Game of Thrones Season 8 Preview

Which characters' stories can we expect to see most represented in the upcoming Season 8 of HBO's Game of Thrones? This is a question that could be puzzling some viewers as they prepare to tune in before tonight's season premiere. I didn't think to ask it to myself just now, but it so happens that I had been maintaining a story grid of the scenes throughout the show's previous seasons. Examining the frequency of scenes primarily featuring certain characters could potentially be used to answer this question. Here's the top 10 appearing characters, according to the analysis I've put together, color-coded for ease of reference.

WARNING: SPOILERS AND MAYBE SOME HALF-ASSED PREDICTIONS AHEAD!

1. JON SNOW
113 total scenes

Most of the promotional material I've seen for GoT S8 has featured the lovely mug of Kit Harrington's lovable bastard... OR IS HE? I mean, he is lovable either way, but his lineage has been thrown into doubt with some conveniently-placed flashbacks. He's taken over the Night's Watch, recruited the Free Folk, and made an alliance with the Dragon Queen (i.e. the queen who has dragons, not the one who acts like a dragon). His upward trajectory and unwavering good alignment make Jon Snow a powerful protagonist, but will he feel any ill effects from the dark magic resurrection spell from the end of Season 5?


2. TYRION LANNISTER
109 total scenes

I have been known to clown Peter Dinklage's accent in the show, since as a straight-up British accent, it honestly isn't all that sharp. But that was in my younger, more judgmental days, and now I realize that his character's not British, he's not British, and not even all the people who play Lannisters on the show are British. It's an accent that is sui generis, and either way, it hasn't distracted me from enjoying the quality of Dinklage's acting through the years. Also THE DINKLES THO!!!1
As one of the prime behind-the-scenes movers in GoT, Tyrion has never exhibited the traits of a true power seeker, and he seems more like a support class than a classic hero.


3. DAENERYS TARGARYEN
101 total scenes

Khaleesi was a fan favorite from the moment audiences saw one of Emilia Clarke's 12,000 wigs (am I getting that right?). Westeros history buffs are also more likely to root for her, pointing out that her family was initially in charge of the Seven Kingdoms, until they were overthrown by the Starks and Baratheons. Although, who did the Targaryens take over the throne from when they emigrated from ... is it Easteros? Essos? The point is, you live by the coup, you die by the coup, and not all rebellions are bad as far as the PEOPLE are concerned. She's got dragons, an army, a love interest, a good advisor, and DRAGONS. Not to mention her goal is clearly the throne, so she's gotta be considered the number one contender.


4. ARYA STARK
76 total scenes / 75 primary scenes

5. SANSA STARK
76 total scenes / 62 primary scenes

It cannot be a coincidence that the two Stark sisters have appeared in the same number of total scenes over the course of seven seasons of television... OR CAN IT? Digging deeper into the numbers in the chart above, you can see that Maisie Williams's Arya has the advantage over Sophie Turner's Sansa in Primary Scenes (where a character's story was the primary purpose of the scene, from my unprofessional perspective), as opposed to Extra Scenes (where that character's story was advanced in a scene that primarily featured a different character). Either way, they are firmly back on the same side, manning the first line of defense against a zombie hoard, and starting further than anyone from the location of the actual Throne. Not looking terribly promising for the Winterfell crew.


6. CERSEI LANNISTER-BARATHEON
74 total scenes / 63 primary scenes

The only true villain so far on this list, Lena Headey's character is close in scene total to both Arya (in total scenes) and Sansa (in primary scenes), which makes sense, given all the scenes the two of them shared in Season 2. But the question is, should Cersei even still be referred to as Baratheon? Her Baratheon husband is dead, as are all three of the children that she was trying to pretend were Baratheon; might as well drop the charade, right? At any rate, in the eyes of succession nerds, her claim to the throne is at best suspect, but let's not forget that possession is 9/10ths and all that. Given that Cersei has all the resources of both King's Landing, the Tyrells, and the Greyjoy fleet, Daenerys would do well to remember that a rightful claim isn't power, POWER is power.


7. NED STARK / ROBB STARK
53 total scenes

8. STANNIS / DAVOS / MELISANDRE
50 total scenes

I'm grouping these two stories together because they're basically finished. Sean Bean, Richard Madden, and Stephen Dillane have been off the show for multiple seasons now. It's true that Carice van Houten's Melisandre has kind of become a free agent, and Liam Cunningham has gone on some solo missions since Davos Seaworth joined forces with Jon (most recently to pick up another throne claimant Gendry), but neither really drive the narrative at this point.


9. BRAN STARK
46 total/primary scenes

Since going north of The Wall, Isaac Hempstead Wright has gone full Druid, all but removing himself from the concerns of his now former family, the Starks. Bran now goes by the moniker "Three-Eyed Raven," he can see different areas of the timeline, and he has lost all sense of social interactions. Scrying, ahem, WARGING is a useful tool for any adventuring party to have, but it seems like Brandon has taken on more of a support role.


