Diggity Doc:

Well a lovely little girl was burned alive, yey.

Thou shan't dwell on the burning of a little girl, the reasoning behind this is what got me. It was clear that Stannis was desperate, which I guess is fair given his situation; it's freezing cold, his camp just got infiltrated by the enemy that he's going to attack and it's freezing cold. We saw a line of his soldiers shivering as they awaited a bit of pork belly on a bed mushroom risotto, nutrition is the key for any soldier. Stannis' men have reached their limit.

Stannis also looked like he had reached his limit, he looked horrible. Hence, he took the drastic action of listening to crazy fire lady.

Stannis needed something to get by, to hang his hat on, a bit of luck or something to give him and his troops hope which resulted in a rather disgusting scene. But, as we saw a certain flying reptile (Dragons are reptiles right?) come to the rescue later on in the episode, fire will clearly play an important role in the battle against the Winter. Crazy fire lady ... fire, crazy, fire, crazy, yeah she might be useful.

I'm not sure that Stannis will get to fulfill his destiny, that bit seems slightly dumb.

It was nice to see a bit more from Dorne, some mercy and humanity which besides the burning of a little girl, was quite prevalent throughout the episode. But every time we go to Dorne, it's a struggle thanks to the weird accents of the Sand Snake posse, and yup that includes our very own Keisha Castle-Hughes. All four of those ladies make it difficult to get excited whenever we drop in on Dorne.

Jonny boy, Mr Snow, I don't know what sort of mess you've got yourself into.

When you were standing at the wall, I did think how shit it would be to make those two girls climb the wall so I think we all need to be chuffed that the gates were opened.

But now what? Lots of people dislike you, you've got to juggle the Wildlings and the Night's Watch which as we've seen in Mereen can be a very difficult task and the atrocities of war are all around, which includes you and your crew being the first point of call for Winter.

Your next decision is whether to help Stannis, which probably isn't much of a decision given that he's trying to take Winterfell, but can you risk sending the men away from the wall? ... in such terrible conditions. Snow, you can't leave Sam and his missus to fend for themselves again.

Also, that little boy who is your friend hates you #justsayin.

Dany and her dragon/s aye. Finally we got to see some lovin' and some flyin' which was nice, but it shouldn't take away from the fact that Mereen is still fucked. Ah, but she's got fire-breathing dragons to keep things in order which is always handy. But the thing about her enemy the Sons Of The Harpy, if there's any left is that the fight in a unique way; shanking in alley ways or similarly close quarter warfare in a coliseum. These attacks can happen at any time, they are masters of popping up in little groups in a coliseum around people who apparently didn't see them and wreaking havoc. This goes against the strengths of a big ol' dragon, as Drogon would struggle to keep the peace if the city descended into street warfare.

Drogon would probably just get silly and burn it all down.

Burn me alive if I'm being dumb; did Arya lie to her teacher guy? I think she did, didn't she??

If she did, keeping her day's activities to herself, that's awesome and so much cooler. She now has an enemy to hunt, to use both her new found skills (and possible some old ones, go the needle sword!). It's hard to see Arya staying with her new faceless family as well, the time will come when she must venture out into the world.

For a moment there I was hoping that Shireen would survive the fire, like Dany did and we'd get this almighty twist, there's still a chance ....................?

Wildcard:

Aaaand there goes the popular vote for Stannis Baratheon.

It’s not like this show is a pamphlet for Child Services or anything, but sacrificing your own daughter at the stake may be a new low as far as parenting goes. Cersei never woulda even considered it.

In hindsight, it was a decision he was always leaning towards in the end. Otherwise why all the set ups, with him saying it was out of the question or the daddy-daughter time where he told her all about how she nearly died from greyscale? Not exactly in a hard-ass like Stannis’ nature and Thrones tends not to waste too much time on non-essential character development, so either we were shown all that to prove he was a man of honour or because it was all foreshadowing to make the sacrifice all the more heavy. And we’ve already done the man of honour stuff the other season with Stannis and Ser Davos.

They laid the foreshadowing on hard in this episode, on top of it all. Getting Davos out of the way, then Davos seeing right through it but knowing there was nothing he could do. Then all the ‘Is there anything I can do, pops?’ ‘Well… there is one thing…’ stuff. By then even Hodor knew what was coming (credit where it’s due, not ruling out that Hodor might have some kind of extrasensory power). Ah, poor Hodor. I miss that loveable lump… Oh, right, but great balls of fire, who sacrifices their own bloody daughter!? Gotta say, I didn’t see the change of heart coming from the mother. Not that it saves her any rep. God those screams were bloodcurling. Shout out to the actress, Kerry Ingram.

And how come the Red God or whoever recognises her as having ‘King’s Blood’ when Stannis is a self-proclaimed king? Even if he’s Robert’s legal heir, Robert claimed the throne in a coup. All silly superstition to me.

