Game of Thrones season 7 (with untagged spoilers, apparently)

[Mechalich]

I don't find the obstacles that hard to believe. Betrayals of a liege lord by an important bannerman isn't exactly unprecedented, and our first look at Randyl Tarly didn't exactly paint him as loyal. From the way he treated his son and his family, he clearly valued rank, appearances, and the appearance of honor more than honor itself, so it's not exactly a surprise that he'd betray his liege lord for the promise of being named Warden of the Reach. It's also not a surprise that the shrewd Lannisters would make that offer.

I can buy Randyl's betrayal. I can even buy him bringing a fair proportion of the Tyrell bannermen and remaining Stormlands lords along with him (in the books after all, he already has an command of roughly those forces). That's fine. What I don't buy is what I mentioned up thread - him taking Highgarden in some kind of lightning strike. That's the poor justification. Much more reasonably, if Tarly sides with the Lannisters he can use his army to besiege Highgarden and bottle up all remaining Westerosi allies - including any Dornish still inclined to side with Dany or simply against House Lannister - in the south where they can't do anything.

While the timing and success of Euron's attack was unexpected, it also wasn't exactly an unforeseeable danger. Though Yara and Theon stole "the best" of the Ironborn ships, they didn't get the majority--particularly when considering the thousand ships Euron built after they left. More importantly, they had the support of none of the high ranking captains, meaning that their crews and officers are likely less capable than Euron's. The only implausible part of this whole situation was that Tyrion and Varys signed off on putting 2/3 of their Westerosi eggs in one basket, knowing that a larger, better crewed, and thoroughly angry basket was out there somewhere looking for it. (Okay, I tortured that metaphor a bit there.)

Keep in mind that Yara's fleet isn't the only one Dany has - she has the ships belonging to House Martell and Tyrell as well as shown in the closing shot of season 6. Euron's having a better fleet than all of those is implausible. The implication here is that Dany controls the Redwyne fleet - since it was sworn to house Tyrell (actually, this is probably the fleet ferrying the Unsullied, which would explain why it's not with Yara when Euron attacks). Perhaps Euron's fleet is more powerful overall, but he should at least be taking some serious losses in these naval engagements. And of course, it's totally unclear how Euron teleported his fleet around the continent to get from just south of Dragonstone to Casterly Rock while stopping in King's Landing, as mentioned.

Even without "unbelievable" obstacles, Dany's conquest wouldn't have necessarily been the cakewalk you believe. The North is bloodied, that part is true. The Stormlands, certainly not at full strength, but also not necessarily crippled. Losses at the Battle of Black Water and the failed march on Winterfell, but also substantial numbers of deserters possibly surviving, and an unknown number who chose to stand down rather than get involved in a war between brothers in the first place. More importantly, any viable forces still there have no baggage preventing cooperation with the North.

Geography prevents forces in the North from effectively coordinating with anyone else. At this point in the story the Riverlands cannot support a campaign. Jon can march troops to Moat Cailin and hold that against pretty much whomever he wishes (minus dragons of course) but he can't attack south. I suppose he could besiege Dragonstone by sea - it's not clear how many warships the Manderlys can muster - but what would that accomplish?

There are certainly Stormlands forces, many of them are presumably fighting with Lord Tarly, but their elite forces died with Stannis either at the Blackwater or in the North (many of the deserters from Stannis' forces presumably joined the Boltons).

The knights of the Vale are still strong. You argue that they can be ignored because Littlefinger is "no friend" of Cersei. Two problems with that--first, that latter bit isn't necessarily true. Neither Littlefinger nor Cersei would let what's happened between them prevent them from working together. Cersei knows he's a schemer, but she doesn't know the extent to which he was responsible setting events in motion that lead to her children's deaths, the only thing I would see as an absolute dealbreaker. They would cooperate against Dany's invasion if it were necessary, and if each thought it would be easier to depose or neutralize the other than to remove Dany after letting her entrench. Second, even of Baelish refuses to work with Cersei (or vice versa), you still can't ignore him. His goal is the Iron Throne. In the best case scenario, he sees the easiest path there to be to help Dany wipe out all the other contenders first. In most other scenarios, she has to fight the Vale eventually, either because LF joins the biggest or most easily betrayed Westerosi force to oppose her, or because she chooses to come for the Vale.