10. JAIME LANNISTER
46 total scenes / 45 primary scenes

This MUST be a coincidence, that the eldest surviving Stark son and the eldest surviving Lannister son appear in the same amount of scenes... OR IS IT!?!?!?!? We've seen a shift in Nikolaj Coster-Waldau's character from being purely power hungry and serving his own self-interests (thereby serving those of his family) to having some concern about the greater good. Will it be enough to aid in the battle against the darkness, or will the knight's change of alignment be too little, too late?

Above is the series cast summary for Game of Thrones on IMDB, as of just mere hours before the premiere, showing that the actors with top seven episodic appearances are also part of the top 10 in terms of story scenes. Of the remaining ones, Samwell Tarly (John Bradley, 38 scenes) is still in the mix, heading back to the action from Oldtown with some pertinent information. Theon Greyjoy (Alfie Allen, 37 scenes combined) has embarked on some sidequesting to rescue his sister Yara (nee Asha, played by Gemma Whelan, and who is also represented in the gray-shaded scenes). I had grouped Littlefinger (Aiden Gillen) and Varys (Conleth Hill) together, but they only truly carry 12 total scenes, since their two storylines were closely linked to Sansa and Tyrion, respectively. The same goes for Iain Glenn's Jorah Mormont, who had appeared in solely Daenerys-dominated scenes for the majority of his time on the show.

I know people always say that past results do not guarantee future performance, but you  mostly hear that in terms of finance or athletic performance. Who knows if it applies to a narrative that's been designed for a particular resolution? Either way, now you know who's had the most, if not screen time, than STORY time in all the past Games of Throne, and it's up to you to decide how it might affect the unfolding season!

Thoughts about Game of Thrones Season 7 Episode 2

After a week spent setting the scenes and reminding the viewers where everyone stands for the new season, we're back to the typical GoT format of laying out some well-thought-out and promising plans for all our favorite characters, only to make us watch them explode spectacularly in a giant fireball. But there were also four other storylines this week that weren't quite so catastrophic, so let's unpack everything that went down (organized by storyline this time, not chronologically).

The latest massive disappointment involves this week's A Story, which picks up right where last week's episode left off, with the supergroup of Daenerys, Tyrion, the younger generation of Greyjoys, the Sand Snakes, and the one surviving Tyrell who matters. (For ease of color-coding, I'm going to group all these characters under Dany's red banner, unless they break off into their own specific missions.) After a header where Daenerys basically demands "honest loyalty" from Varys, Melisandre shows up looking for new bandmates. Everyone's favorite Red Priestess writes a glowing letter of recommendation for the current King in the North Jon Snow, and recommends that they let him into the group, despite the fact that he had her exiled from the North on account of her stance on human sacrifice.

In the next scene in this storyline (Scene 6 overall), once the entire band has shown up to practice, Tyrion breaks out the setlist for their next show: Theon and Yara will use their ships to bring Ellaria's army from Dorne to Westeros, which will help Olenna besiege King's Landing, while the Unsullied mount an attack on the Lannister home base of Casterly Rock. It all seems to make a lot of strategic sense, and there's even some sparks that fly between the women from Sunspear and Pyke... until Scene 11, when crazy uncle Euron bursts in and takes the first step in fulfilling the promise he made to Cersei in the last episode. The mad pirate makes quick work of Yara's fleet, killing two of the sand snakes, capturing the other two, along with his niece Yara, and reducing Theon to the blubbering whimpering shell of a man, who abandons ship and blows yet another chance to take action and save one of the important women in his life.

So not but five scenes after we hear about it, Tyrion's plan for a two-pronged assault falls apart, as it's hard to besiege a port city with just half the ground troops you were expecting to have and no naval superiority. Come to think of it, why did nobody mention Euron's Iron Fleet in any of their previous strategy meetings? Did they just not entertain the possibility of him teaming up with Cersei? If all the heroes can band together, why not the villains as well? Although if Euron continues on with his ships to Dragonstone, Daenerys might have to pivot to a defensive stance before mounting any kind of offensive in any direction. Unless the Unsullied already marched off towards Casterly Rock - it's hard to tell because some of the timing was a little confusing in this episode. For example, the raven that Dany sends to Jon in Scene 1 arrives in Winterfell in the very next scene, whereas the one Sam sent in Scene 8 of the previous episode doesn't arrive until Scene 9 of Episode 2. Maybe the Oldtown email servers are not as fast as the ones they have at Dragonstone...

Speaking of Winterfell, Jon and Sansa's stories look likely to split after the new King in the North agrees to take Davos to meet with Daenerys in order to try and get his hands on some of her sweet, sweet dragonglass, a.k.a. obsidian, i.e. the anti-White Walker element. But I wouldn't be surprised if the vibe between Jon and Dany gets a little steamy, just based on how many people are trying to set them up, and based on the fact that no one knows that Jon is actually Daenerys's nephew. Remember that only Bran knows the truth of Jon's real parentage - Rhaegar Targaryen (Daenerys's brother) and Lyanna Stark (Ned's sister) - although even if something does happen, I feel like we've heard that "the Targaryens have wed brother and sister for a hundred years" enough times that maybe no one will care... which will not make it any less weird. Speaking of Bran, why no one at Castle Black thought to send a raven telling Jon that his brother arrived at The Wall is completely beyond me. The Night's Watch must really need a better broadband connection...

