You’re right. I got mixed up.
Can’t agree with you more about how Bran was used. One better way, if they weren’t going to use his previously shown powers of warging, like into Visyerion, might have been for them to show beforehand that Bran can magically fog the NK’s senses, and vice versa of course. Have Bran cloud the NK’s ability to sense and control his wights, have Arya take the face of one of the wights (like the one she stabbed in the library), and now you have a means to explain Arya getting close enough to the NK to shank him. Or have Bran do it while the NK is occupied with holding Arya up in the air.
I’m trimming not because I dislike your quotes, but for space. I mostly agree with what you wrote. I’ll say it was a pretty death scene for Jorah, and about as good as death as he was likely to get. Though not the kind of thing we’d been conditioned to expect in GOT, I admit. The Dothraki getting killed helps make the writing easier for the last three episodes. Also, disagreeing with Omni, upthread about the quality of the EFX, if you are going to shoot in all black tones to hide the mediocre CGI and other special effects, the idea of representing the Dothraki charge as points of light getting snuffed out was a brilliant stroke of cinematography.
Look, ever since D&D lost whoever was helping them write scripts for, oh, I dunno, ever since Tyrion whacked Tywin, the writing has gone from subtle to spectacle. Clever characters have betrayed their previous motivations: from Stannis and Roose, to Littlefinger and, frankly, Tyrion the last two or three seasons, and now the NK and whatever prophecies were thought to matter regarding his demise. I don’t expect smart, or conversant with medieval tactics, strategy, or logistics from GOT anymore; I expect pretty, ‘Ooooh!’ and ‘Whoa!’, and basically the medieval version of a Michael Bay movie. Which this episode was, so I’m content.
Bring on CleganeBowl! Get Hype!
If anyone has ever wondered “What would have happened if J.R.R. Tolkien had made all the same plot mistakes the creators of **Lost **made?” I think we have our answer.
So here are some of the things I actually liked about the show:
The visual set pieces were amazing. The Dothraki charging into the darkness may or may not have made sense, but the visual of their flaming swords going out one by one to be replaced by total darkness was chilling. Then to see the survivors come racing out of the darkness, running from an unseen but obviously incredibly deadly enemy was classic suspense building. When the dead finally came charging out of the blackness, it was a truly horrifying moment.
The image from the mountaintop of the Dothraki charging in a V formation was very cool, as well as seeing the bird’s-eye view of them getting slaughtered.
The dragon scenes looked great. The CGI plus darkness made it all look extremely real. The strafing runs were cool.
I liked Arya’s cat-and-mouse with the dead in the library, showing off her faceless man training and giving us some foreshadowing that she can get sneak around them.
The early scenes in the crypt, and the later scenes just before the dead began breaking out of their graves was also very well done, and got across the terror those people must have been feeling hearing the dead racing around overhead inside Winterfell and thinking that the battle was lost and it was only a matter of minutes before they too would join the army of the dead.
I liked how the dead were basically like ants, forming bridges with their own bodies, climbing over each other to get over the wall, etc.
Basically, judged as a visual experience (darkness aside) it was pretty spectacular. Lots of very cool set-pieces.
Now the bad:
Bran should have done something in that damned battle. The only warging his did was to send out some ravens to… verify that the Night King was on his way? It would not have taken much to make Bran live up to his potential. For example, during the battle in the air between the Night’s King and Jon/Denaeris, NK could have been thwarted by Ravens swarming him and harassing him and preventing him from seeing the other dragons. Or, Bran could have sensed Arya’s approach to the Godswood and done something to distract the Night’s King, like have a bunch of ravens fly in from the opposite direction, causing the Night’s King and others to momentarily look in that direction, giving Arya her opening. If there had been even that much, I would have accepted it. But given that Bran didn’t actually do anything, we watched him journey for seven years to get back to Winterfell for the big battle - then sit it out. That made no sense for the character’s arc.
But what really got me was the crazy plot armor for the main protagonists. I’m okay with most of them surviving, but if they were to survive it should have been because they were in a place where it was more likely for them to survive. But Jorah LED the Dothraki into that hell, and out of thousands of them he’s the only one that rides out? Grey Worm is at the head of the defensive phalanx when it is completely, overwhelmingly overrun by the dead, but somehow 5 minutes later he’s near the gates of Winterfell, still fighting? Brienne, Jamie and Pod were also on the front lines. All of them should have died almost instantly. In fact, I thought they had. When the Dothraki lights went out I said to my wife, “Well, that’s the end of Ser Jorah.” And when the powerful wave of the dead hit the front lines where the other main characters were I said, “Wow, they really are going to kill all of them off!” Nope. Plot armor saves the day.
Powerful, skilled knights died all around him, but useless Sam, who is ALSO on the front lines and who is a big target who can’t move very fast, somehow survives the initial onslaught, and manages to get back to Winterfell, where he is AGAIN repeatedly overrun by the dead but somehow survives?
