Hello, here we are with this week’s quick take on Game of Thrones S8E3. There are a lot of spoilers for this The Long Night review so if you don’t want to be spoiled just yet, I suggest you skip.

Ok let’s talk about some of the technicals before we dive right into the story and hopefully not spoil you. The cinematography works extremely well here. At least in the first thirty minutes or so. You got symetry, you got contrast and they blended colors extremely well, particularly those moments when Melisandre “blesses” the Dothraki horde’s swords and they burn bright in the lurid, dark evening that will become the Battle of Winterfell. Then minutes later, that same playing with the color gives viewers a chance to see what’s happening with the advance party.

*Spoiler Alert*

Not good.

You can feel that they had a tighter budget for this episode or they may have reached their budget cap which was why the storm and the icy clouds made a sudden appearance in the middle of the episode.

Still, with what they had, it was a visual accomplishment and a damn good episode.

The musical scoring really helped made the episode a masterpiece that it was. From drums and sweeping orchestral suites, everything feels twice as scary and stressful in this episode.

The only negative that I can really comment on is just how dark the setting for the episode is. The best I can compare it to was if you watch a pirated copy of a movie recorded in a theater and you squint really hard just to see what’s going on. But even that is forgiveable because it hits high marks when they did the dark scenes inside Winterfell and that makes it the more thrilling to watch.

Character deaths here are normal and there’s a ton of deaths in this episode. Some are surprising while the others will totally catch viewers off-guard. Except for Nightwatch’s Edd whos death scene was totally telegraphed with the way his scenes were framed. It’s formulaic to be honest.

For this Battle of Winterfell review, we also have to reinforce the statement that this HBO series is a master at giving us chills and suspense when they want. What’s really rare for the series is giving us a happy ending or a satisfying moment for a character. It has been awhile since we got anything like that (for me it was Khaleesi burning the Dothraki Widows tent and emerging unscathed). For this episode, it’s Arya Stark who comes out as the clear cut MVP. It’s actually nice when we get a payoff like this in television or movies. It keeps us invested and helps hitch us a ride towards a big “yes” while tuned into our TV screens.

Surprisingly, I wasn’t as hyped to see the dragon fight in this episode. They were building up hype to that moment with Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen going up against the Night King on their respective dragons. But when they finally did that, it wasn’t up to expectation. Sad really. But it still makes for great entertainment.

Another Night King related gripe for this episode is how he’s so OP and yet we don’t get any fleshed out moments. Would have enjoyed the character death more if they gave him more to despise just like how Joffrey Baratheon was really despised and we saw how they did that.

Game of Thrones S8E3 – The Long Night Review – Verdict

10/10

Get past the stress and strain that this episode will bring about and you’ll see that this was one of the crafty made episode EVER for the hit TV series from HBO. If this is what George R.R. Martin is doing for his book, then we totally can’t wait. What’s even better is the fallout for this battle as this definitely shook up the status quo for Westeros once more.

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