Game of Thrones, Season 5, Ep 9: Dance of the Dragons. AKA: Fly Dragon Fly!

Camp Stannis goes up in flames! Seems like Ramsay and his 20 merry-men have been in, and have done some damage. Stannis talks to Ser Davos who urges him to go back to Castle Black. Stannis is not convinced, and said they’re not going back, nor are they going to move forward. They’re staying put, but they’re going to need supplies. Davos is then ordered back to Castle Black to get more horses, food, and supplies. Davos tries to get Shireen and her mother to go with them, and Stannis refuses saying he has to keep his family with him. Davos talks to Shireen before he leaves and has her read to him. The story of the Dance of Dragons, and he gives her a wooden horse. She's happy. 

Later, while Stannis is talking to his daughter, Stannis tells his Shireen he must fulfill his destiny and become what he is meant to be, even if he hates it. Sweet Shireen says it’s okay dad, no biggie. It doesn’t matter that I don’t know what you’re up to – I’ll help. Shireen and Stannis hug it out and he whispers “forgive me.”

Shireen is then seen being carted through the show toward the stake. She has no clue what’s coming until she sees Melisandre and the pyre. Shireen calls for her father, and Meli says “It’ll all be over soon, Princess.” Despite her gut wrenching screams for her father, and then for her mother, she’s sacrificed. 

“Cleanse her with your fire and let her light lead our way. Accept this token of our faith and lead us through the darkness” proclaims Meli. Despite her cries, papa Stannis says it must be done – she’s king’s blood. Sadly, there’ no arrow through the heart for this girl to spare her suffering. 

Jon Snow and his Wildling group arrive at the Wall. Ser Allister is not happy to see them. Allister and Jon seem to have a telepathic conversation:

“Who are these dudes?”

“Come on, let me in”

“Seriously, who’s the giant?”

“Oh, that’s just Wun-Wun. He’s harmless. A gentle giant”

“Uuuugh. Fiiiiine. Open the gates”

Jon, always broody and hard on himself, claims he feels like a failure. Sam tries to tell him he’s not, and give him an uplifting speech: “Hey, look. See that dude? He doesn’t think you’re a failure. Nor does that dude. Or that chick over there.” Jon turns to Olly for some dark support, and Olly just turns away from him. Ser Alliser walks by and tells Jon: “You have a good heart, Jon Snow, but it will get us all killed.”

Allister! Way to kick a guy when he’s down! 

The Kingslayer is given an audience with Prince Doran, Ellaria Sand, Myrcella and her fiancé Trystane. Myrcella, sporting some sexy Dorne clothing and Jamie doesn’t approve. He tells her What a lovely dress. You must be cold.” Myrcella tells her Daddy-Uncle Jamie “The Dornish climate agrees with me.” Smirk. When Ellaria questions why Jamie came for Myrcella he tells her they received a threat – the princess’s necklace in the jaws of a viper. Uh-oh. Myrcella says that the necklace was stolen from her room, and Ellaria has a deer in the headlights look. Busted. 

Duncle Jamie says she must go back to Kings Landing, and Prince Doran allows this, as long as she can take Tyrstane with her. Dorne reminds Jamie that Sweet Prince Oberyn once held a spot on the Small Council, and Trystane will now take that place. Jamie agrees. As Doran makes a toast to the new King, Ellaria spills her glass refusing to toast to the Lannister boy. Needless to say, the Prince is not pleased! He threatens her life. 

Jamie then asks about his pal Bronn. Seems Bronn is still locked up across from the Sand Snakes, who are playing a game of slap hands. Bronn is brought back to the fold with Jamie and gang, and Trystane is given the power to determine what happens to Bronn. Trystane wants a bit of payback, and Hotah gets to bitch slap Bronn for payback. He ends up elbowing him in the face and Bronn goes down! 

Doran offers Ellaria the chance to show her loyalty to him, and she bows to kiss his ring. Doran tells her there are no second or third chances. She then goes off to find Jaime. When she finds him in his room, she tells him Myrcella, his daughter, did’t have anything to do with Sweet Prince Oberyn’s death, and maybe Jamie didn’t have anything to do with it either. 

Come on – can’t he come back in some dream sequence or something? Just once? You let Drogo do that! Anyhoots. Here's one more look at the Sweet Prince Oberyn....*sigh*

Arya is off to sell her oysters, and slip some poison, to the Thin Man. While walking through the street, she sees Mace Tyrell and his men coming off a ship. One of them is Meryn, the dude that killed her sword teacher. He’s on her list. She becomes distracted and leaves the Thin Man hungry and follows Meryn and his men. Once they are in a brothel, Meryn is shown women so he can have some fun for the evening. Like Golidlocks, he keeps rejecting them. “This one’s too old. This one’s too old. This one’s too old.” The mistress finds a young gal for him and he says “this one’s just right.” Eww. Arya is looking on and is shooed out by the Mistress, but not before Meryn takes a look at her. Either he recognizes her, or he thinks she’s just young enough to be his toy for the next night. Arya returns to Jaqen who asks about the Thin Man. Arya replies that he wasn’t hungry, and Jaqen quips “Perhaps that’s why the man is thin.” Teehee.

