I'm not going to get into the Tower of Joy since there is already another thread about it. But....
How about the return of Osha and Rickon? That totally caught me by surprise. If I remember correctly, in the show, when Winterfell's Maester was about to die, he told Bran and Rickon to split up and told Osha to take Rickon to the Umbers. I was a bit bummed to see that Shaggy Dog was killed off, but I guess that prevents HBO from needing to add CGI costs. At first, I thought maybe the Umbers were using Rickon to gain the trust of Ramsay with plans to turn against him when the time is right. But, HBO hasn't really spent a lot of time on the alliance between the Boltons and Freys (who either captured or killed GreatJohn Umber at the RW), so I think that is less likely. I am thinking that the Umbers really did decide to ally themselves with the Boltons/Karstarks. Rickon will take Mance Rayder's place as the bait that leads to Jon bringing a wildling army to Winterfell.
I wasn't quite sure what to make of the scene between Tommen and the High Septon. I guess the whole point was to make Tommen more pious to make him more likely to go along with the church's process for judging of both Cersei and Marjory.
I found the Tyrion/Varas scenes to be a bit silly. That was a lot of time invested in the two of them finding out information that they should have already known. Of course the other nearby slavers are invested in eliminating Dani from the picture since she has made it her mission to smash the slave trade in Slavers Bay.
The Dani scene was fine. Nothing surprising there. Based on previews for next week, it looks like Mormont is going to liberate her from Vaes Dothrak and win his way back into her good graces.
Nothing surprising in the Sam scene.
The Arya scene was a bit confusing to me. I thought it was counter intuitive to have the Waif/Jaqen wanting Arya to constantly profess that she is "No One" while also making sure that she remembers every detail of Arya Stark's life. It seems like they would have wanted her to give answers like..."I don't know anyone named Arya Stark". "How should I know how many sisters/brothers she has?". "I know nothing of the list that you are asking about".
At the wall.... Jon's watch has ended. I'm interested to see what happens next. Does Sansa show up at Castle Black? If so, is he still there? I thought it was interesting that he turned over command of the Watch to Ed. At first I was thinking that the next Lord Commander would need to be elected, but maybe not. No Lord Commander has ever died and been brought back to life before, so maybe he is in position to be able to pick his successor. More likely, I guess he could put Ed in command until they have a chance to go through the election process and pick their leader.
How about the return of Osha and Rickon? That totally caught me by surprise. If I remember correctly, in the show, when Winterfell's Maester was about to die, he told Bran and Rickon to split up and told Osha to take Rickon to the Umbers. I was a bit bummed to see that Shaggy Dog was killed off, but I guess that prevents HBO from needing to add CGI costs. At first, I thought maybe the Umbers were using Rickon to gain the trust of Ramsay with plans to turn against him when the time is right. But, HBO hasn't really spent a lot of time on the alliance between the Boltons and Freys (who either captured or killed GreatJohn Umber at the RW), so I think that is less likely. I am thinking that the Umbers really did decide to ally themselves with the Boltons/Karstarks. Rickon will take Mance Rayder's place as the bait that leads to Jon bringing a wildling army to Winterfell.
I wasn't quite sure what to make of the scene between Tommen and the High Septon. I guess the whole point was to make Tommen more pious to make him more likely to go along with the church's process for judging of both Cersei and Marjory.
I found the Tyrion/Varas scenes to be a bit silly. That was a lot of time invested in the two of them finding out information that they should have already known. Of course the other nearby slavers are invested in eliminating Dani from the picture since she has made it her mission to smash the slave trade in Slavers Bay.
The Dani scene was fine. Nothing surprising there. Based on previews for next week, it looks like Mormont is going to liberate her from Vaes Dothrak and win his way back into her good graces.
Nothing surprising in the Sam scene.
The Arya scene was a bit confusing to me. I thought it was counter intuitive to have the Waif/Jaqen wanting Arya to constantly profess that she is "No One" while also making sure that she remembers every detail of Arya Stark's life. It seems like they would have wanted her to give answers like..."I don't know anyone named Arya Stark". "How should I know how many sisters/brothers she has?". "I know nothing of the list that you are asking about".
At the wall.... Jon's watch has ended. I'm interested to see what happens next. Does Sansa show up at Castle Black? If so, is he still there? I thought it was interesting that he turned over command of the Watch to Ed. At first I was thinking that the next Lord Commander would need to be elected, but maybe not. No Lord Commander has ever died and been brought back to life before, so maybe he is in position to be able to pick his successor. More likely, I guess he could put Ed in command until they have a chance to go through the election process and pick their leader.
