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Let me just start by starting I’m thrilled to be doing the recaps for season 5 of “Game of Thrones.” I’ve been a huge supporter of the show and the books for the past couple years, and I’ve been waiting for this on the edge of my seat since last years finale. The episode starts off with a flashback scene where we get to see a young Cersei Lannister going with another girl to see a woman who can tell her her future. Though the […]
On the eve of war, Tywin marches, Stannis sails, Tyrion schemes, and Theon is belittled by his sister. Oh, and Nurse Pointless gets naked with the King in the North, possibly earning herself a new nickname. Let’s knock a few of the lesser plotlines out of the way quickly: nothing of significance happened in Qarth (so why did they waste our time with Dany and Jorah?); Jaime and Brienne begin their journey back to King’s Landing/the best buddy cop show on TV right now; Jon […]
Some long-neglected characters got some welcome face time, the bad guys acted like jerks, the good guys also acted like jerks, and the episode title actually makes sense. That makes for a good week on Game of Thrones. I’ve been pondering how the various factions in Game of Thrones map to real-world politics, or at least where they fall on the conservative-liberal spectrum (full disclosure, I’m what you’d call a pragmatic progressive). Interestingly, where fantasy fiction tends to paint repressive, conservative societies as the bad […]
In this week’s episode, nothing terribly unexpected happened, unless you count all the drastic (and sometimes bizarre) ways the series is starting to diverge from the novels: random nurses, kidnapped dragons, and slightly less rape. Things start off with Theon Greyjoy’s brave storming of Winterfell, sneaking over the walls in the night and wrenching it from the old men and children who’d been left to protect it. Then he proudly claims his title as a prince from a crippled 10-year-old. Theon’s not even terribly good […]
Every character’s trajectory was altered in this week’s pivotal episode. From exotic Qarth to the frigid north, all the aimless meandering stopped as plans shifted and lives diverted (or just ended). So who is the Ghost of Harrenhal? We dive right in with a crucial scene that leads right off from last week’s bizarre shadow-monster birthing incident. Renly is in his tent with no one around but Brienne, there to protect him, and Catelyn Stark, there to forge an alliance between Renly and her son […]
Sometimes you have to make tough choices, setting idealism aside. Sometimes you have to harden your heart against the harshness of the world. Sometimes you have to kill a small part of yourself so that the rest can live. Because “What is Dead May Never Die.” We briefly visit Jon Snow north of the wall, in a direct continuation of his encounter last week with Craster’s cudgel and a baby-eating white walker. Craster throws them all out of his hovel, and Lord Mormont has a […]