Jamie, fighting with one hand, manages to survive multiple swarms of the dead? And they just repeatedly, needlessly gave us scenes of our favorite characters almost certainly about to die, then somehow surviving. That felt manipulative, and I hate it when I can tell when a show is trying to manipulate me.
Another trope they went to more than once - when necessary, the army of the dead was just a massive, unstoppable swarm. But if the plot required someone to have a ‘moment’, suddenly the space around them was cleared and the dead seemed to slow down or ignore them. For example, when Jon Snow is trying to get to the Night’s King, all the other dead around him don’t seem to know he’s there other than to shamble into his way one or two at a time so he could dispatch them. They should have swarmed all over him instantly.
It was those smaller things that really got to me. I can forgive the poor tactics, as it’s really hard to get that right in a way that’s also interesting and filmable, and at least they DID show some tactics. It wasn’t just a melee. I liked the planned retreat back into Winterfell, for example. And the Night’s King using a winter storm as a weapon to blind the dragons.
No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy, so it could be that they had a reasonable strategy going in, but it fell apart immediately when the Dothraki instantly died. Something like, 'The Dothraki will form a wedge and punch through the lines of the dead, then harass them from behind as the Unsullied take up the frontal attack." Then the Dothraki just… Died. And the plan went to hell. So that’s fine.
I also groaned when Lady Mormont killed the giant. Oh yes, the smallest warrior kills the biggest one. How poetic. Sure is lucky that of all the people that giant killed he chose to pick this one up and put it right up to his eye. Gah.
Less of that, and I would have been fine with the show. Only tiny changes needed to be made to make it much more palatable to the people watching who wanted to see a little more than just another big good vs evil battle.
Or…Bran’s REAL job as the memory of humanity is only tangentially related to the NK. NK was powerful sure, and maybe in his hubris he thought the raven would make a nice snack, but that doesn’t mean he had the foggiest clue what he was actually up against. Could be Bran wasn’t all that excited about meeting the NK because he didn’t see him as all that big a deal. A zombie king intent on overthrowing the very forces of nature? Trouble me not with such minutiae! Oh, fine! I can see you’re all going to be distracted by it until it’s dealt with, so just send it round my way when it shows up. I’ll be having a quick warg in the meantime. Might see who’s being born in the Riverlands, IDK.
I’m not disagreeing, just paraphrasing the point the podcast hosts were making.
Me personally, I’d have been satisfied if the same number of people survived had it have been achieved in a plausible organic way. But I’m not sure the unwashed masses would feel the same, the theory being that a certain subset of watchers have been trained to view the show as gleeful hero death porn. The came in expecting blood and are pissed they didn’t get it.
Wow, just getting caught up and I just don’t know where to start. When in doubt, bullet point:
- The Night King and the Red Woman know how to make an entrance. Especially The Night King’s pimp stroll through Winterfell. He looked like Avon Barksdale walking into The Pit with Stringer and Wee Bay on the flanks and I loved every second.
- Unsullied excluded, have you people ever heard of pole arms? They are specifically designed to help stop you from being overrun and they’re excellent at using your enemies momentum against them. I suggest you look into that before the next undead horde is at the gates.
- The Unsullied were fucking awesome to watch. I particularly enjoyed the “protect the retreat” maneuvers they were doing. I have no idea how accurate they were but it sure looked like they stepped up and took one for the team when things were ugly.
- Cavalry charge into unknown darkness with ALL of your cavalry? Please stop letting Jon Snow pick the strategy.
- Theon went out like a trooper and that is not what I expected of him.
- Sansa still being a dumbass and telling everybody ALL the secrets. Loose lips got your daddy killed but you just can’t help being Stark stupid. Must run in the family or something. Wasn’t she supposed to have learned from Cersei and Littlefinger?
I love the payoff to Arya’s storyline. For the first half of the story the poor girl literally suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, but after a brief stint at the Sandor Clegane School of Moral Philosophy she chose to stand against a sea of troubles and has done a damn fine job of ending them. Her story is an excellent parable for taking control of ones life and not allowing external factors to determine your ultimate outcome.
I’m taking the optimistic view that Bran’s story and importance isn’t ending with the NKs death. He was doing something really important while he was warging or whatever. WE get 3 episodes to learn what it is. I’m hoping it’s more “mystery” not sloppy storytelling.
Cersei has close to fifty thousand. 20 K golden company, 10 k Lannister, Eurons forces (no idea) + the remains of every house since she controls the food in that part of the world. Of course, other than the golden boys all numbers are approximate.
From the North
Sansa has control of Lord Broyce and the Knights of the Vale
Jon has the remains of the wildlings and nights watch + remains of Stannis’s army
Dany has dragon(s), always a force multiplier but no longer sure if plural is the correct word here. One might have imprinted on Jon.
