IGN – The wording there is interesting. EW says the episode will “be” the longest battle sequence, not “include” it, which implies the battle will take up the entirety of its runtime. With some episodes this season expected to run up to 90 minutes long, that could be very considerable.
Besides being the greatest TV show of all time, Game of Thrones features the most technically complex battles scene that have a bigger scale than anything we’ve ever seen in the history of entertainment. Last season ended with the White Walkers waltzing through the Wall with a brand new ice dragon marching south. Meanwhile Khaleesi is on her way up to Winterfell so I would not be surprised if we see some massive action in the first episode. Things are going to get real messy real fast and I don’t know if I’m ready for it emotionally.
In the meantime lets take a look back at some of the biggest battles we’ve seen so far.
The Battle of Blackwater Bay
S2E9 is when we were introduced to just how intelligent Tyrion really is and we also learn that Wildfire isn’t just some garbage potion that wannabe wizards used to play with.
Battle of the Bastards
S6E9 is where Jon Snow became the GOAT and we witnessed the largest live action battle scene of all time. Suffocating, tense, and heartbreaking; the Battle of the Bastards always gets my blood flowing. Plus that sonofabitch Ramsay finally gets what he’s had coming to him for 4 seasons.
Hardhome
S5E8 is a truly terrifying episode where we finally fully realize the scope of what the White Walkers can do and how screwed Jon Snow and company all really are.
The Loot Train
S7E4 is where Dany shows everyone why the Targaryen’s ruled the world with nothing but a few dragons.
The Battle of Castle Black
S4E9 is just another beautifully coreographed sequence of events. Multiple fights at once, arrows flying all around, fires burning, and Olly…that sonofabitch Olly.
We’re just a little over a month away from the Season 8 premiere, so if you’re like me and woefully behind on your Thrones rewatch it’s time to get in gear.
Deadline – The Sopranos creator David Chase has found his Tony Soprano. Michael Gandolfini has been set to play the future New Jersey organized crime family boss in The Many Saints of Newark, the feature prequel to Chase’s groundbreaking TV series The Sopranos that Alan Taylor is directing for New Line.
If you read my blog on The Sopranos 20th Anniversary a week or two ago or in general follow entertainment even passingly, then you know a prequel movie is being made surrounding the world of the masterpiece HBO series. Basically, it will give us a glimpse into the yesteryear of the criminal world Tony Soprano lived in, the past that he resentfully regaled his guys of, craving for how things used to be. Or at least used to seem, to him.
The two key characters will be Dicky Moltisanti, Christopher’s late father and one of Tony’s idols, as well as Tony’s own Dad and hero, Johnny “Boy” Soprano. On the 20th anniversary, David Chase, the creator, revealed as a sort of gift to the fans and tribute to the since passed Gandolfini, that a young Tony Soprano would also be featured. They had even seemed to of already picked an actor to play him, although I can no longer find the kid’s name via a quick Google search.
That is because, as of yesterday, James Gandolfini’s own son, Michael, has been tapped to play the younger version of his Dad’s monumental role. I can’t imagine what it must feel like not just for Michael and the Gandolfini family, but also the cast of Sopranos, who never miss an opportunity to mention how much they miss their old friend, that the role is being assumed by the son of the man himself. They are keeping it in the family, as Tony himself would have wanted. Poetic justice indeed.
If I’m doing my math right, Michael would be about 20 now, having been on an 8th grade trip with his father when the elder Gandolfini suddenly died from a heart attack in 2013. This makes him a bit old for the role as I think the time period they were shooting for would have implied a pre-pubescent to teenage Tony. That said I just got done binging a Netflix show where actors and actresses as old as 26 were playing high school kids and I don’t think anyone really cares anymore.
To answer the other lingering question, yes Michael Gandolfini is an actor with actual credits to his name. He has a reoccurring role on “The Deuce”, the excellent David Simon/James Franco show about the early days of porn I’ve failed to keep up with. So the chops are there. He is the spitting image of his Dad. Add Jon Bernthal and Vera Farmiga, among others, to the list and we have ourselves a stud cast for this thing.
Fuhgettaboutit.
-Joey B
P.S – I didn’t say “fuck” once in this blog. 2019 is about growth kids.