Right. Now to more aviation-based scenes. Dany flew on her dragon. So, that was cool. Probably a major landmark in the Mother of Dragons thing. Not sure what other significance it has other than to the saving her life side of things and as fodder for the folk singers - it could be a 'fulfilling her destiny/prophecy' thing, perhaps. The dragons are always awesome, though this was the first time where the supposedly limited TV budget let them down, it wasn't quite as realistic as usual. Some obvious green screen moments. Should've called in Peter Jackson, to be honest.

A couple of things that happened earlier… One: Dany's betrothed is dead, so that solves that sticky pickle. Two: The Sons of the Harpy were much more numerous than I thought, but now most of them are dead by dragon fire. Three: Jorah’s back in favour, surely. Doubt he planned it this way but it really couldn’t have worked out better for him – except for all the spilt greyscale-infected blood. Seriously, he took a lot of cuts, yet any bloke he stabbed was a one-hit KO. It's that old favourite Disposable Henchmen Theory.

It’s pretty unlikely that none of the major posse got killed there. Oh, sure, hubby died, but he was a dick. Once they were trapped in circular formation, it should have only taken one kamikaze soldier to get the job done, especially after the dragon turned up and distracted everyone. The Harpies must be willing to die for the cause if they started an ambush, most of them did anyway, so why didn’t someone just throw a spear at Daenerys when they had the chance? Or is killing her not the aim? And speaking of spear throws, that javelin from Jorah was Olympic Gold worthy, he even threw it in a stadium! I wonder if dragon’s fire cures greyscale, that seems like the sort of thing Melisandre would prescribe.

We’re probably assuming Drogon will be okay, right? Like, in The Hobbit it took a missing scale to pierce Smaug’s skin. (Sidebar – Daenerys is in the MS Word dictionary but Smaug isn’t!?) The three-headed dragon emblem wasn’t lost on this fan/reviewer, and it’d be kinda obsolete with a missing head. And decidedly less proverbial. Me, I’da chosen a Two-Headed Dog.

Daario Naharis’ strategies of swiftness and smarts triumphing over brawn sure backfired in his face. Everyone knows the best strategy to win a gladiator fight is this one:

And is it just me, or did the announcer dude at the Coliseum look a lil like Matt Dellavedova from the Cleveland Cavaliers?

A rule in any fantasy series: whenever someone reads some old tale of yore, it always has a current, parallel meaning. Always allegorical. Shireen’s story about split politics works fine for Stannis’ own decision. But it also seems to sum up the situation at The Wall pretty nicely. You’re either a Wildling or a Crow and neither accepts the other, despite the much more dangerous common enemy. Too hung up on irrelevant issues to make an informed decision. You know, like how modern politics boil everything down to a couple of hotbed issues that aren’t even issues (GAY MARRIAGE! THIS AFFECTS YOU EVEN IF YOU AREN’T GAY! … actually it doesn’t, and you don’t get to make life decisions for other people, sorry). It’s the most petty thing ever in the face of what we witnessed last week, and it’s only getting worse next week.

What else? Ramsay Bolton-Snow’s 20 good men worked a treat, the shady bastard. I believe it was Stevie Wonder once sang: ‘all’s fair in love and war’. Ramsay’s taking that saying all the way to its guerrilla warfare/rapist conclusion. Stevie would be appalled. Also Arya’s presumably gonna kill a paedophile (Meryn Trant) next week, so that’s cool. I like Precocious Killer Arya better than Corpse Cleaning Arya. Meanwhile down in Dorne, the whole thing was sorted out with nothing more than a few tears and a broken jaw. Fair to say that part of the season’s been a disappointment, it was much better in the books (book brag).

GoT Leaderboard:

Daenerys Targaryen, Mother Of Dragons – You know what they say about lost dragons, they’re always in the last place you look.
Doran Martell – A leader who shows mercy and common sense. There aren’t many of those, and he’s one of the few on the show who also has followers who’ll listen to him. Though maybe there’s a twist to come in Dorne yet?
Jorah Mormont – “I just caaaalled… to saaay… I love yooooou (and also there’s a guy tryna kill you right behind your back, hold on let me kill him for you).
Jaime Lannister – That episode couldn’t really have worked out better for him short of King Tommen legalising incest and his hand growing back. Even got a little ‘you’re not going out dressed like THAT!’ barb in to his “niece”.
Tyrion Lannister – Put your money on the smaller man, Daario says so too.
Arya Stark – The only brothel in the world without nudity. Probably coz of all the little kids walking around.
Ellaria Sand – Still don’t trust her. Not even after she kissed her dead lover’s brother’s ring. Seems like even with the tears, she gave up too easily.
John Snow – Winter’s really setting in, look at all the snow gathering on Jonny’s mopey face.
Mace Tyrell – Oh, what a voice! He’s the Caruso of Westeros, I’ve always said it.
Ser Bronn of the Blackwater – Ouch.

Also:

11 to 1000. Everyone Not Named Stannis

1001 to etc. Anyone Else Named Stannis but Not Stannis Baratheon

TIED LAST. Stannis Baratheon & Meryn Trant