Sticking with the theme of the Stark children, we pick Arya's storyline back up without any indication whether or not she killed Ed Sheeran and his band of wholesome Lannister soldiers on her way to kill Cersei at King's Landing. The youngest Stark girl reunites with her old traveling companion Hot Pie, who recaps Season 6, Episode 9: Battle of the Bastards, causing her to change course and head back up north to meet Jon at Winterfell. While he'll probably be on his way to Dragonstone at that time, I imagine Arya would still be happy to see her sister, provided Littlefinger hasn't made some creepy power play regarding Sansa. Who knows, maybe Arya will arrive just in time to save her from said power play? Whatever she does, she'll have to do it without her wolf Nymeria, who has become Queen of the Wolves since her last appearance in Season 1, Episode 2: The Kingsroad, and has no time for her former owner.

Arya's change of plans can only be good news for Cersei and Jaime, (both colored magenta, until their interests stop being aligned). In their first scene, Jaime makes a play to lure Randyll Tarly away from Team Tyrell (more on the Tarly clan later). Then Qyburn, the new Hand of the Queen, tells Cersei it's no worries about Daenerys's mythical flying beasts, since he's developed the ultimate in anti-dragon weaponry: a big fuck-off crossbow. Dun-Dun-DUNNNNN!!!! Seriously? We've seen you use your mad science to reanimate a corpse, and the best you can come up with is a CROSSBOW? But based on the "this just might be stupid enough to work" principle, I'm almost certain that thing is gonna be responsible for taking out at least one dragon. Probably Drogon.

This week's E story features the continuation of Sam's rebellious behavior in maester school. Last week he stole some books from the secret members-only section of the library, and this week he's performing experimental invasive surgery without permission... or anesthetic. At least carving off Jorah's infected greyscale skin wasn't nearly as gross as emptying about a million chamber pots full of maester shit. Based on how this story was presented ("You have ONE DAY before we exile you!" "That surgery is FORBIDDEN!"), I'm pretty confident that Sam will be successful and Jorah will have the same results as Shireen Baratheon (before she got burned alive). Otherwise that would've been an awful lot of setup just to eke out some more screen time for a couple of minor characters.

Missing from this episode were Bran Stark and Sandor Clegane. The latter I can understand, as I still consider "The Hound" a rookie in terms of carrying his own storyline (he's only really had five scenes as the protagonist), so you don't necessarily want to feature him in every episode. But as I've already mentioned, the fact that Bran and his head full of magical flashback-knowledge has now been at Castle Black for almost two full episodes and no one else knows about it is kind of mind-boggling. The only explanation I can see is that these stories are presented non-linearly, and maybe Bran and Meera's arrival at The Wall actually happens much later in the show-timeline than it does in the episode-timeline. I just wish we didn't have to wait a whole week in real time to see how much time will have passed when the show picks up again.

Thoughts About Game of Thrones Season 7 Episode 1

For a long time, I resisted Game of Thrones, for much the same reason that I resisted Harry Potter: people kept telling me it was "better than Lord of the Rings." Now, I'm a die-hard Frodo Fanatic, so a comment like this was usually enough for me to turn my nose up in indignation and refuse to acknowledge the matter further. My wife even bought me the first book in the series (not because she's a reader, but because she thought I might like it, bless her heart), and I started to read it, but quit part way through. Lord of the Rings isn't filled with nonstop action or salacious political intrigue, but when I read those books, I feel like I'm reading the basis of something that could become an Oscar-winning blockbuster film series. By contrast, when I read Game of Thrones, I feel like I'm reading something that could be the basis of a cheesy TV program. But then, something utterly expected happened: they made Game of Thrones into a cheesy TV program... and it turned out to be damn compelling.

I'm not saying Game of Thrones is perfect show, nor am I saying that there weren't some moments that were so disturbing and distasteful that I considered not continuing to watch. But when taken as a whole, over more than six seasons (just barely, as of last night), I'd say there were more fun moments than cringe-worthy ones. And over those 6+ seasons, I started to get a little obsessed with the show, as is my nature - I read all the books between seasons 4 and 5, and then prior to this season, I re-watched (most of) the show and tracked all the storylines in a color-coded document, for my own amusement and edification. If only there were a career path where I could put some of these skills to use. Oh, right, there is: TV producer. Anybody want to see my Emmy (certificate)?

Anyway, let's look back at the Season 7 premiere and see how each scene falls into place when considering the larger arc for each story:

WARNING: SPOILERS AND ADULT CONTENT AHEAD!!!

