Yeah, "Olly, bring me my sword" didn't have the same power.

The nod from Stannis was perfectly executed, however.

And the scene demonstrates how impossible it is to carry full gravity in a visual medium. It didn't have as much power because it didn't have the inner monologue.

Here's the written version of the scene - being in Jon's head during the process built the suspense and gave a couple more beats that really made that whole thing work well:

https://twitter.com/SerASOIAF/status/592675914510655488


And here's the show version:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KkU1VW5ODE4" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Good. Not as good.

She had been killing wights.

I’m not arguing that they filled us in. I’m just saying it wasn’t entirely clear that the Night King was the one Melisandre was talking about.

For all we knew at the time, Arya could have killed one of the white walker generals while Jon took on the Night King or maybe when he caught Arya mid-leap, maybe Bran would pull some shit out of his ass to do the deed.

Fully agreed. The lack of inner monologue is also partly why the Jaime/Cersei sept scene got the controversy that it did.

Transitioning to a visual medium has really helped bring emotion and gravity to some scenes (Ned's execution being a visceral example) - but some haven't landed like they did in the books for the reasons you described. The criticism over D&D's dialogue I think can partially be attributed to no longer having GRRM's inner monologue to lift lines from - something they did quite often from Seasons 1-6.

Tormond said to Jon when he arrived at Winterfell anyone whose not here is with the Night King.

Something like this happened again, you cant trust him. He has to go if he is alive.

How would you guys feel about some sort of plot in which the Night King wasn’t truly destroyed? Like maybe Bran, Arya or Jon somehow becoming the Night King.

No problem :thumb:

In the books, sure. It would be silly if they did it on the show at this point, without setting it up in any way. And no, touching Bran or Arya is not setting it up. If the NK just magically appears again in the final episode, whether in his familiar form or with a new face, it's just a 'gotcha!' moment for shock value.

Which wouldn't surprise me a bit after seasons 6 and 7, but would most likely disappoint me.

Plus, if the Night King really did have Bran or Arya under some type of spell or influence, wouldn't that have dissipated like all his army after he died?

I'm about to watch it again. The kid and I have watched it together since Season 1 Episode 1 (a little awkward with her being the daughter and all. We've learned to not talk about certain scenes, lol), but her work schedule now doesn't allow for her to watch on Sunday nights. I'm bummed, because no matter how much she says she's avoided spoilers, there is just no WAY she doesn't know what's going to happen and who does it. Oh well....

Speculation has been since the first time they met that he warged into Bran and the two have some kind of connection beyond a touch, like maybe a piece of him is in Bran.

Like I said, though, that hasn't been established in any way, not even as a possibility, in show lore.

This is what I figured what was going to happen.

How does this show carry on for the rest of the season if that isn't the case?

People in this thread are putting more thought into what is happening, will happen, and has happened than D&D have.

Seriously folks. This show has been getting gradually worse for 3-4 seasons and is bottoming out. IT looks good, but the storytelling is just them hastily and haphazardly slapping conclusions over pretty deep and interesting storylines. This episode summed it up. The storyline is over. Millions questions remain and everyone is mostly unsatisfied. How could you NOT be?

It's just feels like another over-produced marvel movie at this point. It's like we're just going down a checklist.

The story telling for the first two episodes was great, of course that will slow down in the battle.

Still a lot to unwrap. No matter how much time there was left it would never be enough to wind things down.