Finally, an actual target I can mark down in my calendar unlike the last time Thrones was trending for a “premiere date” when it was revealed GoT would return in April….which is a month and not an actual date. So this was welcome news this AM.
The new trailer actually dropped last night, which I missed, ironically enough, because I am currently in the midst of a Thrones rewatch. And just like I said I wouldn’t do, I am woefully behind. Ned Stark is Protector of the Realm right now for christ’s sake. Currently I have 3 episodes remaining in Season 1 along with all of Seasons 2-7 so there are 66 episodes still left on my plate. With the April 14th premiere date, that means there are 91 days left until we hear that sweet, sweet opening music. (If I had to bet, I would say they go with a cold opening so we probably won’t hear the music to start, but thats besides the point)
So for anyone that has yet to get on the Game of Thrones bandwagon or for anyone that wants to start a rewatch, we are rapidly approaching an episode per day territory. April 14th cannot come soon enough. Gods be good.
This is one of the difficult things I’ve ever written. Not in the eulogy sense – I’m not getting choked up or lost in a trance of nostalgia. It’s just, how do you reflect on the debut of, in the opinion of many, the greatest television show of all time and one of the most impactful occurrences in pop culture history.
20 years ago today the first episode of “The Sopranos” aired. It starred little known actor James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano, a physically imposing, violent, scheming, yet emotionally complicated and psychologically, crumbling gangster prince from New Jersey. We followed Tony through his exploits, criminal and (semi-)legal, and daily life, flanked by fellow non-A-listers (at the time) such as Edie Falco, of HBO’s most recent hit at that point “Oz” fame, as Tony’s wife Carmella; The E Street Band Guitarist Steven Van Zandt as Tony’s right-hand man Silvio Dante; and Dominic Chianese, formerly known as Johnny Ola in “The Godfather Pt II”, as Tony’s Uncle and, reluctantly for both sides, mentor Corrado “Junior” Soprano. It should be noted that this cast was largely filled out by Mafia medium veterans such as Tony Sirico (“Gotti”, “Love and Money”), Kathrine Narducci (“A Bronx Tale”), and a crew of actors from “Goodfellas” including Michael Imperioli, Lorraine Bracco, and Frank “Now get your fuckin’ shinebox” Vincent. To go off on a bit of a tangent because I missed this earlier, Sirico of course was also in “Goodfellas”. In the show, he played fan (and my) favorite, Tony’s soldier, Paulie “Walnuts” Gualtieri.
Audiences became infatuated with Tony’s gangster life but also, and maybe even more so, his relationships. They were sometimes loving, but mostly violent and almost always manipulative. We came to know Tony’s view of the world and people around him in just pre- to post-9/11 Metro NY not just through observing his bull-in-a-china shop pirouette to power, but also through his sessions with his psychiatrist, Dr. Jennifer Melfi(Bracco). Indeed this was one of the most important plots of the show, for those both behind and in front of the fourth wall, if not the genesis for the story being told: How could someone who finds success and fortune via a complete apathy towards the vicious and Machiavellian also need to seek therapy for severe panic attacks and bouts of manic depression? Could it be that just like so many out there, Tony’s flaws and undoing was simply caused by a toxic relationship with his mother, Livia (Nancy Marchand)? To us, particularly at a time when mental health was not as much at the dead front of the public consciousness as it is now, this was as intriguing as it was perplexing. It was a most startling juxtaposition and one that could have only been brought to life by a brooding, smoldering James Gandolfini, who was so invested in his performance of a lifetime that he admitted to being troubled by his character’s frequent callousness and malicious indifference
I think in the end what truly drew us to the show, the plot, and the man himself, as well what not so ironically what brought the Tony to see Dr. Melfi, is how torn he was. Was he a doting albeit expectant father to his daughter and son (Jamie Lynn Sigler, Robert Iler)? Was he a larger-than-life leader to his crew, as well as sometimes mentor to his “nephew”, Christopher Moltisanti (Imperioli)? Did he see himself as a Tony Montana-esque force of nature who would be the king no matter who lost their head? Or, in the end, was he just sick of it all? Of the path he chose for himself and that his father chose before him. Of the monotony and tediousness in the packs of cigarettes and trunks of stereos that came with being a gangster. Of the killing of the aloof and just-post adolescent that sometimes came with the job description. Could he be all of that at once? Could any human being contain that much contradiction? For parts of nine years and over 6 (the sixth being a double) seasons, viewers asked themselves this. Audiences obsessed over this question as if they could put Tony at peace if they could answer it. They became so engrossed in the on goings of these North Jersey gangsters that for an hour at a time, we forgot we weren’t a part of it. Full disclosure: Sopranos came out as I finished elementary school. I saw an episode here and there but then truly binged and digested the show when I was 25. My own anecdote of immersion is that I would save this tantalizing, life-changing show for Sundays, where I would binge 6+ episodes at a time. And what would I order to accompany it? Pasta. My blood is 100% Celtic but for the majority of the day every Sunday for a financial quarter (I missed a day here and there), I was a Pisan in my own mind.
