Hello again, “Throning It In” readers. Come, let us process together all that we have seen. And oh Lord of Light, it was a lot.
This episode
didn’t fuck around. It tilted headlong into sweet, sweet death and
destruction! And dust. So much dust. Fans of dust (I know you’re out
there), this was your episode! But before we get to that, a quick word
about what an eventful week this has been offscreen for America’s
least-favorite favorite TV show. Poor
Game of Thrones was forced to walk naked through the streets of King’s Landing for
the minor crime of a stray coffee cup as well as the apparently much more serious matter of an
insufficiently heartfelt good-bye to a cartoon wolf.
The HBO subscriber-base rabble is becoming increasingly hostile toward
this show in its waning days. Heading into last night’s episode, there
was the strong stench of revolution in the air, but I suspect the awful
spectacle did much to jam the senses and pulverize even the most
critical fan into submission and then … quite a bit farther. Let’s get
to it!
The
episode opens on Varys, whose penmanship is truly lovely. I mean, I
guess important stuff is going on, but if you can’t take time to
appreciate penmanship like this, well, I just don’t know. It’s
spectacular. Anyway, Varys is stirring shit up Varys style, letting
someone know who the real king is and so forth, and then a little girl
comes in and informs him that Daenerys has not been eating. I’m going to
cut right to the chase here and point out that this is the most
important piece of news in the whole episode. The next time someone
tells me they’re going on a “juice fast,” I’m going to remind them of
the events of this episode of Game of Thrones.
It is SO IMPORTANT to eat healthy meals throughout the day. Failing to
do so can radically affect your state of mind and make you turn INSANE.
But I’m getting too far ahead …
Next
up, Jon Snow arrives at wherever this place is and is greeted by Varys,
who pitches him on betraying Daenerys and taking his rightful place on
the Iron Throne. Varys breaks it to Jon that there’s a 50 percent chance
that Daenerys is an ultraviolent lunatic, and Jon responds by telling
Varys that he’s not good with riddles. That isn’t a riddle, Jon. It’s a
troubling statistic. But oh well. Jon’s done listening. He doesn’t want
to be king. Next we have a very dark and foreboding scene between Tyrion
and Daenerys, in which she seems (a) nuts, (b) right about everything,
and (c) REALLY hungry. She knows that Varys has been trying to derail
her throneward journey, and she’s very fixated on how much Sansa hates
her. That has me worried for next week. I’m now predicting that Daenerys
is going to swoop down on Winterfell in the series finale and burn it
up, and then burn up every other single thing in the entire world after
that. And my record of predicting things on this show is pret-ty
solid. This scary scene ends with a close-up shot of Daenerys’s
suddenly ashen face, and we have a good long time to contemplate the
ravages of those skipped meals. Trouble ahead!
After
that we see Varys again. He seems to have considered that perhaps
bad-at-riddles Jon is too dumb to be king, and he’s burning his gorgeous
letter. That’s when Grey Worm shows up with an unmistakable “You’re
about to get burned alive by a dragon” look on his face. And sure
enough, Varys gets marched out to the beach, where Tyrion and Jon stand
by as Daenerys passes sentence on Westeros’s most notable professional
gossip. Tyrion and Varys mark the occasion profoundly, and Varys’s final
words are “Good-bye, old friend.” Those are perfectly fine final words,
but they’re nothing compared to what Conleth Hill, the actor who plays
Varys, said when asked about what he’d miss now that
Game of Thrones is over. He said,
“I’m going to miss some of the people and all of the money. That’s what I’ll miss.”
Brother, I hear ya. Daenerys’s dragon lights Varys up as everyone looks
on, and oddly, Varys doesn’t let out a peep. We don’t get to see him,
but, by the sound of it, he is totally chill about burning alive. That
sure made me feel better about it. If he doesn’t mind, why should I?
Then
we see Daenerys and Grey Worm still thinking about Missandei. They
don’t appear to have transitioned out of the anger phase of grief, which
is problematic. Daenerys talks about when they crossed the Narrow Sea,
and it suddenly occurs to me that she talks about that a lot. Crossing a
narrow sea is really not that impressive an accomplishment, lady.
