I read none of the materials leading up to TFA, and I understood all those things just fine.

The only that makes no sense about that scene if Arya and Sansa are both completely serious about their feud is why would Arya hand over her Valurian steel dagger without comment?

My doctors at Kaiser always takes my bloodpressure twice, for this exact reason. They know you just came from the hassle of checking in and parking or dealing with the bus and your co-payment and aaaaahhhh the stress of going to the doctor.... so they take 2 readings. The second one is always so much lower. ^^

I’m with you. The described added scene is exactly what had happened in my head. Including it would have ruined the surprise(soft surprise) turn.

Arya was too busy being impatient, getting manipulated, and not getting on with the sister she’s never really got on with — if she was brought in at all, it was right before the “trial”.

Yeah, I don’t think they were playing Littlefinger. It seemed like as soon as Littlefinger got Sansa to say that Arya wanted to be Lady of Winterfell she realized what was up. Sansa has known since season 1 that Arya never wanted to be a “lady”.

I don’t agree with the ‘nonsensical female rivalry’ thing, though. The changes in Arya, I hesitate to call it growth, were obvious to anyone who knew her prior to Ned Stark’s death at King’s Landing. The older Sansa is much less outwardly changed. I think viewers forget that Arya hasn’t been watching the past 6…

Harryhausen hand animates them.

Well, if you consider that our last ice age was 10,000 years ago, things were pretty much the same (speaking relative to today) from a technology perspective for 9,000+ of those years.

“God’s got this.”

Putting aside for a second the absolute ridiculousness of the President of the United States giving a shit about ratings for a press conference, was he saying that he did it that night because he thought the ratings would be higher due to the hurricane, or he did it that night in order to raise ratings so more people…

Franken’s book is great for a number of reasons, but particularly how he details the ways he did pay his dues and learned how to be a legislator. He spent his time on Air America learning from guests and doing research for his shows. Once elected, he took the advice to show up for every committee meeting, study…

The comparison is not even fair, but that’s beside the point. What this election has taught us is that celebrities who don’t have any previous policy experience have no place in dictating it once in office. Just go study and pay your dues (a la Al Franken) or stay in your lane.

Oh my (George Takei voice)!

The Rock Obama

I thought the shivering sea freezing over was a hilarious twist! It fits right in with all of Martin’s historical references. Hadrian’s Wall, the Great Wall of China, etc., all just as impressive as they were pointless.

You should not be able to defeat magic by loophole.

Most likely book hypothesis, mild spoiler-ish content:

Starred for Upvoted.