The legacy of the “The Sopranos” is, basically, the absence there of. After David Chase’s tidal wave came and then went in 2007, Mafia shows and movies were put on hold, scrapped altogether, or simply never even considered. The genre was all but a taboo. Why? Because how could you top it? One could argue that, over a decade after it went off the air, the mob genre in Hollywood still hasn’t regained traction in “The Sopranos” shadow. I mean, “The Departed”, easily the most successful gangster movie since, killed off the Italians straight off the bat. I suppose you could make an argument with “Boardwalk Empire”, but that was as much of a period piece and a tale of political corruption than it was about the mob, despite having Mafia characters. The success, popularity, and perfection of “The Sopranos” have simply been, too much for Hollywood to top, at least head on.
After the show went off the air, and even during its final days, there were rumors and whispers, maybe just glorified hopes, of a possible movie. There usually is with shows that become as omnipresent in the day’s pop culture as Sopranos was. Those dreams died with James Gandolfini, who passed away tragically and suddenly of a heart attack in 2013. He was 51 years old. With Gandolfini, who brought Tony Soprano to life as Chase could have only dreamed, went our hopes of ever finding out what happened to Tony after “Don’t Stop Believing” and the final scene ever simply and without warning cut to black. It just wasn’t meant to be. David Chase is, however, now working on a movie prequel called “The Many Saints of Newark”. This will follow the story of Tony’s father and idol, Johnny aka “Johnny Boy”, Soprano as well as Christopher’s father Dickie Moltisanti and a host of other names Tony bemoaned as being from the past hey-day of “this thing of theirs”.
As of yesterday, it was even confirmed a young Tony Soprano would make an appearance.
First off, every news outlet reporting that Game of Thrones has an “official release date” can kick rocks. Fake News like you read about. April is not a date, April is a month. HBO could have just told me Thrones is returning in Q1 and I’d have the same amount of information.
BUT it is exciting to know that Thrones won’t be getting pushed back to summer, which I was worried about since they’re essentially filming 6 movies. It also needed to premiere before May to be eligible for next years Emmys technically, so I’m sure that was a strong incentive.
Now its time to fire up the annual rewatch. This show has so many characters, storylines, and subtleties that you’re missing a ton if you’re relying on your memory from a single viewing. Hell, if you don’t read the books you’re out of the loop as HBO just punts on details that help clarify a lot of things. I’ve read 1.5 of the books and it’s helped immensely. But rewatching a show of this magnitude is DAUNTING.
7 seasons of Thrones is a goddamn commitment, but I’m ready to take this challenge head on. I’m just trying to avoid what happened last year. I did not allot for enough time to comfortably rewatch all 6 seasons before the premiere so I was watching like 2 episodes a night the week of the season premiere. You don’t know stress until you’re trying to cram like 3,600 minutes of Thrones into a month.
Now for anyone that wants to join me on this journey I did the math (accurately I think?) on just how long this will take. So with Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Years coming up most of us will be shutting it down at work anyways, so heres what you’ll need to breeze through every single Game of Thrones episode ahead of the final season.
7 seasons
73 episodes
Avg 60 minutes each
4,380 minutes total
4.5 months
138 days until April 1st
Since we don’t know the exact premiere date we’ll just use April 1st as a placeholder to be safe. This breakdown gives you 138 days to burn through 73 episodes, which if you wanted to start today you would need to watch one episode every 1.8 days in order to catch up in time. May it serve you well.
