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 Mr Morden wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:


I actually thought this season whilst getting on with stuff in a way that's an total anathema to GRM it had a lot of his tendency to revisit forgotten plots and bring back people that did not seem relevant.

That's an interesting take on this season.......................what irrelevant 'forgotten plots' and 'people' do you feel have returned this season?

I separated the two.

Forgotten - the whole Frey plotline had been ignored until now, it was a surprise to see it back, not a bad thing, just a surprise -
same with uncle Stark up north beyond the wall, the Hound was another element that seemed to have been finished.

Irrelevant - well the whole "Fat Sam visits his family" wasted a 15 mins. Its not like the books where GRM just keeps inventing new characters to avoid progressing the plot in any way.

Your by now well documented hatred of Sam aside, I don't think those plots or characters are irrelevant, and most weren't forgotten either.

But overall, the TV Series has certainly become a more streamlined experience - and is quite possibly all the better for it.

I'm really glad we weren't subjected to.....quite a few of GRRM's meandering subplots and minor characters.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:
The Greyjoy stuff is a little bit ahead in the book, but it's also a bit different.

Technically, its already caught up to the latest book. What little we know stems from sample chapters from the next book that GRRM has released. There's the introduction of Darkflame I suppose but it looks like he's either been cut or replaced with Kinvara.

Spoiler:

I think the red priestess kinvara who meets tyrion and varys is the shows version of Dark flame, and she might heal Jorahs Grey scale like Dark flame healed victarion greyjoys arm.

Well, more time has passed since the Kingsmoot in the books, but not much more has actually happened. I haven't read the sample chapters yet.

I'm not sure why, but if they keep playing up the idea that Bran affected the past to influence events (like possibly driving the Mad King crazy), then my money will be on it turning out that Bran is/was actually the Three Eyed Raven.

How? Either straight up time-travel (Bran goes back in time and ends up trapped in the tree roots for whatever reason), or more likely: at some point, Bran either intentionally or unintentionally wargs his entire consciousness into someone else's body (Max Von Sydow) long ago in the past, effectively taking over that person's personality, at which point he becomes trapped in the tree for whatever reason.

Of course, the Raven flat out told Bran that he would not end up locked in the roots to the tree, so to make my theory work that would mean either the Three-eyed Raven (future/past Bran) lied to himself to make sure the loop of time events would all work out, or he's technically telling a white lie, since Max Von Sydow is a different body even if it is Bran's consciousness in it.

So what do you think? Stupid? Really unlikely? or a possible winner?

I think there are some theories that Bran is all the Brans that build the Wall and Winterfell and other stuff. I think at one point Old Nan confuses him with other Brans. It's plausible enough that it's worth entertaining.

I don't think it's stupid, and I actually like the idea....but there's just a lot of (feasible) mental gymnastics that have to go on for that to happen.

I can see it being that case in the books sooner than I can in the TV series, as that's a pretty big risk to take with the viewership.

so 9 & 10 episode titles are out .....




Last episode will run for 69 minutes too.

Hm, I wonder what will be about...

So.. the Arya thing


https://www.yahoo.com/news/amazing-game-thrones-fan-theory-233506988.html

the handed thing seems plausible enough

relating to that





that outfit/person on the left..... clothing & hair is very similar to what Arya wore previously isn't it ?

http://cdn.idigitaltimes.com/sites/idigitaltimes.com/files/2015/06/07/arya-stark.png

Actually when you look at the two side by side - the clothing is pretty different.

This does seem odd. Is the whole Bravos thing in Arya's head? Like, did that poison really throw her in a coma or something, and she's in her subconscious?

Great, now I'm being reminded of another premise about alternate identities and perceptions of oneself in one's subconscious, and them fighting for supremacy...and I can't remember what it is. That's going to be annoying.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
This does seem odd. Is the whole Bravos thing in Arya's head? Like, did that poison really throw her in a coma or something, and she's in her subconscious?

Great, now I'm being reminded of another premise about alternate identities and perceptions of oneself in one's subconscious, and them fighting for supremacy...and I can't remember what it is. That's going to be annoying.