Then, it’s game time!! OMG It’s a roast, Dragon style!!

The games are about to begin, and the announcer states “Free citizens of Meereen! By the blessings of the Graces and her majesty the Queen, welcome to the Great Games!” Daenerys questions Hizdahr and asks where’s he’s been. He says he’s just making sure everything is in order. What is he up to? 

Once the challengers are introduced, they all state “I fight and die for your glory, oh glorious queen.” The first two are the quick and the strong. The crowd waits for the Queen’s command, and she slowly claps her hand to start the game. Daario taunts Hizdahr and tries to goad him into betting on who will win. Hizdahr gives some speech that makes Dany take note: 

“You. Yourself. Have you ever tried to kill another man that was trying to kill you?” she asks him. Crickets. He’s got nothing to say. He continues to argue for violence in the service of greatness, and Dany and Tyrion aren’t in agreement. The Quick is the one to die, as his head is chopped off. 

On to Round 2: It’s the Meereenese champion against a Westerosi Knight. Wait, What? WHAT? Ser Jorah! 

Jorah arrives in the center of the ring to fight for his Queen. Dan looks concerned, and the fight begins with the clap of her hands. Jorah is having a hard time – the other dude is taking some good licks at him. Jorah is down. Looks like it’s all over as he gazes up upon his Queen Dany. Then, with some quick moves he stabs the guy ready to take him out in the gut, steals his spear, and chucks it behind Dany killing a Son of the Harpy that was sneaking up to kill the Queen. Whew, did you get that? You better. It’s a Harpy Ho-Down as they all come out of the crowd and start killing everyone. Daario is freaked and the slaughter begins.

 Daario yells “protect your Queen!” and he goes into battle. Jorah gets Dany out of the way. Hizdahr proves he’s never had to fight for his life, and he goes down. Stabbed. Dany is lowered to the pit and they try to escape through one of the tunnels, only to be blocked by more Harpies. They run to another and it’s the Harpy Horde! They start to attack as the Queen is in the center of a circle, surrounded by her small number of guards, Missandei, Tyrion, Daario, and Jorah. The fighting begins, Dany grabs Messandei’s hand and closes her eyes when she hears a scream in the skies. It’s Drogon! Her baby Dragon all grown up, and coming in to save his mother. 

Drogon lands in the center, spewing fire upon those that were trying to hurt his mommie. The ones not going up like marshmallows in a bonfire are throwing spears at Drogon and a few actually hit their target. Dany approaches and takes out a spear to save her baby-Dragon-Drogon. He turns and roars at her, then calms when he sees mommie dearest. 

She has no choice but to climb on top of him, and with her command “Valahd” they fly away. 

 Valahd. Fly? Save us? Get the Eff Out? Who knows… 

Tyrion saves Missandei, Ser Jorah saves his beloved Dany, and more than a few Harpys are burnt to a crisp. Sheesh. And I thought last week had the epic fight scene. No one told me there was “How to Fame your Drogon” episode this week. I would have saved the Epic comment!! 

What happens now with Meereen? 

Next week’s season finale previews: Cersie is a hot mess! Jon Snow is asked what he is going to do. Will the sacrifice of Shireen pay off, or is Melisandre full of hot air? She claims the Lord of Light has made good on his promise and Stannis roars “The siege beings at sunrise!” Will Stannis make it to Winterfell, where Brienne is waiting…Will Arya get her man? Which one – the Thin Man, or Mace? And… Sansa wants to die while there is still some of her left. I don’t think that next week will be Red Wedding status, but who knows?

Game of Thrones, Season 5, Ep8: Hardhome. AKA: Zombie Wars!

Once again the evil overlords otherwise known as "auto post" have magically deleted last week's recap. In a nutshell: Cersei's in jail, Tyrion and Jorah are sold as slaves and Tyrion is revealed as "the gift" for Daenerys, Sansa asks Theon for help. 

This week:

Tyrion finally meets Daenerys, who promptly asks him “Who are you?” and “Why shouldn’t I kill you?” Tyrion talks to Daenerys about their alliance. To gage if she can trust him, she asks him what she what she should do with Ser Jorah. She tells him he betrayed her and vowed to kill him should he return. Tyrion tells her she shouldn’t kill him off as he was once her faithful servant. She’s been betrayed, and like that old saying “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” Daenerys banishes Jorah from the city again. Jorah asks to be enslaved again so that he can fight in the pits since he has nothing else to live for.  

