Mod Note:

To re-iterate forum rules on spoilers.

If you have information based on outside sources (books, articles) you need to put that in spoiler tags. You should not discuss the trailer for the next week's episode as many people avoid those. However in the episode thread for the current episode, I think it is reasonable that people will discuss the trailer that has already aired and/or episode synopsis and speculate. Personal speculation does not need to be spoiler tagged. Episode threads are only opened the day of airing so there is a limited amount of pre-show discussion and speculation based on what has already been aired about the episode. Again, however, if you have read an article or know something about what is happening in the episode, that should be spoiler-tagged. People coming to the thread should expect there to be some pre-show discussion and speculation and if you want to be completely unspoiled, it would be best to not read the thread until you have watched the episode.

When using spoiler tags it is ideal if you briefly describe before the tags what information you are about to divulge so people can know if they want to click on it. Example: "I read that tonight in this episode [spoiler]" or "Spoiler from the book: [spoiler]".

Hopefully this will be a fair way to deal with these threads going forward.

And I guess I need to start watching this show soon?

So much for showing the tournament

I thought the story of the Hounds scars was more effective in the book with him telling Sansa himself, but it was probably easier to squeeze it in that scene.

They will show more of it next week I'm sure.

What would be the rules on stuff from HBO's website, then? Spoiler tagged if dealing with future events (99% of the time, they don't deal with future events) or free for discussion sans tags?

Yeah, that scene felt a little off.

Loved this episode again, and the end scene was great. Still, the only thing that really bothers me is no sense of scale. You only know that King's Landing is supposedly bustling because someone says so.


Not sure if it's a spoiler but:

The sense of time was also off again. I agree with those from the past threads that the show does a poor job conveying how much time has passed.

This was probably my least favorite episode thus far. It felt like a filler without much happening, but of course I don't know if any important events were set up tonight.

As for sense of time, I got the impression that we are about 3 weeks after last week's episode, and the the episode itself spanned several days. Maybe someone can spoiler what the actual time was.

One thing omitted that seemed a bit odd to me was:

Perhaps I missed that in the previous episode. However,

The first half of this episode moved pretty slow but the second half more then made up for it. I can't wait to see Dany order Vicerys killed (speculation) and the fallout from Cat calling Tryion a murderer.

I thought this was a great episode! Except for the usual lack of scale, as someone else mentioned. And the single obvious insert shot of Ghost during the "nobody hurts Sam" scene was pretty awkward.

Gotta at all the people whose panties were in a twist over the lack of Bran's three-eyed crow dream in earlier episodes. Learn to have patience and see how it plays out, please.

I liked how they managed to essentially squeeze in Theon's entire backstory with just a few bits of dialogue. Loved his exchange with Tyrion (or should I say, Tyrion's verbal ownage of him?).

Me too. I would expect most people do.

Also, whoever thought to cast Ridley Scott as the drill sergeant guy at the Wall is a genius. He's perfect!

Yeah I just checked and he doesn't actually say how long he is supposed to be gone. Plenty of time to address it later though.

I didn't notice it until you pointed it out, but man -- that guy does look just like Ridley Scott.

You should not spoiler that surprising information. You ruin everything.

Yeah, it didn't really work to have Littlefinger tell that story, then say "Oh, by the way -- nobody really knows that story so don't spread it around."

Roz is apparently the North's #1 whore.

Loved the episode:

Good introduction of Hodor and Samwell
More laying down of the background story/plot lines
Tyrion is easily becoming my favorite character

the wife hated Versyses, she hopes that he dies very soon

agree with the concerns about the scale/timing, but I am having much to fun with this series to really notice.

Yeah, I forgot about that. That was pretty bad. I kept waiting for Snow to get busted for ordering a code red.

It's been interesting watching this with my non-reader husband. He paused the show in the middle and told me that he's really starting to prefer some of the story lines over others. He loves everything in the north, is kinda meh about the south other than Arya, and he hates the Dothraki/Dany story. I guess that means the show is translating the book well, because I felt the same way as I was reading.

Entirely unrelated to GoT, but your comment triggered a memory of George's "Jerk Store" joke attempt & made me smile.

Dang, another awesome episode setting up some serious confrontations in the next installment(s). Hope my excitement isn't spoiling the show for anyone. Wet drawers tend to do that.

There was a lot of exposition this time around, but it seems that HBO series often do this around the 3rd-4th installments and then lead up to some pretty raw action about midway through the season.

Also, thanks to those posting the differences between the book & tv versions. As with Littlefinger's retelling of the Hound's tale (and the "whip-around" scene last installment), it does help to know how the scenes played out in the books. Judging from your comments, the book versions are better (big shock!), but it's understandable that the creators feel the need to balance certain character appearances, condense for sake of time, etc., even if it makes the scene a little clunky. I can live with that, but thanks again for clarifications.

I was afraid that we might feel the same & find disparate plots uneven (maybe even unappealing in some cases)...and that could be the case in the future. However, at this point we're just enjoying the heck out of learning the backgrounds of all of the characters, past history of the kingdoms, etc.

Guess they threw in the hot tube scene to keep some viewers (ahem) interested during the recounting of the dragons' history. Who knew that reciting the names of reptiles could be such stimulating foreplay?

P.S. Tried it later but didn't work for me.

I probably should have been picturing Ann-Margret, but Lucille Ball kept coming to mind.

Maybe Tori Amos could be cast if they ever show Roz. Or Julianne Moore.

The spoiler controversy reminds me of Gen. Buck "Bucky" Turgidson screaming, "But they'll see the Big Board!"