We expected more, maybe? Killing Bran would eliminate the history to how the White Walkers were created and the history of Westeros but who really cares about that if they plan on turning everyone into white walkers?

With only 3 episodes left & with the directors & RR Martin telling the public that the ending won't be what we expected, what other twists are even possible?

This times 100000. You guys are some salty crybabies.

Suggest you look at R/got or R/ASOIAF for less salt.

Hopefully the books are finished someday and give us more, but it’s worth remembering that the Night King isn’t even a character in the books.

The tactics were completely laughable but it was fun watching the slaughter.

From that in season 5 to becoming the king of a zomby army thousands of years later there's a million questions of what and how it happened. Instead we just get a silly explanation that he wants to kill Bran (himself) because he knows the history of the world. We definitely should have gotten more exposition on who the night king was.

The white walkers were an integral part of the show since the first episode/book. After tonight's episode it really feels like the whole thing was just a plot device to weaken Danny's army so that the final battle for the throne was close which feels a little cheap to me.

This episode is the GOAT, we aren't going to see anything so good for a very long time and there are critics itt. What do you ppl want? Jesus coming out of the sky?

Arya killing the Night King was the last thing I expected to see and it was fantastic.

I guess you could feel that way if literally the only thing you care about in watching the show is finding out who ends up on the Iron Throne.

The resolution of the Night King is the culmination of -Arya’s- storyline, which has been running parallel to all the wars and politics the other characters care about since the First season. There were so many call backs to her history from throughout the series in this episode, and it actually makes all her detours seems worth it. By contrast, the characters mosts involved in the main plot are shown to be almost entirely impotent here (Dany/Jon/Tyrion/Sansa).

Arya was one of the white walkers. She was the one they showed like two seconds before she attacked. Unless the walker they showed was reacting to her I guess.

I really enjoyed it overall, but I agree that the dark snowy setting was kind of a copout to keep the CGI costs reasonable. Couldn't make out what was happening a lot of the time. I didn't care to see 10 minutes of footage of Dany and Jon lost in the whirlwind or whatever that was. I also agree it feels like too quick of a wrap-up after 7 seasons of the looming walker threat. But I guess we all know they'd have to rush things this season.

Also I thought Jon was the prince who was promised... but he didn't even get to face the night king. Is Arya Azhor Ahai?

Let's remember that Arya is one of the Faceless Men, the world's premiere assassins. She put those skills to good use.

I thought it was about as good as they could do, given the build up so far.

NK needs to lose. The dude is also a badass, so it's got to be something a little flukey. No one is going to straight up beat him.

I kind of figured that after the conversation with Melissandre, Arya went to the Godswood and waited. Then she jumped out of the tree or something else. She clearly went there to wait for him. She obviously didn't run past the white walkers.

Yeah, cinematography wasn't great. I'm sure in a movie theater it would have looked much better. Maybe.

I don't get the complaint that it was tactically a bad battle. Other than shutting people in the crypt with a bunch of dead people, what could they have done better? They need to fight off approximately infinity zombies. There is no good plan for that.

Maybe they could/should have killed off a few more people, but I'm not too salty about that.

Was there any explanation as to why NK had to deal with Bran personally? Why wouldn't it have been good enough for one of the zombies to just get him.

Sure the dothraki charging at the dead wasnt some genius battle tactics but its not like they were gonna put all the thousand horses inside the walls either. And their whole savage-bravado thing going on probably would've somewhat warranted an attack like that, while the unsullied were kind of the shield to Hold-the-door.

Was the nightking literally just baiting the two dragons away from the fighting in the middle of the episode? seems like dany and jon compeltely ****ed over the defenses by going after him and then coming back after he dives in

I forgot about the dothraki charging. That was also stupid tactically. But as you say, very in character for them.

I really couldn't tell what the **** all the dragons were doing.

1) Not start the battle by suicide charging with your elite troops in pitch-black darkness? Sending cavalry into huge mass of enemies is pretty much the worst strategy in the world, since they lose their mobility. Cavalry should be in the flanks for mobility where they can support the infantry that holds the line. (Charging the enemy head-on is fine if the enemy could actually rout and/or the charge was followed by infantry charge)

2) Have way more fortification. Bring all the tables etc. from inside. Dug pitfalls, traps...

3) What's the point of trebuchets if you fire them once?

4) Creating some choke-points sound like a good plan against mindless zombie horde.

5) Have some weapons that actually kill the zombies. Not sure if the spears the unsullied carry actually do anything?

6) Oil, rocks, something to throw at the walls

7) Are there really only ~10 bows in the entire army?

8) Light up the area.

9) Use the dragons more. Don't land in middle of zombie horde?


