Beyond The Wall (RECAP) Well Damn.
Another week, another fire Game of Thrones episode. I actually watched this episode at a bar with a bunch of other drunk Thrones fans and I definitely recommend the experience if you can find a cool place near you that shows the episodes on Sundays. It was like watching the Super Bowl, no joke. That being said, I really enjoyed this episode and I think it took some steps to kind of clear up some of the confusion about what certain characters are thinking and why some of them haven’t asked certain questions. There were still a few things that the Reddit crowd will be annoyed with, but it’s whatever. All in all it was a beautifully shot episode with awesome action and dialogue between characters who hadn’t spoken to each other before. There’s a lot of good stuff to talk about, so let’s get started
“Smart people don’t come up here looking for the dead.”
In the first scene showing the execution of the dumbest plan in GoT history, Tormund said what we were all thinking. I loved these walking scenes because we get to see characters who haven’t really interacted much over the course of the series have some pretty good dialogue. After lots of complaints from fans, Jon finally talks to Jorah about Longclaw. This was a touching moment and you can’t overstate how important that sword would be to Jorah, but Jorah being the guy he is can’t accept Jon’s offering. Thank God. There’s some funny banter here regarding the “real” North and how to avoid sexual frustration when there’s no women around. Tormund has really been coming through with the jokes lately. He also makes a really good point that foreshadows a future happening. When he and Jon are talking about Mance Rayer, he says, "How many of his people died because of his pride?" Coming from one of Mance's biggest supporters, this has to carry a lot of weight to Jon.
But Her Emails!
As Arya and Sansa go on an afternoon stroll through Winterfell, Arya takes a trip down memory lane, reminiscing on a time where her father caught her practicing archery without any supervision. She laments on her death and blames Sansa for it right to her face. She pulls out the note she “found” in the last episode and reads it aloud to Sansa. They get into a bit of an argument that ends with Arya once again accusing Sansa of having bigger ambitions than just being the interim Lady of Winterfell. I like how Sansa stood up for herself here, but Arya can do no wrong in my eyes so if she says you’re a snake, you’re a snake. Sorry Sansa.
A Walk To Remember
More great conversations here. The Hound teaches Tormund a new word and hits him with a “Ha! GAYYYY!” joke while Tormund admits his desire to make giant, ferocious babies with Brienne. Beric gives Jon a great pep talk that almost had me ready to light a sword on fire and convert to Lord of Lightism. The Hound spots the arrowhead-shaped mountain that he saw in the fire in episode 1 and we know we’re getting close to some shit going down.
Girl Talk
Dany and Tyrion are chatting it up by the fire about how she only attracts bad boys and what not. She’s listing the names of heroes who have come and gone from her life and tries to pull the old “I don’t remember his name off the top of my head” trick with Jon Snow even though it’s a flash flood every time she sees him. If that wasn’t disrespectful enough, Tyrion tells her that he thinks Jon is in love with her, to which she replies, “He’s too little for me.” Now Dany… The amount of cap and flex in this scene is just unreal. She drinks a little bit of wine and she just wants to act like she hasn’t been lusting over this man for three episodes. This scene just goes to show that women have been shallow since the beginning of time and even in different universes. Yeah, Jon Snow is like 5’6” but dammit he’s the King in the North. Have some damn respect. Anyway, Tyrion tells Dany that she tends to be impulsive in her decision making and she doesn’t like that. Tyrion starts to hint at coming up with a plan of succession, which Dany doesn’t take too kindly too. It’s important to note here that Dany believes she is barren, however in the books it’s noted as an aside that her womb is “quickening”. Will we see Dany become pregnant before the show is over? Also kinda cool, Tyrion hints at possibly setting up some sort of democracy in Westeros when he mentions the methods of the Night’s Watch and the Ironborn.
The Worst Coke Commercial Ever.
