The mountain and the viper

There are no words to describe the pain Game of thrones makes us suffer, it is like when you workout really hard and every muscle hurts, and you know its the good kind of pain, but despite it all, it’s still pain.

*spoilers ahead my friends*

The beginning of the episode was quite slow, whilst I ship Missandai and Grey Worm and I fully appreciate her naked body on screen, I did not care for whatever Degrassi junior high drama plot they were going for, I mean where in the seven hells does it say they can’t just go for it? I know it was all a filler of time to lead up to the big moments of the episode, but whatever happened to HBO giving us notorious sex scenes?

All rants aside, the episode does, as all episodes this season have done, get progressively better and pay off in a big way.

My biggest surprise, second to the trial by combat, was Sansa’s confession, of course that happens a little bit differently in the books, but either way there is definitely something about her that makes us think that maybe she likes Petyr?

Whatever comes next for those two is by far one of the most intriguing things to come. From a writers point of view, you have this absolutely juice drama induced scenario with an extensive history, power play, moral ambiguity, characters denying their feelings whilst simultaneously falling for it and as Sansa grows more knowledgeable and beautiful, Petyr becomes weaker by default. When she walked down those steps, in that moment where he looks up at her in her new feathery clothes and we just get the sense that Sansa is going to become a very dangerous woman.

Speaking of dangerous women, Daenarys learns the truth about Jorah and then exiles him. I understand why she is mad, but surely she cannot believe that he would actually betray her, I mean the man has saved her life countless times, loves her to the Dothraki sea and back and then now more than ever, when she needs his advice the most, because being a teenage queen is so ridiculously hard, she gets petty over some note from her enemies across the narrow seas? Is it that time or the month or what? I just personally feel like that was completely irrational, but then again teen girls are not known for their abilities to make logical decisions or let go of grudges. That was a sad moment for me because I find Jorah extremely loyal and somewhat attractive, in a grandfather sort of way.

They have changed the story so much that for one split second I thought there was some kind of hope for Oberyn Martell.

I have never laughed so hysterically in my whole life. I think due to so much heart ache from both reading then watching some of my absolute favourite characters die, out of complete hopelessness and disbelief, even though I knew it was going to happen, I laughed manically, similar to Arya’s laugh when she find’s out her aunt Lysa just passed, if you could translated it would be directly quoted as “Are you actually fucking kidding me?”

The scene itself was beautifully choreographed, I enjoyed it like a dance, because theoretically stage combat is basically just dancing with swords and spears. I love how reassuring he was saying things like “Today is not the day I die” making us fully believe that it was just not going to happen and the mountain was down, and I was yelling “in your face Cersei you evil hag” and Oberyn go too caught up in getting vengeance that in a split second, his teeth had flown to the feet of his paramour and a few seconds after there mountain had popped his head like a balloon.

Mockingbird

A very well suited title for this episode. Absolutely love the screenshot of the hound getting bitten. I think it is safe to assume we will be loosing another man to an infected boo boo.

Daenarys and Daario’s alleged night of lust was a total rip off. Considering we have seen her being mounted countless times, I personally felt cheated when I did not see his beautiful bearded face attached on to one of her nipples. On the other hand I think it was a good idea not to really show any affection between the two, because it establishes their relationship to the audience in a different way than that which was stablished with Khal Drogo, sex is not something she needs for empowering herself, it is now something she uses strictly for pleasure and she uses Daario to release the stresses of being a young queen who still has no idea what she is doing despite being, by far, the most perceivable super power of this imaginary world.

But let’s be honest, ultimately the whole thing was a set up so that we could hear Jorah’s heart drop as he sees Daario mid way out of her chambers, clothing himself probably smelling of Khaleesi, and if that wasn’t enough, he greets him by saying “She’s in a good mood”  which served no other purpose but to crush big bear.

Speaking of broken hearts, now lets talk about the scene that really did break my heart, when Oberyn tells Tyrion the story of when they first met. Not only does this story confirm that Cersei was born without empathy and Jaime has only ever been evil because of her, but this beautiful story takes us to the past, without cheap flashbacks, which a lot of shows rely on these days, we were painted a delicate picture with Oberyn’s words and I still imagine it in my head as though I had seen it myself. The moment he says “this is no monster, this is just a baby” is absolutely one of my most favourite moments in Game of thrones, and to top it off Oberyn tells Tyrion that he will be fighting for him when the time comes.

