Tyrion and Jorah are hauled out of the fighting-pit-that-was-recycled-from-Doctor-Who's-"The Romans"-serial and brought into the throne room, apparently because the producers realized how stupidly cheap that first set looked. Tyrion and Dany snark at each other for a bit; "Oh, you want to execute me for being a Lannister? Give me one good reason why I should serve you." "Oh, you want to advise me? Give me one good reason not to execute you for being a Lannister." Tyrion has Dany exile Jorah again, and Jorah sells himself back into slavery to fight in the Great Pit. Le sigh.
See, Jorah was already on his way to the pit. Because he needs to be there when Dany does her Big Dumb Dragon Riding Stunt, apparently. But The Genius Writers decided that Tyrion needed to meet Dany beforehand, so they had to have Jorah escape from slavery and then sell himself back into it. That's stupid. Also, Tyrion had two entire scenes where he talked to Dany about how his family killed her family and then he killed his family, but not once did he ask to see where the dragons were. I mean I get that they needed to save the budget for the Big Dumb Action, but really?
Tyrion also at one point calls Daenerys the last best hope for peace. So I will be calling Daenerys the Babylon Project from now on.
In Braavos, Arya is selling oysters, run into a random cameo, and learns about an eeeeeeeeeeeeevil insurance broker. Now, I could be reading that scene wrong, but I thought the broker rejected the applicant because he knew that the applicant was deliberately going to wreck his ship to provide for his family. You know, that thing that's called insurance fraud and is illegal. But anyway she's tasked to kill this guy and given poison to do it. We already saw her pour some vinegar or something on the oysters, so we know how she's going to poison him. (Because having her cut his purse and poison his coin wasn't cool enough or something.) Also she suddenly knows how to lie. Okay, whatever. It's like that time when they compressed Sansa Learning How To Manipulate People into her coming down the stairs in a dark cleavage-y dress.
Speaking of Sansa, she lays into Theon here and gets him to tell her that her brothers Millstone and Baby are still alive. So now she'll trust him again I guess, because him killing two random children totally excuses betraying Robb, sacking Winterfell, and telling Villain Sue about the candle plot.
Meanwhile Villain Sue tells his father that he can take out Stannis's 6,000-man army with 20 good men. So the writers are basically Ramsay fanboys, in case you couldn't tell. This scene is actually a pretty good encapsulation of why I like Roose Bolton but not his bastard son. Roose is cold and calculating and at times comes off as Tywin 2.0 (and I'll remind you again that Tywin was my favorite show character). Ramsay, on the other hand, is an impetuous hothead who can't think more than 20 seconds ahead and isn't going to last long once his father's not around to cover for him anymore.
In King's Landing, Cersei's rotting in her cell while the psychotic nun who taught my Religion course in high school demands that she confess before she's given water. Qyburn shows up and tells her that Kevan is now Hand of the King. No mention is made of a trial by combat, because f*ck that plotline. See, in the books, the current Kingsguard composition is as follows:
- Meryn Trant - "won't be feeling well"
- Boros Blount - coward
- Jaime Lannister - crippled and in the Riverlands
- Osmund Kettleblack - Cersei's tool
- Loras Tyrell - badly injured
- Arys Oakheart - in Dorne (actually dead)
- Balon Swann - on his way to Dorne
In a trial by combat, the royal family must be championed by a Kingsguard knight. So Margaery's hosed, because the only one a) in King's Landing and b) capable of fighting is Cersei's tool and the brother of one of her accusers. This is completely dropped from the show... so is FrankenGregor going to be in the Kingsguard at all? Who knows.
Oop North we have Brutus Olly talking to Sam about stuff 'n' fings. Sam tells him that something that looks like the wrong thing (like allying with the wildlings) might actually be the right thing. Brutus Olly makes it clear that he's interpreting that as "it's okay to do something that looks like the wrong thing - like killing the Lord Commander - because it's actually the right thing."
And finally we have Hardhome, where Tormund beats the Lord of Bones into a bloody pulp. Then Jon parlays with Barbarian Bone-to-pick and Deadmeat Mom, offering them "a region south of the Wall" - better know to book readers as "the Gift," you know, the title of last week's episode? Anyway Ygritte 2.0 accepts while Bald Guy doesn't, and then we have the Big Dumb Action.
Hey, remember the "Blackwater" episode? There was a battle there under poor lighting and everyone was wearing dark armor, but you could still tell who was who? Yeah the show has basically forgotten how to do that. You know, as much as I mock the Red Wedding for being nothing more than 10 extras getting stabbed in a barn, at least you could tell what the f*ck was going on.
So anyway Deadmeat Mom puts her daughters in a boat, meaning she's very obviously going to be a corpse very soon. Bald Guy orders the gates shut and sacrifices a bunch of refugees, adding them to the Sinbad Skeleton army. Brilliant!
Anyway Deadmeat Mom is overwhelmed by child zombies she refuses to kill BECAUSE SHE'S A MOTHER Y'ALL. Bald Guy allies with Jon to try to get at the dragonglass daggers, but it doesn't work and he dies but that's okay because Jon's Valyrian Steel sword does the trick just as well.
Then the Night's King shows up and stands on the edge of the dock while Jon's boat drifts away. He raises his arms to perform some arcane magic spell... but it's not so that the anthropomorphic personification of winter can freeze the water and trap all the boats right there, no, it's so that he can raise his zombie army. Hooray.
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