Okay, sure, Littlefinger could do anything, but his hold on the Vale is decidedly not absolute. It's based entirely on what he can both 1. manipulate Robyn Arryn into doing, which is admittedly a whole lot and 2. get they actual knights of the Vale to do without murdering him, which is considerably less. Siding with the Lannisters is probably not on the list, and again it would be physically extremely challenging to move a large army across the devastated Riverlands to fight in the south anyway.

As for the relative strengths of the foreign forces and the Westerosi adversaries, we have few direct comparisons. From their meeting, they believe all that Dany's foreign forces alone could quickly raze King's Landing with no help from Dorne or Highgarden. However, since they're assuming the Lannisters are all at the Rock, that means they're not counting them as defenders of King's Landing when making that comparison. On the other hand, Tyrion explicitly described the Unsullied as inferior in number to the Lannister army. He also said they had less armor, which I take to mean inferior armor on each Unsullied, and not that he was needlessly pointing out that having fewer men means having fewer sets of armor. The Dothraki are constantly called a horde--this strongly implies that they outnumber the Unsullied, but we don't really know for sure whether they outnumber their potential adversaries, or by how much. In terms of both numbers and effectiveness, it's a complete wildcard as far as we know. From what we've seen, the superior weapons and armor of a Westerosi knight presents a substantial force multiplier against the lightly armed and unarmored Dothraki. Depending on the terrain and the nature of the fight, the Dothraki might need to outnumber the defenders 10 to 1 in order to guarantee a win... or they might force a fight on just the right kind of terrain and be the ones to beat a larger force themselves.

The Dothraki are supposed to be steppe barbarians. All other things being equal, history suggests that the Dothraki would actually be one to one superior to knights. Of course the show has them swinging those blasted kopeshes around and not firing arrows like they should be doing so I really don't know. The real weakness of the Dothraki is their lack of siege weaponry (a common steppe barbarian problem until the Mongols just stole a bunch of designs and engineers from their adversaries) and their inability to overthrow castles - though apparently the show has dispensed with that particular problem. It is worth noting that back in the beginning of the series, just Khal Drogo's forces alone were considered a massive threat to the stability of a nominally unified and undamaged Westeros, and Dany supposedly has the forces of several khalasar at this point (though she was probably limited in how many she could bring).


Ultimately, yes there were ways for the show to make things more challenging for Dany in this current season, it was even necessary that they do so. I actually like the Tarly betrayal as a plot point - simply because the character has an established motive in his xenophobia. However the show has played sloppily wit the strategic picture throughout this season and has allowed things to swing back and forth far too rapidly to the point that I find it undercuts the tension rather than builds it. Everyone taking turns playing the 'ultimate stratagem!' card to swing the pendulum to their side quickly becomes cheesy and devolves into waiting for the last move.

[Dr.Samurai]

It just seems at this point that we're watching like... a recap of Dany's conquering of Westeros. The battle at sea between Ironborn fleets was disappointing, as was the taking of Casterly Rock and Highgarden. We're just sort of fast-forwarding through a power rebalance.

But any one of those could have had a lot more drama and action in them. Maybe part of my disappointment is my expectations. I thought we'd see Dany attempting to conquer Westeros as opposed to simply being told how her forces are getting wrecked wherever they go.

I don't mind them getting wrecked. A large part of waiting for this season to begin is speculating how Cersei would repel Dany's forces. But it'd be cool to see it.

Was a reason given for shortening the seasons?

[CWater]

It just seems at this point that we're watching like... a recap of Dany's conquering of Westeros. The battle at sea between Ironborn fleets was disappointing, as was the taking of Casterly Rock and Highgarden. We're just sort of fast-forwarding through a power rebalance.

But any one of those could have had a lot more drama and action in them. Maybe part of my disappointment is my expectations. I thought we'd see Dany attempting to conquer Westeros as opposed to simply being told how her forces are getting wrecked wherever they go.

I don't mind them getting wrecked. A large part of waiting for this season to begin is speculating how Cersei would repel Dany's forces. But it'd be cool to see it.

Was a reason given for shortening the seasons?

