Okay, sorry to be a downer, but that was arguably the worst episode of Game of Thrones in recent memory.  

I am so tired of characters relentlessly being too stupid to have ever attained and maintained their current status.

Spoiler Alert

Part One: Another Idiotic Strategy

What in the holy hell is Daenerys thinking?

She lost half of her troops (or more), her troops are exhausted, one of her dragons is weakened, and her navy is no match for the Iron Fleet.

But no, instead of creating a real strategy, instead of listening to Sansa (who is right, as usual), she doesn’t rest her forces or work to strengthen her forces, she just decides to march her exhausted and depleted forces back to King’s Landing.

Oh, and if that wasn’t idiotic enough, she also decides to split her forces again.

Oh, and if that wasn’t idiotic enough, she also decides to take part of them by sea again (even though he navy is literally a joke).

Oh, and if that wasn’t idiotic enough, the plan - when they finally arrive at King’s Landing is a siege, because that will somehow turn the people against Cersei (Why? Who the hell knows). Maybe I missed something in my military history, but in order to successfully lay siege to a city, you have to be able to surround it with enough forces to make it impossible for the forces inside to kick your butt.

Given the ragtag group that arrives at King’s Landing that makes ZERO gosh damn sense.

But it gets worse.

When they were making this Master Plan up, everyone seems to forget that Qyburn almost killed Drogon with Scorpions. They also seem to have forgotten that strategy has to be dynamic...in other words, you can’t assume that your enemy is sitting still.

Guess who is waiting for Daenerys and her tiny navy once she sets sail?

Yup, you guessed it the vastly superior Iron Fleet stocked with Giant Scorpions on the deck of every ship.

So, of course, the ships are all destroyed and Rhaegal gets massacred.

Somehow, Drogon survives despite the idiocy of his Mother.

So, the navy is totally destroyed, most of the forces magically turn up on the beach, Euron doesn’t pursue his advantage, and somehow magically, all of them teleport from the beach to in front of King’s Landing before Jon and the Army of the North arrive.

Oh, also, Missandei gets taken captive and both her and Euron are also back at King’s Landing in advance of Jon showing up.

So, here is one last head-scratcher...Jon hasn’t arrived yet, Daenerys seems to have maybe one thousand (at most) unsullied and one dragon (while King’s Landing now has dozens of the new, effective, big Scorpions in place)....why doesn’t Cersei just march the Golden Company out and absolutely obliterate Daenerys and her tiny band of strategically challenged idiots?

What in the world would Daenerys do?

There is so much stupid in this episode it is even hard to keep track.

I am starting to lose any respect I had for Benioff and Weiss, and I am starting to actively root for Cersei because she is the ONLY person on this show who has half a functioning brain. It would be insulting and almost inexcusable for her to lose now.

But she will, because this whole show has become a gigantic exercise in fan fiction written by the galactically stupid (apologies to Aaron Sorkin).

Seriously folks, has anything ever been more pathetic than seeing Tyrion mach out in front of his tiny army demanding that Cersei surrender?

On screen it looked absolutely insane.

In reality Cersei would have slaughtered Tyrion and Missandei and ordered her troops open fire with the Scorpions and her archers to let fly.

Daenerys would have been dead within ten minutes.

Part Two: “We’re Family”

More idiocy...it just never ends.

Daenerys correctly explains to Jon that his secret is a genie that once unleashed, can never be put back in the bottle.

Jon then immediately goes and tells his whole family and Sansa immediately tells Tyrion.

How in the world am I supposed to believe that Jon could be king if he is too stupid to understand why he didn’t need to, and absolutely should not have, told his family about his secret?

There is only one possible argument for why he would tell and that is he wants to be King. But then, he immediately goes about bending the knee, coming up with the world’s stupidest plan, and then leads his troops off to fight for the Queen of Drogon. If he doesn’t want to be King, why would he tell ANYONE. If anyone on this entire show should know the perils of sharing stories out of school it should be Jon Snow.

So, what possible reason could Jon have possibly had to tell Sansa about his true lineage? It makes ZERO sense.

In addition, anyone who showed that little smarts, who didn’t even know how to use a secret like that strategically, could never be a wise or successful king of anything.

When Varys, in a moment of equal insanity, suggests that he and Tyrion turn traitor and take out Daenerys in favor of Jon, what possible good would that have done? Drogon would never fight for Jon and literally the ONLY hope they have of taking King's Landing is Drogon.

Do they think that the mostly broken forces of the North are enough to take out King’s Landing? They would need bare-minimum around 50,000 troops to lay siege to a city of that size (do they even have 5,000 troops?).

Jon is an idiot, Varys is an idiot, and Tyrion is a total idiot.

Part Three: “That’s Not Me”

Gendry gets named lord of Storm’s End and then asks Arya to marry him and become the “Lady of Storm's Landing”

Arya says no, of course (and then takes off with the Hound en route to Cleganebowl.

Jaime gets jealous of Tormond sniffing around Brienne’s tree and ends up sleeping with Brienne.

Within what seems like just a few minutes of consummating the act, and having a quick chat with Tyrion, Jaime runs off to save Cersei (as if she needs saving). My guess is that he will end up being the Queenslayer (sad but true).

Daenerys tries to stoke the fires back up with Jon, and it starts well but ends up with Jon backing off because things have changed between them (incest and all).

She begs him to not tell anyone but we already covered how that turned out.

She begs him to stay, he says it can’t work and she says, “It can, I just told you how.”

He is in big trouble (if Daenerys doesn’t get him, Sansa probably will...especially since she now knows they are not truly related).

Tyrion and Varys try to warm up the old chemistry but that doesn’t work out well either, Tyrion remains committed to Daenerys and Varys cares about the realm.

Oh, and Bron shows up threatens but doesn’t kill Jaime or Tyrion but he does get the best line of the night when he says to Jaime, “You couldn’t do it on your best day you one-handed fuck.”

Also, Cersei tells Euron she is preggo, so, like I said, she will make it official and then he is not long for this world.

Finally. Sam and Gilly are expecting. Congrats to the lucky couple.

I GIve Up

I am basically done, it is getting hard to write about a show that has gone so far off the rails that I can’t even figure out how basic events are happening anymore.

Why in the world didn’t Euron, King of an island nation known for shore raids, mop up after he crushed Daenerys navy and one of her dragons?

How in the world did Daenerys’ loyalists get from being shipwrecked and alone on the beach to in front of Kings Landing almost immediately as if by magic (much less before Jon’s troops arrived)?

Why in the world didn’t Cersei just crush the remaining unsullied and shoot Drogon full of Scorpions? Yes, I get that the dragon was out of range, but Daenerys and the Unsullied weren’t (and the Scorpions would have made quick work of Drogon if the dragon tried to intervene)

Why are we supposed to believe that Tyrion still feels Cersei is still good? Where would that motivation even come from? Cersei tried to have him murdered for most of his life? For goodness sake, Tyrion spent the vast majority of his character journey telling people never to trust Cersei (and for good reason).

When did Varys become a humanitarian?

I am just lost.

See you next week for more commiseration.