Scene 0. (Cold Open) Arya finishes off the Freys

My color-coding system technically tracks characters, not storylines per se, although Arya Stark has had her own storyline since Season 1, when her father Ned allowed her to pursue her own interests (i.e. water dancing) rather than forcing her to conform to established gender roles. Side note: Ned had his own storyline in Season 1 (for which I used Dark Green), which was then continued by his eldest son Robb in the next two seasons (since his main reason for becoming King in the North was to avenge his father), all the way up through the Red Wedding - which was prominently featured in this week's Prev On segment. In this direct reversal of the Red Wedding to start this season, Arya makes use of the class levels of Assassin she gained while working for the Faceless Men to impersonate the (literally) late Lord Walder Frey and lure all his kinsmen to their poison-induced doom. Then, after she unmasks, Mission: Impossible style, Arya delivers an updated version of House Stark's words: "Winter came for House Frey," or as it will surely be parodied in the Game of Bones porn parody: "Winter came... ALL OVER House Frey!"


Scene 1. Bran and Meera arrive at Castle Black

This scene exists pretty much just to showcase the special effects on the army of the dead (now with giants!) and to reassure viewers that Brandon Stark will in fact appear in this season (he sat out all of Season 5 while he was gaining class levels in Druid with the Three-Eyed Raven). Oh, also to remind us that "Dolorous" Edd Tollett is now in charge of the Night's Watch. Side note: did anyone else think they were gonna do a gag where Edd bumped his head on the gate as he turned to go back into the tunnel under the Wall?


Scene 2: Sansa disagrees with (but respects) Jon's style of leadership

If only there were a song about being reunited and it feeling so good, it could be the theme song for the combination of Jon Snow and Sansa Stark's storyline into one. I counted this one as a Jon scene because the main content revolved around Jon making decisions in his capacity as King in the North; or at least "all the LIVING North." Most of the subtext occurred during the second part of the scene, a sidebar between Jon and Sansa, which also provides some good "Uncle/Father" fodder for the Arrested Westeros Twitter account.


Scene 3: Cersei refuses Euron's marriage proposal

This scene is also split into two parts. In the first part, Cersei Lannister-Baratheon (is she still technically Baratheon after Robert died?) recaps all her enemies and Jaime Lannister posits that they desperately need some allies. (Jaime gets his own color for all those episodes he was off with Brienne and then later Bronn... all the B characters.) Then in part two, Cersei rejects one of those potential allies, Euron Greyjoy (uncle of Theon), who offers a marriage proposal, "a thousand ships, and two good hands." He's off to find a suitable present for the Queen, which will probably involve bad news for the Starks in one way or another.


Scene 4: Sam gains access to Oldtown's restricted area

In the first episode where Oldtown is featured on the Main Title Map, everyone's favorite future maester Samwell Tarly stars in his very own training montage! After emptying more buckets of shit than should be allowed to be shown on cable television, Sam sweet talks his maester-mentor into letting him into the adult section of the Oldtown library so he can do his part to fight the incoming zombie apocalypse... with KNOWLEDGE! Side note: I enjoyed seeing Jim Broadbent make his first GoT appearance if only because it gives me the excuse to make the case that he should play Tom Bombadil in the long-awaited spinoff of the Lord of the Rings films...


Scene 5. Brienne distrusts Littlefinger

Even though Brienne of Tarth has her own storyline in my color-coding system (she took over Catelyn Stark's storyline since Brienne is oath-bound to carry on Cat's main mission in life: to protect the Stark children), I gave this scene to Sansa because she's the one making the decision to let Littlefinger stay in Winterfell. Sansa rightly points out that "Littlefinger saved us," but she neglects to mention that the saving came after he sold her out to the Boltons and all but promised to deliver her head on a spike to Cersei Lannister. (That was in Episode 506, Scene 5, although it wasn't featured in the Prev On.)


Scene 6. Arya camps with some Lannister soldiers

We've already seen Arya at her most badass, so this scene really only exists as a vehicle for an Ed Sheeran cameo (who I wouldn't have recognized had my wife not been sitting next to me, mostly ignoring the show as I watched). I did, however, recognize the song he was singing, as it was one of my favorite lines of verse in the book series.


Scene 7. The Hound sees a vision in the flames

Sandor Clegane is the protagonist of the newest storyline in the series, as he only started getting his own scenes to carry 7 episodes into Season 6. He was an important character prior to that, but his scenes were always subsumed by more important characters: specifically Sansa when she was at King's Landing, and then Arya when he took her captive and tried to sell her for ransom. But now it looks like the Hound is not only getting over his fear of fire, but he's also joining the fight against evil in earnest.


Scene 8. Sam learns there is dragonglass on Dragonstone

OK, that's what HAPPENS in the scene - it's a callback to Scene 2 when Jon starts his meeting by telling everyone to keep their eyes open for any dragonglass (i.e. obsidian) they can find because of its use against White Walkers. But the main revelation in this scene (as predicted by Ozzy Man in his review of the Season 7 trailer) is that Jorah Mormont (who never really had his own storyline) has not yet found a cure for his greyscale and is slowly but surely turning into a stone man. Tough break for Jorah the Explorer...