You’ve done better stuff. Let that one go. Jon Snow pops in, and
Daenerys talks about how unloved she is compared to him and about how
she can only rule through fear. Then she puts the moves on Jon, who is
not into it, and Daenerys takes that as proof that love is not an option
for her. But I think she’s forgetting that the reason Jon doesn’t want
to get it on with her is that they are brother and sister, not that
she’s unlovable. By the way, a lot of Game of Thrones fans seem to disagree that Jon and Daenerys are brother and sister but I checked. They are.
Next
up is a scene between Tyrion and Daenerys that I found very confusing,
but I’m sure that’s my fault. I got bored and started thinking about
something else. Is that too honest? Tyrion is begging Daenerys to, what,
surround the city and wait until the people rise up against Cersei, but
Daenerys wants to attack? And Tyrion is afraid that any such attack
would incur massive civilian casualties and turn the people against
their new queen? Is that what’s happening? At some point, though,
Daenerys says “Mercy is our strength,” which makes it sound like she’s
agreeing with Tyrion. Maybe I should go back and rewatch this scene.
(Note: I didn’t.) Anyway, Tyrion tells Daenerys that when she hears the
bells, it means the city is no longer being defended by those loyal to
Cersei and the attack should be called off, and Daenerys tells Tyrion
that Jaime is in their custody. That much I got.
Then
we have a scene at an army encampment, where Tyrion says he’s going to
ask Davos a favor and then reminds Davos what a great smuggler he is.
The scene ends on a mystery! What is the favor? Well, we never find out.
Right? Did I miss something? I do not know what this scene was about.
Then Arya and the Hound show up and pass through camp on their way to
commit some very important murders. Then we take a break for a little
comedy as Tyrion tries to speak Unsullied language. Ha ha ha. What fun,
now shut up and get to the death and destruction, thank you very much.
Then Tyrion proposes a really terrific idea to his brother: Jaime should
help Cersei escape and then make sure the bells ring when they leave
the Red Keep. It’s a perfect way of ending the siege of King’s Landing
without a single person even getting a scratch. All it requires is for
Daenerys to attack later than she intends to and for Cersei to suddenly
become reasonable and realistic and humble about her chances of winning
the battle. It can’t fail!
Then we have a little
table-setting: We see the Tongueless Navy, peasants streaming into the
gates of King’s Landing, the Hound and Arya skulking in with them, and
the Golden Company looking spiffy in their fighting suits. In the middle
of all this, Tyrion mentions his precious bells to Jon, who looks at
him like he’s nuts. Jon has some idea that pretty-sounding bells aren’t
really going to play that big a role in the day’s events. Maybe he’s not
so dumb after all. Then, shit starts happening.
The
last remaining dragon swoops down on Euron’s navy, and all of a sudden,
giant crossbows pose no danger to dragons at all. None whatsoever. How
did these crossbows kill the other dragon so efficiently? Why couldn’t he dodge
these giant arrows? Did he have poor eyesight? It’s possible. I guess
nobody in Westeros is making eyeglasses for dragons. Am I working harder
to make sense out of this discrepancy than the Game of Thrones writing
staff did? Probably. I guess we’re meant to feel that the sheer power
of anger renders giant crossbows ineffective. If those fuckers hadn’t
killed Missandei, they could have shot this dragon out of the sky too,
but now, the dragon is pissed and can fly real good. Deal with it!
Next
up, we see the Golden Company make a classic military blunder by
forgetting that things can also happen behind them. They did not imagine
for one second that the dragon might obliterate the city wall from the
inside and start roasting soldiers with abandon. The Dothraki horde then
charges from the front, and I will say this for the Golden Company:
Elephants would not have helped.
What follows is a
perfectly delightful battle scene.
Good guys romping all over bad guys with a charming level of gore. A
total joy to behold! Cersei’s creepy Hand of the Queen shows up by her
side and delights in telling her all the awful news about how the battle
is going, and Cersei takes it in stride. She believes her people will
fight to the bitter end to defend her. And then, right away, we see how
incredibly wrong she is when her soldiers are surrounded and they get
all mopey and sad and just give up. And then we hear the cries of “Ring
the bell!” At that point, we’re left to consider just how silly Tyrion
was to be so worried about this battle. This was the bloodbath that was
supposed to annihilate so many civilians? It was over in a few minutes
and only killed soldiers. This is a very good outcome. All that’s left
to do is negotiate a surrender for Cersei and get on with the rest of
our wonderful lives in the splendid swords-and-sorcery world of this
neat-o television program.
