Finally got around to watching it, as I was unable to from Monday until now. I should have turned off twitter and Facebook during that period. Nobody explicitly spoiled anything, but everybody is so fucking awful at being vague that it was obvious Robb was going to die. "MAN WOW WHAT AN EPISODE DONT WANNA SPOIL IT POOR STARKS". Fucked up in Game of Thrones equates to someone significant dying. Sooo yeah, thanks social media (and television).
Didn't see Cat and his wife snuffing it, so at least that was shocking.
Overall a really great episode. The rawness of the wedding massacre was top shit. I loved that the massacre was mostly filmed from Catelyn's perspective, as I felt she was the most important observer for the Starks. She's the one who has truly seen her family lose everything. Really great final shot.
Totally saw a Bolton + Frey betrayal though, weeks ago. The series had been beating the viewer over the head that Frey at the very least could not be trusted with anything. And Bolton getting cosy with Tywin was enough evidence to know the logistics of Robb's alliance to the Boltons wasn't half as strong as Robb thought it was.
Bran + Snow stuff were great. Really happy to see their plots briefly converge, and Bran develop people warging. I find Bran to be this weird bridge to the two sides of the Song of Ice & Fire universe. You've got this layer of raw humanity and morality. People being people, basically, throwing blind faith into gods and magic mostly to appeal to egos and fear. Scepticism. War. Etc. But you've got this shroud of mystique and supernatural hanging over everything. The red god. Prophecies. Warging. And of course the White Walkers. Like there's this supernatural force nobody wants to admit or believe, and some can't even see. Bran's importance to me is that he's a bit of a bridge. He comes from a very earthly and human house name, one plagued with raw human tragedy. Yet he now possesses abilities even those familiar with magics do not understand.
Snow actually following through with the plan was great to see. It's easy to be sympathetic to the wildings for the obvious reasons, but he's right in that they're too scattered, disorganised, and reckless. They're a shade of grey like everybody else, and it's nice to see Jon not pander to that and make them into good guys.
All the Daenerys was a bit weak to me though. Seemed like they really just wanted to get the sacking over and done with, and squeezed it in an episode with far bigger priorities and budget spent elsewhere. I can actually agree to that decision, especially if her story has some cool shit next episode, but as it was it seemed a bit rushed and half hearted. And a bit cheap looking. The fight choreography was stupid silly. Fun silly, but still stupid. Totally polarising to the raw massacre of the wedding and some of the other battles in the series. Seemed like everyone was just dancing around with swords trying to be fancy. Wish they had just made it raw and messy. The series is much better when it's not trying to be another flashy high fantasy.
Anyway, looking forward to next week, and not being spoiled on anything.
