Lurker > Inviso

@Peridiam What were your week one predictions again? I remember you had Dominique/Mark ranked high, but I don't remember what your actual predictions were.
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Inviso

Squirrelgate posted...

Inviso posted...

I'd put Paul right alongside Jordan, Rachel, and Dick in terms of getting rigged to victory.

this but I'd put him above them because his rigging was more subtle and wasn't a case where they would've been evicted outright had there not been rigging.

I'd put him above them as well, because admittedly, his gameplay is solid. It's just that he's able to do the shit he's doing because no one would ever consider targeting him due to his veteran status.
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Inviso

I'd put Paul right alongside Jordan, Rachel, and Dick in terms of getting rigged to victory.
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Inviso

The problem is that so many of the cast are awful and the show has to try and salvage SOMEONE, so they go easy on these terrible players in ALL senses of the word.
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Inviso

This is like a scene out of Arrested Development (WARNING: MAY INDUCE NAUSEA)


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Inviso

Espeon
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The Lady of Winterfell Returns (Season 5)
Ramsay Rules Winterfell (Season 6)
Theon Becomes Reek (Seasons 3-5)
Tyrion and Jorah Tour Essos (Season 5)
Rise of the Kraken (Season 6)
The Great Ranging (Seasons 2-3)
Brienne and Podrick's Not-So-Excellent Adventures (Seasons 4-5)
Drowning in the Water Gardens (Seasons 5-6)
Sam Reaches the Reach (Season 6)
Sam the Slayer (Seasons 3-5)
Robb and Bran Manage Winterfell (Seasons 1-2)
Daenerys in Qarth (Season 2)
Bran's Flight North (Seasons 3-4)
The House of Black and White (Seasons 5-6)
Tyrion Runs Meereen (Season 6)
Daenerys Joins the Dosh Khaleen (Seasons 5-6)
All Those That Deny That Are My Foes (Season 2)
Steward Jon Snow (Season 1)
Renly's Ambitions (Seasons 1-2)
The King and the The Kingsroad (Season 1)
The Great Lannister Conspiracy (Season 1)
As High as Honor (Season 1)
The Chained Dragon Queen (Seasons 4-5)
Cersei Versus the Faith (Seasons 5-6)
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32. Bran's Flight North (Seasons 3-4) - This arc is a pretty big nothing arc. I don't think most people would disagree that Bran is one of the biggest momentum killers in any given episode. The problem is that Bran himself is crippled, which automatically limits a lot of his storylines. You're forced into entirely mental plotlines that can't easily have the same level of suspense as the more physical plotlines. As a result, you have this long slog of just moving from Winterfell to the grove or whatever it is, and it's unpleasant and dull. The only semi-interesting portions involve the crossing with the Wall storyline. Beyond that though, it's just a massive filler arc.

31. The King and the The Kingsroad (Season 1) - This is a nice introductory story arc that gives us the details on the Baratheon and Stark families and helps establish all the characters as CHARACTERS that we can then watch grow and learn over time. There's some minor conflict growing between these characters and the hint of conspiracy, and there's a reason why this arc is able is give us such a long-running show. It's solid. Very solid, but nothing beyond introduction really.

30. Robb and Bran Manage Winterfell (Seasons 1-2) - If Bran trekking to the wall is boring, this arc is even moreso, because I legitimately dislike Robb more than Bran. I find season 1 Robb to be an annoying little s*** that we're supposed to root for because he's a Stark, yet his leadership is just being an a****** to Theon and Tyrion all the time. Honestly, I LIKE watching characters try to rule, but Bran is NOT leadership material the way Jon or Dany are in season five. So this is a flat arc for me.

29. The Great Lannister Conspiracy (Season 1) - The Kingsroad is okay, but the Lannister arc of the early season is what really keeps the show exciting and fun. It's just how smarmy Cersei and Jaime are that make us fear for Ned's safety and make us fear for the Starks in general (and it doesn't help that Joffrey is a malicious little s***.) From the moment Bran gets pushed out of a window to the moment Ned kinda comes to his realization of the Lannister secret? It's a solid mystery plotline for me and it WORKS in the first season to set up WHY the Lannisters are the bad guy to the Starks' good guys.

