Living In The Pre-History Of A Post ‘Game Of Thrones’ World (TV REVIEW)

[rating=9.00] “The Winds of Winter”

After airing a season finale that outdoes every season finale that had come before it, showrunners D.B. Weiss and David Benioff have been making the rounds in the press today, thanks to a telling interview published in Deadline. They not only reveal that the show was down to its last two seasons, it has somewhere between 13 to 15 hours left of actual programming content, meaning that the the remaining seasons will be shortened as well.

Though they’ve been showrunners since the first unaired pilot, the two have come a long way in the two seasons since George R.R. Martin, author of the A Song of Ice and Fire series on which the show is based, withdrew his involvement to finish the novels that the show was, at the time, fast eclipsing.

What resulted was an artless, uninspired mess known as season five.

The sixth season, however, now free from almost any of Martin’s source material, began to show their competence as a creative team. While it’s still very much Game of Thrones, the tonal changes brought about through score and cinematography have been significant. So much so that in hindsight, season five seems like an unfortunate byproduct of sorting out what was salvageable on screen from the least-inspired installments of the book series. Whereas season six was told with a swashbuckling confidence that, while faltering on occasion, seemed to thrive when bound only to a rough outline of what Martin had planned.

The show’s evolution aside, it’s stuck with the same basic formula. In the 10-episode season, major events tend to happen in the first and fourth episodes, while the ninth is chock full of epic set pieces and devastating heartache, which sets up for the finale, that has the task to weave the remaining narratives together with an underlying feeling of hope. This is a practical necessity for fans who spend an hour on Sunday nights sitting through things like Ned’s execution, the Battle of Blackwater, the Red Wedding, or the Battle at Castle Black. Again, this all went out the window with the fifth season, which was so barren and hopeless it felt like a blatant middle-finger to the audience.

Instead, this year’s finale was so enormously satisfying that it felt almost like fan-service. It didn’t so much tie up any loose ends as it simply cauterized all of them at the stump, pairing down characters and overlapping plotlines to put the show’s real end game into place.

“May I be a living example of their grace.”

The entire King’s Landing portion of the story focused on Cersei’s revenge, which was so monumental in scope that it was almost universally satisfying, whether they were on the character’s side or not. With Qyburn as her new Varys, he’d employed scores of children to scout out all the places where The Mad King Aerys Targaryen had stashed wildfire more than two decades ago. Upon finding some, she puts a relatively simple plan in place, staying home from her trial at The Sept, before blowing it, and everyone in it, around it, or anywhere near it.

Letting the trial play out for a bit prior to the fireworks (wildfireworks?), where Loras confesses his sins and has the symbol of The Seven carved into his forehead, felt like an unintended metaphor for the show on a whole. There’s an intricate plotline, scheming that goes back seasons, multitudes of characters involved, but it proved be a distraction for one massive, catastrophic payoff.

Pictured: Catastrophic Payoff
Pictured: Massive, catastrophic payoff

With the explosion went almost all of House Tyrell, including Queen Margaery, Lord Mace, and Loras, along with The High Sparrow (FINALLY!), The Faith Militant, and thousands of unfortunate onlookers. Cersei even has Maester Pycelle gutted in Qyburn’s workshop, though I could’ve done without her repeating the “Shame” chant to Septa Unella. Regardless, the entire sequence was edited together with stunning precision, creating a tense and deeply unsettling feeling throughout.

Not everyone’s pleased with the smiting of her enemies, however, and Tommen, who’d been a victim of his mother’s manipulative schemes since Margaery was imprisoned, leaps from his window, taking his own life. While it may not have been entirely intentional — though it would fulfill the prophecy of Maggy The Frog — it opens up the Iron Throne for her big power move, as well as giving Tommen a real King’s Landing.

Get it?
Get it?

Side note: when the scene started, with several faceless shots of characters getting ready, I immediately thought of The Big Chill. This stray observation holds up after the fact, too.

“For House Lannister! For House Frey!”

While Game of Thrones might evolve into more sophisticated sequences, it still harkens back to what it does best: two people in positions of power talking shit to one-another. In his great hall, Walder Frey cheers at the reclaiming of Riverrun, and the off-screen death of The Blackfish (a decision I still applaud, stylistically speaking).