Everyone wants different people to sit in the iron throne at the end of the series, and quite honestly I hope Dorne invades them all. I can really relate to the Dornish culture in the sense that they don’t comply with rules that make no sense. I like that they don’t look down on bastards, I like that sexual pleasures are not limited by gender or marriage, I like that despite being a woman if you are next in line you are by law the next in line to rule (*cough* Myrcella *cough*) and most of all they are a compassionate culture….unless you have of course wronged them.

“What do we do to those who’ve hurt the ones we love the most?”~Petyr Baelish

Alas the biggest WTF moment of episode 7, although I am not sure which one was more disturbing, the kiss or Lysa falling out of the moon door?

There has been much debate as to what exactly in going on in Littlefinger’s scheming  master mind or what his endgame might be, and I don’t think we need to read into it very much, when you know what a man wants you know who he is and you know how to movement, and whilst he might believe he is fully under control in this situation, he is a man who loved and lost and has a second chance, more or less at the woman of his dreams. Disturbing or not, wether he will ever admitted or not, he wants her maiden head.

However, all characters on game of thrones have a core value that will ultimately be their downfall, for Oberyn Martell, it is vengeance, for Littlefinger, well it is a more complicated. Lust and love are not part of his plan, but his whole life, it has gotten in the way because at the core of it all his obsession with Catlyn have been the only disturbances in his plans, so when he ignores his infatuation, he thrives, yet when he gets wrapped up in it he has to take drastic measures to clean up his tracks, like throw Lysa out the hole.

Sansa will learn to play the game by his side, until his lust for her gets in the way, in which he will have to terminate her or she will have to terminate him.

The laws of gods and men

This week on HBO’s Game of Thrones they featured a brand new never before seen city, a young queen learning how to rule a city she knows nothing about and the trial of our favourite half man took an unexpected twist.

*Spoiler ahead*

Finally! We get to see Braavos! We discover a very important piece of information which is that the Iron bank has now decided to support team Stannis, although almost didn’t, but considering the status of the current ruler, or should I say rulers of Westeros, so it makes sense to offer monetary support the usurper?

I’m not too sure about that. But what I do know is that the Iron bank of Braavos is not that different from your average modern day bank, their value and priority is to make sure that you are forever in debt to them, they don’t care who you claim to be, or who your enemy is, or who sits on the iron throne, they want their monthly repayments at an impossibly high interest rate.

It was very brief, but they would not bother making such a grand entrance to Braavos if we were not going to spend more time in it in the not so distant future.

Daenerys is learning really quickly that being queen is not as glamorous as it seems from a distance, in fact I think she flourished better as a nomadic Dothraki Khaleesi than in the comfort of a throne room. She realises that maybe old guy number 2, Ser Barristan Selmy, was probably right about answering justice with mercy. Also sudden realisation that she knows nothing about ruling and she is just winging it. I think this is a huge foreshadowing to the fact that she is not made for the Throne life, she is as wild as her dragons and at a certain point she won’t be able to tame them and no one will be able to tame her.

All the dread fort scenes were a bit of a waste of time, we get it Ramsay is crazy, Theon has stockholm syndrome and Yara is all talk no game. You never know if the sounds coming out of that place are pleasure, pain or both.

We now know where Jaime stands, he would sacrifice his own happiness for his brother’s life, deep down we always knew he would. But if you think about it, Jaime gets the best deal out of this whole situation, he gets to be lord of Casterly rock, probably marry a very beautiful suitor from a powerful house, maybe another beauty from high garden, or a Dornish goddess with whom he could express his wildest sexual fantasies and breed beautiful interracial Lannister children away from the capital, away from his ageing wicked sister.

When you put it that way, its barely a sacrifice at all, he really could have arranged the whole situation previous to the trial. But as Tyrion reminded Jaime of our beloved fallen hero, Ned Stark was also to be sent to the wall, until things took an unexpected turn.

Surely enough, the ultimate betrayal entered the room, and as Shae’s bitter statement became further away from the truth, we lost all hope for happy ending.

You could hear the exact moment in which Tyrion’s heart breaks in two exact halves. What follows if what some would call a performance worthy of many nominations, our favourite half man does it again. I swear I had a small tear rolling down my cheek as I too could not bare the injustice.

Tyrion demands a trial by combat, no longer caring about anything, he might as well leave it up to the gods, I mean it work for him once before at the Eerie when he was also innocent, if the gods are indeed just, it will all work out in his favour, right?

The real question is, with Bronn gone, who will fight for him? Will Jaime fight for him, or will Cersei choose Jaime to fight against him?