28. Daenerys Joins the Dosh Khaleen (Seasons 5-6) - I'm OKAY with this arc, but honestly...I feel like the problem I'm starting to have with Dany is that she's TOO perfect and she wins TOO much. Season 5 was great because that was Dany who has difficulties with things. While I appreciate her badassness in season 6, it just...there's one moment killing the Khals that's cool, and then it's just "look at how badass Dany is" for the rest of the season. It's not BAD at all, and in fact I'll take it over a LOT of arcs...but it's just a bit much for the character, given the actually interesting development of season 5.

27. As High as Honor (Season 1) - Catelyn is one of my favorite characters in the series. She's not perfect, and this is an instance of her making a move that is poorly thought out and kinda shapes the series. But it's still cool. We have Tyrion being a badass and being smart and being witty. We have crazy Lysa being crazy and Catelyn realizing how crazy her sister is. And generally it's a chance to give the Lannisters their time as "good guys" by creating a solid lunatic villain that is not Lannister affiliated. It's a short arc overall, sure, but it's pretty damn good, and it's one of the better portions of the early middle portion of season 1.
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And a rough ranking from worst to best of what's shown up thus far:

The Lady of Winterfell Returns (Season 5)
Ramsay Rules Winterfell (Season 6)
Theon Becomes Reek (Seasons 3-5)
Tyrion and Jorah Tour Essos (Season 5)
Rise of the Kraken (Season 6)
The Great Ranging (Seasons 2-3)
Brienne and Podrick's Not-So-Excellent Adventures (Seasons 4-5)
Drowning in the Water Gardens (Seasons 5-6)
Sam Reaches the Reach (Season 6)
Sam the Slayer (Seasons 3-5)
Daenerys in Qarth (Season 2)
The House of Black and White (Seasons 5-6)
Tyrion Runs Meereen (Season 6)
All Those That Deny That Are My Foes (Season 2)
Steward Jon Snow (Season 1)
Renly's Ambitions (Seasons 1-2)
The Chained Dragon Queen (Seasons 4-5)
Cersei Versus the Faith (Seasons 5-6)
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36. Tyrion Runs Meereen (Season 6) - After the blandness of his season 5 story arc, I appreciate this more as an extension of Dany's season 5 story arc (which I liked). But Tyrion ultimately feels more irrelevant in this role than Dany did because he IS better at ruling than she is, yet is still saddled with the difficulties posed by Meereen's chaotic setting. As a result, he's relegated to more of a background role, unfortunately. It's not bad, but it's just not particularly engaging.

35. Rise of the Kraken (Season 6) - I don't necessarily LIKE the Pyke stuff in the books (again, I GREATLY prefer Dorne), but holy s*** the writers just do not give a f*** about the Iron Islands after season 2. Euron's arrival is completely wasted because the guy is only in two episodes, and we're clearly not meant to give a s*** about the Iron Islands once Yara/Theon leave. I can't even really badmouth this arc because the writers didn't put enough effort into crafting scenes for me to dislike. That's pretty f***ing bad and it IS a complete waste in every aspect.

34. All Those That Deny That Are My Foes (Season 2) - I don't have a lot to say about this one because honestly, with Stannis it's hard for me to disassociate sections of his story from one another. He's a character who feels like he has a complete arc told from his first appearance to his final moments. Is he a bit gruff in season 2? Yeah. And honestly, he feels like more of a set piece meant to cause conflict with the more interesting and charismatic armies around him...but I don't really have any emotional reaction to this arc as a whole. There's FAR worse in season 2 to hate.

