Game of Thrones: The Complete Sixth Season (Blu-Ray + Digital HD)
Blu-Ray Reviews | Nov 21st, 2016
Starring: Peter Dinklage, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Lena Headey, Kit Harington, Emilia Clarke, Sophie Turner, Alfie Allen, Maisie Williams, Gwendoline Christie, Conleth Hill, Carice van Houten, Natalie Dormer, John Bradley, Jonathan Pryce, Iwan Rheon, Isaac Hempstead Wright
Written By: David Benioff & D. B. Weiss, Dave Hill, Bryan Cogman
Directed By: Jeremy Podeswa, Daniel Sackheim, Jack Bender, Mark Mylod, Miguel Sapochnik
Studio: HBO
Buy On Amazon.com
The sixth season of Game of Thrones was one of the best seasons to date but at the same time, it also felt like fan fiction. We (book readers & non-book readers) were all experiencing new territory together. The show is coming back later than usual so now’s your chance to catch up if you haven’t see the show yet!
The biggest cliffhanger from Season 5 was the fact that Jon Snow was murdered by mutineers of the Night’s Watch. Daenerys nearly escaped the Sons of the Harpy in the fighting pits and was taken captive by a Dothraki tribe, Sansa and Theon escaped crazy bastard Ramsay Bolton, Cersei was humiliated in the streets by the High Sparrow, Tyrion and Varys were left cleaning up the mess of Meeren, and Arya went blind by the Faceless Men for killing someone not on their list. Season 6 sees a lot of people re-grouping and pressing on, and war is on the horizon. Old characters that haven’t been on the show in ages return, loose ends are tied up, and new characters emerge. Is that a broad enough description?
***Most likely you’ve seen this season but going forward I’ll be discussing plot points and spoilers so there’s your warning!***
I really loved this season of Game of Thrones despite it feeling like a lot of this won’t happen in the books at all. It made for fun TV watching because you didn’t know what was going to happen. Everybody was in the dark, but honestly, who didn’t know that Jon wasn’t coming back. That’s why the cliffhanger bugged me because as soon as Kit showed up in Ireland, people knew he was back. I’m happy with the way things turned out in the end, and how he met up with Sansa. It should make for interesting times in Season 7 on what happens with those characters.
This season had a lot of loose ends tied up. All these characters that have been absent, were back on and new storylines like The Tarlys and the Euron Greyjoy stuff finally happened. All the characters that finally returned: Benjen(!), Bran, Meera and Hodor (pour one out for my hommie), Brotherhood without Banners, The Hound, Yara & the Greyjoys, Blackfish, Edmure, The Freys, and Rickon and Osha. Out of that batch, couldn’t believe they FINALLY did Coldhands/Benjen even though that’s probably not going to play out the same way in the books. I was pissed off about the way they treated The Blackfish. Knew Rickon wasn’t meant for the show and was sad the way he went out. Happy beyond belief that the Brotherhood without Banners are back and have been sorely missed since Season 3! Now only if they could fit in Lady Stoneheart somehow but that ship has probably sailed I think, unless they do that with another character.
The saddest moment of the series, and probably about any series I’ve seen in a long time was what happened with Hodor. That episode, when it was finished, I literally broke down crying which I never do. It was just so damn sad; the music, the scene and the flashback happening at once. I just couldn’t hold back anymore and let loose.
Besides that episode, the last two episodes of the season were just outstanding! The Battle of the Bastards was a thing of beauty (pour another one out for Wun Wun). Honestly, Ramsay deserved a lot more than what he got in the end. It was an impressive battle, for a TV show and they certainly raised the bar for other shows. The last episode with the stuff with Cersei was somewhat predictable but man, it was marvelous to watch! Set to the beautiful score by Ramin Djawadi, that long scene was just great to see. Besides that stuff, I guess the other big point is we now know who Jon’s parents are, even if he doesn’t yet. Just good stuff!
The Blu-Ray, like always, looked amazing on my TV. The majority of the GOT seasons Blu-Ray had their issues loading really slow or messing up during an episode. That happened during the second episode, which was beyond annoying. Good thing there’s digital HD code that comes with it when these discs act up like that. There are some great featurettes on this Blu-Ray like Re-creating the Dothraki World, The Battle of the Bastards and 18 Hours at the Paint Hall. the 18 Hours one was cool because shows you what happens on the set in a day. They focus more on the crew than any of the actors or directors. It reminded me of the LOTR/ Hobbit extras because they were in-depth. The Battle of the Bastards featurette went into how that episode and the battle was done. I’ve seen some of that footage but this was more of it. The Histories and Lore are always cool to watch and you learn a lot from those. I know I watched the deleted scenes but honestly, I already forgotten about them so they must have not been that great.
Game of Thrones Season 6 was outstanding, exciting, sad, and exhilarating! Couldn’t have asked for a better season really. The Blu-Rays usually get released in March but they were released a little earlier this time. It would make for a good gift this holiday season!
Features:
Episode Guides
Audio Commentaries
Re-creating the Dothraki World
The Battle of the Bastards
18 Hours at the Paint Hall
Histories and Lore
Deleted Scenes
Video:
Codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Audio:
English: Dolby Atmos
English: Dolby TrueHD 7.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: Dolby Digital 5.1
French: Dolby Digital 5.1
Spanish: Dolby Digital 2.0
Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1
German: Dolby Digital 5.1
Portuguese: Dolby Digital 2.0
Subtitles:
English SDH, French, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish
Bottom Line: One of the best seasons!
Rating: NR
Extras Rating:
Overall Rating:
