git stuck on Unpacking Objects phase

I'm trying to do a git pull from a remote repository in github into a local machine... but git gets stuck on 70% into the "Unpacking objects" phase, with no sign of going anywhere.. (left it for several hours now with no change)

Any suggestion on how to fix this issue?

Is it possible to instruct git to only download the latest commit/version from the remote repository without all the Intermediate states?

I had the same problem when I git pull a repository on github.com. I found there were some large files and the connection to github was slow. So maybe you just have to wait patiently before git pulls the whole repository.

For me the solution was to change protocol specifier from https to git, e.g.:
git clone https://github.com/some/repository
to
git clone git://github.com/some/repository

Edit:
Here's something about the protocols used in Git.
Some highlights:
The downside of the Git protocol is the lack of authentication.
It also requires firewall access to port 9418, which isn’t a standard port that corporate firewalls always allow