There are two outrages before this episode even starts. First of all, for the first time all season, there’s no “nudity” in the content warnings at the top of the episode. No nudity? Is this even the same show anymore? Secondly, did everybody else see
that trailer for HBO's new drama that aired before the credits? I was on board until I saw the title: “THE LEFTOVERS.” REALLY? That is not a title of a Justin Theroux-starring paranormal thriller. It is the title of a Justin Thereoux comedy about a rag-tag bunch of World War I infantrymen, maybe, but probably not even that! We need to get HBO to change the title of that show before it’s too late (it is already too late)!
Aaaaand RESET. Last week, everybody freaked out about the decision to go “off book”—placing Bran in the hands of the Mutineers and moving Locke magically across space and time to join the Night’s Watch as the Matt Damon to Roose Bolton’s Jack Nicholson—both of which had no basis in the original text. But this week, all of those new moves are undone at once, in a terrific, self-sabotaging setpiece toward the end of the episode. I was so dazzled by Jon’s fire-lit sword-fighting and BRANHODOR’s brutal killing of Locke that it took me a few minutes before I went “Hey….what the--!?” Because what was the point of all of that, in the end? I’m OK with the idea that these new plots were just stalling for time—but if they were, why not stall a little longer? Why not stall in a way that’s a little more interesting? When Bran watches Jon Snow fight from a distance and then agrees with Jojen Reed that he cannot approach his long-lost brother (from a mystery mother), it’s almost a word-for-word rehash of a scene we got last year, when Jon broke from the Wildlings as Bran watched from a tower. But like an egotistical politician awaiting a recently commissioned bust in his own image, I’m getting ahead of myself. That is probably too clunky a joke. Screw it, I'm leaving it in!
At the top of the episode, Tommen is officially crowned and Cersei changes her game up, going on a charm offensive all across King’s Landing. “When vinegar has done nothing but lay your dead children at your feet, try some honey!” is the Lannister’s second motto, after all. She unexpectedly decides to advocate for marriage between Tommen and Marge (third time’s the charm, Marge!) and even opens up to the Prince of Dorne (not in that way, though, gross).
Meanwhile, in Mereen (
Mereenwhile), Dany learns that the cities she has previously liberated have fallen back into the hands of the slaveowners. When folks were complaining about Dany The Great White Savior last year, this is what the rest of us were tempering your outrage with. Emancipation is hard! Dany thought she could just march around making sex eyes and killing overseers, but that only takes you so far. If you really want to make a difference, you’ve got to lean in. And so Dany decides to do just that, putting off an invasion of King’s Landing even though Tommen is ever so ripe for the roasting. Damn it! So close to Queen Dany. We’ll have to wait (probably forever).
In the Vale, Crazy Lysa Tiger Mom is as crazy as she’s ever been. She rushes her wedding ceremony to Littlefinger so she can get at his little finger, and then she jealously accuses Sansa of sampling her package while it was still on the delivery route. Sansa, frustrated that yet another plot point hinges on the existence of her hymen, pleads innocence and ignorance. And then a new weird penis is dangling over her head, as Lysa reveals her plans to wed Sansa to Baby Buster Arryn, who continues to look like an amalgamation of all the bad DNA purged from the members of One Direction in Simon Cowell’s Nazi Laboratory.
The most important moment occurs when Lysa mentions that she killed her husband, Jon Arryn, on Littlefinger’s orders. WHOA. That means almost all of the action in this entire series, including Ned and Cat’s suspicion of the Lannisters which started the ENTIRE WAR, was driven by Littlefinger. Some serious puppetmaster shit, right there. It quite literally changes everything. I hope Lysa’s sex screams didn’t distract you too much to really let that sink in.
And then there is the aforementioned Battle of Craster’s Keep, where Jon Snow finally kills Young Willem Dafoe (did you know that actor’s name is literally BURN GORMAN? Try to come up with a better name for that guy. SKULL GNAWSON, maybe) in a battle that is oddly reminiscent of George Clooney’s Fantastic Mr. Fox versus Actual Willem Dafoe’s evil (literal) rat. I mean, this version ends a little more graphically, but thematically and knivically it’s pretty much the same deal.
But whatever happens there is going to happen next week. So is Stannis's long-pending departure from Dragonstone, and so is whatever is going to happen at The Wall, and so is whether or not the Hound will get all Khal Drogo from that gnarly bite on his neck. We're waiting on a lot of answers. Especially: DO YOU GUYS THINK LYSA IS GOING TO BE OK?
