Overall, I think the last episode was fairly well done, with some disappointments here and there.
I thought that the scene with Sansa and the heads was well-executed (no pun intended). They got Sansa’s thoughts and intentions across pretty decently with pretty few words, I think. The actress that plays Sansa doesn’t get enough credit in this thread.
The Arya/Yorin scenes were fine. I was fairly impressed that they managed to re-introduce Gendry relatively seamlessly. My Wife (a non-bookie) was able to identify him immediately, which surprised me. [not that my wife is dense or anything, but it was a seemingly throw-away character from half the season back]
The Dany/Drogo sequence was pretty decent. I thought the actress playing Dany fell short a few times: when she first woke up, the actress played it like she was waking from a short, refreshing nap rather than physically and spiritually wrenching ordeal that has caused he to pass out. And she seemed pretty flat during her conversation with Mirri Maz Duur. Maybe the latter was intentional, but rather than playing “cold” it came across as “disinterested” to me.
My wife was flabbergasted that Drogo died. After the smothering scene she turned to me and said, “Wow, they really don’t have a problem killing main characters, do they?”
As much as I thought that the sequence where Jon runs away and gets caught by his buddies was unnecessary, the direction and acting was fine. The montage where the Night’s Watch is mobilizing was very well done.
All the Lannister scenes were great – Tyrion’s chat with his father, and the confrontation between Catelyn and Jaime.
I didn’t know what to make the the Maester Pycelle thing. I liked that he showed himself to be “more than he seems” but the whole thing felt like it should have been in another episode.
The “King in the North” scene was good stuff: not only did it establish how Ned’s death has changed the North’s attitude, but it nicely got you thinking about Renley and Stannis, bolstered by the Tyrion conversation from earlier.
So the only thing that really annoyed me was the aftermath with Dany and the dragons. In the book you got the impression that Jorah went in to recover her (supposed) remains when the pile of embers had cooled sufficiently, and I seem to recall that he had to push past some smoldering timber to find her. But the few desultory scraps of wood lying here and there in the TV scene didn’t do it for me. It seems like anyone with eyes would have seen her squatting there hours beforehand. As a cinematic “reveal”, it just seemed pretty poor. The dragons looked pretty good though.
