For the spoiler-conscious, let's just take a moment to talk about themes. Much of the drama of Game of Thrones and the books from which the show is adapted surrounds characters' motivations and ambitions, and their relative skill in playing the eponymous Game. Ned Stark, our original protagonist, was a classic hero. Honest, noble, generous, principled. He was a good father and a good ruler of his realm. But his unwillingness to play the game ruthlessly cost him his life. Had he seized power and controlled the narrative surrounding the discovery of Joffrey's true parentage and known not to trust Littlefinger so easily, he might have made a real go of it, and perhaps he would have succeeded... in putting Stannis on the throne (oh boy, yeah, that might not have worked so well either.)
The thing is, the very first sequence in the series has nothing to do with court intrigue. Before we know about Winterfell or King's Landing, the Iron Throne, or the history of the Targaryens and Robert's Rebellion, we see a trio of rangers in a snowy landscape who discover a wilding village that has been wiped out, their corpses arranged in a horrible sigil, and soon thereafter, a zombie girl and a much more frightening White Walker comes and kills two of them while the third flees.
The undead have always been a part of the story, even as we are distracted by other conflicts.
Monday, August 28, 2017
Monday, August 7, 2017
Starks in Winterfell on Game of Thrones
It's been a while since I did an episode update, but last night's seemed big enough that it required discussion.
This season seems to be continuing with the fast forward momentum the show has developed since surpassing the events of Martin's books. With only what's left of this short season and next year's short season, certain things we've been waiting to happen for a long time are finally coming to fruition. The pieces are not only getting put in place, but moving and performing the functions we'd always expected them to do.
In Winterfell, every surviving person with the last name Stark is finally home (and Jon is, it seems, more or less safe where he is for now.) Sansa and Arya are both shocked to see how their siblings have changed in this time: Sansa becoming a lady of real power and authority, Arya becoming a seriously skilled fighter with hints at dark things she's done, rather than had done to her. Bran, on the other hand, has lost his humanity in the name of taking on his mystical powers. He'll do what needs to be done to fight the White Walkers, but his specific affections for his family or even Meera, who sacrificed nearly everything in order to get him safely north of the wall and back, are no longer there, or at least no longer relevant to his behavior.
What is delicious, though, is that Littlefinger looks more or less fucked. Petyr Baelish has felt like a smaller presence on the show than he does in the books, where he has always seemed (to me) like he could be the main human antagonist (a role Cersei takes in the show - not to say she doesn't have a shot at the title in the books as well.) He is, however, working very hard to get his hooks in each of the Starks. This is a guy who still wants to sit on the Iron Throne, but how he plans to eventually accomplishes this remains highly mysterious.
The problem is that the Stark kids have all been through so much shit that his manipulations are going to fall flat. Sansa knows him too well (selling her to Ramsay was not a good move,) Arya is a badass assassin, and Bran can literally see his entire past, knowing exactly what he plans and what kind of person he is. When Littlefinger gives Bran the dagger that nearly killed him in season one, clearly trying to set himself up as some kind of protector or mentor to Bran, the Three-Eyed Raven responds with Littlefinger's most famous philosophical statement - one made in private with Varys, who is not the sort to blab unless it serves his agenda - "Chaos is a Ladder."
If that dagger (now wielded by Arya) does not find its way into Littlefinger's body, I'll be shocked.
With Dany's allies largely eliminated, she has chosen to play her best card. Jon gives her wise advice to avoid melting King's Landing under a hail of dragonfire (reminding her, even though I don't think he ever heard her say it explicitly, that she doesn't want to be Queen of the Ashes) and so instead she attacks Jaime's caravan taking food from the Reach to King's Landing. Mind you, the gold got there just fine (there's one seeming throwaway line.)
This does manage to be a battle where none of our well-known characters die (as far as I know, Sam's brother Dickon is still alive as well) but between the Dothraki coming at the Lannister and Tarly forces like the "Indians" in a Western and Daenerys and Drogon dropping fire like napalm on the closed ranks of Jaime's army, it's a pretty clear victory for Daenerys, who really needed one.
Here's the thing:
Blowing up gold would have been fine. Food, not so much.
Also, Bronn shot Drogon with the "scorpion" (aka ballista) that Qyburn designed. Drogon seemed to shake off the hit like it was only a flesh wound (yes, I know that all wounds are flesh wounds, and the shoulder is a vulnerable place for anyone) but given that Qyburn was involved, there's a chance there was poison on that bolt, so I'm worried for Drogon.
Jaime attempts one suicidal charge to try to kill either Dany or Drogon with a spear, but just as he's about to get a face full of dragonfire, someone (not sure if it was Bronn or Dickon) tackles him into the nearby lake - safe from the fire, yes, but also sinking into the water in full plate armor, so...
We know that Tyrion is also watching the battle from a nearby hill, and he's desperately hoping for Jaime to just run away - for all his flaws, Jaime was always kind to Tyrion, and Tyrion I'm sure would rather have Jaime bend the knee and join their side, even if he doesn't think it would happen.
