White Watchers GoT Recap: 6.9 “Battle of the Bastards”

This is a recap of Game of Thrones season 6 episode 9 “Battle of the Bastards.”

********Show and Book SPOILERS below**********

This episode began in Mereen with a fearful Tyrion insisting that the slavers were only attacking because Mereen was starting to succeed. Sure, okay. No matter the reason they were still attacking and team Dragon Queen needed a plan. When Dany described her plan to KILL EVERYBODY, Tyrion told her she was acting like the Mad King. So they took a slightly different approach, meeting with a few leaders from the other side and offering them a chance to surrender. They didn’t take it, and immediately regretted it when Dany climbed atop her dragon and began setting fire to their ships. Her other dragons joined her while the Horde slaughtered the sons of the Harpy and Gray Worm sliced some throats, setting the slave army free and leaving one master to tell of the events that transpired.

Most of the rest of the episode took place at Winterfell. Jon and his pack of trusted leaders—Sansa, Tormund, Davos, and Lyanna Mormont among others—met to treat with Ramsay. Jon offered to forgo the battle and settle it the old way: a one-on-one fight to the death. Ramsay opted instead to threaten them disgustingly with his dogs who haven’t eaten for a week and retreat behind the walls of Winterfell.

The leaders went back to camp for one last planning session. It was pretty bleak, and no one understood that better than Sansa, who railed at Jon for not listening to her. She pleaded with Jon not to play into Ramsay’s traps before warning him that she would not be taken alive.

Tormund and Davos had a nice bro moment bonding over their pasts and their loyalty to Jon before Davos wandered away to find Shereen’s sacrificial pyre.

As the sun rose in Westeros, Theon and Yara met with Dany and Tyrion in Mereen. They brought her 100 ships—asking in return for her support of Yara’s claim to the Salt Throne and independence for the Iron Islands. They explained Euron’s plans to wed Daenerys, as well as his history as a kingslaying usurper. After some bonding over unfortunate family histories, the two forces reached an agreement—on the condition that there be no more reaving and raping.

Back on the battlefield, the armies waited in suspense for the fighting to begin. Ramsay brought out Rickon and forced him to play a game while the thousands gathered watched. As Rickon ran and Jon rode furiously to meet him, Ramsay shot arrows after his prisoner. This, of course, ended with Rickon getting an arrow to the heart mere feet from Jon’s outstretched arm. A devastated Jon charged as Ramsay walked away gloating.

And then the battle began. Jon’s horse was down before he even reached the cavalry line, but he somehow survived the melee on foot. As Jon’s army shrank rapidly, the Bolton force surrounded them, poking spears out from behind long shields. Tormund won a hard-fought bout with Smalljohn Umber by the skin of his teeth, and Jon barely survived getting trampled in the rapidly diminishing field as the shielded army advanced. When all hope was lost, horns sounded in the distance, announcing the arrival of the army of House Arryn. The Knights of the Vale smashed Ramsay’s army, but they couldn’t keep Ramsay from retreating behind the castle walls. Jon, Tormund, and Wun Wun pursued him, and while Ramsay was saying he was confident they could survive a siege, Wun Wun broke down the door. As Jon’s men flooded in through the gate, Wun Wun took an arrow to the eye. But it was too late to make a difference.

Ramsay decided it was time to face Jon one-on-one after all. Ramsay loosed arrow after arrow to impede Jon’s advance, to no avail. Jon took him down with nothing but a shield and his hands, beating Ramsay savagely until he looked up to see Sansa watching and remembered his place.

They hung the Stark banner upon the walls of Winterfell again at last as Rickon’s body was brought to the crypt. Sansa made her way to the cell where Ramsay was being kept and, after an exchange of last words, Sansa watched Ramsay’s dogs eat him alive.

Conclusion:

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Okay. Honestly, this is probably the most predictable episode Game of Thrones has ever come out with. But I don’t even care. The battle sequence was engaging and terrifying and beautiful. Everything about it was utterly revolting and heartbreaking. And I loved it.