First of his name

“First of his name” referring to the coronation of Tommen Baratheon begins with just that and the many blessing from and between his dear friends, family and his mum and future wife.

*Just a friendly reminder that there will be some spoilers if you have not seen this episode*

It was a tender moment for Cersei, one that she does not often share with many people. We got to see her like never before, with a soft care for her children that did not involve power or money, but their safety and purity was at her best interest. I see this, however, as the calm before the storm. GoT often makes us sympathise with characters in an attempt to remind us that no one side inherently evil. Her scenes with Margary Tyrell and Oberyn Martell are out of character, and for a second we really do feel sorry for her, as a mother. However, mixed emotions arise when we are reminded that she wants to kill one of our favorite,  and completely innocent characters.

(Note: Tommen is a total cutie. If young teenage girls are sneaking behind their parents to watch this show they are having crazy fantasies involving him and all members of One Direction)

We saw Daenerys, choosing not to take over Westeros just yet whilst she learns how to rule in this trial city and further push Jorah into the gaping hole of the friend zone, seriously I feel jibbed we did not get to see him kiss her, as he tries in the books. I actively root for Jorah, despite his tormented past, he is just such a good…..friend.

From one friend zone to another we find ourselves on the way to the Eerie, with little finger finding any excuse to touch Sansa in the midst of conversation. Until we of course see Robin and Lysa Aryn again, going crazy in their weird tower.

This is a huge deal, we get spoon fed some really important information about what started it all, and if we didn’t think Littlefinger was already the biggest player of this game, we find out that he came up with the fantastic idea of getting Lysa to poison her husband and send a letter to her sister, which begin the whole show. I mean someone needs to start writing a musical about this franchise.

For a man with a weak spot for the Tully flare he seems very uninterested in his wife to be, oh wait here comes the wedding, oh ok we are skipping to the “screaming so loud they will hear it across the narrow sea”, well I don’t know if they heard it, but Sansa surely did, it certainly seems like Littlefinger does not live up to his name, or he learned a thing or two from the same book Podrick was reading.

Alright enough cheeky business. Aunt Lysa is not as safe as she seems, she is loopy and unpredictable, she will offer you lemon cakes and next minute make you cry uncontrollably. Poor Sansa could she just have one break just one, where she is happy and out of harms way.  Littlefinger has a history of eliminating drunk fools, and unpredictable rulers, so Lysa fits somewhere in between those two and I highly doubt that she is the exception to the rule.

At this point in time, Podrick and Brienne, and, Arya and the hound, add some funny relief from the more serious plot points and long scenes with information overload. They helped to break up the episode and give us a moment to digest the immensity of it all. The facts are I am loving every minute of it.

Ending at Crasters keep was probably a good option, they added action and suspense to an otherwise minor event in the books, so for the most part we knew nothing serious would go down, but rather got some awesome kills, notably by Bran/Hodor and  Jon Snow. Even though we did not get a cuddly family reunion at least we got that massive burning down of Crasters keep after years of rape and incest, which should count as a small victory. We don’t get a lot of justice in Game of Thrones so we might as well savour this one for as long as we possibly can.

Oathkeeper

Another late one, I will not let it happen again, I swear it by the old gods and the new gods.

A serious deviation from the book, for better or for worse, Oathkeeper will have book readers equally as confused as regular viewers.

Good, it was getting too chummy around here.

Week after week Game of Thrones is becoming a more alternative universe to ASoIAF. The plot points are changing and we are surpassing the reading material slowly but surely. I don’t believe this is necessarily a bad thing.

I love that reading the books and watching the TV show provide two very different experiences. We should always, when watching or reading, always be critical and ask questions and have an educated discussion, but just getting pissed off over unexpected plot changes is really a bitter way to view this incredible franchise and it will not allow you to use critical thinking when analysing the story but rather you will be one of those people who have nothing to say but are really good at spotting bad grammar and punctuation.

Now let’s talk about the episode!

*spoiler alert*

Daenarys takes over Meereen effortlessly with her use of Greyworm, the power of positive motivation and blades. I am not going to make too many real life comparisons, but if I have learned anything from revolutionary leaders throughout history, specially when they favour one group of people and punish another group of people, based on their own judgement of “good vs evil”, we get a kind of great leader but one that despite all their efforts end up being the tragic heroes, hated by many and only remembered by their extremism and questionable morality.

Notable cute couple of 2014 however, Messandai and Greyworm. This ship has sailed. Bon voyage!