Perhpas you mean either Fight Club or Identity with John Cusack.

 gunslingerpro wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
This does seem odd. Is the whole Bravos thing in Arya's head? Like, did that poison really throw her in a coma or something, and she's in her subconscious?

Great, now I'm being reminded of another premise about alternate identities and perceptions of oneself in one's subconscious, and them fighting for supremacy...and I can't remember what it is. That's going to be annoying.

Perhpas you mean either Fight Club or Identity with John Cusack.

Yeh, it was Fight Club. I should really see that movie again. Its been a while.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
This does seem odd. Is the whole Bravos thing in Arya's head? Like, did that poison really throw her in a coma or something, and she's in her subconscious?

I would not be that happy as we have had scenes from other peoples POV as well as Arya - on that note have any of the people who accompanied Daddy Tyrel mentioned the assassination there that she carried out? I can't recall.

 d-usa wrote:
I think there are some theories that Bran is all the Brans that build the Wall and Winterfell and other stuff. I think at one point Old Nan confuses him with other Brans. It's plausible enough that it's worth entertaining.

It's also suggested that the NK's name is Brandon, although that seems kinda blown from a show standpoint.

 cincydooley wrote:
I don't think it's stupid, and I actually like the idea....but there's just a lot of (feasible) mental gymnastics that have to go on for that to happen.

I can see it being that case in the books sooner than I can in the TV series, as that's a pretty big risk to take with the viewership.

I think there's a LOT of show stuff that will be explored more deeply in the books, if it's even in the books. Here's a quote I found from the showrunners:

So much of what we’re doing diverges from the books at this point. And while there are certain key elements that will be the same, we’re not going to talk so much about that – and I don’t think George is either. People are going to be very surprised when they read the books after the show. They’re quite divergent in so many respects for the remainder of the show.

 reds8n wrote:
So.. the Arya thing

https://www.yahoo.com/news/amazing-game-thrones-fan-theory-233506988.html

the handed thing seems plausible enough

That all looks very solid to me.

 reds8n wrote:

Spoiler:

So.. the Arya thing


https://www.yahoo.com/news/amazing-game-thrones-fan-theory-233506988.html

the handed thing seems plausible enough

relating to that





that outfit/person on the left..... clothing & hair is very similar to what Arya wore previously isn't it ?

http://cdn.idigitaltimes.com/sites/idigitaltimes.com/files/2015/06/07/arya-stark.png

I am inclined to agree.

Though I have had that theory for a few days, that the house of black and white, tests people to see if someone has too much of an indiviuality are given to the water dancers, and those who lose their identity become faceless men.

They want people to lose individuality those who don't either fail or become water dancers.

Water Dancers are cool - lets see some more of them

 Mr Morden wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
This does seem odd. Is the whole Bravos thing in Arya's head? Like, did that poison really throw her in a coma or something, and she's in her subconscious?

I would not be that happy as we have had scenes from other peoples POV as well as Arya - on that note have any of the people who accompanied Daddy Tyrel mentioned the assassination there that she carried out? I can't recall.

Meryn trant didn't return to Westeros with Mace & when Arya first starts begging you can hear someone walking by talking about that Kingsguard member that got killed recently but aside from that it's not really been mentioned

 Alpharius wrote:

Your by now well documented hatred of Sam aside, I don't think those plots or characters are irrelevant, and most weren't forgotten either.

But overall, the TV Series has certainly become a more streamlined experience - and is quite possibly all the better for it.

I'm really glad we weren't subjected to.....quite a few of GRRM's meandering subplots and minor characters.

They streamlined it so much that time travel shenanigans have been added into the mix.

Streamlining itself would have been ok if they had carefully decided which things to remove and which things to simplify. I for one don't think the showrunners have done a great job out of it, and honestly since the TV series started to diverge heavily from the source material, things like Littlefinger's teleport device have become more the norm than the exception.

Compared to the books?

They've absolutely streamlined it!

I kinda dig that Arya theory.

A lot.

 Alpharius wrote:
Compared to the books?

They've absolutely streamlined it!

