Ian Thomas Malone

Monthly Archive: May 2016

Monday

30

May 2016

3

COMMENTS

Game of Thrones Season 6 Recap: Episode 6

Written by , Posted in Blog, Game of Thrones

This recap features analysis from a devoted book fan. As the show has largely deviated from the books I’m not sure how much this matters, but if you hate spoilers you should probably not read these articles. I encourage you to subscribe so you never miss a recap. Thank you for reading. 

There was a brief moment during the Benjen is Coldhands reveal when I considered giving up on the show. That theory is one of my least favorite prevalent ones because it’s easily debunked in the books. I even wrote an article on it last year. Benjen can be “Showhands,” but it just doesn’t make sense in the books.

I felt a change of heart as I realized that this is actually a good thing. Benjen as Coldhands isn’t a book spoiler at all. It almost has the reverse effect as it reminds us that these are two separate entities. Benjen being Coldhands worked in the show because he revealed himself early on in the rescue (as opposed to leading Samwell and Gilly to the Wall and Bran and his friends to Bloodraven without a single mention of being a Stark) and the show also needed to give us an answer as to what the hell happened to him, something it doesn’t have all the time in the world to explain.

The one thing that needs to be criticized is the handling of Hodor’s death. For a show that dedicated several scenes last season to Brienne mourning Renly’s death that happened three seasons prior, it’s disgraceful that neither Bran nor Meera acknowledged the death of their fearless companion considering both ruined his whole life. Hodor’s death reminded us that a show with as much death as Game of Thrones can still use it as an emotional hook. Improperly handling the aftermath makes it harder to care.

This episode gave us two plotlines that the show had previously skipped over with Coldhands and the siege of Riverrun, which happened in A Dance with Dragons and A Feast for Crows. I doubt many people expected either Brienne or Jaime in the Riverlands at this point and now they both will be. The show has different obligations than the books, but I like that it still managed to work in good storylines that wouldn’t have worked in previous seasons.

The aftermath Red Wedding was never really addressed and didn’t necessarily need to be, but Walder Frey is too good of a villain not to feature again. Like many, I questioned Edmure Tully’s future on the show given Tobias Menzies’ obligations to Outlander. In the books, the Freys get to keep Riverrun after Jaime brokers a deal that sends Lord Tully to Casterly Rock to live a comfortable, yet imprisoned, life. I doubt this will happen this way given the presence of Brienne and Co., but it will be interesting to watch.

I’ve criticized the show in the past for making the figures in power in King’s Landing look ridiculously weak. Sending Jaime to help the Freys shows that the powers that be still have power. What this means long term, when Dany’s arrival appears to be in the not so distant future remains to be seen, but it’s important to show that KL isn’t just a setting for a soap opera.

The payoff for the High Sparrow stuff was rather underwhelming. It’s hard to care all that much with the White Walkers and Dany’s massive army, but the storyline moved perhaps a little too slow for its own good. We were treated to far too many High Sparrow lectures over the course of this season. I did think there was a good chance that Margaery could be killed, which would have likely pitted the Tyrells and the Lannisters against each other. That would have been far more interesting than what actually happened.

I’ve been pretty complimentary of Arya’s progress in Braavos for most of the season. I don’t love her decision to leave the House of Black and White, but it’s too early to condemn it entirely. It’s only natural that she feels a sense of loyalty to her family. Her driving force to leave Westeros, both in the books and the show, is that they’re all gone. There’s nothing left for her. We, the viewers, know this isn’t true. Bran and Rickon are alive and Sansa has escaped. She doesn’t. It seems almost unfair to Jaqen, who’s been fairly loyal to her.

Mixed feelings about the Sam/Horn Hill storyline. It was good TV. The presence of James Faulkner, who played a similarly sinister patriarch on Downton Abbey, enhanced the soapiness of the whole plotline. In the books, Lord Tarly is a highly respected battle commander, even recommended for Hand of the King by Kevan Lannister. Here, he’s quarreling with his son away from anything meaningful.

That goes for Sam as well. This season has really done a number on the credibility of the Night’s Watch. Jon is allowed to quit and Sam can go off gallivanting with Gilly. What do vows even mean anymore?

Dany didn’t do much. I talked about the fast pacing of her storyline two weeks ago. The Drogon appearance was very cool although as my sister noted, her horse seemed to have vanished.

It’s clear that Yara/Reek will supply at least some of Dany’s ships. I’m curious to see where she goes from there. The mainland of Westeros seems like the logical choice, but Euron/the Slaver’s could take her in a number of directions.

That’s it for this week. No Tyrion, Jon, Sansa, Ramsey, or Hodor… ever again. See you next week.