The Kingslayer brothers, has a nice ring to it I think, it would make a great heavy metal band. All joking and kidding aside Jaime loves Tyrion theres no doubt about that and Jaime also loves Brienne, he wants her to be safe and theres no way she can be safer than out of kings landing, away from his evil twin sister, with a Valerian steel sword and brand new armour. No one can keep her safer than a well equipped version of herself and a smiling squire who is amazing in bed. What more could a woman want?

Oathkeeper is about that sword, and the quest to get the stark girls back to safety, whatever safety even means for them.

At this point Brienne is more likely to meet up with Arya and the Hound than she is finding Sansa as she is sailing to what we believe to be the Eerie.

Notable cute couple number two, although less likely Brienne and Podrick. You saw the ship sail here first. Au revoir!

But thats not the only ship sailing away.

Sansa maybe a fragile bird, but she is wise not to trust Littlefinger and it is a good thing that she is asking so many questions and not giving into his charms and false sense of home. Out of everyone in the ASoIAF universe, Petyr seems to be the one person who knows that the only way to the iron throne is not by playing the hero, or the breaker of chains, or an army, but rather through manipulation, staying a low threat and removing unpredictable players from the game.

His allays are also people who are in a similar frame of mind. The Tyrells, or at least the Tyrell women understand that they can achieve anything by passing undetected under the radar and sneaking into pre-pubescent teen’s bedrooms at night to share secrets. Not to mention, Olenna’s unexpected confession to Margery, remind us that things are not always as they seem.

The transitions from the different scenes in this episode were well thought out and flawlessly connected.

The most memorable part of the episode is of course, the end. It left viewers all over the globe shocked and confused and theorising what is to come next. For the most part the really is no point cross referencing where we are up to in the books, because what a good TV series does to engage their audience is not same as the techniques that a book uses to engage a reader.

Game of thrones has a big task which is not only use those TV show tools, but also engage people who think they know what is going to happen, and they have succeeded at it. Because I was not for the life of me expecting to see the Night’s king. It is just so wonderful that they are using folk stories from this universe and bringing them to light, making the most out of the source material.

Breaker of Chains

A little late, but better late than never, Perhaps a bit of a slow continuation from a very exiting end to last week’s episode. Breaker of chains resumed the events of the purple wedding and remind us that things are not always as they seem.

*spoiler alert if you have not seen the episode, although not much to spoil*

The episode picked up exactly where we left off, with King Joffrey’s cold choked body laid in his mother’s arms as she yelled for arrest of her brother Tyrion, under the suspicion that he is the killer. Soon after he has been stopped she begins to yell for Sansa whom we see quickly escape the scene with Ser Dontos. Sansa’s great escape was a bit of a disappointment.

Perhaps they wanted it to be quick and to the point in consideration that the rest of the episode would move at a snail’s pace. But when I read this part, it was Sansa having a manic freak out moment in which she laughs in a brief happiness and simultaneously is overcome with fear, disgust and angst as she tries to put one step in front of the other making her way out.

She also is supposed to climb down a very steep ladder, where she is even more panicked and confused, where her fear of falling to her death is not comparable to her fear of staying at the capitol a second longer. All we got instead was a look back in her little cape, which for a second confused me as to wether she actually had something to do with it.

The sequence was saved by seeing her in the hands of Littlefinger. He is even creepier than first imagined, the way he holds her and looks at her, he handles her like his pawn. Which at this point, more than ever, she truly is a pawn. He does not reveal much of his master plan, but he lets us know he had something to do with it, and the necklace was his charm. He tells her they are heading home, but by this point we must wonder wether there is a home for Sansa, or even a safe place for her. Littlefinger might be a manipulative liar and a power hungry man, but she is arguably, safest with him.

Stannis Baratheon. All you need to know about that storyline, is that Grayscale princess and the Onion knight are adorable and should spinoff in an epic adventure and that ‘team Stannis’ has NO money so Davos is attempting to contact the Iron Bank of Bravvos, with whom the Throne is also heavily in dept to.

Tywin Lannister and Olenna Tyrell move on very quickly, as they both immediately asses the advantages of a new younger and king Tommen, and remind others of what a troublesome king Joffrey was. His monologue to Tommen in the sept right in front of Joffrey’s freshly dead corpse and Cersei’s mourning, was the highlight of the episode.

Ultimately telling him that in order to be a good ruler he must listen to him, making Tywin, the actual ruler. The scene that follows this monologue is a controversial one at best. People around the world were more or less disturbed by it, but I personally believe that it added to the story beautifully, and I would have been very disappoint it with the episode overall had it not been for the brilliant execution of that scene.​ ​The scene served the purpose to remind us that no one is fully good, or fully evil in this story. 