Scene 9. Daenerys arrives at Dragonstone

This scene consists of only one line of dialogue (not counting the SEAGULLS SCREECHING and DRAGONS SCREECHING descriptives that appear in the closed captions), but it's tremendously significant in the Game of Thrones timeline, as it represents the end of Daenerys Targaryen's journey from across the Narrow Sea to her ancestral home on Dragonstone... the very same dragonglass-rich Dragonstone that is the title of this week's episode! Also of note, her entourage includes prime mover/shaker Tyrion Lannister, and they arrived using ships provided by Theon and Yara Greyjoy. And Khaleesi also unveils another gem in her collection of Going Out Tops, the original backronym for GoT.

Game of Thrones Season 5 Finale-plus-1 Preview

I am going to make a statement: I am a devoted watcher of Game of Thrones. If I made this statement two or three years ago, the response would probably be, "Naturally! It's one of the most critically acclaimed shows on television - one of HBO's most impressive offerings, and they've produced some of the all-time greats." This same statement made in the last two or three weeks would likely elicit a response more along the lines of, "Really? That trashy hotbed of rape and shocksploitation and sloppy storytelling? It doesn't even stay faithful to its source material!" Recent change in public opinion aside, I'm sticking with the show, not only because I'm somewhat "pot committed" after nearly five mostly-enjoyable seasons (mostly...), but also because of the pure good clean spectacle offered by episodes such as last Sunday's "Hardhome."

Before talking about that episode and looking forward to the rest of the season, I'd like to make another statement: I am a devoted watcher of the weekly recap/commentary videos posted by Ozzy Man Reviews. The response to this statement, regardless of when I make it, is likely to be something like, "Who?" I've mentioned him a couple of times on this blog before, but  suffice it to say, Ozzy Man's combination of humor, insight, and a mint Strine accent has kept me coming back week after week. He's also come up with several terms and tropes that add a great deal to the ongoing conversation about the show.

The first term is "fun boobs," which are distinct from "sexposition" in that there are generally no important plot points to pay attention to, and distinct from the scenes depicting sexual assault in that they are, for lack of a better word, fun. Examples include Melisandre having a bath, Melisandre sitting on Jon Snow's lap, Melisandre tearing Stannis's pants off on the strategy table... basically any scene with Melisandre where she's not giving birth to a shadow monster. Then there are Ozzy Man's various nicknames: "Stannis the Mannis" goes without saying, "Jorah the Explorer" for when he and Tyrion are sailing through the ruins of Old Valyria, Samwell Tarly becomes "Sambo," Barristan Selmy becomes "Bazzer," and other little flourishes that make his commentary unique.

But the most relevant term to our discussion is "Book Wanker," used to refer to someone who has read all the novels in the Song of Ice and Fire series, and who can't help themselves from constantly comparing the books to the show. I became a member of the Book Wanker camp when I read all the books during the hiatus between Seasons 4 and 5, because I didn't want to wait for the show to come back to find out what happened in the story. Now I find myself regretting my decision, not only because the show has quickly left the books in the dust, but also because now I find myself doing the compare and contrast game rather than just enjoying the show for what it is. But rather than try and quell my instincts, I'm just going to embrace them and do a little examination of where each character stands heading into the final two episodes of the season, the first of which is historically when the most impactful shit goes down.

A word of warning: while I won't directly give away anything that happens to our nearest and dearest characters in the books, those of you looking to remain completely spoiler-free should probably steer clear of the rest of this post...

SPOILER ALERT!

Let's start with Arya, since her story most closely mirrors what's happening to her in the books, except for a brief moment of will-she-or-won't-she get accepted into the House of Black and White at the beginning of her arc. And a change of name for her assumed identity, calling back to her aunt Lyanna (Lanna) rather than her mother Catelyn (Cat of the Canals). It remains to be seen whether the show will gloss over one of her hardest trials (which was also mostly glossed over in the books) or if they will stretch the ~1 chapter of book material into multiple episodes like they did with Theon's torture (although in a far less unpleasant manner).

Next, going in order of book fidelity, is Cersei Lannister, trapped helplessly by the faith militant. Her two Tyrell companions in prison do not share the same fate in the books, but for Loras, the end result is about the same. Another character whose storyline is basically going according to plan is Stannis, dutifully marching his army south towards Winterfell. The only notable deviation is the inclusion of his daughter in the party, who Melisandre will hopefully not convince him to sacrifice to the Red God, otherwise what was the point of all their family bonding scenes earlier in the season?

After the events of last night's episode, it looks like Jon Snow's arc is going through a mere detour rather than a complete 180, since the "next on" tease showed what looks to be a tense confrontation between him (and his army of wildlings) and Ser Alliser at Castle Black. Needless to say, the book version of the Lord Commander never boarded those ships for Hardhome, but based on the second half of the most recent episode, I'd say it was a good change. I am a little confused to see Sam and Gilly still hanging out at Castle Black, but there's still time for them to fulfill their bookish destinies.