Monday

23

May 2016

1

COMMENTS

Game of Thrones Season 6 Recap: Episode 5

Written by , Posted in Game of Thrones

This recap features analysis from a devoted book fan. As the show has largely deviated from the books I’m not sure how much this matters, but if you hate spoilers you should probably not read these articles. I encourage you to subscribe so you never miss a recap. Thank you for reading. 

Last night’s episode was the first time that it really felt like the show was spoiling the books. There’s been minor stuff here and there, plus Jon’s revival which everyone knew was coming, but the show has deviated so far from the books in general that’s it’s hard to say any particular storyline has been spoiled. The Sand Snakes probably aren’t going to foolishly kill their relatives, Ser Alliser didn’t participate in the mutiny and won’t be hanged, and Jorah isn’t going to be needlessly infected with greyscale.

The Night’s King being head of the White Walkers though. That’s a big one. So is the death of a certain gentle giant, whose death revealed the mystery behind perhaps the most famous word to come out of A Song of Ice and Fire.

I don’t mean to suggest that this is a fault of the show. We, the book readers, knew the risks. I’ve never been one to let spoilers get to me anyway.

Hodor’s death hit me. I think it hit just about everyone with a heart. Tragedy has always been a predominant element of ASOIAF. I don’t think there was any greater example of that left for the show to give. The whole time traveling/destiny thing perhaps makes it sadder. I’ll hold off on full judgment until we see how Bran comes to terms with this responsibility, but a lot of why I was so sad about Hodor dying was that it had nothing to do with his own free will.

We haven’t really seen that in the series, at least with noteworthy characters. Ned died because he made poor political choices. Same goes for Robb and to a lesser extent, Catelyn. Others, like Drogo, Tywin, and Stannis were simply beat out by their opposition (keeping it simple here). We have reason behind nearly all the deaths over the course of the whole series. We sort of do with Hodor as well, but it’s a crappy reason.

The other thing I couldn’t really wrap my head around with the deaths of Hodor and Summer was the balance of story contrasted with the show’s recent obsession with trimming down the cast. It’s clear that Hodor’s death will be similar in the books, with the important “hold the door” line. Summer may die in that battle too. I’ve mentioned in earlier recaps that it’s clear Kristian Nairn, the actor who plays Hodor, can’t carry Issac Hempstead Wright anymore. The show may not want to pay for the CGI required to feature Summer, which is at least partially supported by the death of Shaggydog last week. Who knows which category these deaths fall under?

I used the phrase “half-baked” to refer to nearly all the other plotlines in the episode during my video recap last night. The idea that Jon, a resurrected bastard Night’s Watch deserter, can rally the North is half-baked. Brienne doing absolutely nothing about Davos/Melisandre is half-baked. Euron openly admitting he committed regicide is half-baked. Yara and Theon running away with the whole fleet while twenty Ironborn watch Euron is half-baked. Jorah and his stupid greyscale is half-baked.

Littlefinger has quietly become the show’s most interesting character. Book readers won’t find this surprising, but the character has been portrayed so inconsistently on screen that it’s hard to really care most of the time. Does he actually love Sansa? I’m not willing to say no to that and not just because of the books. He put himself at great risk being alone with her. He may wish to do right. Maybe not.

Sansa lying is weird. I’m sure it’ll serve some future plotline, but as with LF’s decision to marry her off to Ramsey, it doesn’t make much sense from a character perspective. Advancing the plot isn’t an excuse to defy character norms and we didn’t get anything that resembled an explanation.

I’m excited to see the Blackfish again. He’s a favorite in the books. It is a bit weird that the Frey’s have been essentially written out of the series. No troops were at Winterfell with the Boltons and they somehow lost Riverrun, an easily defendable castle for however long it would take to get reinforcements.

Arya continues to be an interesting storyline to follow. I liked how the play had errors with the storyline as people in Braavos wouldn’t necessarily have specific details and likely wouldn’t care either. It gave Arya a chance to question her loyalty to the House of Black & White.

I don’t love the introduction of another red priestess, as the show has been fairly inconsistent with the Lord of Light. It’s clear that they’re starting to lay down the framework for a Jon/Dany faceoff to see who’s the Prince(ss) who was Promised. I did take note of Varys’ hatred of the Red God and was pleased to see it mentioned here.

Poor Jorah. Infected with a stupid disease. Not sure where he’s going to go. Is he going to call Dr. House?

Boy the Kingsmoot was a bomb. I guess Yara’s going to go visit Dany first. I’ll say this again though because it merits repeating. How did she escape with the whole fleet?

I could talk about Bloodraven dying some more. I don’t want to. He was kind of a letdown. I’m excited to see how Bran explores the Children of the Forest creating the White Walkers, but I’m almost rooting for them at this point. Hodor.

That’s it for this week. Sorry for the brevity on non-Hodor plotlines. I’m happy to answer any questions you have, either here or on my Facebook page. See you next week.