Money. Filming GoT is sadly hideously expensive, and with the conclusion getting closer they wanted to be able to use their resources more sparingly. We've yet to see anything too spectacular as a result, but we're not even halfway through this season yet, so I've not lost hope yet. I don't mind the Casterly Rock, Highgarden and Yara's fleet battles to being short or nonexistent, neither of the castles had even been shown before and it seems like the deciding battles will be elsewhere. Not saying these battles weren't important, they clearly turned the tables more to Cercei's favour, but they were more about setting up the stage.

So if the show creators chose to invest more in some yet-to-be-seen battle that is more crucial (or other scenes expensive for other reasons), I don't mind if they'll do those well.

[Dr.Samurai]

I don't really know how stuff like hbo works. I thought given how popular GoT is money wouldn't be an issue. But I guess they don't make enough money from it to cover production?

[CWater]

I don't really know how stuff like hbo works. I thought given how popular GoT is money wouldn't be an issue. But I guess they don't make enough money from it to cover production?

Making money from a TV show is actually not that easy. I'm not particularly knowledgeable in this area, but to my understanding most of the money comes from channel subscriptions or from selling the show to other channels (who have their own ways of making it profit them, subscriptions of their own or ads). The side products, etc. probably make some too, but I don't know how much that goes to HBO.

Also remember that while GoT is very popular, it's also one, if not the, most pirated shows in the world, which means that it has a great number of viewers that make no contribution to pay for the costs of its production, which again is a LOT. (Settings, clothes, armour, weapons, wages for actors, extras, stuntmen, consults, crewmen, etc., location rent and set up, transport, CGI, marketing, animals, wages for their handlers, plus a lot of other things I probably wouldn't even think about.) It's certainly not a case where money's not an issue.

(Also, in the end of the day, a show also needs to make enough money to not only cover the costs, but also make a profit for someone, because that's how the industry works. GoT is enjoyable, but it's not art that is made just for it's own sake, even though that would be nice.)

[solidork]

I don't really know how stuff like hbo works. I thought given how popular GoT is money wouldn't be an issue. But I guess they don't make enough money from it to cover production?

I think that regardless of what the total is, doing fewer episodes is always going to mean being able to spend more on each individual episode.

I think it would help Jon if he explained what happened at Hardhome, like in detail.

[Velaryon]

It does seem to me like the writing on the show gets a bit sloppier and harder to believe the further ahead of the books they get. They really need an explanation for how Euron's fleet moves around so much faster than everyone else, and it needs to be better than "because he's Ironborn."

I was okay with how the attack on Casterly Rock played out, with Tyrion describing the hypothetical casualties of a frontal siege, and then showing us what actually happened when the Unsullied went in through the "ho door" (as I've seen it nicknamed on Facebook ). I'm even okay with Jaime predicting his brother's attack and withdrawing the troops for an attack on Highgarden since, as has been pointed out, Tyrion doesn't know that Casterly Rock's gold mines have run dry and therefore the castle's strategic value is reduced (though hardly worthless). However, the show portrays the Tyrells as pushovers because they're "not as great of warriors as everyone else," and to that I can only say "since when?" Way back in season 2, Renly was believed the early favorite because he had linked up with the Tyrells, who supposedly had the largest force. If they've been decimated that much through wars and through losing a lot of their prominent people at the Sept, the show needed to do a better job of telling us that.

Otherwise, the episode mostly went well. Cersei's revenge against Ellaria Sand was very well done. Jon and Dany's meeting went pretty much as expected, though she does seem to be falling back pretty hard on "I'm your rightful queen so you should bow to me, even though I've done nothing to show I care about you and I claim to want to win hearts and minds rather than just conquer everyone." I still hate Bran, but that's nothing new. He's always been my least favorite Stark, except for the little pointless one that Ramsay killed. Sad not to have any Arya in this episode, but I'm sure she'll show up next time.

I don't think Sansa is going to betray Jon - she is being portrayed as seeing right through Littlefinger, and I think she will ultimately be the one who outsmarts and defeats him. There's no way in hell she's going to trust him ever again after he gave her to Ramsay, and I definitely don't see her betraying a family member for him.

[Chen]

I think that regardless of what the total is, doing fewer episodes is always going to mean being able to spend more on each individual episode.