Couple of other issues with the episode. How come Arya was suddenly alone in the library? That whole scene felt really out of place. She could (and should) just kill them all if she can so easily manipulate them. I wonder who thought crypts were a great idea? If the battle is lost, everyone inside dies. Just escape south. Conveniently Jorah is pretty much only person who returns from the suicide charge.

they probably fitted their spears with dragonglass they spent like 15 minutes in the first 2 episodes showing people dragging-around/doing-blacksmith-stuff with dragonglass speartips/whatever like arya's

I liked tonight's episode surprisingly.

Why does the NK want Bran what is it that he is getting from him?

Because If I want to enjoy standard hollywood trope cheese, I more than well served.

I am happy to pay dollar and watch End Game and thoroughly enjoy every minute of it.

GOT however scratched a different itch and was refreshing in how it broke the monopolistic straitjacket said tropes have over film and television. That was what made it GOAT.

In this episode it surrendered, bent over, and let all of those tropes **** it in the arse, stick their **** stained dicks in its mouth and leave it a worthless used up whore.

Whole episode was a massive low point in dramatic television.

Deus ex machina assassination of NK is probably the most unsatisfying event in television and makes all my investment in GOT seem cheap and pointless.

Hope there is tons more slow mo in the next episode.

IIRC from the books, Cersei Lannister has green eyes.

I agree with oafk.

I can live with less main character carnage than expected even though I think it's a total sellout. It makes the previous episode seem to useless, did we have an entire episode in the final season with only 6 episodes just about relishing in the good times only to have about 3 side characters die?

I can't live with having "winter is coming/here" etc slogans and an 8 YEAR build up only for the NK to get "LMAO gotcha'd" after an hour of relevance.

I mean seriously he's tanking dragon fire for fun and soloing dragons like it ain't no thing but apparently he is done if he just gets poked with a little dagger. I have nfi why they were even afraid of him it can't have been hard to just shoot him with an arrow because surely that too would suffice. Couldn't arya just sneak up on him before he came? Couldn't literally ANYONE who took the same faceless sneak course Arya did just solo him? We're talking the biggest and baddest guy on the show with 8 years of build up getting killed off in the most ridiculous fashion after an hour of being relevant. I don't get how people can be satisfied with waiting years and years and God knows how many hours of the show on planning how to beat him only to realize that anyone with any bit of stealth could solo them all. We have build up for 'the long night' jk it lasts one half episode.

I was thinking/hoping the main characters would be saved on the dragons and flown south and then we'd have some kind of united human guys vs undead or alternatively cersei betrays them and then loses vs the white walkers instead of this.

Horrible writing. It was a total sellout episode imo. I do think it was epic (although rip darkness) and many amazing shots and things going on but it was ridiculous how apparently anyone who's even a half relevant character can stand alone for hours fending off literally thousands of dead guys.

I guess now we know why they're called the white walkers - they did nothing but walk for 8 years.

If the show was called Medieval Walking Dead it would have been goat TV.

Just as a standard nit pick I have not seen anyone make yet.

Did Theon even have a silver bullet sword?

There are debates about the tactics, but having Bran as bait, and knowing it was the one place the NK was going to be and then having him just be gaurded by Theon and a few iron borne armed with just bows seemed like an obviously flawed idea, especially when you have so many superior expenda bro's on hand. The main thing is though he did not seem to have any weapon apart from his bow, had to pick up a spear off the ground etc.

Cliff: Why was there not a much more substantial force guarding Bran, why was there no planning beyond yea NK will come for Bran, Theon you shoot him with a bow mkay?

Using Bran as bait, fine, having what seemed like no planning for leveraging the bait, not fine.

Presumably the NK wouldn't come until he knew it was safe. He and his white homies only came in when Theon was alone (and already wounded or down?).

But yeah putting all your "who delivers the final blow?"-eggs in the Theon basket doesn't seem like a great idea. But then again it didn't really seem like optimising strategy was their cup of tea.

I mean seriously having arguably your strongest soldiers - on horseback - yolo charge into the night WELL KNOWING that the NK can resurrect both them and whoever they do manage to kill is quite possibly the most unexplainable and stupid tactical decision in the entire series. What could they possibly have hoped to accomplish?

Then again it did look badass and being badass always seemed to come before good ideas in dothraki culture..

Well... at least now I know what it's like for my half blind father when he has to watch football...

Why did stabbing the undead giant in the eye kill it? We've seen plenty of undead manage just fine without any eyes. Thought the only way to kill them was chop off the head or burn them.

For a moment, I thought the Night King was going to kneel before Bran. Not sure it would have made sense, but it would have explained their stupid tactics - Bran was just bringing the NK a bigger army.

Dragonglass

Dumb question but did one of Danny's dragons (the one all the walkers attacked) die? It looked like he was done for but last I remember he was trying to fly away and throwing the walkers off.

This episode was pretty epic in terms of the suspense and non stop action. Can't imagine how many man-hours of CGI must have gone into this.