CletusMusashi

When you're new and you don't know where to go to why don't you go where Mountain sleeps? Givin' us the creeps!

There's so many weird meta jokes going on this season. Weird not because they're meta, but because they seem to know exactly what's wrong, but would rather point at it than fix it. Makes me wonder if the need to cut six+ minutes off their film was a reference to the show's current running time being so off. As usual, I have mixed feelings about the episode. But I would have loved to see that whole movie!

I think the Tyrells are powerful enough that if Olenna tells the one in charge that they can phone it in on their virginity inspection, they don't argue with her. "Yes, my lady, of course. To question Lady Margaery would be absurd. And, yes, you're quite right about the others as well. Loras is completely straight and Mace is totally not a muppet."

Last season, I read him as obviously prepubecent because of his reaction to to Margaery. I can believe in dragons. I can believe in worgs. I can believe in Faceless Men, White Walkers, or magical fire priestesses. But one thing I had serious problems with was the idea that a pubescent boy, right after having Natalie Dormer sneak into his bedroom and flirt with him, would just happily roll over and go to sleep afterwards. Biology doesn't work like that, folks. Had Tommen been anywhere close to thirteen last year, I guarantee that there is one thing he would have done before going to sleep.

All we really know about FrankenMountain is: The Mountain did not actually die when he fought Oberyn. Qyburn was kicked out of Maesterworts for being involved in strange medical experiments. He told Cersei that the process he was using would "change" him. When asked if it would make him weaker, he said "no" in a very sinister tone. Somebody big is under a sheet, occasionally grunting and moving. And, maybe, just maybe, he is now green, has bolts in his neck, and eats dwarf heads and rats. Think of the merchandising possibilities if George R. R. Martin decides to put out a breakfast cereal.

Where the hell is Ser Pounce? I mean, surely the CGI budget can handle that?

So did they feed Slynt to the Thenn prisoners? It would save a lot on rations. I'm not even sure if Littlefinger has a plan any more. I think he just randomly does things to be sneaky. Like he has a bucket list of people he hasn't lied to yet. I think Roose Bolton thinks that, too. I think Cersei is mostly trying to work with the sparrows because of the amount of blackmail information they have, because of Lancel. We need Lady Olenna back. King's Landing just isn't the same any more. No Joffrey, no Tywin, no Olenna, no Varys.... and who do they have instead? Qyburn and Mace Tyrell? Please. Somebody's got to stir some shit up there. Maybe Ser Pounce will start eating sparrows.

Jon's sword is Valyrian, isn't it? Not sure if Robb's was.

Tyrion, you are a four foot tall very white man with an obvious King's Landing accent. Why would you think that putting up your hood would change that? So Jorah's spent all this time drinking in a Khaleesi-themed whorehouse. Yeah, that sounds about right. Littlefinger and Roose were good, but Littlefinger and Sansa were even duller than Bran. So what's the dead rat for? Does FrankenMountain eat rats now? Which does he like better, rats or dwarf heads? Coolest thing about Jon Snow executing Slynt was the way he sat back and finished his beer first. This was not a good week to be a flabby old man, was it?

Budgetary limits.

I'd like to change my vote rankings, I think if it really came down to a final 2 of Dan and Will, I would vote for Will. Because Will is already a D-list celebrity, so being a "Survivor" winner gives him nothing except money. Dan, meanwhile, would spend the rest of his life strutting around and gloating about being the greatest player of all time. I don't want him to have that. Will is going to dance around on Youtube and think he's awesome no matter what, so whether he wins or not isn't going to improve his happiness quite as much as it would Dan's. I do not want either of them to be happy.