It did seem quite contrived in some ways—for example, Jon making it out of that battle alive… I literally had the thought “he must have had some felix felicis before stepping out today,” because that was way too much. The deus ex Littlefinger also struck me as too good to be true, as well as utterly predictable for the fantasy genre. I wonder how much of this predictable black and white, good vs. evil, beloved underdog v. arrogant bastard stuff was intentional. Like, are we going to pay for this happy ending next episode? I’m okay with some contrivance when it comes to plot and writing if it’s for symbolism purposes, but the symbolism has to be made really clear: otherwise it just seems lazy. Right now I’m withholding judgment.

I could definitely seem some shuffling around in the way they killed main characters. Obviously they couldn’t let Jon, Davos, Tormund, AND Wun Wun live; someone had to die, and Wun Wun was easily the obvious choice. It’s sad because he’s the last of the giants, but it’s not so sad that it takes us out of the episode to mourn and wail at the writers. Rickon’s death was basically perfect—in that in light of the plot box he was shoved into there was no chance he was going to live, and there was no way for Ramsay to have done it that would have made more sense. So in that way, the writing was really good. As far as the overall arc of writing though, his death is actually pretty flat: they just brought him back, only to kill him immediately without him even getting to say anything. Which is why it’s kind of amazing that they managed to pull his death off so heart-breaking and jaw-droppingly.

Ramsay’s death was good. I approve.

I think they wanted us to feel exhilarated after the adrenaline of battle, and killing too many main characters probably would have ruined that. Not that I’m complaining, because I certainly wanted everybody to live (not counting Ramsay, of course). My thought, though, is that the exhilaration is nothing but a set up for a real big drop in the finale.

In conclusion, Sansa is Queen.

Also: all that flirting between Yara and Dany. I am here for this. Krakdragon. Danara. Iron Dragon. Firekracker. Okay, I’m done.

I give this episode 5 out of 5 kings. I know it’s not perfect, but I just don’t even care right now.

White Watchers GoT Recap: 6.8 “No One”

This is a recap of Game of Thrones season 6 episode 8 “No One.”

********Show and Book SPOILERS below**********

The Hound killed some (gross) people in order to find the Brotherhood without Banners. It didn’t help, but he found them anyway. And they were in the process of killing the three men who slaughtered the Hound's religious friends. So the Hound and the Brotherhood ended up being as friendly as the Hound can be, and Dondarrion and Thoros tried to convince him to stay and help them do… whatever it is they’re doing now. It seems they plan to go north to fight “the cold winds.” But will the Hound go with them?

Brienne made it to Riverrun, and even got inside the castle after speaking with Jaime, who let her pass in hopes that she would convince the Blackfish to surrender. He didn’t, apparently preferring to fight the Lannister army to the death rather than leave to fight for his niece’s kin. When Brienne’s plan failed, Jaime sent Edmure in to resume his Lordship and then order the surrender of his men. In the surrender, the Blackfish was killed. Brienne and Pod escaped down the river in a rowboat.

A wounded Arya went home with the actress after hiding in her dressing room. Arya told her that she wanted to go west of Westeros, and then accepted the milk of the Poppy. When she woke up, the actress was dead and the Waif was waiting for her. After a long and painful chase, Arya led the Waif into her hovel, where she used Needle to kill her. Then Arya went back to Jaquen Hagaar and told him that she was Arya Stark.

Cersei chose violence when the sparrows came for her, which led to King Tommen declaring the end of Trial by Combat and ensuring his mother’s impending imprisonment/death.

Daenerys is back in Mereen, just in time to see it being attacked by slavers.

Oh, and Varys is off on some secret mission.

We didn’t see anything from the other various corners of the world. But next episode is the Bastardbowl, so who even cares about this episode, really.

Conclusion:

I was a little disappointed in the missed opportunities for violence; there were fights I really wanted to see that just got skimmed over, probably in the interest of time. That said, I get it I guess. I felt like so much happened this episode, and the tension was thick.

Every part was tense—except for one: Tyrion. I don’t much care for Tyrion bonding with …well anyone really. We’ve been seeing a lot of this lately, and I feel like it just doesn’t fit with the tension of everything else that’s going on. It’s kind of making me like Tyrion less and less instead of more. Boo.