Snow Team 6 is walking through a pretty gnarly snowstorm when they get attacked by a huge, wight polar bear. He takes out a few of the redshirts before sinking his teeth into Thoros, Revenant style. Jorah eventually kills the beast with a dragonglass dagger, but Thoros is critically wounded. Beric cauterizes the wound with his flaming sword though and the gang keeps pushing. Back on his feet, Thoros admits to being blackout drunk during the Seige of Pyke, one of the last battles of Greyjoy’s Rebellion. What a legend. The gang comes up on a group of wights led by the white walker who looks like a kung-fu master and ambushes them. They make pretty quick work of them here, but we find out some information that could be pretty crucial going forward. When Jon kills the white walker, most of the wights fall with him. Later on in the episode, Jon and Jorah deduce that when you kill a white walker, all the wights that it raised up die with it. Seems important. They capture a wight and bind him up, but not before he let’s out a piercing death scream to alert the rest of his dead buddies. Jon sends Gendry, who apparently has shown himself to be the fastest one of the bunch, back to Eastwatch to send word to Danaerys for reinforcements. The rest of the gang makes a run for it and ends up on a big ass rock in the middle of a half-frozen lake. According to some guy on Reddit, they’re out on that rock for about 4 days, but I don’t buy it. I don’t think it makes much of a difference. Oh yeah, and Thoros freezes to death :/
Sansa gon' Sans
Sansa always has a damn attitude man. She receives a raven from Cersei summoning her to King’s Landing and she decides to send Brienne in her stead. A mistake considering that she’s the only one who could stop Arya should she decided to kill her. But what do I know? Brienne tries to talk some sense into her but Sansa snaps at her in her own Sansa way and tells her to hit the road.
All White, No Socks
NEW FIT ALERT! Dany’s got her away whites on as she gets ready to take her dragons up north to save the Magnificent.. 6 (RIP Thoros). It’s a really great look for her and really makes her eyes pop. It’s that classic Targaryen look. Tyrion advises her against going to save her friends, but Dany says she’s sick of doing nothing, and rightfully so. She flies away with all three of her dragons ready to do her stuff.
Dickhead of the Day goes to…
The Hound’s ol’ dumbass for being childish and throwing rocks across the lake. Like damn bruh, can you chill? Rule #1 of throwing rocks at zombies is DO NOT underthrow, and he decides to hit us with his best Chad Pennington impersonation and leaves the rock about 10 feet short. This serves as enough proof that the lake has frozen back over and the wights begin their assault. Cool note: If you look closely you can see that Tormund, Jorah and the Hound are using weapons made from dragonglass. Jon gives the order to fall back and we almost lose Tormund until The Hound saves the day. Also noteworthy, Jon is really doing his thing with the sword play. He had some really nice kills off some moves we haven’t seen before. He’s probably the best in the land at this point. Anyway, the guys are backed into a corner and all hope seems to be lost when…
IS THAT DANAERYS TARGARYEN’S MUSIC I HEAR?????
Why yes.. Yes it is. Dany comes in hot ready to do her stuff like DOOT DOOT DOOT DOOT! Her three dragons show great teamwork in obliterating the army of the dead and our heroes find new life as they look to the heavens and gaze upon the Dragon Queen. She lands Drogon right by where the gang is standing and urges them to hop aboard. Jon, being the heroic idiot he is, decides to fight off the last of the wights trying to attack the crew. Meanwhile, the Night King is fed up and his other bald, bearded white walker friend passes him his trusty ice javelin. As our heroes hop aboard Drogon, the Night King calmly walks forward into Steph Curry range, pulls up with a stick and lets it hit. He launches the ice javelin at Viserion and scores a critical hit. Viserion crashes into the frozen lake as our heroes watch in despair and disbelief. Dany is visibly shaken and it’s just a jarring scene altogether, though it was executed perfectly. I knew it had to happen eventually but damn it hurt to see Viserion go out like that. At this point, Jon is the only person not on Drogon’s back for unknown reasons, but he turns around and sees the the Night King getting ready to toss another ice javelin. Drogon, learning from his past mistakes, dodges this one and the gang minus Jon fly off to safety. Jon is swamped by wights and dragged into a hole in the ice in what’s a pretty scary moment. I was pretty concerned for a while and I was thinking we were gonna see wight Jon, but alas, plot armor prevails. Jon surfaces, grabs Longclaw and starts limping away when one of the wights notices he’s still alive. They head toward him and surely this must be curtains for our hero when…
IS THAT BENJEN STARK’S MUSIC I HEAR??????
