Scenery and costumes are still to a high standard, similar to GoT, but the actors, storylines and intrigue is so much less than the orginal GoT. The actors look like puppets, there is hardly any expression and seem to be going through the motions. I don't feel any connection with any of them, the storyline doesn't make it easy either with nothing special happening where the viewer could get excited about no small scenes to built those emotional connections that were plentiful in GoT and the pretty much total lack of intrigue and plotting against each other, too little strong contenders for the throne that get actually developed. So all in all, very disappointing, even coming down from the last season of GoT. HoD is picking up later in the season, episodes 7-9 are a bit better, but too little and too late.