Looks like 90 percent of the unsullied survived, so about 8 k and an indeterminate number of Dothraki +house greyjoy is pledged to Dany as well
On the board still between Sansa and Jon, the winterfell army plus the banner men
Lots of room for activities
I don’t think we disagree here at all! It was absolutely brilliant, the tactics may have sucked but the payoff was worth it.
I don’t subscribe to the theory that they shot it shitty to hide the effects at all. My position, shared by the A/V Home Theater wonks out there, is that the good cinematography and photography was ruined by the compression.
I like the first post I’m reading there ::
Cribbing from elsewhere, but that kind of charge is exactly in their character: insanely aggressive, bold, and utterly idiotic against anything other than rabble.
Honestly the army of the dead were rabble, if we’re looking at this with an eye to medieval tactics. The army of the dead had no organization or supportive formations, no or few polearms to keep heavy cavalry at bay: they were a loose mass of aggressive light infantry. Which is what you’re supposed to be able to ride down with a mass of horse.
Looked really cool though, didn’t it?
It’s like all the main characters were protected by invisible dumpsters.
I was disagreeing with you about the quality of the FX. I thought their reach exceeded their financial grasp, and they used dark cinematography and jump cuts to hide it. I concede I’m probably wrong, and that a lot of the bitching I’ve read elsewhere is due to compression artifacts.
That’s not me. I’m not looking for “blood porn”. What I was looking for was a dramatic sense of danger. The possibility that the battle could go either way, that characters could be killed - that’s what makes watching a battle compelling.
Most of the previous action scenes in this show had that. Hardhome felt like a significant fraction of the Night’s Watch could’ve died (and the wildlings). Maybe it’d be hard to believe that main character Jon Snow himself would die, but there was definitely tension there. Battle of the Bastards felt like it could go badly for the Starks. I actually hated the Deus Ex Sansa way that it ended (and talked about that at length), but during the actual battle, there’s real tension there. It feels like it can go either way. The wildlings very well could’ve won the Battle of the Wall, changing the game up a bit.
But this battle didn’t have that. As soon as they used the Dothraki slaughter to show that “oh shit, the army of the dead might actually win”, they immediately undermined it by having Jorah come back unscathed, and then ridiculously, over the top undermined it by countless scenes in which Brienne, Podrick, Jaime, and Grey Worm were completely swarmed with undead, surrounded by them, covered on top with them, overpowered by them… and then were just fine two scenes later with no explanation.
Almost every other battle scene in the show (with the possible exception of the retarded capture a wight plotline of last scene) had that underlying tension that anything could happen. And before you say “well, shows don’t kill their main characters”, this show uniquely has the credibility to do exactly that because it has done it before.
So the show has a track record of creating battles with dramatic tension and that what appear to be main characters aren’t invincible, and we have a unique 8 year investment in these characters, so we naturally very much care about them, and we should be on the edge of our seats and sick to our stomach when the battle seems to be going poorly. The show has a unique position to make 8 years of trope breaking and investment of characters amount to one of the most tense, suspenseful battles of all time.
But they showed us early on that no one was really in danger. The good guys were going to win. Anyone who died was going to die exactly how you’d expect them to die, exactly like they’d have chosen to die.
That’s not wanting blood porn. That’s wanting payoff and good storytelling after 8 years of investment. Not a sudden change from a groundbreaking show into a standard cliche fantasy/superhero movie.
I think your POV exactly mirrors my own. With the exception of Lyanna…I’m totally ok with that little nugget of fan service. That said, with all it’s flaws, I was still rapt watching it.
They had the budget to blow up a church in an impressive green fireball, and to make convincing dragons and their associated doings. And Hardhome wasn’t exactly Halloween makeup on local highschoolers. Knowing nothing else about it, I’d go with the techies on this one. It was shot to be disorienting, and the broadcaster fuxed it all up.
That’s what the show says.
If you melt Valyrian steel, it isn’t Valyrian steel any more. Valyrian steel isn’t a particular material, its qualities depend on how it is made. And that takes a very special expertise.
Also, about all the heroes surviving: NOW when they’re killed by more predictable Lannister skullduggery it will be even that much more unjust. “X survived at Winterfell, maybe even Battle of the Bastards, and got taken down by a poison kiss, or the pox, or a funny whelk.” That kind of echoes Ned The Badass being an awesome soldier and just ruler…getting his head lopped off at the word of an emo teenager.
I think they made some choices to save money and make it “shootable”. The Dothraki dying fast and off screen saved a lot of time and money. Most of the battle on the ground being shrouded in the blizzard, big CGI savings for the aerial battles. The sea of the dead beyond the fire of the trench being obscured in the dark required a lot less tiling. So they definitely did some of that.
But the dismal contrast on the stuff they wanted you to see like the dragon fights and the close quarter combat wasn’t their fault. We know they are proud of the dragon CGI and the army of the dead CGI from lots of previous episodes.