Oh yes. Coldhands rides in to save the day once again with his swingy fireball. I saw a lot of people asking why Benjen just didn’t get on the horse and ride with Jon to safety, so I’ll tell you why he didn’t. Benjen is technically a wight, but he’s a good one. White Walkers found him while he was out ranging and attempted to turn him, but the Children of the Forest found him and saved him before their magic could fully take hold. That being said, The Wall has ancient spells and wards carved into its foundation that prevent the dead from passing through. Even if Benjen were to hop on the horse with Jon, he could never reach true safety because he’s actually dead. I’m sure he’s tired of being a zombie at this point, so he figured he’d go out like a hero while saving his favorite nephew. Can’t be mad at that. Jon rides for The Wall where Dany and the gang are waiting on him. Just when Dany is about to give up hope, the horn blows one time for a ranger returning and she sees a horse approaching the gate. Davos and Tormund pry his frozen clothes off his body as Dany watches and sees the knife wounds Jon took when he died. She’s got this great look of, “this man really died and now I feel warm inside,” which leads me to say, Emilia Clark was outstanding in this episode and has been all season.
The Game of Faces
Back at Winterfell, Sansa is snooping around Arya’s chambers when she comes across her bag of severed faces. Arya comes in behind her undetected and confronts her. They play a version of the Game of Faces that Arya and the Waif played in the House of Black and White. This scene was pretty open-ended, but I took it as Arya didn’t see any fear or deceit in Sansa’s face so she spared her. Maybe we’ll get some more clarity next week, but it was kinda scary to see my girl like that, I’m not gonna lie. As much as I disapprove of Sansa’s decision-making and attitude sometimes, I’d hate to see Arya kill her.
The Love Boat
Jon wakes up to Dany watching him ever so closely. Jon shows his sensitive side and apologizes for Dany’s loss. Dany, taking the loss better than expected, vows to fight the Night King and the Army of the Dead with Jon Snow. Jon thanks her and calls her “Dany”, which she laughs at because the last person who called her that was her brother, Viserys. Then Jon, being the smooth lover he is, corrects himself with the line of the century.
“All right. Not Dany. How about, ‘my queen’”
He drops that heater, and offers to bend the knee and at this point he’s 100% positive he’s gonna make sweet love to the Mother of Dragons. She grabs his hand ever so tightly and they stare into each other’s eyes for a moment that felt like an eternity until Dany pulls her hand away and hits him with the, “You should get some rest.”
Bruh…
I know Jon was sick because he immediately closes his eyes and goes straight to sleep. I would too. Smh. It’s gotta happen next episode right?
Blue Eyes Wight Dragon
We cut straight back to north of The Wall where the remaining wights are using heavy duty industrial chains to drag Viserion out of the frozen lake. They get him out and the Night King turns him into a wight ice dragon that will probably be able to freeze people into nothingness. Shit…
Power Rankings
The Night King – Break a dragon, take a dragon.
Jon – Still alive. Chicks dig scars.
Jorah – We all thought you’d die buddy. Congrats.
Arya – Scariest woman in the Seven Kingdoms not named Lannister or Targaryen.
Gendry – Fastest man in Westeros by default.
Tormund – Thought you were a goner. Wait until Brienne hears about this.
The Hound – Headed to King’s Landing with Jon and Dany. Clegane Bowl???? Get hype.
Littlefinger – What’s he up to?
Beric – Why not?
Dany – Lost a son. Didn’t make love to Jon.
Sansa – Passed the Game of Faces but also confided in Littlefinger.
Tyrion – Got dunked by Dany, twice.
The season finale should be incredible. We’ve been surprisingly low on important deaths this season, so brace yourself for some shit come Sunday. I’m thinking Littlefinger has to be outta here, but who else? I feel like something crazy might go down and I don’t think I’m ready, but until then remember that death is the enemy, and the enemy always wins, but we’ve got to fight him anyway.