Yahoo – Wendell Brown, 30, is a former football star in Detroit, a standout at powerhouse King High School and then a three-year starting linebacker at Ball State in Indiana where he graduated in 2009. He later played for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the Canadian Football League, a number of arena teams and even a professional league in Austria. He also coached the game, at King High and then a season as an assistant at Adrian College, a D-III program in Michigan. In 2015, he found his way to Chongqing, China, a city of some 18 million in the southwest part of the country, to play and then, after an injury, coach in the American Football League of China. It seemed like an incredible opportunity. While there he taught English to adults and football to kids. He spoke at the U.S. Embassy about the game. To supplement his income, he opened a cross training business, Brown Elite Fitness. As a 6-foot, 225-pound African-American in the middle of China, he stood out. Brown is in incredible physical condition and was a cast member once on the Discovery Network reality television show, “American Muscle.” Pictures of him putting middle-aged locals through workouts and barking motivational sayings at them – “Elite!”, “All Day!”, “Eight Days a Week”— entertained his family back home. “We used to joke with him, ‘You look like Billy Blanks,’ ” Antoinette said with a laugh. Life was great until Sept. 24, 2016, when Brown attended a birthday party for a friend at a bar. As Wendell’s side tells it, he struggled to blend in when out on the town because many Chinese assumed he was either rich or famous. That night some men wanted to drink with him, but Brown declined. They got angry and a dispute broke out. Brown was later arrested for hitting a man. Brown claimed he never hit anyone and only raised his arms to block bottles being thrown at him. Regardless, Brown was taken to the Chongqing Jiangbei detention center. He had never before been arrested. Faced with no American-style bail available, no discovery process about the evidence against him and a confusing array of laws that bear little resemblance to the United States, he’s spent the past 14 months in a Chinese jail.
This is insanity. The guy got in a bar fight and has been in jail for 14 fucking months. That is absolutely criminal. This is why I don’t want to travel anywhere. I’m cool with Boston, LA, maybe sprinkle in some of the midwest. Its either ISIS bullshit or school shootings or corrupt ass foreign governments locking you up and throwing away the key. You can’t win, which is why I cringe every time somebody posts that misguided fucking Jeff Daniels speech from the Newsroom about how America isn’t the best country in the world anymore.
Um, yea it still is. You do something bad in America, you get treated fairly (for the most part) and punished accordingly with the crime. But you find yourself in a bad situation in another country like Wendell Brown did and boom you’re in jail for over a year.
Unless you’re a pseudo celebrity like LiAngelo Ball you’re basically fucked. According to this Dan Wetzel article the conviction rate of Chinese prosecutors is 99.2%. That is not okay. This is why I prefer to go somewhere I can blend in and being a 5’8″ white guy with a red beard, there’s not many places I can do that besides maybe Ireland or England.
You just know this guy was a target being a 6 foot tall black dude walking around the streets of China. Every dickhead always wants to start shit with the outsider. Doesn’t matter if its Faneuil Hall or fucking Hong Kong.
“According to Brown’s friends who attended the trial, the evidence against him fell apart. The Chinese don’t release details or evidence and there is no independent media in China, however, his friends said the video surveillance showed he didn’t hit anyone, let alone with a bottle like it was alleged. It was revealed the man who claimed he was hit and had his eye injured by Brown, actually had suffered the injury in a previous incident, according to Brown’s friends. They claim Brown took the stand in his own defense and was compelling and convincing, noting that considering his size and strength, had he wanted to fight there would have been significant injuries. That was July. There is still no verdict. It’s been four months without a ruling and no one knows when, if ever, one will come.”
Now he faces 3-10 years in jail for something as small as a bar fight. As Brown said in his own defense, if he *really* wanted to fight he would have done some damage. He probably could have just caved in the faces of half a dozen Chinese dudes before any could have stopped him.
We joke about the hollow nature of internet condolences, but seriously prayers to this guy. Hey Donald, you think you can swing back into China like when Costanza forgot his hat and get Xi to spring this dude too? Lets stop letting our own people get locked up abroad for nothing.
