Television review: Game of Thrones, Sky Atlantic

Enough with the army of undead ice walkers and give us the love affair we never knew we wanted — Tormund and Brienne.

We are halfway through Game of Thrones season 6 and it has been a series of hits and misses. Every second episode so far seems to be laying the groundwork for a future climax yet to be revealed — leaving both the body and nipple count disappointingly low in comparison to other years.

And yet we have been treated to great moments — and great one-liners. We know that Ramsey Bolton ‘prefers being an only child’, since he fed his newborn half-brother and the child’s mother to his dogs after knifing his father to death.

As we predicted, Melisandre has nailed her red colours to Jon Snow’s attempts to retake Winterfell, conveniently moving on from naming Stannis as the chosen one.

Sansa’s evolution from damsel in distress to vengeful vixen has been great to watch, but thankfully Daenerys is done wandering the grasslands and is heading back to Mereen with an army fit, well, for a queen.

Hopefully, we are also close to seeing Ayra return to Winterfell where all the rest of her remaining clan are gathering, because frankly, a girl doesn’t care much for the Faceless Men training.

One of the highpoints was seeing Hoder fulfill his destiny and “hold the door”, and we learned that a vision of the feat so tormented the hulking stable boy Wylis as a child that he became the simple-minded Hodor.

Things are hotting up for Monday’s showdown between incest buddies Cersai/Jaime and the High Sparrow and his church load of fanatics. There will be blood — and lots of it.

And following Bran’s visions, have we finally discovered Jon’s true parents? Did Prince Rhaegar Targaryen, brother of Daenerys abduct and rape Ned’s beloved sister Lyanna Stark — and did Ned, whom we have learned is not such a shiny hero as we thought — murder his sister to save her shame?

We can only look forward to what the Starks will do to Ramsey if they do manage to reclaim Winterfell and with rumours that The Hound is coming back into the show, Euron Greyjoy convinced he can offer Daenerys safe passage back to the Seven Kingdoms and the White Walkers seemingly unstoppable, all we need is a few dragons to create the perfect cliffhanger ending. Bring it on — but just a bit more quickly.