Daenerys also has a chance for her story to align with what happens in the books, albeit with the presence of a new ally, Tyrion Lannister. This is the one point in which the show has leapfrogged over the books most significantly, accelerating the meeting of two of the three top-billed cast members and skipping the machinations that Tyrion and an uninfected Ser Jorah would have to carry out in order to gain their way into Mereen. I do have to say that the power potential of these two characters coming together does make me fear for Tyrion's safety during the upcoming events at the Great Pyramid (also teased in the "next on"), since the show does not tend to let sensible alliances last too long.

Now for the most blatant deviations from the novels. I have no problem with Jaime and Bronn embarking on a road movie style buddy comedy together, not only because it served as an excuse for two of the most fun boobs in the show's history, but also because it's a heck of a lot more interesting than what those characters are doing in the books. I do not have the same feelings for Sansa's predicament, about which enough has already been said. Even after the implication of multiple repeat rapes at the hands of the show's most inexcusably campy villain, I am actually more nervous for her future based on a) the information she gets about her younger brothers being alive, since this show tends to kill off characters in their rare moments of happiness, and b) the sharp object she picked up in the previous week's episode. I'm also a devoted watcher of The Walking Dead, which has shown us the dangers inherent when a female lead pulls a concealed blade on her captor.


Regardless of how closely the show will follow anything that happens in the books from here on out, we can expect to see some dynamic plot points unfold in next week's episode. But as long as there are no more graphic rapes or attempted rapes, I'll count it as an overall positive experience.

Game of Thrones MLB Depth Chart

Ever wonder what would happen if your favorite stars from Game of Thrones were to take the field as part of a baseball team? Well, wonder no more!

Broke Ass Game Show: Big Ass Pinata

Wow, did any of you see Episode 3 of Broke Ass Game Show on MTV? The one that ended with the Big Ass Pinata game? What a way to get excited about the baseball season, right? Here's some screenshots I pulled from MTV's website while watching. Pretty cool, huh?!

Thoughts About The Walking Dead Midnale

I started watching The Walking Dead in January of 2013 when I was on hiatus and looking for a show to get into. This was during the Season 3 midseason break, so the first two seasons were available on Netflix. I was blown away by the stark efficiency of the six-episode first season, but then felt like it struggled to maintain its consistency over twice as many episodes in Season 2. After feeling like I had to binge-watch three episodes in order to experience one episode's worth of content, I wasn't too eager to get caught up to watch in real time, so I waited until the next year when the next season was available for instant streaming.

I enjoyed the escapades in the prison well enough and The Governor is obviously a franchise-defining character, but afterwards I kind of lost interest. Until I discovered Ozzy Man Reviews on YouTube. I've been obsessed with this channel recently, so I figure I'll just keep plugging it as much as possible until my obsession passes. After memorizing the brilliant comedic overdub "Eddie Stark: Australian Dad" and burning through his Game of Thrones reviews, I noticed that there were also links to Walking Dead, Season 5 episodes. Season 5? What happened to Season 4? Oh, that's right, it was sitting there in my Netflix queueub, or list, and I hadn't been watching it.

Needless to say, if I wanted Ozzy's latest works to make sense, I would have to power through some episodes and fast. So at a whirlwind pace I sped through the group's final days at the prison, the Governor's brief solo campaign and subsequent failure to grow or change as a character, and some ripping crosscutting between storylines as our various heroes make their ways towards Terminus. I laughed along with Team Flat Top/Mullet, cried along with Carol and Tyreese and those two girls who just didn't get it, and held my breath in anticipation when Daryl lost track of Beth and fell in with the wrong crowd. Top it all off with a season finale for the ages - complete with a cliffhanger rife with overconfidence - and Season 4 was in the books. Then once I used AMC's streaming service to get caught up on Season 5, it was time to start watching with my friends on Sunday nights, when the episodes actually air (shocking, I know).

In the last two half-seasons before the Season 5 midnale (the word I've coined (I think) to describe the last episode before AMC's patented midseason break), Rick and the gang have neutralized, with extreme prejudice, two hostile groups of humans: Daryl's lie-hating merry band of outlaws and the nasty cannibals at Terminus. In the cold open, it immediately looks like Rick will continue his murderous streak with Dawn's group of corrupt cops when he rear-ends Bob 2 as he goes on his morning jog. After misquoting a lyric from a song off Taylor Swift's new album ("All you had to do was STOP!"), Rick puts Bob 2 out of his misery, proving beyond any doubt that he has no qualms about executing people he sees to be a threat.

I learned that when you watch TV live in real time, you gain insights about the program that you don't get through streaming alone. For example, when the promo for a given night's Talking Dead advertises the presence of a "mystery guest," you can be pretty sure that a character is going to die in that night's episode, and that the mystery guest will be whichever actor played said unfortunate character. Those of us who had unwittingly seen spoilers thankfully kept their mouths shut, but we were all pretty sure that the big death would be someone more important than Bob 2 or the random cop who enjoys shoving old people - even though it was pretty appropriate that he was killed when Beth shoved him into an open elevator shaft. You live by the shove, you die by the shove.