Still, after this battle, assuming Jaime doesn't just drown, which would be anticlimactic, we're likely to see a rather agonized interaction between the Lannister brothers. Jaime is unlikely to switch sides just because he was beaten - he's actually probably the Lannister most loyal to family, and even if he loves his brother, he's unlikely to forgive him for killing their father. Even though he knows Cersei is unhinged, she's still his, er, favorite sibling.
While I worry for Drogon, I think this battle also really demonstrates how absurdly effective having a dragon to ride in on changes the math on warfare. The cavalry charge, which historically has been a powerful battle-ending move, only served as a means to get the soldiers to line up close to each other, allowing Drogon to kill that many more people in a single breath. But let's hope that there are still some left alive to flame-broil the undead up north.
This season seems to be continuing with the fast forward momentum the show has developed since surpassing the events of Martin's books. With only what's left of this short season and next year's short season, certain things we've been waiting to happen for a long time are finally coming to fruition. The pieces are not only getting put in place, but moving and performing the functions we'd always expected them to do.
In Winterfell, every surviving person with the last name Stark is finally home (and Jon is, it seems, more or less safe where he is for now.) Sansa and Arya are both shocked to see how their siblings have changed in this time: Sansa becoming a lady of real power and authority, Arya becoming a seriously skilled fighter with hints at dark things she's done, rather than had done to her. Bran, on the other hand, has lost his humanity in the name of taking on his mystical powers. He'll do what needs to be done to fight the White Walkers, but his specific affections for his family or even Meera, who sacrificed nearly everything in order to get him safely north of the wall and back, are no longer there, or at least no longer relevant to his behavior.
What is delicious, though, is that Littlefinger looks more or less fucked. Petyr Baelish has felt like a smaller presence on the show than he does in the books, where he has always seemed (to me) like he could be the main human antagonist (a role Cersei takes in the show - not to say she doesn't have a shot at the title in the books as well.) He is, however, working very hard to get his hooks in each of the Starks. This is a guy who still wants to sit on the Iron Throne, but how he plans to eventually accomplishes this remains highly mysterious.
The problem is that the Stark kids have all been through so much shit that his manipulations are going to fall flat. Sansa knows him too well (selling her to Ramsay was not a good move,) Arya is a badass assassin, and Bran can literally see his entire past, knowing exactly what he plans and what kind of person he is. When Littlefinger gives Bran the dagger that nearly killed him in season one, clearly trying to set himself up as some kind of protector or mentor to Bran, the Three-Eyed Raven responds with Littlefinger's most famous philosophical statement - one made in private with Varys, who is not the sort to blab unless it serves his agenda - "Chaos is a Ladder."
If that dagger (now wielded by Arya) does not find its way into Littlefinger's body, I'll be shocked.
With Dany's allies largely eliminated, she has chosen to play her best card. Jon gives her wise advice to avoid melting King's Landing under a hail of dragonfire (reminding her, even though I don't think he ever heard her say it explicitly, that she doesn't want to be Queen of the Ashes) and so instead she attacks Jaime's caravan taking food from the Reach to King's Landing. Mind you, the gold got there just fine (there's one seeming throwaway line.)
This does manage to be a battle where none of our well-known characters die (as far as I know, Sam's brother Dickon is still alive as well) but between the Dothraki coming at the Lannister and Tarly forces like the "Indians" in a Western and Daenerys and Drogon dropping fire like napalm on the closed ranks of Jaime's army, it's a pretty clear victory for Daenerys, who really needed one.
Here's the thing:
Blowing up gold would have been fine. Food, not so much.
Also, Bronn shot Drogon with the "scorpion" (aka ballista) that Qyburn designed. Drogon seemed to shake off the hit like it was only a flesh wound (yes, I know that all wounds are flesh wounds, and the shoulder is a vulnerable place for anyone) but given that Qyburn was involved, there's a chance there was poison on that bolt, so I'm worried for Drogon.
Jaime attempts one suicidal charge to try to kill either Dany or Drogon with a spear, but just as he's about to get a face full of dragonfire, someone (not sure if it was Bronn or Dickon) tackles him into the nearby lake - safe from the fire, yes, but also sinking into the water in full plate armor, so...
We know that Tyrion is also watching the battle from a nearby hill, and he's desperately hoping for Jaime to just run away - for all his flaws, Jaime was always kind to Tyrion, and Tyrion I'm sure would rather have Jaime bend the knee and join their side, even if he doesn't think it would happen.
Still, after this battle, assuming Jaime doesn't just drown, which would be anticlimactic, we're likely to see a rather agonized interaction between the Lannister brothers. Jaime is unlikely to switch sides just because he was beaten - he's actually probably the Lannister most loyal to family, and even if he loves his brother, he's unlikely to forgive him for killing their father. Even though he knows Cersei is unhinged, she's still his, er, favorite sibling.
While I worry for Drogon, I think this battle also really demonstrates how absurdly effective having a dragon to ride in on changes the math on warfare. The cavalry charge, which historically has been a powerful battle-ending move, only served as a means to get the soldiers to line up close to each other, allowing Drogon to kill that many more people in a single breath. But let's hope that there are still some left alive to flame-broil the undead up north.
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