That's the problem for this season. In my opinion previous seasons have done a good job (or at least a much better job) of pacing. This one has had a lot of questionable pacing. There's a lot of things they should have split and some areas they should have hastened through and some they should have slowed up on a bit. I mean, really, we get Stannis going straight from Shireen's death to an entire battle (which was barely even shown) and then his death in 2 episodes? Spread that shit out.
Yeah, I completely agree. I've felt for a while this season that the pacing has been abruptly quick for some of the more important things, with a lot of build-up for various events happening a lot faster than it has previously. It feels like they're racing to the finish in some ways.
Since the show's producers know how it all unfolds, and there's no more pretense about waiting for the book series to finish, they're now essentially in the midst of wrapping up final storylines. So the pieces, i.e. characters, are being moved to where they need to be quicker, and stuff in general that would have taken course over a few episodes in the past now gets a lot less.
There's the whole deal with Stannis vexing over how to keep his men alive to storm Winterfell, getting ambushed by Ramsay, and finally reaching the breaking point in deciding to torch his own daughter alive as he buries himself, his family, and his army. Stannis after leaving Castle Black is something that feels like it would have been notably more prolonged in past seasons (including the first two). As it stands his end felt anti-climatic.
If certain character deaths or other major events from this season aren't hitting as hard for some people as they think they should, the pacing is probably part of it (and possible desensitization, as people die an awful lot here, after all).