We didn't keep a tally or put any money on our guesses of who would bite the farm, but the popular consensus seemed to be Carol. She never really became part of the group again after Rick exiled her and she's had plenty of character development in the recent episodes so we'd be sure to feel the emotional sting of her departure. Plus apparently she dies really early in the comics so she's been living on borrowed time for multiple seasons. My vote was for Daryl - just something about how he said "Everyone goes home" when agreeing with Tyreese's plan in the last episode made it seem like he would be the one to not go home. Some folks objected that people would stop watching if they got rid of such a popular character, but my line of thinking was that Game of Thrones wouldn't hesitate. But then again Game of Thrones doesn't formulaic-ly kill off characters every half season.

A few people suggested Beth, but that's just because they were getting kind of sick of her constant sing alongs and weird misplaced eyebrow scars. It became fairly predictable that #RIPBeth was going to be a thing as the episode progressed since she was the main character with whom we spent the most time. And then there was that pair of scissors she slipped into her cast. It's like Anton Chekov's old rule: if you introduce a pair of scissors in the first act, someone's gonna get shot in the face in the third act. It was emotional, if not terribly shocking, that Beth took a bullet in that exchange with Dawn. My biggest disappointment was that she biffed her chance to stab the latest antagonist at point blank range. Part of me thinks she would have been more successful if she forgot the scissors and used her teeth like Rick did last season.

The middle of Season 5 seems like it got wrapped up in a nice little package. The team is back together, with a couple of new members, and they're all set to commence wandering aimlessly without Eugene's mission to keep them going. The only unresolved issue is the return of Morgan from the pilot (if you watched till the end of the credits), but what do we have to look forward to there other than another reunion? I'll still tune in next season because I've committed four and a half seasons and now it's an excuse for me to be social. I just don't know what I'll be expecting.

Thoughts About The Walking Dead and Magic

Sometimes when you're experiencing any form of entertainment, you experience something that instantly reminds you of another form of entertainment. They can be similar types, for example when you hear Hans Zimmer's haunting music from Interstellar, you might recall an amped up version of Philip Glass's haunting music from Koyaanisqatsi. Or fundamentally different types, like when the imagery from an episode of Game of Thrones recalls imagery from the popular trading card game Magic: The Gathering (or vice versa). But other times, the similarities go beyond just imagery, penetrating deep down to the subject matter itself. For example, when I (finally) watched the season finale for Season 4 of The Walking Dead last night, one of the early climactic moments of the show brought to mind a specific Magic card, a black card, from the Mirrodin block. I don't like to give away spoilers, but it's been more than seven months since the episode (entitled "A") first aired on AMC, so I have no qualms about giving away the card I'm talking about. I even went through the trouble of using MTG Cardsmith to create an alternate art reprint that could easily go into a Walking Dead themed expansion set (marketing hint).

I've said it before and I'll say it again (probably): The scene where Rick zombies-up and tears the throat out of his would-be Deliverance-esque assaulter with his fucken teeth was one of the more satisfying moments in the series so far. It was not only the pure gore factor, though that was not unimpressive, but also the philosophical and tactical implications of using the strategy. We've seen countless walkers take out humans by biting them in the throat, so it obviously works, even with decayed teeth and undead jaw muscles. But it requires you to abandon your humanity, to become like your common enemy in order to best destroy a fellow living creature.

The parallel to the Magic card Go for the Throat (if not to its vampiric art by David Rapoza), in that it doesn't work against artifact creatures, is shocking: not that constructs or golems exist in the Walking Dead universe, but if they did, Rick would never have been able to effectively execute the same move against them. Come to think of it, the move wouldn't have worked on a walker either. Or a dragon or a hydra or an elephant, which are just some of the standard creature types that a Go for the Throat reprint would be able to target. So maybe the card is a little overpowered when taken out of context of the show, but the flavor is just too spot on to ignore.

Another reason that scene is so powerful is because it tells the story of how Rick, a high level series regular (to use a Dungeons and Dragons term) was able to transform a situation where he was on his knees, at gunpoint and surrounded, to an absolute bloodbath in his team's favor. Rick ends the season in a similar way to how he started that scene: trapped inside a train car, surrounded by armed foes. But this time his team's a little bit bigger and he is fully in control of his confidence that this show cannot exist without him. As someone who is about to dive into Season 5, however possible, I hope that Rick's confidence extends not just to his survival, but also to the entertainment value of his existence. Because we've seen first hand what can happen to the pace of this show when all the regulars are bound up together in an enclosed space. And this time the group doesn't even have their weapons to help them.

At least Cutty and Carol are still on the loose, so we'll have a B Story to cut back to. Or maybe they'll pull a Book 4 of A Song of Ice and Fire (only nine years late on that one) and leave out half the characters entirely. Who can know? All I can say is that I'm especially excited for this new season of Walking Dead, not only to find out what happens, but because Ozzy Man is doing episode reviews on YouTube, and it was only his brilliant comedy dub Eddie Stark: Australian Dad that got me through a long and arduous baseball postseason.

