This week’s episode of Game of Thrones is brought to you by serial murder by crossbow, avalanches, the fact that it’s hard out here for a Lannister (unless your name is Tywin) and EW JESUS FUCK OMFG THEY RIPPED THE SKIN OFF HIS FINGER.
(Spoiler Alert!)
Despite the intense, visceral nature of my reaction to that all-caps plot point, that’s not where we’ll start. Right at the beginning, we see Samwell Tarly being his hapless self and unsure of how to build a proper fire. This shot highlights the societal division between him and Gilly, the daughter-wife he rescued from the slaughter at Craster’s Keep in episode 4, “And Now His Watch is Ended.” In most ways they are quite similar – two (essentially) young people out of their comfort zones, who are far kinder than the ugly world they inhabit. Also, not bad singing for a dude who’s mostly trying not to freeze to death.
From there, we segue into what is currently the most oblique plot line: Bran Stark’s journey north to find his brother Jon Snow at the Wall. While that’s a perfectly straightforward destination, the angle of Bran’s “greensight” – kinda like uncontrollable soothsaying – seems unclear the way it’s presented in the show. In the book, it’s (somewhat) better explained, but the show simply doesn’t have the time to unpack that sort of exposition, at least not in a traditional TV fashion. Whether that matters is another issue entirely.
The most exciting bit from a filmmaking standpoint is Jon Snow’s journey up the wall with the wildlings. Clearly, the effects and production design crews got to go wild here. However, it takes up a decent portion of the episode and doesn’t really get us anywhere plot-wise. Granted, there is an amazing kiss moment with Jon Snow and Ygritte – no hot springs fucking, but it’ll do. And one very important reveal: Ygritte knows, or at least suspects, that Jon Snow is still allied with the Night’s Watch, but doesn’t much care as long as he is loyal to her at the end of the day.
From that point on, it’s largely shock/surprise and horror with a few well-placed moments of comic relief here and there – most of which involve the Tyrell family. I mean, the example of Ser Loras – unable to stop from fantasizing about fabric and brooches in front of the woman (Sansa) he’s supposed to marry – stands alone. You slay me, Game of Thrones. Also, there is the moment when Lady Olenna, the “Queen of Thorns,” basically accuses Tywin Lannister of homosexual childhood experimentation and calling his firstborn son and daughter out as the incestuous bastards they are. Priceless.
However, shock is our primary engine. Melisandre resurfaces for the first time since the season’s third episode – and somehow she’s shown up on the mainland of Westeros in the same woods as Arya Stark and the Brotherhood Without Banners. Her conversation with Thoros of Myr is the first time we get to see two full-fledged followers of the Lord of Light interact and it is fascinating, as she’s unfamiliar with his particular gift and has never been able to bring someone back the way he’s done for Beric Dondarrion.
This is hardly her primary purpose for being out here. Her purpose concerns Gendry, the last bastard son of Robert Baratheon. She said she needed king’s blood from someone other than Stannis, and we should’ve guessed who she meant. That said, her genuine fear upon being confronted by Arya, who grabs her and shouts, “You’re a witch,” is intriguing. Her response of, “I see a darkness in you, and eyes staring back at me…eyes you’ll shut forever,” is also quite intriguing. (Not to mention a nice bit of Chekhov’s-gun foreshadowing for those of us who’ve read the books. For those who haven’t, I will tease but not spoil.)
The continuing torture of Theon Greyjoy reached its apex so far, with FLAYING. SKIN AND FLESH TORN AWAY FROM FINGER BONE IN A CLOSE-UP SHOT. I HOPE YOU WEREN’T FUCKIN EATING WHILE YOU WATCHED. For some reviewers, this is becoming problematic, as its purpose and payoff are unclear if you haven’t read the books. While I have, I can sympathize with such complaints – the show hasn’t even yet clearly revealed who his torturer is (for edification’s sake, his name is Ramsay Snow, no relation to Jon). So, as for television, on an objective level, it’s not exactly easy to parse, but it’s also fascinating in a train-wreck sense.
The episode climaxes (not ends, the ending is the aforementioned Jon/Ygritte kiss) with a pointed dialogue scene between Littlefinger and Varys, in the room housing the Iron Throne of Westeros, echoing a scene from the first season finale. Not that we haven’t known Littlefinger was power-hungry from the beginning, but this scene brings it into horrific, stark realization, and also highlights his deep vein of cruelty. Joffrey’s evil is brought to light, too. I found the sight of Ros’s half-naked body riddled with crossbow bolts and strung up from the posts of this venomous king’s bed to be far uglier than the realistic-to-a-fault flaying scene from earlier in the episode. (This makes me want to point out the excellent performance by Esme Bianco as Ros, in a somewhat small and more-than-somewhat thankless role, as one of the only fully original characters in Game of Thrones.
However, the key to this scene is Littlefinger’s monologue. It’d be silly to quote it in full here – the gist of it is, “Chaos is a ladder…and the climb is all there is.” To Littlefinger’s spoken way of thinking, the chaos is a worthwhile creation if it gets him what he wants. He’s shown himself to be smart, so you’d think he’d be intelligent enough to know that true chaos bites not only the hands that feed it, but any and all surrounding hands. That’s just how it works. By that logic, he’s as likely to end up bitten as anybody else. Considering that he probably knows this and doesn’t seem to care, that possibility speaks to a far deeper, darker and more complex character than the power-hungry leech that he typically appears to be on the surface. It speaks to a self-destructive impulse that is terrible to behold.
These moments, these characters and these wonderful bits of lyrical dialogue are the foundation of what makes this show continually worth watching. It’s a show that examines the ways in which ordinary, small people deal with life’s greatest matters – family, politics, sociology, faith and more – through the prism of a fantastic allegory. And that is something worth celebrating.
Liam Green can be reached at lgreen@thoughtpollution.com.