House of the Dragon 9

 Being the spoiler-tastic review of this episode, but not spoiling anything beyond it.

Fire and Blood 8

 The book-spoiler post. Gonna once again spoil a major, major death (the one that Thrones already spoiled, as I mentioned in an earlier post), as well as another one.

House of the Dragon 8

I didn't think it was possible, but we finally saw a more badass ascent to the Iron Throne than the one Tywin gave to Joffrey way back when Thrones was good.

Being, as usual, the post that discusses everything up through the end of the episode, but leaving book spoilers for the companion post.

House of the Dragon 7

 The excessive profanity and capitalized red text throughout this blog post is an intentional creative decision. 

LIGHT YOUR FUCKING SETS, MIGUEL! LIGHT YOUR FUCKING SETS! WE'RE NOT WATCHING AN AUDIO PLAY, MIGUEL! THIS ISN'T A FUCKING PODCAST! HBO PAID RIDICULOUS SUMS OF MONEY FOR THOSE SETS AND COSTUMES AND ACTORS (AND EVEN MORE MONEY FOR THOSE ACTORS TO TAKE THOSE COSTUMES OFF) BUT APPARENTLY MISTER FUCKING ARTISTIC VISION, MISTER FUCKING CAN'T-SHOOT-AN-ACTION-SCENE-TO-SAVE-HIS-LIFE (MAYBE THAT'S WHY EVERYTHING IS ALWAYS SO FUCKING DARK) THINKS HE'S PUTTING ON A FUCKING AUDIOBOOK! WHY MUST YOU FAIL A DIRECTOR'S MOST BASIC JOB? GOD! DAMN! 

AND ANOTHER THING, MIGUEL! I'VE SEEN AMATEUR HIGH SCHOOL DRAMA CLUB FILMS WITH MORE COMPETENT DAY-FOR-NIGHT FILTERS THAN YOU HAVE IN YOUR MULTIGAZILLION-DOLLAR DRAGON/TITTY SEQUEL! EVEN THE 70s BOND FILMS DO IT BETTER, FUCK! YOU'VE GOT THE MONEY, YOU'VE GOT THE LOCATIONS! MIGUEL! FUCKING SHOOT YOUR NIGHT SCENES AT FUCKING NIGHT! JESUS CHRIST, I DON'T KNOW IF THE "OUR MAINS FRAK ON A BEACH" SCENE IN BATTLESTAR GALACTICA WAS DONE IN DAY-FOR-NIGHT, IT SURE DOESN'T FRAKKING LOOK LIKE IT, BUT THAT WAS SIXTEEN FRAKKING YEARS AGO ON A FRACTION OF YOUR BUDGET!

FUCK! 

(Ahem)

This is the review of Episode 7 of HBO's (apparent) radio drama House of the Dragon (A Project GRRM is Working on Instead of Winds of Winter): A Prequel to Game of Thrones (A Project GRRM Worked on Instead of Winds of Winter) Based on Fire and Blood (A Project GRMM Worked on Instead of Winds of Winter). 

It's this fundamental lack of respect for the audience, manifested both in George's GODDAMN REFUSAL TO FINISH THE GODDAMN BOOKS and in Miguel's GODDAMN REFUSAL TO LIGHT HIS GODDAMN SHOW CORRECTLY, that has finally reached the breaking point for me. It's been FOUR THOUSAND AND NINETY-TWO DAYS between the release of A Diversion With Doldrums A Dance With Dragons and the initial broadcast of HotD Episode 7. Memo to George: you, like King Joeserys, are not getting any younger. FINISH. THE FUCKING. BOOKS. It's been ONE THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY-THREE DAYS between the initial broadcast of "The Long Night," Miguel's previous can't-do-the-director's-most-basic-job-and-show-us-what's-fucking-happening episode, and the broadcast of last week's episode "Driftmark." Memo to Miguel: This is not your goddamn college arthouse project. This is a prequel to a dragon/titty remix of The Wars of the Roses. TAKE A FUCKING LIGHTING CLASS.

Okay.

I've said my piece. For now. On to the review, such as it is.

In this episode, the smirking jerkwad second son character whose name is an anagram of "A Demon" claims a dragon to ride. And his nephew loses an eye, ba-dum tish. It spoils the episode but does not go into future book spoilers. The future book spoiler post is over here.

Fire and Blood 7

 Being the future book-spoiler post. If you don't want future spoilers (or want the rest of the review), go here.

Fire and Blood 6

 Being the spoilertastic review of House of the Dragon episode six. The review that only discusses events up to that episode is here. But in this post, I'm going to start off by immediately talking about the next major death that will occur in the series, probably in Episode 7. So go away if you don't want those sorts of spoilers.

House of the Dragon 6

 Being the up-through-the-end-of-this-episode spoiler. Future spoilers are, as always, in the companion post. Except in one notable instance where the show spoiled it for you (it's that thing Princess Bug-Collector said).

House of the Dragon, 4 and 5

 Wow.

As always, this post will spoil the episodes themselves; the companion post will contain book spoilers (i.e., spoilers for future episodes). (Yes, I know the "HotD Spoiler-Free" tag technically contains spoilers, but only up to the most recent episode. I specifically want to avoid future spoilers with that tag.) I'll also discuss the book up to this point, which I think is fair game.