But
wait, what’s that? Daenerys looking crazed and panting atop her one
sharp-eyed dragon? Don’t tell me she didn’t bring snacks along for the
big battle! If she still hasn’t eaten, her blood sugar must be terribly
low and there’s no telling what she’ll do!! Oh nooooo.
Yes,
sadly, now comes what felt like, and probably was, an hourlong festival
of mindless, pointless destruction and death. Everything must go!
Because why not?
All
sorts of other things happen while peasants were being raped and burned
alive for no reason. Euron and Jaime have a chance encounter and fight
it out over their love of Cersei. They both get killed, but Jaime’s
killing doesn’t stick. I think he might have said “Time out” right
before getting stabbed. Anyway, he charges off to save Cersei even
though it’s way too late to pull off Tyrion’s awesome plan. The Hound
and Arya arrive in the Red Keep, and the Hound cautions Arya against a
life of vengeance-seeking. She thanks him and gives up on killing
Cersei. Or does she? Read on for my theory on that!
And then we get the big,
long-awaited showdown between the Hound and The Mountain,
the highlight of which is the moment when Cersei scoots past the Hound
like “I’ll leave you two boys to it” and gets the fuck out of there. The
epic battle between these two brothers is shot like a CGI dream, with
golden light streaming through dust clouds as the ground crumbles
beneath their feet. Early in the battle, the Mountain’s helmet comes
off. I will leave the Anakin Skywalker comparisons to everyone else and
take the contrarian position that the Mountain is surprisingly handsome.
They are as evenly matched as we always knew they would be, but at one
point, the Hound gets the better of his big brother and sinks his sword
deep into the Mountain’s chest. That’s it, huh? Nope. He must have
called time out too, because this fatal stab doesn’t bother the Mountain
in the slightest. To his credit, the Hound actually seems fairly amused
by his inability to kill his brother after all these years. The poor
guy had no idea his brother was an immortal Frankenstein. All you can
really do is laugh at that point. Shortly after the Mountain pulls his
signature move — the thumb-to-eye skull-crush maneuver that has
basically not stopped playing across my mind since he pulled it on Inigo
Montoya several seasons ago — the Hound decides they might as well both
go down together, and off they plunge into the void, where it seems
probable that the Hound dies, but there’s no reason to believe that the
Mountain gets hurt at all. Oh well.
Then
Cersei and Jaime reunite and head out to safety, Jon realizes his own
troops are likely to be incinerated next and orders them out of the
city, and Arya tragically botches a peasant rescue. We rejoin Jaime and
Cersei under the Red Keep, where their escape route has been demolished.
Cersei finally seems to get what Tyrion has been saying all along about
her baby. But it’s a wee bit too late. The ceiling starts to cave in on
them, and here is my big theory about this episode. Ready? Okay, all
season long I have been waiting and waiting for Arya to do that trick
where she can put on someone else’s face and then kill somebody.
I boldly predicted a few recaps ago
that she was going to kill the Mountain and then wear his face to kill
Cersei. But it appears I was just a little bit off. What I think
happened in this episode is that Arya wore the face of the ceiling of
the basement of the Red Keep and then killed Cersei by falling down on
her, just like she told Ed Sheeran she was going to do! If that theory
sounds dumb to you, well, yeah, it sounds dumb to me too — just dumb
enough to be true!
In
the final moment of the show, Arya wakes up covered in dust, like you
would if you had just impersonated a crumbling ceiling in order to
murder someone, and she sees a beautiful white horse and rides off into
the final episode, in which Winterfell and everything else will be
destroyed by a dragon.
Okay, that’ll do it! Tonight, by the way, was also the
series finale of Veep,
which, as I have never failed to point out to you in these recaps, I
was in this season! I do hope you’ve had a chance to check it out,
because
Veep was a very special and hilarious
show, and I dare say they sent it off brilliantly. And that brings me to
the one regular feature of this column. Which guest role should I have
been cast in, in this episode of
Game of Thrones?
Once again, it’s slim pickin’s. There was one frantic peasant who had a
nice moment with Arya. I think he cried out, “Where’s my wife?!” I
would have given them some alts, other stuff he could have been looking
for as the city was reduced to rubble all around him. “Where’s my class
ring?!” “Where’s my top hat?!” “Where’s my dwarf cock?!” (deep-cut
callback).
All
right, friends. See you next week, unless HBO decides we don’t deserve
the last episode because of all your complaining. Careful!
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