Ranking all the 'Game of Thrones' episodes

Although summer is around the corner, winter is coming and "Game of Thrones" fans are anxiously awaiting season six, which premieres Sunday, April 24, at 9:00 p.m. on HBO. The first book, "A Game of Thrones," was published in 1996, and the series has since become a cultural phenomenon, with HBO cashing in on the complex and often violent tale by George R. R. Martin.

Throughout its five seasons, "Game of Thrones" has expertly intertwined the elaborate storylines of House Stark, Lannister, Targaryen, Tyrell, Baratheon, Martell, Greyjoy, Bolton, Tully and Frey, plus hundreds of other characters in the Seven Kingdoms and beyond. "Game of Thrones" continues to be one of the most-watched shows on TV, with good reviews and high ratings to match.

To prepare for the new season, the experts at PrettyFamous ranked all 50 episodes of the entire "Game of Thrones" series based on each episode's IMDb rating. In the case of a tie, the episode with more votes ranked higher. All 50 "Game of Thrones" episodes scored over a seven, but only 10 episodes reached nine and above. For each episode, we also note the total viewership, as reported by Nielsen. However, we didn’t factor viewership into our analysis and total viewership did not necessarily lead to higher ratings.

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