Quote from: Magegg on Jun 08, 2015, 07:57:26 AM
I think this is no doubt the weakest season so far, it's quite notorious the quality decline now that the series is entering into the filler/forced/plot device/original material territory. Most of the Sparrows thing felt out of tone and out of place, the Sand Snakes thing is uninteresting, and having Daenerys still grounded at Mereen is quite boring and tedious and frustrating.
I blame the source material (though I disagree with your opinion, I think it's a great, measured season; the only thing I don't like is that the Dorne stuff was skinned in the middle part of the season: good opening, weak middle, great scenes last episode!).
Honestly, they've cut so much dross from the last two books in this season. GRRM said some time ago that those books would take 3 seasons to cover. Three seasons, three years of Brienne wandering around, Dany in Meereen, nobody getting anywhere...
As for Stannis, he's entrapped in a classic Trolley Problem -- he either sacrifices his daughter to save the realm, or he saves his daughter only to doom her and everyone else somewhere down the line. It's a terrible position, but as Stannis he has to be resolute to the end. It's a repellent act, but I thought the point of Hardhome -and it's a point many commentators claimed to have felt very deeply- was that winter is coming and the White Walkers aren't messing around. They will butcher everyone, including children, babies, et al. -- and Shireen!
The Abrahamic religions still laud Abraham for holding a knife over Isaac, and Abraham didn't have the fate of the world on his shoulders. Jephthah served up his only daughter as a burnt offering because God allowed him to defeat his enemies, the Ammonites, in return. Truman dropped the A-bomb on two cities to end a war that his supporters say would have killed millions more if he hadn't been willing to annihilate a few hundred thousand. These are the kinds of impossible moral dilemmas the show (and the books) are interested in presenting.