Oh, I will be mentioning the upcoming significant... alteration to the cast, but unless you've been living under a rock you know it's coming. (The other significant exception to the "no future spoilers" rule is that I'm allowed to tell you that everyone dies, because this is a prequel. I'm just not allowed to tell you how they die, even though in one case the parent show already did...) 

Fire and Blood, 4 and 5

 Being the future-spoiler review of the two most recent episodes of House of the Dragon. The companion post will only spoil those two episodes; this one will spoil far more. (Not that any of this matters, because, again, Game of Thrones itself spoiled the ending, lol.)

So, again, major - MAJOR - spoilers for upcoming episodes in 3... 2... last chance... 1...

House of the Dragon, Episode 3

 Just like last time, this post will spoil this episode. A companion post will spoil subsequent episodes.

Fire and Blood, part 3

 Being the book-spoiler review of House of the Dragon part 3. If you don't want future episodes spoiled, do not read this because I'm going to straight-up spoil some very major plot points. The that-episode-only recap is here.

House of the Dragon, Episode 2

  Lord Strong got some screentime, Rasputin did a stupid, the Eleventh Doctor stole an egg, and the king decided to not marry a child, so he married a teenager instead.

This episode had no sex and very little violence (which is not to say there's no disturbing imagery; there's a guy getting crucified - done very tastefully, you know what's being nailed where without them actually having to show you - a guy getting eaten by crabs, and a guy getting his finger eaten by gangrene and maggots). It also had just the right amount of Matt Smith. Until the next generation gets up and running, the story runs the risk of being the Daemon Targaryen Show (which I'm totally here for), but they wisely keep him back for most of the episode's runtime. 

Spoilers for this episode (book spoilers are in a different post)

House of the Dragon, Future Spoilers

TURN BACK NOW if you don't want me to spoil basically everything that I think is going to happen this season. The less-spoileriffic review of Episode 2 is here.

House of the Dragon, Episode 1

 Look, I don't get paid the HBO bucks, I didn't go to the HBO School of Narrative Storytelling or the Miguel Sapochnik School of Proper Lighting, I just think it's a dumb dumb thing to remind everybody about the unmitigated awfulness that was Game Of Thrones Seasons 5-8. 

But, no, we're going to start the episode off tugging those nostalgia themes with the "Daenerys," "Iron Throne," and main Game of Thrones theme. Okay then. And we're going to end the episode-

No, no, let's do this one bizarre decision at a time. And fair warning: I've read the source material and we should all have some idea of where this is going: Game of Thrones Season 8 The Wars of the Roses The Anarchy no really just The Wars of the Roses Again.* So I consider everything up to King Viserys's death (which probably won't happen until near the end of this season) to be fair game to spoil. Who marries who, who has kids, etc. Not saying I'm going to lay out the entire thing in this post, but I could do that in a future one.

*Okay, I'm lying, it is the Anarchy, but boy oh boy are they trying to head-fake you into thinking its War of the Roses again.

I found a Game of Thrones Season Six wishlist. Hahahahahahaha.

I was rooting around in the deepest darkest depths of my computer where no sane man dares tread, and I found a list I'd written earlier this year of all the stuff I wanted to have happen in Season Six of Game of Thrones. Here's that list.

Ashes of Victory: Game of Thrones 6.10 vs. My Desire to See Any Adaptation of the Honorverse

The first 20 minutes of that episode was the only good part. It was also written back in 2000, by someone else.

Field of Dishonor: Game of Thrones 6.09 vs. Any Semblance of Dramatic Tension

Yes, this is the right image, and you're my favorite person if you know why before I explain it.

Wow. What a steaming pile of direwolf dung.

Game of Thrones is actually bad (6x09: "Battle of the Bastards")

Guys, Game of Thrones is officially worse than A Dance With Dragons, something I'd not thought possible even as late as whatever epic awfulness was happening last season.

Pictured: both what was happening last season, and what should be done to ADWD

Both the series and the books are now having to come to grips with the contradiction at the heart of the franchise:

• This is a "realistic" series with "consequences" and "no plot armor" which means "anyone can die."
• The audience still expects the good guys (tm) to ultimately win, and will be gravely disappointed if the last book/season is 10,000 words/10 hours of snow falling on graves.

Don't think for a moment that GRRM's going to have an easier time of this. Hell, don't think that GRRM's not going to croak before finishing the series. Game of Thrones is what you're getting, children, so enjoy the road trip to Hell.

There were a lot of things that were wrong with the episode. Very few of them had anything to do with the City Where Plots Go To Die, which should raise more red flags than Bernie Sanders's front yard on May Day (yes, I shamelessly stole that from somebody, I forgot who). In fact, the City Where Plots Go To Die wasn't all that bad. Clever Dwarf was clever, Boring Dragon Lady briefly captured my attention by flirting with Swashbuckling Lesbian, and there were some big fire-breathing lizards that probably ate into the effects budget and explained why the BATTLE OF THE BASTARDS was so utterly underwhelming.

Now onto the meat of the episode.

Season Five: The Autopsy

Game of Thrones Season Five was the biggest disappointment since my son.

Said Tywin Lannister.

A few more thoughts about the Game of Thrones finale

I'm on my other computer and can't merge the two posts on this account. Might do later.
Anyway SPOILERS