WearyTraveler

If R+L=J, way to go, simpleton! You pulled one over every one of those sophisticated schemers, right under their noses too!

I think they made a mistake by not speeding up Arya's story a little bit. Only until the part where she gets to wear a face. Then audiences will be riveted because they saw the faces, but J'aquen changing his fce for Arya was a long time ago, and the plot point loses its punch. If we saw Arya wearing someone else's face.... well, that would fire up all sorts of speculation and excitement. IMO. Part of the problem is, I think, that since she was the closing shot last season, people sort of expected her story to be something with more fireworks, not training in a dungeon.

There would be no dramatic tension, IMO, if they end the season with Dany surrounded by Dothraki. She has Drogon, she rode him, it will be assumed she's finally figured out how to command a fully grown dragon. What are the Dothraki going to do? Attack her and Drogon? Fat chance! And if they attack, Drogon will fry them. So, people will figure out Dany will get the Khalasar Vyseris thought he'd get, and include them in her army when she goes to Westeros. Big deal. That ending wouldn't leave me excited. But, oh well, if that's what they're doing, so be it.

I love this! Thank you for posting it. I specially love that Ned is the leader. He's followed, in order, by Robb, Oberyn, Khal Drogo, Catelyn, Lady, Greywind, Ygritte, Talisa, and Old Bear Mormont. 6 out of the top 10 are Starks. 8 out of the top 10 are related to a Northern storyline. I'm not going to argue that a Slate game like this is representative of the entire audience, but, man, do they reflect how I feel!!! (although I didn't care much for Khal Drogo and much less for Talisa)

Maybe it's wishful thinking on my part but if they are not closing the season with Dany riding Drogon, which is as powerful as images go, how will they close it? I agree with many others that leaving it at Jon's stabbing seems silly, since news of Harington filming will spread fairly quickly; so, could it be that they close the season with a Jon resurrection? I know they said they would close with a scene from the books, but, did they specify what book? Could it be a scene from the as of yet unpublished Winds of Winter?

I came to ask you for this post's hand in marriage, I'll be honored if you concede it.

The horn Jon found with the dragon glass that he gave to Sam. In the books, there are several mentions of that horn and I believe Sam still has it. I also think this could be the magic horn and that someone could blow it by accident. I do think the Wall might come down, or be breached, but I don't think the Walkers will make it past the neck.

Mel serves The Lord of Light. She doesn't care about Westeros. All she cares about is defeating the Other god. Presumably the Night King, AKA, the King of the White Walkers.

That journal idea sounds wonderful, if you're up to it. It's great to read all the stuff behind the scenes, at least for me.

Maybe they were forced to make land North of the Wall because of the weather or something. The show hasn't really established the geography of East Watch and all the other NW properties. But I suspect this is about amping up the drama. I don't care either way. That look between Jon and Thorne was awesome.

I may be remembering wrong, but from what I recall, Theon's internal monologue before he went to the Iron Islands to bring Robb's letter to Balon, showed no indication that he felt he had a knife on his throat, or was a prisoner or resented the Starks to the point of betrayal. He was jealous of the loyalty and admiration they inspired and wanted to be just like them in that regard. On his way to see his father, all he talks about is being heralded as a hero by his people and his father, sitting in the Lord's chair and basically just being the Ned Stark of the Iron Islands. It's only when he gets there and starts listening to his father and the other Ironborn's opinion of his time with the Starks that he starts feeling resentment and believing that he was a prisoner, like his family believed. I think this says a lot about Theon and the Starks, and I'll leave it a that because this is the episode thread and I get bored with long winded discussions of moral points that we can't know for sure because there's enough evidence in the text to support both sides of the argument.

That was my impression too. I thought he wouldn't have bothered to go down the hill for anything / anyone else. I also think he knows / perceives that Jon is not aware of his full powers yet, so, he came down his vantage point to scare him by making a big show of power. Maybe he thinks if he manages to get Jon scared enough to run away, he won't decide to fight them and will not, therefore, realize his full potential as AA. Maybe that can happen in future books, but I doubt it will in this series. Not only are the prophecies everywhere, but some have come true already (e.g. Maggie the Frog's prophecies-not all but several have become true). Weird! I hadn't noticed that. I would have thought that the first time Jon saw the wights and WW in the Fist of the First Men he would have at least said "FUCK!!!" As someone pointed out upthread, they have been a threat for longer than that. But, as Sam explains to Jon in the books, the records are confusing, and a lot of the information has been lost. They had no printing press, so all the records were made by hand on parchment paper. Some of the books in the NW have disintegrated or are illegible. There are several mentions in the books (mostly in Bran's chapters) about the Children of the Forest having knowledge about these things and all other sort of magic-related issues, but since the Children are gone (or so is the belief in Westeros), all that knowledge is gone too. It's a little bit like the tale of The Boy Who Cried Wolf. The first hundred years after the last WW assault people probably believed in the threat, but after thousands of years of long summers and long winters with no sign of the WW, people stopped believing and attributed those beliefs to superstitions. Tyrion even jokes about "Grumpkins" with Jon on the way to The Wall in AGOT. Even The Watch forgot all about it. Upon re-read of the books, I always find myself paying a lot more attention to Old Nan and the stories she told Bran, because it seems all of them were true. The last time Azor Ahai shut them down, way before the Targaryens showed up. Westeros was first inhabited by The Children, then came The First Men (the Starks are descendents of this group), who had an amicable relationship with them. Then came the Andals who brought iron, and their weapons being superior, they drove away The Children, who hid in the forests. So the Andals cut down all the Weirwoods in the South. At the time this story takes place in Westeros, most people believe The Children are extinct. It's Bran who discovers that they survived and are hiding north of The Wall. Brandon The Builder (one of the Stark's ancestors and a First Man) was the one who built The Wall after the WW were beat by AA the last time. The Children of the Forest put spells on it, which is one of the reasons the WWs and wights can't cross it and why Cold Hands had to ask Sam (a sworn Black Brother) to open the Weirwood gate for Bran. There's a story in one of Bran's chapters, IIRC, when they are hiding by the tower in the middle of a lake, about one of the Targaryen queens riding her dragon all the way to The Wall, so she could see it. My memory is fuzzy on the details, but basically The Wall was up long before Aegon crossed the Narrow Sea to invade and conquer Westeros. Martin himself denied this in response to a note by his editor in one manuscript (i.e. not a public thing, it was discovered fairly recently), so, I don't think that'll be the case. Although that would have been cool. It's weird because Benjen is such a minor character in the series, but one of my hopes is that we find out what happened to him. This mystery of his disappearance is very intriguing to me. Other brothers of the NW that have gone North have been lost, but they always find out what happened to them. When I read about Benjen missing in the books, it feels important, but I can't put my finger on exactly why it feels that way. It's heavily implied in the books, and Jon and Sam deduce it must be so that Valyrian steel can kill a WW, but there's no factual evidence of this in the books. And we have only seen one WW die by Jon's Valyrian sword on the show. So I was wondering if the show will do away with the Valyrian steel thing for simplicity's sake and the message we were meant to take away from that scene is that Jon's sword (and not all Valyrian swords) is special. It's been my theory for a while that Longclaw is Lightbringer. That it was given to the Mormonts, the family that lives the furthest north for safekeeping after the last battle with the White Walkers, but that the knowledge of just how important this sword is was also lost as time went by. It would be awesome to have that theory confirmed. She confesses to adultery (Lancel and the Kettleblacks) and pretends to repent for it. So, her punishment for that is the Walk. In exchange for this confession she gets to go home to await trial for the regicide in a sort of Medieval house arrest. I don't know. His actions toward Rickard and Brandon Stark seemed pretty crazy (from awoiaf): "Before any of the marriages could take place Lyanna disappeared. Brandon held Rhaegar Targaryen, the heir to the throne, responsible and went with a small company of young nobles to King's Landing to challenge Rhaegar. Aerys II had them all imprisoned on charges of conspiring to kill the crown prince and summoned their fathers to answer for the crimes of their sons. The nobles went and were immediately executed with their sons by Aerys. As was his right, Rickard demanded a trial by combat. Jaime Lannister relates that Aerys granted Rickard's request but to Aerys, the Targaryen champion was fire. He had Rickard burned, with the pyromancer Rossart lighting a fire beneath him while Rickard was dressed in his armor. Brandon was made to watch his father die with a noose around his neck and a sword just out of his reach. Trying to reach the sword to save his father, Brandon strangled himself."

Maybe they're just mourning the character, or trying to stir up some shit. Start a hashtag #SheBetterBeDead and maybe that'll get their attention

When / if the Faith Militant (FM) plot and the Faceless Men (FM) plots converge, it's going to take a few lines to determine who the poster is talking about :D Maybe we can refer toTthe Faith Militant as TFM to avoid possible confusions?

Just check that would not be breaking any confidentiality thing. We wouldn't want you to get in trouble on our account. And I suppose if the way they want you to dress might reveal something, then it should be in the spoiler thread. So exciting! Edited because grammar is important to me

I think for show spoilers we have to spoiler tag it in here.

Jorah doesn't get greyscale in the books, but Jon Connington does. The show is giving Jorah that part of his plot. Also, I think that to get infected you need to touch infected skin. The stone men that attacked Jorah and Tyrion were covered head to toe with the disease, Jorah's only got a little area on his arm active. I'm not completely sure about this, though, so, if someone has a better recollection of greyscale transmission from the books, by all means...

I think whenever someone tries to hide something (as they are blatantly trying to do here), it creates more interest in finding out what the secret is.

I totally teared up at when Sam was doing the funeral service for Aemon. Great delivery of those lines (and the music probably played a part too). Best part of the episode was seeing Ghost. Dorne is ridiculous. Cersei making empty threats that she will not be able to carry was fun. Regarding the direction of the Sansa plot, next week's preview is up on youtube and it seems (spoiler fonting the preview, just in case)

Chills!

I like that they said Can't wait for

Awesome!

Peter: "Ned Stark was a lot of fun" Backup singers: "So fun!" LMAO!!!

Well, if it's confirmed that the scene was shot that way, then, it's confirmed that the reason the actresses haven't filmed a scene together was because of backstage issues, and not because the plot dictated it, as TPTB would have us believe. I just wish people were more professional about things like this. It's ridiculous. The job is the job. Whoever started it, whoever is the most to blame, whatever the hell happened, they should just suck it up and do their jobs!

Win!