In what has become an annual showcase for Game of Thrones, HBO proved once again the penultimate episode of each season is the one you don’t want to miss with last night’s “Beyond the Wall.” Every year the second to last episode of each season is an absolute gem. Here’s a quick refresher on how GOT never waits around until the finale to drop some bombs. Each season’s penultimate episode:
Season 1: “Baelor” (Ned Stark loses his head and Khal Drogo falls ill)
Season 2: “Blackwater” (Still arguably the best episode in the series as Stannis attacks Kings Landing on Blackwater Bay only to be defeted by Tyrion and co.
Season 3: “Rains of Castermere” (The goddamn Red Wedding, which IMDB synopsis describes as ‘Robb and Catelyn arrive at the Twins for the wedding’ in a horribly misleading fashion.)
Season 4: “The Watchers on the Wall” (Jon Snow and the Night’s Watch defend the Wall against Mance Rayder and the wildlings.)
Season 5: “The Dance of Dragons” (Stannis roasts his daughter, Jon Snow brings the wildlings through the Wall, Khaleesi rides Drogon to safety out of the Mereen fighting pits.)
Season 6: “Battle of the Bastards” (Not much to say here other than this could also be arguably the greatest GOT episode ever.)
The show picks up right where we left off last week with Magnificent Seven venturing beyond the wall.
Jon Snow and Jorah have a heart to heart for the first time and its a refreshing moment of growth. Remember Jorah should rightfully hate Jon Snow. Jon’s father Ned labeled Jorah a traitor and essentially forced him to leave his family and his homeland forever. Jon also effectively became Jeor Mormont’s surrogate son whom he passed Longclaw down to after the shame Jorah brought to House Mormont. To top it all off, no Jon’s moving in on his girl Khaleesi. But Jorah doesn’t hate Jon. He respects him for everything he’s accomplished, including earning his father’s respect and earning Longclaw, regardless of what his name is.
In an instance of foreshadowing we see the first animal wight in the form of a zombie polar bear. “Do bears have blue eyes?” one of the Magnificent Seven asks before it all goes down. Thoros of Myr ends up getting ragdolled by a goddamn zombie bear and a few nameless wildlings got axed too. We also learn that The Hound is going to have a hard time serving the Lord of Light and fighting wights since the one thing that kills them most effectively (ya know, fire) paralyzes him with fear.
The group heads further north until The Hound sees the same thing he saw in his vision in the fire, a mountain shaped like an arrowhead. Not long after they stumble upon a lone White Walker and a group of wights like a dead ranging party. Time to initiate the ill advised plan to try and capture a wight and bring it back south.
Of course they all nearly die because this moronic plan shockingly does not go well. They do take out the group of wights with Jon destroying the White Walker with the Valyrian steel sword he nearly gave away minutes before (WTF Jon). Except their POW wight lets out a scream that acts as a bat signal for every other dead soldier in the north and now our heroes are screwed.
The gang gets marooned on an ice island as the White Walkers and their army surrounded them. The only reason they aren’t immediately killed is because the thin ice breaks and the dead aren’t exactly fond of swimming. So now we play the waiting game. Just waiting for death to come, figuratively and literally.
Jon opts to use one of his 3 lifelines and sends Gendry to phone a friend.
Tyrion tries to advise Khaleesi on a number of things in this episode such as what’s the plan of succession if she were to die? Khaleesi is not a fan of the conversation and says they’ll discuss it when she wears the crown, which could be a bit of grim foreshadowing we all look back on. But specifically he once again advises Khaleesi again risking her own life to rescue Jon Snow, Jorah and the others. In a direct response to the recent failures she’s experienced following Tyrion’s advice while simultaneously directly heeding the late Olenna’s advice (“Be a dragon”) Khaleesi says enough is enough and rides north on the back of Drogon.
Enter Khaleesi (if you can accept White Walkers but you can’t accept faster than normal travel I don’t want to be your friend) and her 3 gigantic dragons who just start flame throwing the entire place. It seems like the dragons really are the end all be all of weapons in the 7 Kingdoms, but similar to the Loot Train scene from a couple of weeks ago we once again see just how powerful yet vulnerable the dragons are at the same time.
The Night King takes his ice spear and just rifles it into the sky as Viserion gets tagged and falls from the sky while bleeding uncontrollably. I think this was the saddest I’ve been watching a TV show since Jack had a nervous breakdown about leaving the island on LOST.