I think it would help Jon if he explained what happened at Hardhome, like in detail.

Melissandre could probably also give some corroborating evidence (well vision) of the whole armies of the dead and stuff too. And why didn't she mention bringing Jon back to life? I mean I can understand his reluctance to mention it but why didn't she when she was talking to Dany about Jon?

[pendell]

Melissandre could probably also give some corroborating evidence (well vision) of the whole armies of the dead and stuff too. And why didn't she mention bringing Jon back to life? I mean I can understand his reluctance to mention it but why didn't she when she was talking to Dany about Jon?

Haven't seen the episode, so must ask: Did she at some point mention she was a witch who practiced blood magic? Giving Daenerys' previous experience in this regard, which killed her husband and only son, that would probably be the quickest route to becoming Purina Dragon Chow.

If I were Melisandre, I'd be on a boat out of the seven kingdoms and go as far away from it as I could. Why is she even still here?

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Malimar]

Melissandre could probably also give some corroborating evidence (well vision) of the whole armies of the dead and stuff too. And why didn't she mention bringing Jon back to life? I mean I can understand his reluctance to mention it but why didn't she when she was talking to Dany about Jon?

Probably because Dany had only just met Melisandre, so throwing out a "the undead are on the march, oh yeah and I resurrected this one dude once" would throw her credibility into question.

Or the writers wanted this particular thing to be a point of conflict and didn't care about making sense.

One of the two.

[solidork]

Melissandre could probably also give some corroborating evidence (well vision) of the whole armies of the dead and stuff too. And why didn't she mention bringing Jon back to life? I mean I can understand his reluctance to mention it but why didn't she when she was talking to Dany about Jon?

I'm probably wrong, but I got the impression that they didn't bring up the whole "Jon came back from the dead" because they would react poorly even if they did believe him. I get the impression that Jon himself doesn't consider it a selling point, and he probably wants to think about it as little as possible.

Jon and company don't really have a way to know this, but team Dany is not big on magic; Varys hates magic users, and Dany herself had bad experiences with both Mirri Maz Duur and the warlocks of Quarth. Dany would definitely have some preconceived notions about what bringing someone back from the dead would entail and none of them would reflect well on Jon.

I realized that we probably wouldn't get any more scenes with Brienne and Jamie and then got sad.

[Chen]

All those seem to be good reasons for Jon not to say anything, but they KNOW Melisandre is a red priestess. There was one who came to see them last season too. I think they must at least be aware of their mystical side.

[Velaryon]

Haven't seen the episode, so must ask: Did she at some point mention she was a witch who practiced blood magic? Giving Daenerys' previous experience in this regard, which killed her husband and only son, that would probably be the quickest route to becoming Purina Dragon Chow.

If I were Melisandre, I'd be on a boat out of the seven kingdoms and go as far away from it as I could. Why is she even still here?

Respectfully,

Brian P.

It's not clear how much Dany knows about the priests/priestesses of R'hllor and their level of magical ability, but she seems to have a favorable impression toward them based on the ones she has encountered previously. Probably because they saw her as the fulfillment of their prophecy and encouraged others to follow her.

[Lacuna Caster]

Keep in mind that Yara's fleet isn't the only one Dany has - she has the ships belonging to House Martell and Tyrell as well as shown in the closing shot of season 6. Euron's having a better fleet than all of those is implausible. The implication here is that Dany controls the Redwyne fleet - since it was sworn to house Tyrell (actually, this is probably the fleet ferrying the Unsullied, which would explain why it's not with Yara when Euron attacks). Perhaps Euron's fleet is more powerful overall, but he should at least be taking some serious losses in these naval engagements. And of course, it's totally unclear how Euron teleported his fleet around the continent to get from just south of Dragonstone to Casterly Rock while stopping in King's Landing, as mentioned.

It does seem to me like the writing on the show gets a bit sloppier and harder to believe the further ahead of the books they get. They really need an explanation for how Euron's fleet moves around so much faster than everyone else, and it needs to be better than "because he's Ironborn."

I've generally felt like the writing of the show has steadily improved over time. I do completely agree about the questionable handling of geography, but to be fair, in the past we had Asha circumnavigating the continent to rescue Theon from Ramsey and then... go home disappointed, basically?