Thoughts About Game of Thrones and Magic

Sunday's episode of Game of Thrones, "The Laws of Gods and Men," aired on Sunday, which means that, according to industry jargon, watching it on Monday (as I did) would technically be a "live-plus-one viewing," since I watched it one day after it had aired. So then if I review it on Tuesday, that review goes up on Day Live +2. But before I start getting confused by how they measure those TV ratings, all those +'s got me thinking of Magic: The Gathering (as in +1/+1 counters). And also the term God is used in both tonight's GoT episode and MtG's most recent expansion block, which takes place on the plane of Theros. I've paid devotion to three Theran Gods in my time in the Planeswalker Program, each representing one or a pair of the five colors of mana (abbreviated WUBRG). I noticed that some characters on Game of Thrones also correspond to the same color wheel (if not the same pantheon) as used in the game of Magic.

#ImpressiveVisualEffects

The first mention of color I noticed in "Laws of Gods and Men" (or, for more industry jargon, Episode 406) is when a jovial pirate (with very good taste) tells an old joke involving a ship's captain and a red shirt - a joke that my father and I had been telling since the holiday parties of my childhood. Suffice it to say, he joins up with Stannis Baratheon, the possibly rightful heir to the eponymous throne, who is himself very well acquainted with red mana. After all, his most trusted and most powerful ally is known as the Red Woman. And he lives in Dragonstone, and dragons usually cost red mana to summon in Magic. Speaking of Magic colors, the Iron Bank is clearly colorless, since I'm pretty sure Stannis and Davos's skiff (Is skiff appropriate?) sailed right past the Colossus of Akros.

And speaking of dragons, we got a good look at one of Daenerys's's dragons, which used its firebreathing ability to burninate / barbecue some sheep. Seeing as firebreathing is a red card, Dany definitely costs red, but she's all into justice too, so white makes sense. Plus Jorah Mormont and Barristan Selmy (JR and BS for short) are knights, which are usually white. Plus her rule wsa forged in the Dothraki plains and all. Should there be a third color, since she's a contender for the throne? Probably blue, since she wears blue, and also based on the way she gains control of all these armies...

See the resemblance?

I think a character who definitely wields three colors well is Tywin Lannister, one of the few people actually fit to be king, as evidenced by the fact that he's basically acting king. Right away I pegged House Lannister as identifying with White, Red, and Black, based on both their standard and the way they act -- and if they all three go with Tywin, it allows his three offspring to each get a different two-color combination (also known as "guild" in the nerd jargon). Jamie, the Kingslayer, inherits red and white: he's got a sense of honor, but his passion and incendiary nature  often get the better of him. Tyrion, also referred to as Kingslayer this episode, seems a good fit for black and white: he was master of coin at one point, so he fits in with the coinsmiths and the users of the extort ability word. Cersei is black and red: referred to as the "mother of madness," need I say more? Also this way it allows the late King Joffrey (before he was placed in the Lannister graveyard, so to speak) to go back to the three-color-combo, since he inherited all three colors from his true parents, heyo!

I thought a lot about what colors the rest of the houses might be, but when you go up north, things start to get so that you almost have to venture into Dungeons and Dragons alignment territory: Wildlings are Chaotic Evil, the whole Bolton/Frey contingent is Neutral Evil. If Targaryen (or House Stormborn, for easier spelling, but not to be confused with House Swarmborn) is Chaotic Good while the Lannisters are probably Lawful Neutral, with a little bit of all the spectrum mixed in throughout the bloodline, then House Stark is Neutral Good. But as none of them appear in this episode, let's go to some other random musings to end today's thoughts:


- Back to Magic: The Night's (Knight's?) Watch is obvi mono Black (hello, Castle Black, duh), but who cares, since we didn't see any of them in this episode anyway.

- Prince Oberyn, whom we did see, pretty clearly embodies the precepts of the Red Green combination. I mean, the trademark RG Planeswalker Xenagos is named "der Hedonist" in German. Not that its name has any bearing on game play...

- I could picture a good Duel Deck: Ramsay Snow (mono black, Human Berserker) vs. Yara Greyjoy (mono green, Human Scout). Each side would have an Alfie Allen card: one would be Theon of the Iron Islands and the other would be Reek of Dreadfort. #FlavorWin

- Theon/Reek went deep with his personal identity crisis this episode. Maybe it was the scars, or the performance, or the pale and drawn look, but I kept equating his relationship with Ramsay to what would happen if there were a Good-aligned Gollum and an Evil-aligned Frodo.

- More Magic: idea for King's Landing mirrored pairs: Varys, White/Black, Human Advisor with lifelink. Grand Maester General Veers, White/Black, Human Cleric with deathtouch. Maybe they both have extort? Maybe neither?

- And finally the last line of HBO's blurb about the episode referenced a Throne Room, which I equated not to the throne on which the game is based, but on the music from the Throne Room stage in the Genesis port of Mortal Kombat, even though that music is really based on the theme that appears in The Pit stage of the arcade game. #VideoGameBGMTrivia