They talk about how to get the Iron Throne and Tyrion tells her she would do better staying in Mereen since she doesn’t have support of many others: No Tagaryens, no Lannisters, no Starks. She wants it all, and tells him that the Game of Thrones is just a wheel and she’s not going to spin it, she’s going to break it. Tyrion tells her she can’t go in with force alone.

Cersei is in jail and looking a lot like Margaery – dirty and disheveled! She’ brought water by the Septa and holds out the spoon for her to drink and is scolded “Confess!”  When she refuses – she’s bitch slapped. I think this is my favorite part of the entire season. No, the entire series! She won’t confess to the High Sparrow! She won’t beg like some bare-footed commoner! She’s bid goodbye. She learns her trial is soon and she’s accused of fornication (check), treason (check), incest (check, check), and the murder of King Robert (um, check). Seems she’s been deserted and the young King won’t see her. Mommie dearest, that’s what you get for pissing off your son when he begged for his queen. Qybern tells her Kevan Lannister has control of the council, the burden of proof for her crimes is pretty low amongst the Faith, and she just needs to fess up – confess and be absolved. She refuses and again, and again, the Septa comes to bring her water and see if she’s changed her mind about spilling her sins. She does her wicked Cersei scream and calls for the Septa’s death. The Septa just pours the water on the floor, which Cersei licks up like a dog once the Septa leaves. 

Arya is playing the game of faces again. She tells Jaqen that her name is Lana, and she’s an orphan who begged enough money to buy a bucket of oysters, and once she has enough to buy more she walks through Braavos selling her gods. She’s good – not getting smacked once for her tale. After telling her story with no affect – she is told that she has done well and will make a fine servant for the Many-Faced God. She is told which direction to go with her goods, and report back what she sees. She ends up selling her oysters to a man that appears to be collecting gold. Jaqen describes him as The Gambler, but really he’s a cheat – gambling on the lives of merchants that sell themselves and their safe return for a price, somewhat like a strange insurance policy. When the merchant’s ships go down, he doesn’t pay the claim to the families of the dead merchant, as who is going to challenge him? Jaqen tells Arya/Lana to hand the gambler a vial of poison. When she heads out again, the other girl says she’s not ready, and Jaqen replies that it really doesn’t matter if she is ready or not. Hmm – if she’s not ready does she end up in the creepy Hall of Faces? 

Theon goes to deliver Sansa food and she asks him how he could rat her out and tell Ramsay that she wanted to escape. He screams that he isn’t Theon, he is Reek. In his mind, he saved her from the torture he experienced. Tells her how Theon was strapped to a cross and was carved away piece by piece until there was no more of him left. Sansa says she would do the same to him for what he did to her family. He confesses all his sins, including killing “those two boys”. Bran and Rickon weren’t the ones killed. He couldn’t find them so he used two farm boys that he killed and burned so no one would know. Sansa is trying to find out where they went. He freaks out and runs from the room but Sansa now knows her brothers live. Where the heck are they anyway? 

Ramsay wants to take on the Stannis armies rather than letting them die of starvation and cold. He tells daddy Lord Bolton that he only needs 20 men to do so. Eep! What is this sick dude up to now? 

And finally, Jon Snow goes with Tormund to Hardhome. He talks to the Lord of Bones who says that Tormund is a traitor, and Tor gives him the royal beat down with his own stick! So then Jon talks to the elders and tries to get them to go down south with him, and fight to White Walkers along with him when they come. He tells them they’re not friends, and his proposal isn’t about being BFF’s in the future – it’s about survival. They ask where Mance is and Jon tells them he shot him in the heart, but it was done in mercy. While many of the elders to with, others say behind. Ruh-roh! Not a good idea. As Jon is loading the boats with the Wildlings, World War Z (the movie version, not the book) and The Walking Dead collide and it’s an all-out zombie fest!! Where’s Rick and Daryl when you need them? Jon goes back to get the Dragonglass, and sees the White Walkers on their horses. Epic fight scene! Fight, zombie, eat, kill, slash, fall down, get back up. While real men are on the ground fighting, Wun-Wun the Giant is playing whack-a-mole smashing zombies with his feet. 

The White Walkers attack and crash through the swords of everyone except Jon, who has his super strength Valyrian steel on his side. Jon and his super steel take down The Lord Commander. Jon and Tormund then high-tail it to the boat while the other Wildlings are left behind go get eaten by zombies and resurrected. 

I can’t describe the impact of this scene – similar to the Red Wedding, it was epic, grand scale and well done!.