I was always very skeptical that Tyrion would be able to sail his queen's forces around the continent without major incident while the Greyjoys were still a factor. I would almost have inclined to march them across from the opposite shore and build bridges and forts and alliances as they went, even if it took longer.

Otherwise, the episode mostly went well. Cersei's revenge against Ellaria Sand was very well done. Jon and Dany's meeting went pretty much as expected, though she does seem to be falling back pretty hard on "I'm your rightful queen so you should bow to me, even though I've done nothing to show I care about you and I claim to want to win hearts and minds rather than just conquer everyone." I still hate Bran, but that's nothing new. He's always been my least favorite Stark, except for the little pointless one that Ramsay killed. Sad not to have any Arya in this episode, but I'm sure she'll show up next time.

I don't think Sansa is going to betray Jon - she is being portrayed as seeing right through Littlefinger, and I think she will ultimately be the one who outsmarts and defeats him. There's no way in hell she's going to trust him ever again after he gave her to Ramsay, and I definitely don't see her betraying a family member for him.

Rickon is dead!?!?

I will be astonished if Sansa turns on Jon, and am generally looking thoroughly forward to seeing the four stark siblings finally team up on their enemies. I'm thoroughly surprised by how tactically savvy Cersei and Jaime are turning out to be, though. I really hope they don't contrive to kill any of Dany's dragons.

[Velaryon]

Rickon is dead!?!?

Rickon was killed last season during the episode "The Battle of the Bastards," at the beginning of the battle between Jon's forces and Ramsay's.

I will be astonished if Sansa turns on Jon, and am generally looking thoroughly forward to seeing the four stark siblings finally team up on their enemies. I'm thoroughly surprised by how tactically savvy Cersei and Jaime are turning out to be, though. I really hope they don't contrive to kill any of Dany's dragons.

The Stark kids have been scattered for so long that I really don't know what to expect from them when they're all together again.

Show Cersei is much, much smarter than her book counterpart, whether by conscious decision or because the show writers didn't grasp how poor her decision-making skills were. I'm less than impressed by their solution for the dragons, not only because it's highly derivative of The Hobbit but because it's just so... anti-climactic, for lack of a better word. I'm interested to see what happens.

[Lacuna Caster]

Rickon was killed last season during the episode "The Battle of the Bastards," at the beginning of the battle between Jon's forces and Ramsay's.

Oh, I remember now! Head like a sieve these days.

Yeah, the show version of Cersei is marginally more likeable as well. Which I guess isn't a bad thing. I am a smidge disappointed that Arya hasn't made a beeline for her jugular, though- shapeshifting assassins would probably have more application down south.

About the ballistas, I do remember thinking "are dragons really so important when all these ships can apparently hurl fireballs around the place with great abandon"? It might be interesting if there turns out to be a techno-alchemical solution to that pesky ice zombie problem.

[Velaryon]

Oh, I remember now! Head like a sieve these days.

Yeah, the show version of Cersei is marginally more likeable as well. Which I guess isn't a bad thing. I am a smidge disappointed that Arya hasn't made a beeline for her jugular, though- shapeshifting assassins would probably have more application down south.

About the ballistas, I do remember thinking "are dragons really so important when all these ships can apparently hurl fireballs around the place with great abandon"? It might be interesting if there turns out to be a techno-alchemical solution to that pesky ice zombie problem.

Forgetting about Rickon is understandable, since he was a mostly pointless character whose only significant scene in the entire series was getting killed to motivate Jon a little bit more.

[Malimar]

I've generally felt like the writing of the show has steadily improved over time. I do completely agree about the questionable handling of geography, but to be fair, in the past we had Asha circumnavigating the continent to rescue Theon from Ramsey and then... go home disappointed, basically?

I was going to say "she didn't need to circumnavigate anything", but I checked a map and the Dreadfort is way the heck on the eastern edge of the North, so that would indeed probably have been easier than scuttling through the Wolfswood like I assumed she did.

Show Cersei is much, much smarter than her book counterpart, whether by conscious decision or because the show writers didn't grasp how poor her decision-making skills were. I'm less than impressed by their solution for the dragons, not only because it's highly derivative of The Hobbit but because it's just so... anti-climactic, for lack of a better word. I'm interested to see what happens.

