Game of Thrones Season 7 - Episode 1

[OlennasWimple]

SPOILERS ALERT

THIS THREAD IS FOR DISCUSSION OF SEASON 7, EPISODE 1 "DRAGONSTONE"

Come and discuss the eagerly awaited Season 7 opening episode airing July 17th at 2am UK time! Don't read the thread if you want to avoid spoilers from Season 7 but also Seasons 1-6

HBO description of the episode: Jon (Kit Harington) organizes the defense of the North. Cersei (Lena Headey) tries to even the odds. Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) comes home

Please avoid discussing leaks and production details for Seasons 7 and 8 but speculate away on what we have learnt from the new episode and what it might mean for the rest of the Season and the ultimate winner(s) of the Game of Thrones

Why would Sansa bend the knee to cersei?

It's very much emphasised in the books that Jon and Sansa barely interacted she growing up.

I'm surprised Cersei didn't ask for Sansa to be sent back to Kings Landing as a traitor.

Does she know Littlefinger betrayed her? Last time she saw she asked him to find and kill Sansa.

I don't know why Sansa would do it after Joffrey, Ned's death etc - but it was interesting that she was seen to admire Cersei and did not deny it.

Thanks Drinks for the link to Alys Karstark - will read up.

She admires cersei I think as she has learnt, through being brutalised by the lannisters and the boltons, that to be ruthless is the only way to survive. I don't think it means she would ever want to be anywhere near cersei again.

I wondered if cersi, who knew Dany was heading to Dragonstone...planted some of her wildfire ahead of her arrival...

There is a reason that the place is empty...

Sam knew about the dragon glass weapons pile that was found seasons ago but has never mentioned it to the nightswatch. It's all very well knowing that there are stores hidden at dragonstone but there is also a big pile of it not far. To be fair it wouldn't be me going to hunt for it out there.

Knowing that dragon glass is important. Is it made by the dragons that Dany has?

Could Dany survive wildfire. We know she can survive normal fire.

Euron is a prick

Sheeran was pointless

I so hope Littlefinger gets a spike up his arse soon

Ooh that Ed sheeran scene was cringy and pointless! Was that wee lad from this is England in it too?

I really enjoyed it, but some of the scripting seems a bit clunky.... I don't know if it's because it's the first episode and they're trying to juggle viewers memories or something.

I'm glad euron seems a bit more interesting. I thought he was rather wet when first introduced, although a wee bit pantomime maybe.

Just watched it on Now TV, might watch it again before bed.
Enjoyed it, I felt like it really set the scene for the rest of the season. It put all the figures on the map, literally and figuratively.
Jumped out of my skin at Jorah
Was amused/revolted by the chore montage
Grinned like a fool at Tormond and Brienne
Lolled at 'Two Working Hands'
Rolled my eyes so hard at Ed.
Thought Pete Postlewaite's son was Kylo Ren.
Softly sang 'there may be trouble ahead' throughout the Sansa/Jon faceoff.
Nearly cried at the Hound burying and saying words over the bodies of the farmer and his daughter.

By the way, I think the Hound has always known the consequences of his actions, he just didn't (or didn't allow himself to) care. Over the last few years he's realised that he doesn't need to be the monster that people say he is and he's trying to atone for what he's done. Not necessarily in the belief of an afterlife and trying to forgive his sins, but to balance up the scales that he feels himself, if that makes sense?

Didn't ..... overly enjoy this episode. Didn't quite understand some bits.

Oh and I could be wrong, but I thought Bran's 'I saw you at Hardholme' speech was showing that he is important in his own right and not just as a Stark. Furthering him from his family and further binding him to the weirnet. He's not getting passage cause he's Jon's wee brother, he's getting passage because he has knowledge to end this war. and is breaching the magic of the wall by crossing with the dark mark on his arm

I really liked the pace of the episode.

I agree re. Tyrion's head being the present, that was my immediate thought.

Ed Sheeran was a bit awkward I suppose, I saw it as Arya being confronted by the human side/grey area of the house conflict since they were Lannister bannermen.

Dany is sitting on an absolute powerhouse WRT the whitewalkers - dragons and all of that dragon glass she is now unknowingly sitting on. She has (a little too conveniently) wandered into a very powerful political position.

One thing that made me really? Was Jon saying that all of the girls would be trained to fight along with the boys. I mean, I consider myself a feminist but this world is meant to be based on medieval society, so that seemed a bit ridiculous and a contrived attempt to overcompensate for all of the throwaway violence against women scenes in the seasons where they have had to follow GRRM's story.

I think that Sansa is secretly mulling over Littlefinger's proposal. I don't think that there will be a Sansa/Jon romance, at any rate, I think that we are being shown how she has become distanced from the honourable Stark worldview. I think the show is showing her as if she had more of a history with him than the books did (the show skipped over how Catelyn Stark was the wicked step mother, as well), so she is affectionate towards him but feeling a bit distanced/incompatible in some ways now.

Why wouldn't he say girls should fight? Surely it comes from all the time he spent with the wildlings - whose women do fight?

Yeah I wondered that, but he still grew up immersed in a society where it would be like suggesting women grow a second head, and knows this, so he wouldn't just blurt it out like it's common sense. I also don't think people would accept it so easily.

I suspect the present from Euron was supposed to be a reference to Tyrion's head because in the books there is a long-running storyline after Joffrey is poisoned and Tyrion escapes where Cersei promises a rich reward to anyone who brings her Tyrion's head and she receives a succession of heads (mostly, but not always, other dwarves)

The show is quite clever in how it re-uses some of the book storylines that don't get featured in their own right

Exactly. Wilding women fight same as men and Ygritte was a fierce archer.

Wondered if gift would be the horn (ooer) that commands the dragons?

Though others have speculated a sand snake

I think if it were consistent then 99% of the lords in the room would have considered it ludicrous and not backed down on negotiating it. I think they would have felt as if they had been told to send helpless children into battle, because that would be the attitude towards women that most of them would have had, regardless of Jon Snows enlightening gap year to the wall.

"enlightening gap year" 😂😂😂

I think the plan re the women fighting is more so they can defend themselves in the castles if the men are off fighting? Rather than sending them out in formation

Maybe - possibly I over-inferred when the camera focused in on Brienne in her big tough armour looking like she could crush a man with her bare hands when he said it!

I forgot about Bran

I quite enjoyed Euron. And Arya interacting with the soldiers (apart from Ed Sheersn obviously).

It's been a long wait so I think expectations were very high.

I watched this at 2am and have rewatched this evening - thought it was solid on the first viewing, liked it better on the second.

I like the belter of an opening scene and, given that Arya is probably my least favourite character still standing, I thought that was pretty fucking cool

Agree that the whole sheeran scene was a bit awful.

I loved that the whole Dany sequence was silent until she speaks those 3 words at the very end.