Game of Thrones: Oathbreaker

Game of Thrones is a television show. This may come as a surprise to some of you who thought it was a series of books. I'd call it an American television show, but its scope is global. Anyhow, the thing about television that's different than a book is that it relies on visuals to move the plot along. Books use words. Stick with me here just like Bran is sticking with that guy who grew into a tree. A subtle pun rests in the prior sentence because trees have sticks. Anyhow, there was a great deal of exposition this episode, a few false starts, and then the end of a watch. With GOT, I often expect a great deal to happen. Though I sometimes then criticize the show for rushing through scenes and making a mess of it. Hello Dorne plot line. This episode was satisfying, in part because it was content with things not happening. The most exciting scene, a legendary sword battle, took place twenty to thirty years prior. 

We grant books their expositional scenes, though apparently Martin's are notorious for describing the exact flavor of the mead and pig's snout. In television, we often expect more. Mad Men, televisions best show for many years, was allowed to rise slowly towards a climax like an expert lover. Because GOT is so grand, it's hard not to want everything to happen all at once, and it's a relief when it doesn't. In part because the slow build of scenes and rivalries is what made the plot leading up to the Red Wedding just so good. What's Tywin up to with all those birds. Oh, I see, plotting an awful murder. Except I didn't see, which is why it's fun to occasionally linger, watching Tyrion try and coax something interesting out of Missandei and Grey Worm was delightful. My only real doubt in this regard is wondering if time lost in those lingering scenes. It wouldn’t be a problem in season one, but the viewer can start to feel the clock ticking on these final 19 episodes that need to bring us from fifty different narrative threads into one giant war with ice zombies who look like someone’s long haired grandpa. If that long haired grandpa was also a zombie who stole babies. I only had one grandpa like that. The other one was pretty normal. 

The show is bookended by scenes at the wall. The rearrival of the show’s hero, Jon Snow, is spiked with some nice dialogic turns. Rather than throwing Jon back into the world raging at Sir Alliser the bastard, we get a rather nice scene of Jon, genuinely perplexed at his plight. “I shouldn’t  be here,” he says, but even better, “I did what I thought was the right thing, and I got killed for it.” The Stark children have been learning that lesson for quite some time, and it’s nice that this time they could just bring the murdered child back to life. Even if he isn’t a full Stark, but part Targaryan as well. I found the scenes of him hugging the red-haired Wildling and his friend very touching, just as I found the scene at the end where he parted ways with Olly and Sir Alliser, touching. He seems genuinely troubled with what has transpired, and it’s believable that he leaves the wall, his watch, by virtue of his death, ended. However, I’m not entirely sure what  Jon Snow who isn’t only doing the right thing will look like. It’s not like he doesn’t know that the ice zombies are out there taunting him, so he better walk quickly, and in a southern direction if he wants to get anywhere worth being.

Remember Sam and Gilly? What about Gilly’s baby? Bran Stark has grown three feet in the same amount of time that child has gone from being 8 months old to nine months old. That said, their relationship is a sweet counterpoint to the usual muck and mayhem of a thrones episode, though I can’t even remember the last time we had a good scene of sexposition. However, like Jon, Sam needs to get off that boat, wipe the vomit from his hair and get to reading books because the white walkers aren’t moving as slowly as that baby’s journey through life.

Since Lost ended, television has always had one rule, flashbacks are great. The second is like unto it: having a sword fight with a dude spinning two swords at once makes it way cooler. Young Ned proves to be a bit light in the swordsmanship and benefits from a stab in the back to best the best sword in the land, which leads him, though he looks about 17, up into the tower to rescue Jon before his sister dies. Or whatever you think is up there…but it’s that.

Back in the weirdwood tree, Bran carps about being a cripple, while Hodor gently rubs his lower back and asks if they can slow Bran’s growth spurt down like Craster’s baby. Alas, says the man who lives in the tree, we’re just going to hang out and look at the past. Now roll me another one Bran and let me tell you about the time I rode a dragon.

Unsatisfied, with the incredibly fast pace of the Daenyrs plot line in Mereen, (the queen raises taxes by one denari, the populous is restless…is roughly what a video game version would like. Her plot is basically leveling to the nth degree), they move her back into the Doth Rahki home..or do they? If she gets condemned to death it’s clear that Drogon is going to come down and eat the Doth Rahki like goats.

Back in Mereen, Varus finally makes some headway into solving the man in the golden masks. Those masks look heavy and make them rather easy to identify. I think they should have gone with arm bands or something. Varus, ever the kind heart, manages to buy off the prostitute and put her on a ship, though the news he delivers is virtually useless—all the other rich people are working against us. This is peppered between Tyrion trying to get Grey Worm or Missendei to say anything interesting, but I feel like that particular show could go on for 8 more seasons without ever having that happen. Theirs is a love story that can never be told, and so I hope it isn’t.

Qyburn arrives back on the scene, creepy as ever, handing out odd plum candy to children. Qyburn, everyone thinks you’re creepy. Can’t you give them some chocolate or something. Does it have to be candied plums? Nevertheless, his spy network is now out and about seeking to find anyone who doesn’t like Cersei so the purple mountain can bash their head into a wall.

As I noted at the start, some things don’t happen. Cersei and Jaime march into the small council to declare war on Dorne and the council promptly walks out. Though it was a delight to see the lady Olenna, a real treasure of the show back to throw barbs at everyone in sight.

Tommen, full of as much rage as his kitten from the books, marches into the High Sparrow’s presence and appears to have a sermon delivered to him. It was your standard three point sermon, probably learned in seminary, but Tommen seems convinced and promptly forgets why he was there and starts batting at a yarn ball.

Arya continues her “training.” And by training I mean beatings and torture. As I noted before, I’m not quite certain what she’s gaining by eliminating her identity, since it’s her identity that lead her to become an assassin in the first place. Can she not just call it quits now, like when someone is ABD and decides to become a surf instructor instead of a history professor? Can she walk now? I think she should. I think she won’t.

And finally, we get Ramsay another pair of people to torture. Like most viewers, I’m confused by the nuanced presentation of Ramsay that the show has engaged in so far. Is he horrible? The worst? Or the horrible worst? I can’t wait to see what sort of unholy things he has to unleash on Rikkon and Osha to show the viewer that he’s quite evil, a fact which escapes us otherwise. I can only hope that he’ll be eating a sausage in a few episodes while Rikkon looks on in horror. Okay. I just hope Osha stabs him in the scrotum for five minutes straight. I guess we'll see.