I think show Cersei is at least as dumb as book Cersei, she just has the writers protecting her from her stupid-ass decisions. Blowin' up the super-popular sparrow-pope ought to have gotten the peasants and the lords alike at least a little riled up, for example, but nope, facing consequences for one's actions are for lesser mortals than Cersei.

[pendell]

Forgetting about Rickon is understandable, since he was a mostly pointless character whose only significant scene in the entire series was getting killed to motivate Jon a little bit more.

This is the fellow who was

Spoiler

Show

Murdered by Ramsay Bolton with an arrow, right?

That wasn't "getting killed'. That was deliberate murder in an attempt Jon Snow into getting angry and doing something tactically stupid rather than fighting the Bolton army in an intelligent way. It succeeded brilliantly -- which is why Jon needs Sansas' wisdom and needs to listen to her counsel.

Sure, they rub against each other -- she's cunning and he's brave. If they can learn to combine their strengths and counterbalance each other's weaknesses, they will be unbeatable.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Lacuna Caster]

I'm sure the combined Starks will be formidable once they're all on the same page. Doubly so if they can get Dany to play ball, which seems almost inevitable by now.

What do we call the ship? Stargaryen? Jony? Tark? Baked Alaska?

I was going to say "she didn't need to circumnavigate anything", but I checked a map and the Dreadfort is way the heck on the eastern edge of the North, so that would indeed probably have been easier than scuttling through the Wolfswood like I assumed she did.

I think the previous episode explicitly shows Asha getting on a boat with the intent of rescuing her brother, but my recollection could be faulty?

I guess Baelor's Sept didn't result in open revolt for the same reasons that the Red Wedding didn't? Plausible deniability plus Rains of Castamere?

[Dr.Samurai]

The High Sparrow openly defied Cersei. They made her do a walk of shame. Suddenly the Sept explodes, killing everyone, her son flies out a window, and now she's Queen.

I can forgive the good people of King's Landing if they're trying to pretend they weren't throwing **** at her in the streets last week and they're totally cool with her ruling.

Though maybe some tiny revolts here and there are called for. At least to show Cersei keeping the peace with an iron fist.

[JoshL]

What do we call the ship? .... Baked Alaska?

This seems the clear choice.

[Chen]

Though maybe some tiny revolts here and there are called for. At least to show Cersei keeping the peace with an iron fist.

They showed the zombie Mountain killing a guy who told a rude joke/story about Cersei. Presumably after a little more of those with the story going around the regular citizens fall in line pretty quick.

[Mordar]

@Khyber: I think Jaime now knows for sure that Tyrion was innocent, so this might be a point of contention between the two of them if it comes up.

EProbably not? Like, it shows that Jaimie and Cersei were wrong to blame Tyrion, and are therefore indirectly responsible for Tywin's death and Tyrion signing on with Dany. But it doesn't really change that much. "Oh, a different one of our enemies was responsible. Oops".

I don't think Jaime *ever* believed Tyrion killed Joffery. Its either that or Jaime thought it was an okay thing for him to do...which is possible too. I believe the Tyrion hate was all Cersei all the time. But I'm not 100% certain.

On Daenerys:

Failures: Has she really lost anything yet? The fleet was to get her bacon to Westeros. The Dothraki and Unsullied are still around and undefeated. The dragons are dragoning, despite Qyburn's "invention". Sure, her new kinda-allies in Dorne and Highgarden are down the tubes...but they weren't really part of the equation anyway.

Demands: Kind of funny that the third-born child of the Mad King, who also happens to be a girl, thinks she was "born to sit on the Iron Throne" since she was actually born to be traded/married off to someone else. She has risen to her position in part by her own hand and in part by the machinations of others (even if those machinations generally fail). She should lean much more on that. While I don't think demands of fealty are equivalent to slavery, she will need to re-learn some diplomacy...or fight everyone left in Westeros.

Advice & Advisors: It seems like different writers wrote the episodes at the same time...because (as many others have mentioned) she's getting swamped with advice all at the wrong time and having to handle administrative discussions during meetings with visiting potentates...looks pretty poorly organized. That said, the asides to Tyrion during the meeting with Jon were excellent because they served a purpose in the meeting as well. I guess much of it can be forgiven because we didn't have time to see her administrative development when there are many more important things to see on screen.

