re: Rank the 4 battles of Game of Thrones

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I still think the arrowplay by Ygritte, tracking shot all around castle black, soundtrack, and Tormund action made the Wall battle one of the most memorable. It might pale in comparison, but it's very impressive.

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Aside from Ygritte getting shot and Slynt cowering, I can't really remember a damn thing about the episode. The only character I really gave a shite about was Jon and maybe Tormund to some extent. I mean yeah, you got that going on at Hardhome as well, but the tension was much more real, and Jon lost the damn battle on top of that. It was pretty terrifying.

I also never feared for Jon's life. Yes, maybe as a book reader I knew he was going to survive, but I also knew he would survive the Battle of the Bastards. But I feared for Jon's life quite a few times in that battle among the chaos and the lengths Ramsay was going to kill him and rip personally his soul apart. Plus there are much more interesting characters involved in this that I cared about and wanted them to succeed.

So thinking it through, the Battle of the Bastards may have been the best battle, but the best episode is still Blackwater. Just everyone on all sides I cared for and it was incredibly interesting. Watchers on the Wall they just tried to one-up Blackwater, and largely failed. The darkness that worked in Blackwater didn't have the same effect on the Wall. It also didn't have near the conflict or interesting characters as Blackwater did to hold it down. Sam, Gilly, and Slynt bitching and moaning isn't nearly as interesting as a drunken Cersei plotting a mass murder/suicide if Stannis were to breech the walls while Sansa is almost rapped by the Hound. It's really the reason why I say they needed a secondary plot occurring in that episode, like Tyrion killing Tywin.

D&D learned this from that episode to give us smaller plots that move the story alone. They toned it down a bit with Hardhome and Battle of the Bastards and focused on what was really important. It wasn't some guy we've never met being hit with a giant arrow.