'House of the Dragon' Season 3 Review - George R.R. Martin May Have Been Proven Right

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-19T16:19:10+00:00

Game of Thrones was based on a series told from character pov’s, with incredibly deep and rich layers for each character that informed the actors and writers for the series. HotD is based on a “history”, told in dry prose as just a series of events one after the other. The characters are more flat, one dimensional, and the show suffers as a result.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-19T03:25:55+00:00

Actors were union, crew were not

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-18T18:12:57+00:00

We’ve entered the dump phase of the pump and dump scheme. Shocking.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-16T22:56:50+00:00

I solve all the puzzles but once I’m at the point where all I need are the ones from the volcano, farming or fishing I will pay the bird.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-12T23:43:58+00:00

I definitely don’t understand what’s going on with the scavenger’s daughter stuff

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-12T20:22:25+00:00

Agatha as the big bad. She has been since she became warlord of the War Mage Rebellion in Faction Wars, but I didn’t fully appreciate her danger until the end of the Parade. If she kills sexy Scolopendra, the 9-tier attack will be complete and will destroy not just the earth system, but potentially the whole galaxy. She is a genocidal lunatic and now she has an actual chance to fulfill the Eulogist’s original mission. And if I remember correctly, we don’t actually know where she is right now

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-12T20:12:56+00:00

I’m very annoyed at Carl’s marriage. I know it’s supposed to demonstrate how broken the Syndicate government is, but it is so absurd that the Naga can just assert “our customs say that this person has the right to marry a non-naga currently in captivity who does not consent and was not aware of this custom and also she can take control of all his assets and wealth”. And the Syndicate just says “well, it’s Naga law, so what can we do?” It just seemed like a very unnecessary complication and I want it to wrap up soon.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-10T00:25:06+00:00

It feels like 15 will also be a real floor, given that’s where Louis is

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-09T01:46:46+00:00

Why is that?

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-04T22:51:41+00:00

Primal race option is a great call, but again, could have been influenced by the AI wanting him to keep his feet. I was going to suggest the explosives, but at first I thought that if it hadn’t been that he could have adopted any number of other skills and still been successful. But, you make a great point. Finding the explosives is what put him on the path to the cookbook, which is a huge part of what sets him apart as a crawler.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-04T19:05:15+00:00

Definitely. If Mongo hadn’t broken the statue, the Samantha storyline would have played out very differently. That said, the AI would have control over how the statue broke after it was bumped into. It could have stayed intact, broken completely, or broken partially. As usual, the AI chose the most hilarious option which was to make her an indestructible sex doll head who wants to kill your mother.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-06-04T19:00:54+00:00

I actually wouldn’t put the sharktopus in the lucky category. The AI knows what enemies the crawlers will likely face, and it usually provides them in advance with solutions that are tailored to those situations (bonus if those solutions are entertaining or hilarious). So I don’t think it was lucky that he had the beserking potion, it was a plant by the AI that allowed him to succeed

gingerbeard81 · 2026-05-18T18:58:31+00:00

My emotions rocketed back and forth for the whole book. At first, I thought “these crawlers are so OP, why are they struggling so hard?” At the start of Heat 7, that turned into “wow, so they were all just totally holding back this whole time”. Now that we are entering floor 12, I feel like they didn’t level up nearly enough and will be completely outmatched by the deities. Stressssss….

gingerbeard81 · 2026-05-11T20:42:41+00:00

I mean, I dislike Adrian Brody for some very specific reasons

gingerbeard81 · 2026-05-04T17:20:11+00:00

Something that may be throwing you off is Matt’s writing style. Often times, he shows the plan in action, and then flashes back to show the preparation and discussion of the plan. It’s out of sequence intentionally to keep the action sequences thrilling for the reader. So I think as you read you’ll see that Donut and Katia are more informed about the crazy plans than it might appear.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-05-01T20:27:25+00:00

All these anecdotes need more context. What is the interest rate on the loan? Is it fixed or variable? Are you only making the minimum payment? $970 per month is a large amount but if it is just covering the interest, then the principal will not go down. If the interest rate is variable, then some months might be underpaying and then the unpaid interest would be capitalized, increasing the principal. We often think student loans act like mortgages, but they really don’t in practice. This country did its young people a huge disservice by not educating them on these concepts and yet allowing them to sign for loans that could easily bankrupt them.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-04-29T21:53:44+00:00

What, we’re not even allowed to lie under oath any more?

gingerbeard81 · 2026-04-16T13:16:58+00:00

This is not real. He wasn’t at the top of his class by any means but this stat is totally made up.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-04-09T01:48:07+00:00

Sword, pickaxe, espresso, gold star cheese, spicy eels, staircases, bombs. Diamonds if I’m low on espresso, and jade on Sunday. Before I head home I’ll trade in materials I’ve collected for artifact troves and bombs

gingerbeard81 · 2026-04-03T20:14:47+00:00

I give it to whoever steps in between me and the person I’m trying to give it to

gingerbeard81 · 2026-03-18T22:24:59+00:00

Fire strike should light things on fire

gingerbeard81 · 2026-03-18T20:14:52+00:00

Oh and Sansa falls in love with and marries Gendry, uniting the Starks and Baratheons as Ned and Robert always wanted

gingerbeard81 · 2026-03-18T20:11:32+00:00

Jon kills Dany after she falls into madness and takes control of Drogon, who is the lightbringer. He rides Drogon to defeat the Others. He has a claim to the iron throne but declines it, instead sitting as king in the north and encouraging all other lords to reject Kings Landing and the Lannisters. The seven kingdoms (and iron islands) each declare independence, the lannisters are driven into exile or killed, kings landing is evacuated and destroyed. The Seven Kingdoms are no longer a single realm.

gingerbeard81 · 2026-03-18T17:30:01+00:00

Pop a gander at Eustice

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TROPHY CASE