The look Jon Snow gives the Night King had me thinking this is it for our boy, he’s going to go out in a blaze of glory trying to take out the head White Walker. As he tells Khaleesi to go he battles a few more wights before falling through the ice, which is the second time in three episodes the show runners have teased a major character drowning.
Shockingly, Jon does not in fact drown, but there is still an army of dead 50 feet away. This would be a pretty anti-climactic way to die so suddenly half-dead Uncle Benjen rides in out of nowhere on his horse to save Jon Snow’s ass and then sacrifices himself. Why couldn’t Benjen get on the horse and ride away with Jon too? As Michael Bay once said to Ben Affleck after Ben asked wouldn’t it be easier to just teach astronauts how to drill rather than the reverse? Shutup, Ben.
After surviving and making it back to the wall the team loads Jon up on the ship back to Dragonstone and we have a real moment between Khaleesi and Jon. Her dragons are not just pets to her, one of Khaleesi’s children just died, which is what makes it all the worse that they died helping Jon. So we see Khaleesi have the first real crack in her armor in years as she nearly breaks down sobbing mourning her dragon.
In a show of faith in her as a true leader and probably also a vague marriage proposal Jon tells her “You are my queen.” Jon bends the knee, well figuratively, since he’s on his deathbed once again.
Its the first time we have the North truly following a Targaryen since the Mad King. Jon doesn’t care what his people will say, he knows Khaleesi is the Queen they need. Now whether, Jon will be her King or not remains to be seen. But for now, they are allies at the very least.
Also, in addition to the Jon’s knife wounds on his chest courtesy of the Night’s Watch, he suddenly has blue marks on his chest. Is this just the frostbite and remnants of nearly drowning in ice cold water or is it something more? If you look at Benjen (RIP) closely, his face has the same blueish hue after he apparently fought off death and a transition to a wight. We don’t really ever learn a ton around Benjen’s story and what really happened (and we probably never will now) but has Jon been touched by something? Or is this just me looking too deeply into a show that has prided itself on deep, deep world building? I digress.
In the Den of Geek breakdown they also pointed out something interesting about this scene as well as everyone’s transportation home.
“It’s a moment so romantic that Dany even finds the scars that prove he was stabbed in the heart endearing. Jon appears to truly be hers, and hey he still tellingly didn’t ride Drogon with the rest of his comrades… he has his father’s namesake, Rhaegal, to look forward to mounting.”
So that is an interesting bit I thought. We still have yet to see Jon Snow on a dragon, even though all his crew has now been on one. And Khaleesi has only ever ridden on the back of Drogon. So is Rhaegal keeping his back for the one true king, Jon Snow?
The whole Sansa/Arya sister rivalry just took a dark twist as Sansa stumbles upon Arya’s bag of faces and realizes her little sister might be an even bigger psychopath than she thought. Arya all but threatens Sansa’s life and now we have the strangest power struggle I can remember on this show. It seems a little convenient writing as I would like to think after years of surviving older, more experienced foes and politicking all through the 7 Kingdowns (and Essos) that these two would be able to understand whats going on here. Imagine taking the transcript of an AIM chat you had when you were 14 and using that as hardcore, stone cold evidence of your character as a person years later?
Either way, Sansa is spooked about Arya either killing her or actually convincing the other northern lords that the words a 14 year old girl wrote, under durress, prove she is a traitor. Sansa fears losing her head as well as her role as ruler of the North.
So naturally she sends her sworn protector Brienne of Tarth to Kings Landing, which reeks of Littlefingers, well, finger prints. Was there actually a raven summoning her to Kings Landing or does Sansa just want to get Brienne out of Winterfell in case she needs to off Arya? Brienne is after all sworn to protect both of Catlyn Tully’s daughters, so if Sansa needs to axe Arya she doesn’t want anyone there to stop her. My question is though, as Sansa, the one without a single day of combat training, wouldn’t you be more worried about Arya killing you? Wouldn’t you want a bodyguard with you now more than ever? This story line just gets odder and odder.
