On the surface, this was a good episode with some incredible fight sequences. But in all honesty, I’m disappointed. With the hype and anticipation surrounding this episode, it was a letdown… Apologies in advance for the lengthy post.
Let me start with the good. Because there definitely was some good.
- It was an INTENSE 80 minutes of non-stop suspense. I dont know how many times I caught myself holding my breath. And it’s not easy to keep people that focused on one battle for that long without getting fatigued. Props.
- Dragon fights in/above the clouds, shots around Winterfell, and the zombie chase scenes were all visually stunning.
- Fantastic score, as always.
- I actually loved Arya being the badass with her assassin skills at the end.. I think most everyone, including myself, fully expected it to be Jon. Very cool twist.
And now for the bad:
- For starters, the first 15 minutes were so dark and blurry, even with my screen at full brightness. I could barely make out some faces. Perhaps it was meant to be like that, immersive, fighting at night, limited vision, but it was just frustrating more than anything else.
- Poor military strategy. Dothraki charging first into the darkness? Unsullied in front of the trenches? I mean, trenches should not be the last line of defense before the castle wall. What a waste of two formidable armies.
- Given the stakes, way more characters survived than should’ve been possible. Plot armor was so thick for the main characters here. Thinking of it this way, the Dothraki are supposed to be great warriors, and they were wiped out in 30 seconds. Major characters like Jon, Jaime, Brienne, Pod were surrounded by wight hoards, in impossible scenarios, and managed to escape unscathed. Sam was literally lying on the ground crying for who knows how long, but he’s totally fine?!? Valar morghulis, unless you’re a main character, right?
- Ghost? Great seeing him for a whole 5 seconds before he’s killed off with the entire Dothraki army.
- How exactly did Arya get through the circle of white walkers and wights? And didn’t she give the dagger to Sansa?
- 8 years of buildup and neither the Night King nor the white walkers engaged in combat in this battle. I’m just disappointed they didn’t do much of.. well, anything really.
I get that the Night King was subplot/b-story. He’s not even in the books . The meat of the show is still to come. And I’m definitely not in it just for battles. But still, he’s not just your average villain. It just feels like there should’ve been more.