Not sure about Alexander but I know both Johnson and Alvarez fought guys hilariously larger than them as ONE has almost no real monitoring of weight classes.

I think it’s more Unworthy Thor. Thrall didn’t retire, he left in disgrace because he had abused his connection to the spirits or whatever to exact Vengeance (killing Garrosh in Warlords) and the spirits left him.

I think constantly pointing to the rule book and saying “hey our rule book sucks but it also exists” is to an extent hand waving these issues away. Give Toronto a little authority to make judgement on this sort of stuff. I mean, we now have two games in which the reviewable play took away a winning goal even though…

The comparison between this and the Landeskog issue last week really captures how dumb this all is.

Except Nyquist would have never gotten the puck without it, as he’d be behind two St. Louis players. I think the fact Meier got a secondary assist on the score sheet is pretty telling.

I agree, unfortunately. That’s what I was originally saying, my love of the books wants to view them as the true narrative (in addition to all the extra story threads and characters). But I can’t anymore, both due to recency and the prevalence of the show.

I mean, to each their own. I got into ASoIaF a little late, starting GoT in ~2005 and read straight through AFfC in early 2007. So maybe coming from Storm directly into AFfC and the major change in pacing is what throws my recollection of it. I’ve also only read it once, so upon a second read I may feel differently…

Agree 100%

Let me clarify...I don’t disagree with any of what you’re saying. In fact, I’m on record (on this site, for what it matters) for saying AFfC and ADwD are both bloated narrative messes. I liked how GoT basically streamlined much of those books, albeit after misfiring badly in the first half of season 5.

It’s missing 40% of the characters and story lines that the books have?

The worst part, for me, is that some of the books (A Feast for Crows specifically, and to a lesser extent A Dance with Dragons) were a slog to get through and I haven’t actually read them a second time. The show has become more prevalent in mind as the true narrative even though I know that to not be the case. 

Trust me, I’m trying not to think about it. It’s the writers and directors that keep talking about it.

Aren’t the writers arguing though that that isn’t true? The idea that the two children she referred to in The Winter Soldier were in fact with the Steve that travelled back in time. That is why it’s frustrating because it under cuts the time travel explanation they use for the rest of the movie.

I feel that the show has the exact opposite problem that Martin has. Martin has woven such a deeply rich, complex and intertwined narrative that he is seriously struggling to progress the story forward in a way that both makes sense but also does all of his threads and characters justice.

I did enjoy his tweet over the weekend, again showing he has zero understanding of tariffs and also that it was basically 50's era Russia propaganda supporting state run Communism (did he forget which side he was on?).

I agree that the real problem here is the self inflicted episode limit. I’ve always felt that Dany was going down this path, although I’m curious how it plays with Fake Aegon in the books (is he on the throne instead of Cersei?). But this seems to have always been what Martin had planned.

They had no reason to follow her, is how I took it. Everything that everyone had told her up to this point had not come true or worked. Even after devastating Cersei so quickly, the whole “let it be fear” came back. With Sansa still controlling the north and Jon’s superior claim, how does she convince the people that…

The lineup Emery rolled out yesterday is really what they should have been using since December. Keeping Mustafi out of the back three, using four wide in the midfield with Ozil to link with the two forwards. They’ve run that lineup almost exclusively against Napoli and Valencia and just torched them both.

Seems overly complicated, but I suppose awarding a spot to a losing team also isn’t a great look. Thanks for the breakdown!

Seems the primary complaint is the movie gave their character arcs depth and growth and people just wanted them to be unemotional badasses that killed things real good.