Its been going down hill for about two seasons now, in my opinion. I’ll finish watching it because I have watched it for a while but last night’s episode reminded me of what went wrong with Star Wars. Lots and lots and lots of talk to set up a complex word without much action. I was hoping the last season, with less episodes and a massive budget, would go out like Breaking Bad — non-stop action in each one. But last night was a disappointment.
Agree; I thought it was slow, nothing suspenseful, too much complicated dialogue, the only segment I really liked was the ride on the dragons and the terror of the townspeople.
I think the "problem" with GOT is the opposite of what you suggest. The show started out with story lines that took several seasons to develop. I think it took 5 seasons to get Arya Stark back to Winterfell after she started in episode 1 of Season 2. Now that they have run out of George R R Martin books and have only his outline to go on, it seems that are telescoping events at too rapid a rate. Deneirys' rescue of Jon and his followers at the end of Season 6 is an example of something that was done in minutes whereas in the past, it took half a season or more to cover large areas of Westeros. I think the overly sped-up style started last season.
Last night's episode was IMO typical of first season episodes of this show. They are almost always kind of slow, with reminders of what happened last season and setting the stage for the new one. I expect the remaining ones will be almost too action-packed. Like you, I do not find the show as compelling as I once did, but I am in for the long haul.