I think i read they said they had about 13 episodes left after this season and that they might split that into 2 seasons.
Yeah, Arya’s story is really dragging. It’s kinda unfortunate that her character is so popular, otherwise they might just fast forward her story without checking in so much.
That scene in the tunnel with Hodor, Bran, Meera, and Leaf running from the horde of wights… damn that was good stuff! Very creepy.
Uh oh, a red priestess employed to help Dany? This won’t end well.
Do you think Jorah will find a cure, as his queen commands?
A girl did not appear to appreciate the theatre.
I have a theory. Arya will continue her training until one day the Faceless Men say, “Well done! You’re very nearly one of us! There’s just one more thing you need to do to prove that you’re no longer Arya Stark.”
Then they bring in her improbably-captured direwolf and make her slit its throat.
I base this theory on the fact that the show likes to hurt me.
Yeah, there was no reason to drag the “will she, won’t she” murder storyline into another episode.
Yeah, and how many training scenes have we had? It’s gotta be like 6 by now.
Well, at we know that it’s survivable.
We know from Sam that the children used obsidian for hunting, every White Walker that entered that cave should have been hit with an arrow or spear.
The cave attack only made sense in a Hollywood way. What did the Night’s King’s earthquake attack actually do? He and his 3 horsemen enter the cave and the Wights have to go around the fire and up and over on top of the hill… and then burrow through the root system and rocks to get to the center waaaay before the White Walkers…also… why is there a door in this cave anyway? Was that established before? (maybe in the first episode this season when Meera is hanging outside.
Otherwise… sad that Summer went out this way and poor Hodor.
So this also establishes that Bran doesn’t need a Weirwood tree to time travel… he was no longer touching the tree while still in the past…he was also Warging AND timetravel viewing at the same time.
I also think its cheap to have Sansa lie for no reason (pretty sure no one in the room even knows who Little Finger is other than Davos and Melisandre being vaguely aware of him) and then get called out on it by Brienne and then cut the scene before she explains… it gives the impression that the writers don’t know why she’d lie either, but they needed drama.
I also now think the Vale may show up on Ramsay’s side in the battle with the plan of crushing Jon’ army and having Ramsay indebted to Little Finger. Little Finger’s plan would be to keep Sansa as a “hostage” in the Vale.
And are they laying groundwork for a Sansa/Jon coupling? I’m not sure what to make of the silly smiles at each other and people are starting to say HALF brother a lot–I think to ease into the idea if Jons revealed not to be Ned’s son.
I have a lot of critiques of the episode but I did really like it.
Other questions: What did Varys hear when his junk was burned? Why did Sansa lie about where she heard about Blackfish? How’m I gonna ask someone to hold the elevator from now on without bursting into tears?
I don’t think it was for no reason, she lied because they are all talking about doing whatever it takes to get help at basically her request and she just turned down the entire Vale because she was pissed about taking it in the butt.
For the questions about Hodor, the way I took it is that Bran was stuck in the dream/past and accessed the adult Hodor’s mind by using the younger Hodor as a conduit. This meant that the younger Hodor literally experienced his own violent death in his mind, which caused permanent traumatic brain injury.
Amazing episode, I thought.
I think Sansa lied because she knows that turning away the help of the Vale when she is guilting her (half) brother into attacking Winterfell is one of the stupider moves made so far in the series. She’s embarrassed.
At some point in the future, when I rewatch the series from the start, Hodor’s scenes will be very different.
Sansa should have just killed Littlefinger and sent ravens to the Reeds and Yohn Royce to bring the army up.
A little too cut throat for her and Brienne though.
Wait, was that Richard E. Fucking Grant as one of the performers?
It looks like we’ll get at least one more episode of Miss Lannister’s Murder Mysteries! 
I wonder home many kings/lords they’ve lost that way (easy enough to write off any deaths or survivals as the Drowned God having the finally say though.)
Same here.
Actually, I agree it would have been good to show the first contender actually drowning after his triumph.
I for one don’t believe that Ned died an idiot.
Perhaps a little too blinded by his honorbinding.
I rewatched the scene to try to firm up my take on it. I agree with your second sentence, that young Hodor experienced all the terror, fear, and urgency of older Hodor’s death throes. I’m not sure your second sentence holds up. We see Bran warg into older Hodor to snap him out of his fear huddle. (Side note: his tendency to be nervous around frantic situations fits right in with his younger self’s mindfuck.) Older Hodor gets all the way outside the cave before Bran is back in Winterfell when we see younger Hodor go eyes-up. I figured Bran was just in hyper-over-drive mode and heard his friends yelling for Hodor to hold the door, and Bran double-dipped his warging into younger Hodor, crossing the streams. Or something.
To be honest, I suspect the exact timeline of who was warging where and when was driven in significant part by dramatic needs, possibly at the expense of super-consistent science/magic. And I’m okay with that.