Originally written June 14, 2015
I recall that season 4 of Game of Thrones was the best season of the show to date, with every episode having something crazy going on. So, understandably coming off such a high from last season, it would be hard to keep the momentum going as good as it was all of last season. That’s why I feel I should give season 5 some leeway, because it would have been very hard to top the previous season. Instead, what we have is a season that’s kind of taken the show a few steps back, but still provides some very interesting drama.
For starters, the show almost feels like it’s starting over at first. Where it seemed like the storylines from season 3 naturally transitioned into season 4, here in season 5 we have stories that feel like they’re starting anew. I don’t want to go into specifics about where the story is at for any particular character because I don’t want to spoil any of the plot. If you’ve seen the show up to this point, you know where the story is at without me saying, and if you haven’t then you should watch it.
However, on the whole I’ll just come right out and say it that this was the worst season of Game of Thrones so far. That’s not to say it’s a bad season, it’s still great. It’s just that the show sets the bar so high for itself that when there’s a season like this, it’s very noticeable that there’s a step back in quality. I think this mainly plays into what I said about how stories almost feel like they’re just starting at the beginning.
See, I recall from season 1 that the main problem I had with it was that it took too long to get going. The first half of that season was mainly exposition, which wasn’t uninteresting, but the really good stuff didn’t start happening until the second half of the season. Season 5 is pretty much the same way, which is interesting because I felt like the show hasn’t had that problem since the beginning of the series. Yes, what we have in season 5 is a few episodes in the beginning of it that are just pretty uneventful all around. I found myself feeling completely underwhelmed with the first episode of the season in particular. Things started improving slightly every episode after that, but again things really didn’t start kicking in to the quality of Game of Thrones we expect until the season was already halfway over. Call me disappointed honestly.
I also have to say that on the whole, the storylines for most individual characters pale in comparison to the storylines we’ve seen for them in past seasons. There are a few exceptions, but characters like Arya Stark and Jon Snow wind up not having very interesting storylines until the end of the season. Again I need to expand on that point by saying that their storylines aren’t necessarily BAD or anything, just not up to the usual standard that the show has set for itself.
Listen, I’m all for having a story of a season take a few episodes to get going until some interesting stuff kicks in, but that doesn’t work when your seasons are only 10 episodes long. It’s a lot different to start off a season with five slow episodes when a season has 22 episodes than when it only has 10. Plus, aside from its first season, Game of Thrones hasn’t had a history of doing that, so we know the quality that the show is capable of reaching and it didn’t quite make it there this time. Season 5 is still great, but it’s not as good as past seasons of the show.
4/5
