A criticism commonly levied at recent episodes of Game of Thrones is that characters suddenly appear to have developed the ability to teleport from one side of Westeros to the other with no more than a crinkling of their noses.
Jon was in Winterfell. Then Dragonstone. Then all of a sudden he was north of the Wall on some harebrained scheme to kidnap a Wight. Whereas previous seasons would have dwelled on the minutiae of trudging from place to place, mining rich seams of character development along the way, this one has more world-ending matters to deal with than spending five episodes watching Jon and chums amble up a snowy hill. So it doesn’t bother. And while I reject the “teleportation” criticism – they don’t tend to show characters on the toilet either, because that too would be irrelevant to the plot – it is indicative of a deeper issue with the current series: that it’s become blindingly obvious seven episodes is simply not enough. The producers’ decision to shorten the episode count from 10 did make each episode a thrilling set piece. The problem is that they’ve been trying to cram so much into each, little things like “logic” and “character” have burst out of the seams.
Take this week’s episode, which alone gave us a panoply of huge, plot-altering events. We got a couple of fairly high-profile deaths in Benjen Stark and Paul Kaye’s Thoros. Arya basically threatening Sansa with a Littlefinger-approved DIY face-ectomy. So much Dany/Jon flirting you could cut the incestuous tension with a Valyrian steel dagger. Dany and Tyrion having a big falling out. A brilliant and very cold-looking battle. More dragons. An actual zombie bear. And then, the piece de resistance: the Night’s King getting a blue-eyed dragon all of his own.
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