So I guess here are the ones I'm hoping to win, in order: 1. Shirin. Honestly, I think if Mike wins, he'll have earned it more. He fights hard for every time he avoids being voted out. But I'd be happier to see Shirin win. Mainly because I like her and almost nobody else does. And because, honestly, this would be huge for her. Mike is already pretty happy and confident and self-actualized. Winning is worth more than just the money, to almost anybody, but to some it's worth way more than to others. 2. Mike. This ends the list of winners who I would be happy with. 3. Sierra. I don't even like Sierra. She's a spineless follower who's been shooting for the bronze this entire game. But, if she wins, it will annoy Jeff more than... 4. Tyler. I also don't like Tyler. He does want to win, but doesn't seem interested in anything besides that. No sense of fun or humor, no snarky confessionals about how he can't believe how horrible the people in his alliance are but he's stuck with them, no... anything, except "Tylerbot seeks victory. Scanning for allies. Alliance confirmed. Simulate humanization by employing interaction protocol with allies. Refuel with rice. Re-confirm alliances. Power down." What the hell does a robot need with a million dollars? I mean, a cool robot like Bender, sure. But not Tyler. 5. Carolyn. I think she's a mean, bitter person, but she can be quite scrappy in the challenges, and she was smart enough find an idol. Her gameplay is solid. I just don't like her personally. But I can only take off so many points for her treatment of Shirin, because everyone below her on the list has been at least as noxious. 6. Oh boy. Do I really have to vote any of these people? I guess Rodney. Not because I like him any more than I like Dan or Will, but simply because he'd be the most likely to spend all the money on cocaine, Yeager, and a fast new car in order to immediately crash into a tree and kill himself. 7. Either Will or Dan, obviously. I think I'd just have to go by their final answers/ speeches. But if that didn't help, I actually might just walk out there and, instead of a jury question, take out a coin and say "You're both assholes, but heads it's you, tails it's you," then flip it, show them, say "Whatever," and walk away. Wow. This season really is awful, isn't it?

Never actually liked him, but there was just a sort of vibe of shallow, crowd-pleasing vacancy to him that I was never really sure if it was him, or an act, or just me misinterpreting his mannerisms, or whatever. But apparently there's more to him than meets the eye. Under all that surface stupidity, he does in fact have a personality. I wish he didn't. Like Dan last week, he has now officially joined my actual 'hate" list.

Best thing about a Shirin victory would be that Jeff would finally quit.

I love this idea! Maybe she flies under the radar for a while because Mike gets voted out and nobody sees her as a threat, so they keep on infighting and picking at each other... it's a long shot, but it could happen! In that case, she could easily have votes from Jenn, Hali, Joe, and Mike. Meanwhile, Will, Tyler and Caroline would vote for whichever man pissed them off less, and Sierra would vote for whichever man used "Shut up and vote for me, you stupid bitch" as his jury speech. What happens if it's a draw, though? Please let the tie breaker be a spelling puzzle!

How funny would it have been if Jenn had won the extra vote and saved it for when she was on jury?

So Dan is going to ride the coat-tails of the biggest group he can, and his big plan is to save his ass at F5 or whatever by using... something that he won randomly by grabbing a rock. How the hell does he expect to win this game? Nobody in Sharegate came across well. At all. Don't buy Rodney's crap for a second about how Mike almost "cost" everyone's chance to have that special moment. First of all, you're out there for like a month. Less, for most of them. After you're out, you can read all the letters you want. Quit being such crybabies. Second of all, let me explain how auctions work. If you choose not to buy steak dinners or pictures from home, you have more money to buy game advantages with than if you do choose to buy those things. Anyone who is happy to just draw lots for it obviously doesn't want it as much as somebody who wants to save their money for it. There is nobody I (usually) like in this thing any more except for Mike and Shireen. But even if he wins next week and gives his HII to Shirin, that's only one asshole that they can remove. The week after that, one of them will be gone anyway, and then the other. Don't think I can watch all the way through just for those other people.

So... that secret food stash that Will let everybody eat... what was it exactly? Just a bigass treasure chest full of crazy pills?