One thing is for sure: The series is diverging from the book and will soon be ahead of the story.

Game of Thrones, Season 5, Ep6: Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken. AKA: Bent over and broken

So that just happened. 

Just when you thought that Game of Thrones couldn’t get any more gruesome, they did.

First, Arya continues to wash dead people. She keep asking questions – where are they taken? They go through a mysterious door that closes immediate after they take out the corpse, but then what? She puts her foot down and states she’s not giving anymore sponge baths to dead people until she gets answers. Hoo-boy. She got answers all right. First, she plays some slapstick version of Two Truths and a Lie, called Game of Faces. Except in this game when you lie, you get smacked with a stick. 

First, with her roommate. Then, Jaqen H’ghar asks her questions and smacks her when he catches her lying: She hates Hound. Lie. Smack. She wants to be No One. Lie. Smack. Later, a man brings his sick daughter to the temple telling Arya “She suffers every day of her life.”  Arya dons a straight face and lies to the girl, telling her she was very sick, once, and was dying. Since her father also loved her, so he brought her to the House to be healed by the waters from the fountain. She clearly lies her butt off when she tells the girl that drinking the water from heal her. Of course, it doesn’t, but she was able to lie and get away with it. 

This seemed to earn her some privileges and she is shown what’s behind door number 1. Jagen takes Arya to the Hall of Faces. Otherwise known as a creepy room with large columns of faces that the Faceless Man gets to use. Did you get that? Bizarre, I know. Any-hoots, my first question was “um, how do they get to the ones on top? Do they have to step on other faces to get to the top?” 

Next, Tyrion tells Jorah of his father’s death by the Nights’ Watchmen. Tyrion and Jorah are then captured and the men want to cut off Tyrion’s  *ahem* appendage,  because they think that dwarf cock has magical powers. *insert dirty comment here: doesn’t all cock have magical powers?* Tyrion convinces them to not give him a detachable penis and they agree – but only until they can find a cock merchant. They have cock merchants? What are those? IDK. it’s all so bizarre! When the fighting pits are mentioned, Tyrion also convinces them that Jorah is a prize fighter, and they should take him there. Of course, that just helps get them one step closer to the Dragon mother Daenerys. 

Littlefinger has given Sansa to the Boltons.  Littlefinger then returns to King’s Landing to tell Cersei that Sansa is alive and engaged to Ramsay. He also he promises her that the Knights of the Vale will fight for the Lannisters to take Winterfell. Why? So that he can be named Warden of the North. Cersei states she’ll believe him when he provides Sansa’s head on a spike. 

 Cersei also gets into it with her new daughter-in-law Margaery, who quickly calls in Gramma Lady Olenna as reinforcement. Lady and Cersei get into a verbal spar, and an inquest is held. Loras denies having relations with men, Margaery denies any knowledge of this until his boy toy is brought forward and confirms not only the relationship, but Margaery’s private peep show staring the two of them. Calling him a liar, he mentions Loras’ birthmark on his thigh. Whoopsie! Cersie is smug when she sees that both Loras and Margaery are carted off to jail. 

Cersei’s daughter Myrcella is in the garden with her betrothed Prince Martell when Jamie and Bronn bust in to save her. She doesn’t want to go with uncle/daddy Jamie. The Sand Snakes, a trio of women warriors that are Prince Oberyon’s daughters, come in ready to off Myrcella and Jamie and Bronn are in their way. They all end up duking it out until the guard Hota comes in and breaks it up, arresting Jamie and Bronn. 

Sansa is completing her bathing ritual before her wedding to twisted Ramsay. Her attendant, Myranda, tells tales of Ramsay’s abuse and his evil twisted ways. Sansa snaps back “How long have you loved him?” and lifts her chin “I’m Sansa Stark of Winterfell (biatch). This is my home. You can’t frighten me.”  Um, maybe you should have paid a bit more attention to Myranda. 

Theon is Sansa’s escort and he hands her off to be married to Ramsay. They retreat to the bedroom – and I mean THEY. All three of them: Ramsay, Sansa and Theon. Ramsay asks if she’s a virgin telling her not to lie to her new husband. He then tells her to remove her clothes, and orders Theon to stay put. And watch. “You’ve known Sansa since she was a girl. Now watch her become a woman.”

The scene ends with a close up of her face down on the bed, crying. Theon standing in the corner, crying. Sansa is bent over and Theon is broken again. SO disturbing, yet it's not. Ramsay is more evil than Jofrey. Theon is too beaten down to stop it. Sansa knows fighting will make it worse. 

What did this scene accomplish? It’s not on the books. It’s not even Sansa that marries Ramsay – it’s a girl pretending to be Arya.Where is GoT going with this? What are they setting up? We'll just have to wait and see....