Re-watching Season 6...

[Joel Needs a Car]

I'm about to embark on a rewatch of the season on the boxset, having waited for a while so I can finish without too much delay before season 7. I always find running through a season without the weekly break (and ad breaks on a less than optimal quality stream) makes for a much more enjoyable, cohesive experience.

So, has anyone else binged on season 6 and found things very different than when they watched it week by week? Maybe it was better or worse than the first time round? Did you pick up on anything with the benefit of hindsight? If you watched the boxset how were he extras - interesting/helpful?

[Chilli]

I'm going to watch season 6 next week. I don't have the blu-ray, only the dvd boxes of all the seasons. I might buy blu-ray once all the seasons are finished.
I'll let you know next week how the rewatch is going.

[Joel Needs a Car]

Thanks Chilli

I wasn't completely spoiler free for S6 but didn't go actively seeking so I only had a vague inkling of where things might be going based more on speculation about TWoW.

I've watched episodes 1 - 4 so far. The first two I felt were better for watching them together than when I saw them last year with a one week gap. All the scenes seemed to be important and meaningful.

Now, as an Arya fan I did originally watch season 6 primarily with an expectant eye to her story and not so much the rest of it (yes, shallow I know!). Oddly the Arya scenes so far are the ones which feel most like filler - which is strange when I now know where her season 6 story ends, yet it still somehow feels too disconnected from the other story arcs.

I get ever more impressed with Alfie Allen...

Even before the later big events of season 6, you can feel things ratcheting up...

[vigilist]

I found King's Landing to be the storyline which benefits the most from a rewatch. As it was initially airing it felt incredibly slow paced (especially compared to some other plots) and anticlimactic.

Rewatching it with the hindsight of what it's building up to and without having to wait a week between each episode improved it dramatically for me. I don't think anything else in the season gains as much from the physical release as much as King's Landing does.

[Joel Needs a Car]

I found King's Landing to be the storyline which benefits the most from a rewatch. As it was initially airing it felt incredibly slow paced (especially compared to some other plots) and anticlimactic.

Rewatching it with the hindsight of what it's building up to and without having to wait a week between each episode improved it dramatically for me. I don't think anything else in the season gains as much from the physical release as much as King's Landing does.

Good points that I would go along with, I mean it was pretty clear it was building up to a Crown vs Church confrontation but so much pre-season expectation was solely about CleganeBowl. Knowing what the pay-off is now WRT Tommen etc makes the slow build up more satisfying for me.

[Raeslewolhn]

For me, binging and weekly watching have different kinds of value. The weekly is more exciting, more engaging, of course. But I always enjoy binging more because it's like one long movie. If I could stand to wait, I would binge when the season is over like I do everything else .

[Tensor the Mage]

Binge-watching enables me to see the foreshadowings and connections more easily. For example, Cercei's great moment, "I choose violence," has a deeper meaning than just within the scene where she delivers it to Lancel and the other Sparrows. Those Sparrows in the courtyard prove impotent against her agent of violence, FrankenMountain, just as all of the Sparrows will prove impotent against her next agent of violence, the wildfire.

Going back further than Season 6, Lancel Lannister is the very first character to mention wildfire...

[Joel Needs a Car]

Re-watched episodes 7 & 8 last night and despite being an avid Arya fan, the Arya vs Waif scenes really don't seem any more believable than they did first time round, and without having the tension of f=not knowing how it turns out! I mean they are quite fun if you completely turn off your Credibility Sensor Array, especially knowing that Maisie did quite a bit of her own stunt work but they just look shoehorned in to inject some jeopardy and spice up what is in the books admittedly a very protracted stay in Braavos without much action that translates well to TV .

I guess we have a long wait yet to see what happens in the books with Arya after the 'Mercy' chapter but her season 5 & 6 arc feels like a lost opportunity to me. That said, we did have some strong scenes with Arya and Lady Crane in season 6 and I'd like to have seen rather more of those as well as making more of "Blind Beth" learning skills other than just being smacked about by the Waif.

However, Lyanna Mormont and "62" was just as great second time around!

[Chilli]

I've done my re-watch. I only have to rewatch the last episode, but that I'm gonna do on sunday evening to have it all fresh in my mind before the new episode.

New things I noticed:
- Dany saying goodbye to Jorah was completely different from what she said to Daario. Nice to see the contrast.
- Just before Dany was burning the Khals, she reminded me for one second of her brother Viserys. Don't know if it was the hair, the look, or the make-up, but it was very well done.
- The way Sansa spoke to the Northern lords was so entitled. I knew she did it the wrong way, but only now I realised what she was doing wrong.
- The waif runs like Terminator during the chase. Don't know if that was on purpose.
- Many died the way the killed others or lose their most important body part. Roose died the way he killed Rob Stark. Ramsay dies the way he killed Walda. Jaime loses his sword hand, Bran the climber loses his legs. Theon who loves sex, loses his ... Olena Tyrell who killed Cersei's son, loses her son and grandchildren. Tommen falls from a window, Jaime pushed Bran out of a window. Both red priests revived someone when they were at their lowest.

[Dee Stark]

I've done my re-watch. I only have to rewatch the last episode, but that I'm gonna do on sunday evening to have it all fresh in my mind before the new episode.

New things I noticed:
- Dany saying goodbye to Jorah was completely different from what she said to Daario. Nice to see the contrast.
- Just before Dany was burning the Khals, she reminded me for one second of her brother Viserys. Don't know if it was the hair, the look, or the make-up, but it was very well done.
- The way Sansa spoke to the Northern lords was so entitled. I knew she did it the wrong way, but only now I realised what she was doing wrong.
- The waif runs like Terminator during the chase. Don't know if that was on purpose.
- Many died the way the killed others or lose their most important body part. Roose died the way he killed Rob Stark. Ramsay dies the way he killed Walda. Jaime loses his sword hand, Bran the climber loses his legs. Theon who loves sex, loses his ... Olena Tyrell who killed Cersei's son, loses her son and grandchildren. Tommen falls from a window, Jaime pushed Bran out of a window. Both red priests revived someone when they were at their lowest.

Excellent notes. I love it!