I've never been a big fan of her, either in the books or show...certainly has her moments, but they seem to be fewer and fewer lately.

On Battles, Time and Teleporting Ships:

Skipping Battle Scenes: Martin totally does this. The show totally does it. Probably for two different reasons. In the show, do we really miss out on much? We know any large-scale battles won't be well done, so I'm for saving the money.

One Sided Battles: Is it just me or has every battle recently been ridiculously one sided? Sure, a few of the winning side suffer, but it sure seems 90-10 these days.

Empty Rock: How did NO ONE notice thousands...tens of thousands...of Lannister soldiers marching across the Reach? Is that area really that empty?

Timing: So let me get this straight...

1. Yara, Ellaria and Olenna are all in Dragonstone and the plan is hatched;
2. Part of the fleet will take Unsullied around the continent to take Casterly Rock while another (?) part of the fleet goes the same way to drop off the Dornish and Olenna at their homes to marshal armies to take King's Landing;
3. Somewhere between Dragonstone and Sunspear Yara's flagship is taken, she and the Dornish are captured and Theon jumps overboard;
4. Euron swings by King's Landing for a parade and parlay with Jaime, drops off captives;
5. Euron then leaves and speeds across the ocean at ridiculous speed;
6. Jaime then leaves and speeds across the Reach at ridiculous speed;
7. The Unsullied take mostly-empty Casterly Rock;
8. Euron and his fleet appear in the harbor and destroy the mostly-empty (?) ships;
9. The Lannister army, seemingly not in any disrepair based on years of war, empty coffers and virtually every other house as an enemy, arrives at Highgarden in excellent order;
10. Jamie arrives at High Garden just in time for the "siege";
11. Siege takes about 30 minutes despite the Tyrell forces being well-fed, well-provisioned and not at all tired from the stealthiest land march ever.

That sound about right? And it doesn't even touch on Jon's trip from Winterfell which seems to be as long a land journey as Jaime's plus about half as long a sea voyage as Euron's second run.

The only thing I can think of is that Westeros must be the size of Rhode Island. Maybe Olenna was dropped off by the Unsullied portion of the fleet...but other than that...it must take like a day to get from King's Landing to Highgarden by horse if these timings are to be believed.

Maybe we just need a little clock running on screen like "24" used

No, the show doesn't need massive battle scenes every week...but a little more display of the damage of war on both sides would be nice.

No, the show doesn't need to hew to complete temporal accuracy...but enough of the "everyone can be everywhere they need to be for DRAMA" without any effort to show the difficulties of travel in such a setting.

Sheesh!

- M

[S@tanicoaldo]

I'm starting to think that time, must like the seasons don't flow on westeros as it does in here, time is distorted in Lordran Westeros.

[kyoryu]

The only thing I can think of is that Westeros must be the size of Rhode Island. Maybe Olenna was dropped off by the Unsullied portion of the fleet...but other than that...it must take like a day to get from King's Landing to Highgarden by horse if these timings are to be believed.

I know it's tongue-in-cheek, but Westeros is *literally* England, just upside down.

[Dienekes]

I know it's tongue-in-cheek, but Westeros is *literally* England, just upside down.

According to GRRM, Westeros is roughly England, but much bigger, to be about the size of Europe. Which matches the medieval sizes of the army he uses as being able to be called up by the various lords. In Westeros lords call up armies that would take all of, say, Medieval France to muster.

[Lacuna Caster]

I know it's tongue-in-cheek, but Westeros is *literally* England, just upside down.

I love that the republic is an uninhabited wasteland. :P

[Kyberwulf]

The thing about sansa betraying Jon. They were pretty much only buddy buddy because they thought they were the only Starks left. Now that roughly only 2 out 6 are dead. There is less reason for them to have any ties.

[Lethologica]

The thing about sansa betraying Jon. They were pretty much only buddy buddy because they thought they were the only Starks left. Now that roughly only 2 out 6 are dead. There is less reason for them to have any ties.

(a) They don't know about Arya yet.
(b) What leads you to believe that the only reason Jon and Sansa stick together is because they're the last ones left?