It's streamlined but that's not necessarily a good thing, at this point in the the show there's not really much of the scheming which (to me at least) was one of the major appeals of ASOAIF but now basically anything that comes close to a subtle move by a character is revealed by the next episode

 Hlaine Larkin mk2 wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Compared to the books?

They've absolutely streamlined it!

It's streamlined but that's not necessarily a good thing, at this point in the the show there's not really much of the scheming which (to me at least) was one of the major appeals of ASOAIF but now basically anything that comes close to a subtle move by a character is revealed by the next episode

The scheming is still there though as you say, they're just relying on the audience being capable of assuming time can pass between scenes and episodes without needing to waste half an episode on walky-talky-timey-wasty scenes(the ones that aren't necessary for a bit of character development of exposition, anyway). Everyone knows who Littlefinger is and what he's about, in general terms, we don't need further scenes of him smirking, glancing furtively, and spouting obvious doubletalk while winking furiously at the audience to get that he's a dirty scheming git who's probably not acting in good faith, just as we don't need further scenes of Jaime and Bronn bantering as they ride to the Riverlands to understand the relationship between those characters because we had those scenes already during the Dorne sequence and before that during the training scenes.

Basically the showrunners, unlike GRRM, have learned how to use "***" to keep the story moving along.

Littlefinger is that slimy bastard you love to hate. I like his expositions and screen time. Less so now that he's no longer in his brothel and we get the gratuitous boobage.

I miss the gratuitous boobage.

 kronk wrote:
Littlefinger is that slimy bastard you love to hate. I like his expositions and screen time. Less so now that he's no longer in his brothel and we get the gratuitous boobage.

I miss the gratuitous boobage.

Watch Versailles for that - check out Charles II's sister emerging from the lake...............

Little Finger's accent is now travelling more than he is.

 Hlaine Larkin mk2 wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Compared to the books?

They've absolutely streamlined it!

It's streamlined but that's not necessarily a good thing, at this point in the the show there's not really much of the scheming which (to me at least) was one of the major appeals of ASOAIF but now basically anything that comes close to a subtle move by a character is revealed by the next episode

I'm not sure if it's related, but since the showrunners started doing their own thing, Tyrion seems to have languished. I suspect that it's partially due to the pacing not giving the character much room to do his thing, and partially because they just don't write him as well as GRRM can.

Personally, I really miss the depth of the books at times, and see things in the show that feel unsatisfying because they're such shortcuts. That stuff can never fully make the translation into the TV medium. But I'm still allowed to miss it.

http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2016-06-10/does-this-game-of-thrones-silhouette-hint-at-the-return-of-another-fan-favourite-character


blimey eh ?


TBF could just be a flashback or magic disguise or whatever.

I liked that guy!

Yes, more of him!

I'd love to see Forel back, I don't care if in book or show form.

I'm quite thrilled to see him "water dancing" for a while, although I fear the choreography won't live up to my expectations, as in general they've got sloppier and sloppier as the show has progressed (the Dorne gardens fight being one of the worst fights I've ever seen in a show/film, and I've seen truly bad ones).

I've always pictured the Braavosi water dancing as a mixture of spanish and italian rapier fencing from the late XVI and XVII centuries. But since the hollywood dual wielding from the Tower of Joy scene, I don't know what to expect any more

Miltos Unspellablesurname was in Thronecast this week. It struck me as odd to have a guest actor so far removed from the current story. Now it seems entirely deliberate...

 Korinov wrote:
I'd love to see Forel back, I don't care if in book or show form.

I'm quite thrilled to see him "water dancing" for a while, although I fear the choreography won't live up to my expectations, as in general they've got sloppier and sloppier as the show has progressed (the Dorne gardens fight being one of the worst fights I've ever seen in a show/film, and I've seen truly bad ones).

I've always pictured the Braavosi water dancing as a mixture of spanish and italian rapier fencing from the late XVI and XVII centuries. But since the hollywood dual wielding from the Tower of Joy scene, I don't know what to expect any more

Minus the fight between Ned Stark and the Sword of the Morning.

The dorne stuff everyone thinks is terrible. Everyone has the same reaction to the dorne scenes. IE. (We don't care)