33. Renly's Ambitions (Seasons 1-2) - Yeah, I agree with your assessment of the arc. It FEELS unfinished. Like, there's no actual battle and we just have everyone predicting Renly will dominate, but then Stannis nips that in the bud and the only real consequence is the Tyrell army ultimately siding with the Lannisters. I think it's interesting the way the show paints it as "Hey Renly, you should totally be king. *suck suck*" and then Renly goes about that exactly how you'd expect, with him basically playing a king rather than realizing what's actually required. Not much else to say though.
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40. The Lady of Winterfell Returns (Season 5) - Another Ramsay arc, yay. And somehow, I think this might just be the worst one of all, because of how utterly idiotic it is. Ramsay/Theon dragged for a long time, but it characterized Theon. Ramsay ruling Winterfell was the writers jerking off to Ramsay, but at least it built up Ramsay's downfall as a cathartic moment for the fans. This arc? This is just dumb. Littlefinger has been characterized as the smartest manipulator in Westeros, yet he just HANDS Sansa to a sadist? And then we follow said sadist through a season of him abusing Sansa both physically and emotionally? Ugh. What's worse is that at the end of season 4, we had Sansa finally stepping up and becoming stronger as a character, and this whole plot felt like throwing her back to season 2 or 3 where she was the series' punching bag. Terribly written all around.

39. The Chained Dragon Queen (Seasons 4-5) - I actually like this arc. One of the few good things about season 5 (along with Cersei vs. the Faith) is how Dany is explored as a character. It's very easy to have her walk around and talk a big game and then insert one or two glorious moments of triumph per season (see Dracarys, burning the slaver fleet, burning the Khals), but what I appreciated about her Meereen storyline is how she actually had to sit down and learn to RULE. That's the thing...so much of GoT is told from the perspective of "We need to fight this war so I can be king!" and rarely do they explore what being king means in a time of peace. It's always either an incompetent ruler, or a military commander leading his troops. So for Dany to be given control of a city and actually have to try and make it work with her as the leader...it's fascinating to me. It goes off the rails, sure, but that just makes it MORE interesting. I like watching Dany struggle with moral choices beyond "I'm a badass and I'm gonna conquer this s***."

38. Tyrion and Jorah Tour Essos (Season 5) - f*** this whole storyline. Seriously, f*** this s***. It's not BAD, but it's completely pointless. I GET that Peter Dinklage is the star of the show, but his role in season 5 is SO f***ing stupid. It's a season of him and Jorah just trekking around, getting captured, and miraculously appearing before Dany. I just hate the pacing of this arc. We spend like, 5 or 6 episodes with Tyrion as Jorah's prisoner, then two episodes after that he's meeting Dany. We should've spent more time with Tyrion/Jorah in the fighting pits, rather than sitting on a boat while Jorah acts anti-social.

37. The House of Black and White (Seasons 5-6) - Another arc that was just a complete waste of time. I like Arya, I do. And I appreciate the show giving her an arc of becoming a stone-cold killer because she's completely disconnected from everything else. But this arc was just two seasons of absolute NOTHING. Arya spends two seasons cleaning floors, being blind, and getting hit by sticks, and ultimately just leaves? This whole arc felt like a rushed ending with the only real learning she got being how to fight in the dark, and how to remove faces? Doesn't help that Jaqen, who is awesome, was completely wasted as a character here. I like the Waif and her hilarious hatred for Arya though. So um...points for that I guess?
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41. Cersei Versus the Faith (Seasons 5-6) - Okay, here's where we REALLY disagree (unless this arc is specific to Cersei and doesn't encompass everything in King's Landing for seasons 5-6.) Yes, there are some dumb anti-climax moments (the Mountain not getting to actually fight anyone, the army not actually getting to take down the High Sparrow), but honestly, I LIKE that. Book Cersei is right up there with Brienne for me as far as why AFfC is painful to read. She's not AMAZING here, but it's nice to see her trying to play the game and manipulate, only to prove how woefully outmatched she is by almost everyone around her. That actually makes Cersei a bit more sympathetic, rather than a Ramsay tier "they're the big bad guy because everyone around them just LETS them do stupid s***" villain.

Beyond that though, it's just fascinating to watch the major players in King's Landing at work. Margaery is playing from a position of weakness, yet she's cunning and manages to get her way. Tommen is being pulled in all sorts of directions, and you feel bad for the kid because he actually seems like one of the few good people who probably SHOULD rule the seven kingdoms (granted, with competent advisors rather than self-serving a******s.) And the High Sparrow...holy s*** he is one of my favorite characters in the series. He starts off as a nobody who gets elevated to the highest religious position in the land, and he seems to be the one person smart enough to use Cersei's petty semi-insanity against her to amass power. But what makes him better is that he's one of the few people that doesn't seem to want power just to rule the seven kingdoms so much as it's devotion to his faith.