Jaime has always been a good example of that and is a man who acts on impulse and desire, not necessarily with honour. Let’s not forget that this is the same man, who threw a child out of a window episode one, and other than having a soft spot for Brienne, Jaime hasn’t done anything to prove himself the likeable hero, despite his story to redeem him of the kings layer name, he still is and has always been a man with no honour and this scene stayed true to his character and the reoccurring questioning of ethics and “good vs evil” in ASOIAF.

The hound also reminded us of this in the episode. Just when you start to think of him as the likeable hero, he reminds you he is not. The hound acts on primal instinct and survival, Jaime acts on impulse and desire. Their choices ultimately always come down to these wether it is, forcing himself on his lover, or jumping into a bear pit without a weapon.

Moreover, rape to us in this world, cannot be compared the same as what constitutes rape in the world of ASOIAF, because under our society’s standards, almost every woman in ASOIAF is being raped at some point or another in her lifetime. In their world women are forced onto everything in their life, marriage, children, sex, submission and subsequently in small cases power.

A great example of this is Daenarys. She did not consent to her marriage to Khal Drogo, or their various first sexual encounters, or to be the Kaleesi. She was forced to do all of this things, with full resistance at first, she only became great when she embraced her role in her environment. We cannot expect every episode of the series to be full of action and brutal deaths.

Daenarys or the “Breaker of Chains” was more or less an anticlimax, when you think she was going to totally use her power to take over the whole city, she kinda just threw barrels of broken chains in them, I thought it would be barrels of gasoline and then her dragons would come around and “dracarys” the shit out of everyone, but whatever its still cool.

 

We have to consider the season as whole, and I think this episode fit into the story they are telling gracefully and made choices for the characters that stick true to ASoIAF series.

The Lion and the Rose

We got to catch up with some of the other story lines from last season, which for the most part were uneventful fillers leading up to a very eventful royal wedding.

*Major spoilers ahead if you have not seen the episode*

“War is war, but killing a man at a wedding? Horrid. What sort of monster would do such a thing? As if men need more reasons to fear marriage.”~ Olenna Tyrell

I think it is important to address this first, because it was essentially the big ‘wow’ moment of the episode. The anticipated or for some not so anticipated death of King Joffrey Baratheon. He will always be remembered as the most hated character in television history, making us sit through some uncomfortable moments as he tortured, tormented, beheaded and mocked our favourite characters even until his last minutes of life. The midget jousting was just a step too far, I remember reading that in the books and putting the book down for a second and breath as I held all the power in me not to rip the pages apart and only hoping that Tyrion took out a knife and stabbed him repeatedly until justice was served. Instead we got what seems to be, him suffocating due to maybe poison?       I went through a moment of brief happiness, followed by some laughter at Cersei’s tears and then emptiness by the end of the credits. Because whilst it is fantastic to see him suffer in that moment as his face turned purple, there is no death gruesome enough that would do justice to the atrocities he has done. We will never get Ned back, or the Starks back together as a family, or Lady, or Tyrion’s dignity. I think George R R Martin makes a strong point of that throughout ASOIAF, revenge serves as motivation to so many characters but it is paralysing and the pain will always linger even after the depts are paid. Many interesting interactions took place inside and outside the wedding. Jaime and Bronn we had seen in trailers leading up to the season and assumed they were practicing but made for a very comic and entertaining segment of the episode. I can only hope that this served to establish a friendship in the upcoming episodes seeing as they are both devoted smart asses.       Jaime and Loras was an unexpected interaction for me as I was not expecting Jaime to still be that jealous, hate to say it, boyfriend type, specially knowing  Loras is all about the D. I found this to be a glimpse of the old Jaime, you know, one that would throw a child out of a window for the love of his sister, and I guess thats why I did not like it. I like the new Jaime and glimpses of the old Jaime, scare me, and when it comes to Cersei, make me barf in my mouth. Directly after was that conversation between Brienne and Cersei. I could just hear the outrage when Brienne did not reply to the love question, but I think people are not seeing the bigger picture. They have been through an incredible but tragic journey side by side. She has seen him at his absolute worst, lowest of lows, in tears, poop and horse piss. In amidst all that, he has saved her repeatedly, although he was her prisoner and even after losing his sword hand. She might be a human light post, but she is a woman nonetheless. Is it romantic and sexual kind of love? Probably not. Is it admiration, respect and a little bit fangirl? Absolutely. Everything away from king’s landing, came off as a bit of a filler for the episode so that they could push the wedding and Joffrey’s death to the very end. The whole situation with Ramsay Snow and the Boltons in general was kind of setting up the next characters we should hate. And now that the King is dead, there is a spot in our hearts for the next most hated characters, and the Boltons are definitely next up. Although, Stannis is a close second due to his lack of enthusiasm. He is about as exiting as steamed broccoli. Thus far his story is only carried out by his supporting cast led by the Red lady, the Onion Knight and Greyscale Princess. Overall the Lion and the Rose was not consistently, as strong as Two Swords, but saved itself with giving us the payoff that we desired, nay, NEEDED, even if accompanied by a side of Stannis Baratheon and Ramsay Snow.

