Warning: season seven spoilers ahead

Diehard fans of Game of Thrones have accused the HBO mega-series of losing the plot in its latest season, pointing to implausible twists, timing inconsistencies and character irregularities.

Those who have followed the television version of George RR Martin’s books from the beginning have begun to question whether the show’s writers are incapable of dealing with the complexity of their original source material.

Reddit forum ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ features a thread with hundreds of comments titled ‘This show has officially gone off the rails‘.

“All of the clever characters have seen a drop off in quality. Tyrion, Varys, Littlefinger,” one Reddit user argued.

“[George RR Martin] seems like he’s just smarter than most people and can write clever, witty, scheming characters, and absent his source material, it becomes difficult to recreate it from scratch.”

The hosts of popular Game of Thrones podcast On the Throne, were similarly unconvinced by the action of the most recent season seven episode, Eastwatch, calling the opening scene “bulls**t”.

“That reveal of Jaime and Bronn somehow swimming up what looked like a half mile away from the burning fields of the battle? That was just lazy, it was implausible, and it was unnecessary,” one host said.

Eastwatch also saw Daenerys Targaryen, Jon Snow and Tyrion cook up a plan to send Tyrion into King’s Landing, where he is a wanted man, while Jon Snow and co venture beyond the wall to somehow capture a white walker and bring it to King’s Landing.

Fans have deemed this plan laughably complicated, with the hosts of podcast Game of Thrones LIVE comparing it to famously convoluted heist film Ocean’s Eleven.

“One of the most elaborate and terrible ideas,” one host declared.

On the Throne pointed out that it “wasn’t plausible” Cersei Lannister would allow her brother-turned-mortal enemy Tyrion to walk free from King’s Landing.

“I don’t buy it,” one host said.

Fans find it unlikely ruthless Cersei Lannister would let her traitor brother Tyrion walk free. Photo: HBO

Fans have also taken issue with the speed at which various characters are apparently traversing Westeros, seemingly covering long distances by boat, foot or horse in a matter of hours.

“It’s fine to skip some travel for the sake of moving the plot along, but our Westeros avengers traversed an entire continent by sea in the blink of an eye in the middle of winter,” one Reddit user pointed out.

However, others have defended the show’s creators and writers, DB Weiss and David Benioff, arguing they “didn’t sign up for” writing an entire third season without Martin’s guidance.

“They have to try and finish the story from the convoluted mess it became, which has so far proven impossible for George himself,” one Redditor said, referring to the fact Martin is yet to complete the final two books in the series.

Another pointed out the inconsistencies were likely a product of the show only having one season left to wrap up the various characters’ stories.

“We’re at the end of the story arc where you can’t just continue to have story buildup and you need more ‘action’ to reach the peak confrontation,” the Redditor said.