Ultimately, I love the way this arc concludes as well. Cersei tries to manipulate the High Sparrow to remove Margaery from power, but that gets turned back around on her and she's forced into the Walk of Shame. Cersei tries to use The Mountain as her warrior for trial by combat, but she just couldn't hold her cards close to the chest, and as a result trial by combat gets abolished. She tries to get revenge on the High Sparrow via the Tyrells, but Margaery outsmarts her via Tommen. With EVERY. SINGLE. PLAN. falling apart due to Cersei being nowhere near as clever as she thinks she is, she goes with the nuclear option and essentially flips the Monopoly board over to give herself the win. It's a perfect arc for her character while still allowing her to claim a victory.
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46. Theon Becomes Reek (Seasons 3-5) - I've said before that Ramsay is my least favorite character in the show. Hands down. There are other evil and twisted psychopaths in the show, but I can appreciate them because the show knows how to handle them. Most of them, even if they hold power (see Walder Frey and Joffrey) are still treated like s*** by the rest of the cast, so you at least have some positive moments. With Ramsay, the most negative reaction he gets is people calling him a monster behind his back, and Roose passive aggressively sniping at him. It makes Ramsay out to be this God tier villain when he's just an over-exposed sociopath. And honestly, his role in Theon's storyline single-handedly brings down both season 3 and 5 for me. I don't need to see an a****** have everything handed to him on a silver platter, and I don't need to watch Theon suffer for three whole goddamn seasons.

45. Sam the Slayer (Seasons 3-5) - This isn't a good storyline, but it's mostly not a storyline at all. We're supposed to like Sam because he's a loser, and I appreciate that. But his storyline is so f***ing boring. It's just him wandering beyond the wall and then serving as Jon's conscience when Jon comes back as a much bigger badass than he was before his awful ranging subplot. I just don't give a s*** about Sam's storyline. At all. In any season beyond the first, really. It's not BAD, it's just NOTHING.

44. Steward Jon Snow (Season 1) - I hate Jon in season 1. I'm sorry, but I do. I think he's just this smug little prick who thinks that because he has it a LITTLE tough at Winterfell, he's the most put-upon person in the world. And then he goes to the Wall where his arrogance pisses me off to no end. That being said, this is not a bad storyline. Jon NEEDS to be that snotty little brat early on so we can appreciate the man he grows into later on. I don't think I'd be able to like Jon as much as I do if he hadn't grown up and was just ALWAYS a badass. So I do appreciate this storyline in making him a three-dimensional character, even if it's not always pleasant.

43. Sam Reaches the Reach (Season 6) - Honestly, this should be lumped in with the rest of Sam's story because there's not really much difference. He's still the same fat loser trying to grow into a strong independent woman who don't need no man. Only now we get to meet his a****** father. Seriously, I don't get why this wasn't just lumped with the rest of his storyline. It's all the same.

42. Ramsay Rules Winterfell (Season 6) - Everything I said about Ramsay and Theon's storyline still applies here. This is worse though. Because at least in the first case, we had Theon to make us feel SOME sympathy for a character to justify the constant screentime. Season 6 Ramsay? He murders Roose and Walda with no consequences. He murders Osha with no consequences. He is literally GIVEN Rickon and murders HIM with no consequences (bear with me here.) It's just more of the show building up this character as God tier, and it sucks. We just had three seasons of Ramsay being a sadistic bastard. We don't need you to kill off MORE characters at his hand. We already hate him, trust me. All of this leads to the Battle of the Bastards, and it honestly is diminished because of just how blatantly obvious it is that Ramsay HAS to lose. You don't spend a season building this f***er up as even WORSE than he was before, and then he wins his battle against American Hero Jon Snow. Ramsay really is the absolute worst thing about this series. Everything else can be overlooked or ignored. But not this f***er.
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Gonna go back and give my thoughts on what's gone down thus far:

