Game of Thrones: The House of Black and White

Game of Thrones: The House of Black and White

At its best, GOT seasons begin like a pile of Legos. The first few episodes are spent putting small pieces together in a way that can occasionally be frustrating, but, in general, Theon torture porn aside, the final product tends to feel as if it has been constructed with a user’s manual that you just didn’t have access to. Of course, readers of the books will point out that that’s exactly the way the show has been constructed because it had such strong source material. And now that we’re starting to venture North of the Wall, contracting or getting rid of whole bits of Martin’s narrative, I wonder what the final structure of Season 5 will look like.

One of the chief elements that’s missing from this season of GOT is villainy. We’re down Joffrey, one of the all-time greats, and Tywin, the master of all, and the Bolton’s are presumably on a family vacation on the Iron Islands posting Instagrams of one another, so it’s hard to find someone to really hate. Cersei seems to be a lynch pin for this season, but she’s so careless and rude that she’s already lost her chief ally in the new head of the Lannister household, Kevan. Really, Kevin? After all the names of Tyrion and Tywin etc. someone is named Kevan? Anyhow, I’m wondering when we’ll get another scene of the White Walkers, who are the ur villain hanging like the Sword of Damocles over the petty fights of the people in King’s Landing.

Or maybe this season will be about the continuing evolution of characters like Arya and Sansa, or Jaime. Perhaps the season will be a bit more about the thin line that lies between an evil and a good character. It’s worth taking an  aside here to honor the show for having no nudity for one whole episode, thank goodness an ample number of nights had their heads split open or I don’t know how I’d be feeling. This show might as well be on CBS.

The episode begins in a natural place, with the other Stark sister gone bad, Arya, sailing across the sea on her way to find Jaqan H’gar. When last we left Arya she was sitting in the dark reciting the names of people she’d like to kill and sneaking away from the kind Hound and extremely tall Brienne in search of assassins. I think we all wish she’d spent most of her life fighting with the dancing master from Braavos reciting lines like, what do we say to death? Not today. Sadly, it wasn’t meant to be. The ship’s captain tells the story of how a Titan, the giant statue guarding the city, roars to life when the city is threatened. And, after dragons and children throwing fire and men who are seated in trees. In short, is this going to end with dragons fighting titans fighting ice zombies? If so, can we get Peter Jackson vs. Guillermo Del Toro vs. Quentin Tarantino to direct it and dispense with all those crummy characters and just get to giant swordsman swatting at dragons while ice zombies swarm around? No. Okay. Fine.

Arya sails through Braavos only to discover that she’s accidentally in Venice. Awkwardly, the captain takes her to Saint Mark’s Cathedral. At the house of Black and White a strange man opens the door and shoos Arya away. Except, hey Arya, we all remember that Jaquan can change faces. Well, maybe not all. She spends the night outside chanting the names of people she’d like to kill. At some point this habit is going to cost her some invites to birthdays, before making her way through the city to kill pigeons. Only now she’s great at it. See. Things are looking up! Eventually Jaquan arrives to protect her from a gang of thugs who looked like they might break into song, and she ends up back at the house of Black and White, preparing to become nothing. Forgive me if I’m not excited about the prospects of that sweet child turning into a nameless and faceless assassin. I think I might be the only one.

The world’s most meh journey continued with Brienne self-loathing and Podrick romancing his way through the forest. Of course, this time Brienne, (Yay, take that book readers. She actually sees the girls in the show….even if it doesn’t amount to anything) finds Sansa and is able to convince her of…well, nothing. She does cleave some heads from bodies first though, which is always a relief.

From there we go to King’s Landing where Cersei is out and about charming every one in sight. And by charming everyone I mean ordering everyone around. Jaime heads off to retrieve their daughter, and I can only hope that he grows out his hair. However, most importantly, he snags Bronn, who we all miss like our first loves, to accompany him along the way. This duo could rival The Hound and Arya for sheer fun.

We drop off in Dorne to briefly remind everyone that Dorne is a place where sunshine and happiness reign supreme. Well, except that one lady who wants to bring rack and ruin on everyone in the 7 kingdoms. She seems less peacable. In general though, things seem fine. Although the king is staring off into the distance thinking of peace, which in the GOT verse tends to mean that he’s about to be killed, probably by braining with a stone by his nephew or something.

In Mereen, things are kind of happening? Okay. I get that nothing is happening, and I kind of wish Dany could have had a more gradual path to this standstill. However, Martin has done a rather nice job of reimagining the American standstill in Iraq. How do you govern a people in a new way when they are used to something entirely different? Things don’t change overnight now do they? It doesn’t help when you lop off people’s heads, but I guess you have to try something. On the bright side her episode ends as it must, with dragons. Speaking of names, the dragon who came back is actually named Dragon. Maybe there is an extra o. Point is, she could have tried harder, I guess she was naked and not on fire, so she wasn’t thinking. Anyhow, these dragons aren’t quite Sleeth, but they are more than we could expect from a cable drama. Now how long until they set fire to everything?

Cersei continues to set up her small council. Bringing on the rain doctor who is planning to put a dwarf’s head on Gregor Klegane? Am I the only one who’s excited for Gregor 2.0? I bet he turns out to be really sweet. I’d say this is a joke…except we’re actually trying a head transplant in the real world.

Up North Jon Snow is busy getting elected Lord Commander. Wait, what? How is he going to get to Dany and marry her to unite the two hero’s journeys? Sigh. I guess he’ll fly Dragon the dragon. Honestly, I didn’t expect this move, and though it sets him up as the lead defender against the inevitable ice zombie attack. It also potentially waylays him with politics and machinations at the wall. I don’t want to watch two seasons of Sir Allisair trying to undermine him while shoveling pig dung. We’ll see.

All in all, Black and White house was a solid hour of television. The scene in King’s Landing and on the road with Sir Jaime are coming into view and Jon Snow’s legend continues to grow at the wall. What it’s all leading to this season is unclear to me. But I have faith. The show hasn’t steered me wrong yet.