, does it not?

Indeed it does.

But I didn’t really feel the need to include ‘usual etiquette expected’

I can totally go and edit it if you feel it’s that pressing a need?

If you don't want to be spoiled about this week's episode of game of thrones, and you come to page 7 or 8 of a thread entitled "GOT Season 8 speculation and spoilers" then I don't know what to say but you have no one to blame but yourself.

It made sense to use spoilers when the books were ahead of the show, but that time is long past.

 Ouze wrote:
If you don't want to be spoiled about this week's episode of game of thrones, and you come to page 7 or 8 of a thread entitled "GOT Season 8 speculation and spoilers" then I don't know what to say but you have no one to blame but yourself.

It made sense to use spoilers when the books were ahead of the show, but that time is long past.