At the end of the episode we see the army of the dead pulling Viserion up from his icy grave to be resurrected. Enter the ice dragon. The Night King’s wight dragon. Something else that Den of Geek speculated on is that maybe the reason the Night King and the White Walkers were simply waiting for the ice to freeze so they can attack Jon and his gang wasn’t just exposition allowing Khaleesi enough time to get there. Maybe the Night King knew Khaleesi was coming with her dragons and he was legitimately waiting for her. Waiting for her to come into his arena so he can down one and claim a dragon of his own. A much more satisfying and chilling explanation to that entire scene. Because we all know the White Walkers and the wights can’t break through the Wall. But what if the Night King had his own damn dragon to simply fly over the towering ice monstrosity of a wall? Or maybe they make good on the Season 7 opening credits and simply walk around the wall over the frozen ice. Either way the big baddie now has a dragon of his own which is downright frightening.
Next week we have the most tense meeting of the UN ever created. What traps and tricks can we expect in the 90 minute season finale? Did we really risk so much, getting Viserion (and Thoros!) killed just for one wight?
That whole sequence better actually have been worth it, but I’m not too optimistic. I don’t expect Cersei to suddenly care about some existential threat (real or not) because she is so single-mindedly focused on keeping the Iron Throne she will do whatever it takes to stay there. Even if it means her own demise. We’re running out of time though for everyone to be fighting two battles at the same time, so someone is gonna have to either shit or get off the pot. Next week could be the last we see of Cersei.
One more episode guys and then the Long Night truly does begin because god knows how long it’ll be until the 8th and final season of Game of Thrones.
Yah00 – Sophie Turner has been in the spotlight since her teens after being cast as the ill-fated princess Sansa Stark in the hit HBO fantasy series, aged 14. It meant that she swiftly built up a considerable following on Twitter (1.34 million), Instagram (5.4 million) and Facebook (2 million), which she says helped her in auditions…She told Porter: “A lot of what I have achieved is about timing and luck, but it is also, and I hate to say it, about a big social-media following…”I auditioned for a project and it was between me and another girl who is a far better actress than I am, far better, but I had the followers, so I got the job. It’s not right, but it is part of the movie industry now.”
Oh you’re a better actress than me? Welp, my Insta game is fire flames so good luck sweetheart. There’s a reason the “best” actors do Broadway and not the most popular ones. Sansa Stark is just straight up Mean Girls-ing the competition.
Totally reminds me of the scene where Ramsay’s side piece Miranda is talking about all the horrible things that have happened to all of Lord Bolton’s former girlfriends and Sansa just straight up puts Miranda through the mental ringer.
Psychological warfare is the name of the game and she learned from the best, Cersei Lannister, who I just assume is as calculated and ruthless in real life.
PS – Lena Headey legit seems like a down to earth girl that can straight up laugh off people cussing her out in public because she is so good as Cersei on Thrones that they can’t disassociate her from the character.
So real quick just to do a quick callback to one of our recommended binges. You may have noticed a new actor playing Sam’s brother, Dickon Tarley (teehee) on Sunday’s episode. Recasting has long been a headache for GOT fans. They don’t always make it obvious it’s a character you’ve seen before, especially considering, although you may not remeber, pre-“Game Of Thrones” there wasn’t a lot of shows you had to remember 6,000 characters. Anyway, the dude who played Cormac McClaggen in a Harry Potter movie or two is not playing the favored Tarley brother anymore, apparently because of a scheduling conflict with another show he was set to be on – that since has been cancelled. To reiterate, he quit GAME OF THRONES to be on an ABC show, albeit in a more prevalent part, that has already been cancelled, all across about a 6 month time-span. Fire your agent bromigo.
Which brings us to his replacement, which is a curious one as physqiue/size wise they at least appear pretty different. Anyway, the actor in question is Tom Hopper, who played a character by the name of Billy Bones….
As a “Black Sails” diehard I obviously fanboy’d out when Hopper did his little turnaround (see: I squealed like a little school girl). Lady Ballgame was not impressed and quite frankly a bit disgusted. But whatever. Believe me when I say these two things.
1.) Tom Hopper will be a star within the next couple of years. He’s Charlie Hunnam with a bit better acting chops (and I love Hunnam)
2.) Too much Dickon Tarley is not enough Dickon Tarley from here on out.
Either way, Sansa is spooked about Arya either killing her or actually convincing the other northern lords that the words a 14 year old girl wrote, under durress, prove she is a traitor. Sansa fears losing her head as well as her role as ruler of the North.
The 300s 