50. Brienne and Podrick's Not-So-Excellent Adventures (Seasons 4-5) - Yeah this is weak. It's basically "Brienne stumbles into situations where she can complete her mission, and fails miserably twice." Brienne vs. The Hound is cool, sure, but this whole arc is a complete non-starter. Unlike you though, I hated it MORE in the book because it's just poorly handled there. AFfC is easily my least favorite book of the five, and Brienne getting like, eight chapters to wander around Westeros is a large part of that. She's on a quest that, due to the fact that Sansa/Arya chapters exist, we KNOW Brienne is nowhere near completing. So as a result, you have eight chapters that feel completely pointless and have little suspense beyond whether or not Brienne herself (who is tangentially connected to the main story at that point) will survive.

49. Daenerys in Qarth (Season 2) - This arc is complete filler. COMPLETE filler. In the books and in the show. It's literally four chapters in ACoK that serve no purpose really to Dany's overall story beyond some mystical prophecy bulls*** in the House of the Undying. A LARGE part of why season 2 drags so badly is because of this arc and how Dany is forced to get pointless scenes that slow the plot and just keep her at the forefront of the audience's mind. Dany's followers are dying in the desert. Dany gets confronted by rich dudes in the desert. Dany attends an ELEGANT DINNER PARTY. Dany loses her dragons, and is slightly miffed about this. Dany sees some mystical visions and kills a bald dude. That's it. It's dumb and a complete waste of time. That being said...it's actually BETTER than the other s***ty season 2 plotline of Jon Snow's journeys, because at least Qarth is almost so over-the-top that it's amusing.

48. Drowning in the Water Gardens (Seasons 5-6) - Yeah this is bad and I think everyone can agree this is bad. The politics of Dorne are fascinating in theory because of just how set apart they are from the rest of the seven kingdoms. But the acting is subpar, the plotting is subpar, and it actually manages to damage my enjoyment of Jaime Lannister/Bronn with just how inane it all is. It's a real shame because as I've said, I LOVE Dorne in the books. It's the one thing that salvages AFfC for me. But we don't get any of the nuance or political intrigue here. Just Doran being a p****, Areo being a background character, and Ellaria/Sand Snakes acting stupid. I think the one positive about this storyline is that ultimately it's completely irrelevant to the overall storyline, so it was easy enough to neglect it and focus on better stuff (compared to the disasters of season 2 where two of the three main characters had godawful storylines that HAD to be shown because they're main characters.)

47. The Great Ranging (Seasons 2-3) - See the last sentence of my Qarth write-up for my feelings on this one. Jon Snow takes a good deal of time in my opinion before he actually becomes a great character, and a lot of that is because of how s***ty his story is in the show. Stuck-up brat in season 1 at least fits with his character. But then we get like, a season of Jon wandering in the wilderness doing dumb s*** for little explained reason, following by the adventures of Sam doing equally dumb and pointless s*** while Jon's story gets a little better in season 3. NOTHING about the beyond the wall stuff is interesting or enjoyable in the slightest, and it doesn't even have the benefit of an aesthetically pleasing setting like Qarth and Dorne. This storyline actually hurts season 2 MORE than Qarth's stupidity, in my opinion.
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Two things:

1. Show Dorne SUCKS. We're given no reason to character about the characters, which is a DAMN shame after Oberyn introduced the Martells in such a cool and fiery way. That being said, I LOVE Dorne in the books. Mostly because AFfC sucks and is dragged down by bland and meandering Brienne chapters, and far too many "Cersei is crazy" chapters. Watching the struggles of varying factions trying to take control in Dorne was cool in the books. The show NEEDED Arianne.

2. The Iron Islands should be completely out by now. You wanna talk about a plot line that just had the ball dropped, Jesus Christ. Ignored for long stretches and given pointless filler scenes despite having Theon in the show from the very first season. After season 2, the Iron Islands are rendered irrelevant for no reason despite having so MANY reasons to keep them hyped up in the show (again, Theon exists, and they do eventually become important in AFfC/ADwD.) Introducing Euron out of nowhere in season 6 (and having him exist for two episodes before Yara/Theon just run off and advance the plot with Dany) is so terribly handled.
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