We're already almost halfway through the season, and things are moving along at breakneck speed.
Lady Stark-Lannister-Bolton and Her Merry Band
With Jon away, Sansa's in charge, and she's pretty good at it. But Littlefinger tells her that even though she's managing things well at the moment, she needs to prepare for every foreseeable eventuality. Which should be a lot easier because Bran unexpectedly returns to Winterfell and tells her he's the all-seeing Three-Eyed Raven, even though he doesn't bother to explain what that actually means.
Mr. Sam Goes to Oldtown
Jorah's suddenly well enough to leave the Citadel and return to the Khaleesi's service, and Archmaester Ebrose wants to know what happened. The patient's lips are sealed, so Sam is summoned to the maester's office. Surprisingly, he is praised for his efforts and not immediately expelled from the Citadel. However, he is immediately returned to his scut work, since he's still just a low-level initiate.
The King in The North Meets The Queen in the South
After what must have been a harrowing and dangerous journey south by ship, Jon and Davos have arrived at Dragonstone. They catch up with Tyrion, who blew up Davos' son, and who may or may not be legally married to Jon's sister. In any case, the Queen is waiting, and she wants Jon to bend the knee, which he's not particularly interested in doing. Instead, he'd like her to send all her forces north to fight the army of the dead. An army that she's never heard of and doesn't believe exists. As neither is willing to compromise, Daenerys seizes Jon's ship and keeps him on the island until they can sort things out.
Fortunately, Tyrion's a more reasonable person, and while he can't convince Jon to swear allegiance or Daenerys to send her army north, he can at least get the Queen to acquiesce to a less extreme request from the King to keep him busy and earn his gratitude, so she lets him start mining the dragon glass.
War for Three to Five of the Seven Kingdoms
The last of the ironborn haul Theon out of the water and make him feel even worse about not saving his sister than he already did.
Euron parades Yara, Ellaria, and whoever the last Sand Snake is through the streets of King's Landing and delivers the latter two as a gift to Cersei. With her daughter's killers now in her possession, the Queen can finally exact her highly-justified vengeance. She poisons the snake with what Qyburn assures her is exactly the same poison they used to kill Myrcella, then leaves her to die and rot while her mother is chained up and forced to watch.
In the meantime, Tycho Nestoris has returned to discuss the Crown's debts to the Iron Bank. Cersei doesn't have the cash to pay right away, but she has a plan to get it. When the Unsullied reach Casterly Rock, they find it nearly abandoned, and their ships are ambushed and sunk by the Iron Fleet. The bulk of the Lannister forces have teamed up with traitors from the Reach and marched south so they can capture Highgarden and rob it blind. With no bannermen to join them, the Tyrell forces and the castle fall quickly. All that's left is for Lady Olenna to chug some poisoned wine Jaime gives to her and to bid him tell Cersei that she was the one who had Joffrey killed.
What I Liked
-"You stand in the presence of Daenerys Stormborn, breaker of chains, Khaleesi, etc." "This is Jon Snow....... he's King in The North" Leave it to Davos to point out how stupidly-long and pointless Daenerys' title is.
-All the adulation from the crowds gives Euron a boner, a boner he intends to use on Cersei once Jaime explains how she likes to get down. The show's been in need a swaggering rogue type ever since they recast Daario.
-Tyrion built himself a secret sex room while he was master of drains at Casterly Rock. That's much more useful than all the secret passages and so forth under King's Landing.
-"Are you trying to present your own statements as ancient wisdom?" "I would never do that... to you." Heh.
-Archmaester Ebrose has a medical poking stick that he uses to prod Jorah.
What I Hated
-Incessant speechifying. I get that Jon and Daenerys have never met before, but the audience knows their backstories, so we don't need them reiterated to us.
-Sansa somehow has insight into food rationing and armour design. I get that she's supposed to be smarter than she lets on, but she's still ignorant, having spent most of her life on frivolity or as a prisoner. Also, all the learned lords, maesters, and blacksmiths are apparently morons.
-Bran's a robot. The last Three-Eyed Raven didn't seem to be totally emotionless, but for some reason the new one is.
-Highgarden falls just as fast as Casterly Rock. Even without bannermen, the Tyrell forces should've been able to withstand a siege for months or even years. It's a massive castle with extremely high walls.
-Euron ambushes another fleet. He's such a master of naval warfare that his ships can sneak up on you in broad daylight.
Final Thoughts
Daenerys can't really expect Jon to swear fealty to her just because of her last name, can she? I don't think she can possibly be that stupid, but then she acts all snotty and takes him quasi-prisoner when he doesn't do it.
The ironborn look down on Theon a bit too much. It's not like any of them fought Euron's fleet to the death. Of course, it's surprising that any of them survived, considering that the fleet is enormous, invincible, and apparently has stealth technology. With ability to build all those ships so rapidly, and with the crews to man them, the Iron Islanders should've conquered Westeros decades ago.
Jorah's on the way to the current location of his father's sword. It's not exactly nearby, but the journey should only take about as long as it took Jon to get there from Winterfell, so he should be in Dragonstone at the start of the next episode.
Ellaria's punishment is pretty severe, but well-deserved. She murdered an innocent girl, staged a coup in her homeland, and rebelled against the Crown. Worst of all, she made all the time the show spent on Dorne a complete waste. Honestly, the only thing that came out of that was Myrcella's death, and they could've accomplished that in dozens of other ways. That entire plot line could've been excised. The Sand Snakes were pointless, Doran was pointless, the coup was pointless, allying with Daenerys was pointless. It really shows how the writers have no idea what to do without the books as a guide.
Varys' spy network must have atrophied in his absence. He should have gotten word that the Lannister forces were moving long before the Unsullied arrived. Not that it would've done them any good, since there's no quick way to get a message to a navy. But he should've at least been able to send word to Highgarden.
Siege warfare is very inconsistent on this show. Casterly Rock and Highgarden fell immediately, King's Landing almost did as well, while Riverrun withstood a siege for months, and Storm's End held up for nearly a year.
I don't understand the way they're pacing the show this season. Important, plot-altering events take mere moments, while trivial things take forever. Jon and Daenerys relay their backstories to each other for like ten minutes; Euron rides down the streets with his captives behind him for what seems like forever; the explanation of Ellaria's punishment goes on for an eternity; but the battles for Casterly Rock and Highgarden take about three minutes total. Long battles obviously cost a lot of money to shoot, but HBO's not exactly hurting for cash, and they were practically begging the showrunners to make more episodes.
It's for that reason that I can't really give this episode a high rating. Everything seems to be taking the wrong amount of time. Everyone's motivations are clear at this point, and we don't need to see the characters explain them to each other ad nauseam.