This episode had kind of a slow start. At first I thought the only laughs I was going to get were from Chang breaking an egg over and over again. Not that I didn't laugh, but... the Dean and Annie were too frantic, Abed making jokes about not being funny is not as funny as Abed being funny, and the overall dynamic of the group has just not felt right this season. But then it found itself, and it stayed found. I think that if they'd tightened it up into a traditional pre-Yahoo length, it would have been great. But they just don't know what to do with this extra time. The lack of editing distillation takes great scripts and turns them into bloated, diluted half hours. Harmon used to go on the DVD commentaries and talk about how, before script editing, many of their episodes would have had running times of over forty minutes. I used to think "Wow! I'd love to see that!" But honestly, it appears that there is a correct length for an episode of "Community" to be, and that length, unfortunately, is 22 minutes.

Or it's a term he used for very tall Crows.

Qyburn is increasingly becoming one of the back-characters I'm most curious about. What is he doing with The Mountain? What does his laboratory look like? Are there steampunk goggles involved? I kind of hate steampunk, but I do feel that Qyburn should have the goggles. I also feel like we're missing out on some great stuff with Margaery and Tommen. The whole time Cersei was pulling her coupe in the council chamber, they were probably having a tea party with Ser Pounce. And... quite possibly the Mountain, depending on how Qyburn's experiments are progressing. Rickon is useless, but I would tolerate him just to see Osha and Shaggydog again. Bran can stay missing as long as he wants, though. And Ser Jorah? I feel like somewhere in the deserts of Essos, there's a very tired man, pushing aside hundreds and hundreds of empty whisky bottle... yelling "Come on, buddy, you've been here for two months! I need to mop this bar up and go home!"

So what the hell is Qyburn using the dwarf head for? Gregor's hands are still weak, and he needs heads to crush for exercise? Pieces of skull are going to be implanted all over Gregor's body. as subcutaneous armor? Qyburn is planning to moonlight as a ventriloquist? Or, and please let it be this one... Gregor's brain was damaged by the poison, so the dwarf head is going to be reanimated and attached on top of it, to provide a human brain to give the subhuman brain directions. Just like Master Blaster.

Littlefinger never even realized who Podrick was, did he? Brienne Schmienne, Podrick was the boy who had Littlefinger's whores refusing to take money! Not sure if he would have tried to kill him, hire him, or pump him for secrets the way Tyrion and Bronn did, but there certainly would have been some reaction! You know what worries me about Arya? Her entire training arc might just be A Man standing in front of a chalkboard explaining all the new grammar rules. "... and on the third day of the second month, a girl may use one first person pronoun per five sentences, but on the fourth day she may not even use proper nouns. A girl would be wise not to travel at that time; trying to get directions then is a real bitch ..." Was Ghost even in this episode? Damn it, writers, don't even think about letting Shireen visit the wall without getting to pet a gigantic dire doggy!

Dany's people really need to get better at thinking about crowd security. Why are there so many damned throwing rocks lying around outside the castle? Send a guy out with a wheelbarrow, why don't you?

Ten random thoughts: 1. This was way more fun than last week. 2. Sam, Gilly, and Shireen need more scenes together. Also, loved Sam's speech. Especially him scoring points on Slynt! 3. Some of the actors are really owning their material. I don't think Dany made any brilliant decisions this week, but the way she was showing all the conflict made me cheer for the show. Maybe not so much for the character, but the actress? Hell yeah! Also completely awesome, Maester Aemon's obvious glee at holding back that one vote, just in case it might come in handy. 4. Varys and Tyrion gave me the gratuitous shoutout to "Road to.." movies that I've been waiting for. I'll try to shut up about it now. 5. Littlefinger did a very good job of putting Brienne in her place. On paper. But in actual performance: the Wheel of Accents makes it a lot harder to consider him the voice of sanity. 6. Why is it that Sandy is sending huge ridiculous threatmails built around G.I. Joe surplus gag dildos... yet is so lackadaisical about her own villainous appearance that she's frumping around Dorne with Mom hair? 7. Bronn is back! Yay! 8. Cersei's council scene was perfect! I loved the mixed reactions. 9. I'm skeptical that Qyburn was truly planning an experiment that required, for some reason, a dwarf skull. I think he just wanted a little head. 10. I'm very sorry about that last thought.