Two Swords

After months of agonising anticipation, the HBO hit show Game of Thrones is back. Setting the pace for the season to come, Two Swords introduces us to many new characters, establishes the relationships dynamics between new and old characters and sets up a lot of important clues for the episodes to come.

 

 

*spoilers ahead if you have not seen the episode*

 

The rains of Castamere play in the background, as Ned Stark’s sword burns in the fire. Tywin Lannister watches in all his victory as the Valyrian steel is melted into two swords. What a start to the episode. Game of thrones, the TV show, does an incredible job at bringing, not only the world from the ASOIAF book series to life with all its historical details, but they also do a good job at creating scenes that will express the internal dialogue of the characters, which builds up so much of the narrative in the books. The scene where Jaime is with Joffrey looking at the book with all the good deeds of past Kingsguards and when him and Brienne are looking out at Sansa and she reminds him of his oath. Both of these scenes are mostly straight from his inner battle with himself but rather we get to see it externally with his interactions with other people. Personally, I don’t think they could have done this in any other way. The show does not have a voice over for the actors, and if it did it would be disturbing at best. So choosing to make this interaction be external is what makes the TV show such a different, yet equally enthralling experience to the books and a lot of people take that for granted. If we had just had Jaime in the room looking at the book, flicking the pages with his golden hand making strange faces, it would have made no sense at all. But rather what we got was a new interaction for the audience that brought across the same message in an interesting way. These new and fresh encounters are surprising for book readers as well because, whilst we think we know exactly what is going to happen next, we get to enjoy scenes with characters that may not have occurred in our memory of the story, yet we wished we would had seen them take place, causing this kind of fan fiction style Déjà vu. Where we know that a character has thought this, or dreamed it, or heard of it in some form or another and now we get to live this interaction or an alternative interaction in this same universe. Speaking of amazing character interactions, introducing: Oberyn Martell, Prince of Dorne, The Viper, apparent pansexual god and not very fond of the Lannisters. We knew he would be a badass, but he really blew me away, perhaps its the sexy spanish accent, or the fact that he wants revenge on the Lannisters about as bad as the audience wants it that we just yearn for more. He is definitely being made a much bigger character than he is in the books, understandably so, they should and I am sold. He introduces another culture of Westeros that we have only heard of in passing, furthermore he brings back into light the story of his sister and reminds us of the complex history between families but most importantly he reminds Tyrion that “the Lannisters are not the only ones who pay their depts.” Clever foreshadowing for what’s to come, but knowing Game of Thrones, things are never what they seem. We got to see some other clues for what is to come in game of thrones, the crumbling of Shae and Tyrion’s relationship caught first hand by one of Cersei’s spies, a once knight now drunken fool, Ser Dontos gives Sansa a very important piece of jewellery as a token of his gratitude, and Deanery’s getting a small glimpse of her rebelling teenagers AKA dragons and the difficulty that comes even when you are, or rather specially when you are a “Misa”. The episode ends as strong as it started with an equal parts, comical and gruesome with a pinch of payback. When Arya is reunited with Needle and steps up to the plate to take the life of an old enemy. He might not have remembered her at first but by the time she reminded him of his own words, a tiny but effective needle had been put through his throat. It was maybe a little creepy to watch Arya smiling as he choked on his own blood but definitely a defining moment for her character as it was juxtaposed with the way Sansa was dealing with the death of her mother and brother. “Everything is changed” according to Cersei Lannister, for some, the war may be over but the events that have occurred up to this point have defined and changed the characters once again. Two swords has set the tone for revenge, from the Ygritte and the wildings, Daenerys and her quest to free the slaves, from the Starks to the Martells. Only death can pay for life, and us, the audience, is equally thirsty for it. But we are going to learn very quickly that there is no satisfaction in playing the hero. Valar Morghulis.