But overall, I liked the episode. I’m really riding on this wave of stress and fear. This is what Game of Thrones does well. Even though there were things I disliked about the writing and the things they chose to focus on this episode, the negs were overshadowed by just how much I’m into all the crap.

I give this episode 3.5 out of 5 kings.

White Watchers GoT Recap: 6.7 “The Broken Man”

This is a recap of Game of Thrones season 6 episode 7 “The Broken Man.”

********Show and Book SPOILERS below**********

The Hound is back and he’s out for blood after a group worshipping the Red God (possibly tied to the Brotherhood without Banners?) slaughtered his priest best friend and a community of nice happy people devoted to the Seven. I really hope this is the beginning of a certain Brotherhood without Banners storyline. And I can’t wait to see what the Hound is going to do with that ax. But hold on just a second—isn’t Brienne headed that way? Can you imagine if Brienne and the Hound meet AGAIN?

Brienne wasn’t in this episode but it looks like she’s going to be reuniting with good ol’ Jaime as soon as next week. Speaking of Jaime, he’s arrived in the Riverlands to take over the siege from the Freys and pry Riverrun from the hands of the Blackfish. Bronn also made an appearance.

Sansa and Jon have secured Wildling allegiance and are now making their way from house to house in the North, with only minimal success in gathering an army. Jon wants to attack Ramsay as soon as possible, but Sansa knows they need more men. She wrote a letter to someone (presumably to that end) and signed it Sansa Stark. Could it be to Littlefinger in the Erie?

Meanwhile Arya has booked passage back to Westeros, which would be really exciting if she hadn’t also been stabbed and left for dead. That faceless Waif really has it out for her, although apparently not enough to make sure Arya is actually dead before she takes off. (Wouldn’t you think that a servant of Death should be able to tell when someone is still alive?)

And then there’s Margaery, who is playing the game in King’s Landing. I think it’s pretty obvious that she’s faking her devotion; the real question is whether it’s obvious to the High Sparrow and Septa Unella. Margaery took a risk in warning her grandmother that she should leave and now the situation is out of her hands. The Queen of Thorns plans to go back to Highgarden, but Cersei desperately wants her to stay and help get things under control. And although The Queen of Thorns admitted that she hates Cersei more than anyone, Cersei may be right in suggesting that Margaery needs all the help she can get.

Finally, Yara and Theon and company have stopped off somewhere not nearly far enough away from Pyke to party a bit before making their way to the Dragon Queen. That makes things interesting; I’m willing to bet that Daenerys would take them—or at least their ships. She is in need of those after all. So the younger Greyjoys are surviving so far. Yara gave Theon some tough Viking love that made me cringe a little, but hopefully it did him some good, because I’d really like to see them win one of these days.

No word this episode from Bran, Sam and Gilly, Ramsay, or the Wall. Not from Daenerys, Mereen, Jorah, or Euron either. Or Dorne. Will we ever see Dorne again?

Conclusion:

It’s too bad Ian McShane’s priest character is already gone. I liked him. I also really liked Lyanna Mormont, who—thankfully—is still alive. The Hound storyline and the Mormont scene were both highlights of this episode for me. Also a high point was Arya’s scene, but only because I’m 99% sure she will live through this. If she doesn’t, I’m going to be very upset.

I did think the lead up to the stabbing was sort of odd. Last we saw Arya she was in the House of Black and White waiting with Needle. Why didn’t the Waif attack her before now? Why wasn’t Arya carrying Needle? Why was she not sneaking around? At first I seriously thought it must be a dream, because the whole thing just didn’t make a whole lot of sense. But anyway, we knew something was going to happen.

Overall, it was a decent episode. I thought it was a good choice to focus on the characters they did this week. Even though we only got about half the characters, it felt like we got everything that was important and everything fit. These are the characters and stories that I find most interesting (minus Bran and Brienne). I’m not surprised that Bran wasn’t in this episode though, just because of the way they’ve shown his story to us in the past. He hit a good stopping point last episode, so I’m good. I like episodes that are a bit of a slow burn of building excitement, and I’m certainly excited to see where this season goes. This episode was a bit of a valley compared to 6.5, but a step up from 6.6 to me.

I give this episode 3.5 out of 5 kings.