The main thing that leaps out is how conversational this episode really is. There's not a great deal to say about it, when it deliberately avoids trying to sustain the momentum of last season's finale.
It is a slow moving episode, I suspect the feeling of slowness has to do with the fact that there are no big surprises. Given the slower pace, what this episode is really about is the characters and re-establishing them and their relationships, both old and new. We have Tyrion and Tywin meeting once again. This scene is the highlight of the episode, as Dance and Dinklage get across the bitter reality of their family life. The scene with Cersei before it continues the trend of examining the family dynamic, and the actors do a fair job getting it across. Tyrion's wariness around his sister is well-deserved, especially when we consider the fact that on the show it's been suggested to Tyrion that Cersei herself was behind the attempt on his life.
We do get our first look at Mance Rader, Tortmund, The Unsullied and Quyburn, a character who will go on to be very important.
All in all, despite the quibbles, despite the disappointment in the introductions of the new characters whom book readers had anticipated so much, this was a solid start. Individually, most of the scenes hang well together, with the actors all in top form, and there's a good level of coherence. They avoided the pitfall of last year's opener, which was trying to catch up with every single character (plus giving significant time to a brand new region and characters in it), and so were able to give the scenes they did have just a bit more room to breath. It's only a shame that they loaded so much of last season's finale with the surprises and twists that could have opened this show, and given these scenes a sense of borrowed urgency simply by their juxtaposition wih the surprises that they could have had.
It is a slow moving episode, I suspect the feeling of slowness has to do with the fact that there are no big surprises. Given the slower pace, what this episode is really about is the characters and re-establishing them and their relationships, both old and new. We have Tyrion and Tywin meeting once again. This scene is the highlight of the episode, as Dance and Dinklage get across the bitter reality of their family life. The scene with Cersei before it continues the trend of examining the family dynamic, and the actors do a fair job getting it across. Tyrion's wariness around his sister is well-deserved, especially when we consider the fact that on the show it's been suggested to Tyrion that Cersei herself was behind the attempt on his life.
We do get our first look at Mance Rader, Tortmund, The Unsullied and Quyburn, a character who will go on to be very important.
All in all, despite the quibbles, despite the disappointment in the introductions of the new characters whom book readers had anticipated so much, this was a solid start. Individually, most of the scenes hang well together, with the actors all in top form, and there's a good level of coherence. They avoided the pitfall of last year's opener, which was trying to catch up with every single character (plus giving significant time to a brand new region and characters in it), and so were able to give the scenes they did have just a bit more room to breath. It's only a shame that they loaded so much of last season's finale with the surprises and twists that could have opened this show, and given these scenes a sense of borrowed urgency simply by their juxtaposition wih the surprises that they could have had.