Walder wants to bask in the glory of his unearned victory, Jaime simply scoffs at him, degrading both his character and his House for being in perpetual need of help from the Lannisters. Before long the two are outwardly mocking one another with vile contempt, while Jaime goes on making eyes at a Frey servant.

Turns out, that servant is none other than the girl that has a name, Arya Stark, who wasted no time getting out of Braavos to start scratching off some of the names that remain on her list. This time, it’s Walder himself, killed in a way purposefully similar to how Arya’s mother was killed just a few feet away in that very same room. But only after he’d been Scott Tenorman’d and had his two sons fed to him.

You know, if she survives, Arya’s bell curve of revenge will eclipse Cersei’s in no time.

“Father always promised, didn’t he?”

Okay, so even if Jon Snow wasn’t technically the lord of Winterfell (or the North) when this scene began, we all saw it ending up that way, and his first act as a ruler was profoundly misguided. Prior to the Battle of the Bastards, Davos had found the tiny stag he’d carved for Shireen, who’d been burned at the stake in his absence — something Stannis had done specifically to keep him unaware of what was happening. He puts two-and-two together, and Melisandre explains to Jon that her sacrifice was necessary because the Lord of Light, Jon’s resurrection, destiny, and so on.

So, she didn’t exactly have the best argument, but she did bring Jon Snow back to life, which turned out to be pretty important. Rather than deal with it in any rational way, Jon simply banished her from the North, which at this point in the show is basically banishing her to another character’s plotline only to have it come back and bite him in the ass.

He tries to make a pact to trust Sansa, lamenting their many enemies, despite having taken back The North. She apologizes for not revealing that she had Littlefinger and the Knights of the Vale up her sleeve (though she doesn’t explain why), and later rejects Littlefinger himself by the wierwood tree. He tries to explain her importance to the Seven Kingdoms, that as a true-born son of Ned Stark, and the last living child (they presume), it’s rightfully hers. He praises her birthright, comparing to the loyalty she’d command in the North instead of “some bastard born in the south,” which likely meant Jon Snow, but would be a fitting description for himself, as well.

Also, Jon Snow becomes King in the North, thanks again to Lyanna Mormont. Give her a spinoff now, please.

“Fire and blood.”

You know what they say about the best visits to Dorne are the short ones? Here we have the biggest example of plotline consolidation: Lady Olenna obviously wants revenge on Cersei for killing the rest of House Tyrell, “my future,” she called them, lamentably. So, she confers with Elia Sand, who’d just stabbed her prince to death, which made Olenna skeptical. But she also hated Cersei, which made Olenna consider an alliance, once she shut down the Sand Snakes, who, by now, rank highest on the ‘characters that don’t live up to the hype’ scale.

Varys that seals the deal, strolling out from around the corner and stealing Fury Road‘s catchphrase while offering both of them a chance to piggyback on Daenerys’ coming invasion of King’s Landing.

“I’ll do what I can, as long as I can.” 

When Benjen drops Bran and Meera off at the enclave of a place so guarded with magic he cannot enter (considering the fact he’s dead), Meera knowingly gives Bran a very deserved “are you sure” before Bran returns once again to the past. Specifically, the Tower of Joy, a scene that blue-balled viewers weeks earlier.

Climbing the tower after his father, at long last, we get iron-clad confirmation of R+L=J, with Lyanna begging Ned to take care of her and Rhaegar Targaryen’s baby, and to hide his identity from Robert Baratheon, who was fast on his way to becoming king. While it gives every obsessive fan a big, fat, resounding “finally,” revealing Jon Snow’s true identity to Bran seems like it’ll come in incredibly handy when that pesky Night’s King finally shows up.

“How about the fact that this is actually happening?”

Other than a quick note that Daenerys breaking up with Daario for practical reasons was a lot like John Lennon having to hide his marriage during the Beatles’ first U.S. tour, the only thing worth pointing out here is that Tyrion’s quote spoke for pretty much every Game of Thrones fan out there right now.

At long, long last
At long, long last

Bring on the invasion of King’s Landing in 2017.

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