Monday

16

May 2016

0

COMMENTS

Game of Thrones Season 6 Recap: Episode 4

Written by , Posted in Blog, Celebrity Apprentice, Game of Thrones

This recap features analysis from a devoted book fan. As the show has largely deviated from the books I’m not sure how much this matters, but if you hate spoilers you should probably not read these articles. I encourage you to subscribe so you never miss a recap. Thank you for reading. 

I think it’s safe to say that this episode was the best of the season and perhaps the best since season 4’s “The Watchers on the Wall.”

The reunion of Jon and Sansa is significant for a number of reasons. None of the major Stark children (excluding Rickon) have seen each other since season one and most have no idea which of the others are even still alive. Jon and Sansa don’t really have much of a relationship in the books, something that was sort of hinted at in the episode. Given that Sansa isn’t in the North in the books, this plotline will be especially interesting to follow.

Brienne’s hypocrisy is borderline intolerable. I sort of forgot about the weird Brienne/Davos/Melisandre dynamic since the Red Woman is the only one at the Wall in the books, but it was about as awkward as could be expected. Brienne, who “executed” Stannis on the “authority” of a dead pretender king, shows next to no animosity toward Melisandre, the woman who conjured up the shadow demon that killed Renly.

It is by no means a stretch to suggest that Melisandre played a much, much bigger role in Renly’s death than Stannis, being both the person who executed the plan and presumably also the one who came up with it. Couple Brienne’s carefree attitude toward her with Davos’ casual mention of Shireen’s death, in episode 4 mind you, and we have ourselves a prime example of the show’s laziness in closing up plotlines it doesn’t like. Like Dorne, Stannis’ arc was quickly wrapped up with little logic. I know most regular readers of these recaps are hoping for the day when I stop mentioning Stannis, but that was important to acknowledge.

The pacing of Sansa’s arrival to the Wall was superb, but the fact that Jon continues to hang around Castle Black is kind of weird. I liked how he mentioned his death releasing him from his vows, but if that’s all true, he sort of needs to move on. The divorce between Jon and the Watch looks quite messier than it should. At least he showed remorse for killing Olly.

Why does Tormund only have 2,000 warriors? What happened to the 100,000 that attacked the Wall two seasons ago? They couldn’t have all died at Hardhome.

It was hard to be excited about Littlefinger’s return since he’s one of the most inconsistently portrayed characters on the show, but his scene was excellent. His seemingly indefensible decision to marry Sansa to Ramsey was handled quite well by casting doubt on Lord Royce. The only thing that kind of bugs me is that Littlefinger does show genuine affection toward Sansa in the books. I wouldn’t be surprised if that turns out to be the case later on in the show, but it’s not really believable. Who wasn’t thrilled to see Sweetrobin again?!?!

The Meereen plotline got a much needed infusion of life into it, despite having two of the most boring characters on the whole show. Grey Worm and Missandei’s deficiencies only further show what a mistake it was to kill Ser Barristan last year. Tyrion was on point as usual, but he needs a stronger character to spar with.

Jorah and his magical durable shirt are back! Which means I have to make an obligatory “why does Jorah have greyscale?” mention. Doesn’t look like I’ll be saying that much longer. More on Dany at the end of the recap.

King’s Landing also perked up. I’ve been mentioning the Tyrell’s powerful army for about a year now. It’s about time someone brought up using it. Giving the key KL players something to do was long overdue. It’ll be interesting to see if both Margaery and Loras make it out alive. I’m guessing no, but I’m willing to sacrifice both if it means we don’t have to endure another High Sparrow lecture. Jonathan Pryce is great and all. I just don’t care about listening to him ramble anymore.

How did Theon get a boat? Seriously. Anyone?

The Yara/Theon interaction was another highlight in a very strong episode. Yara is the obvious candidate to rule the Iron Islands, though A Feast for Crows had a different idea. Euron stands as a better challenger than Reek, but this will make the Kingsmoot dynamic all the more interesting. It’s hard to speculate as to what Theon’s role will be beyond a mere endorser of his sister.

Osha falls victim to the “let’s get rid of all the characters we don’t want anymore” cleanse. I’m kind of okay with it. She’s a fun character, but the show was right to acknowledge the fact that Ramsey would definitely know about her involvement in their escape. Another scene where she gets to speak would have been nice, but this episode had a lot going on.

Finally we go to Vaes Dothrak. I was rolling my eyes at the idea that Daario and Jorah would help by somehow retrieving Drogon, Dany’s scene with the Khals was excellent. As with the Sansa plotline, I was surprised with its fast pacing, but that’s a good thing. Meereen is bound to be a complete wash with everyone inevitably setting their eyes on Westeros in the not so distant future.

The parallels to the end of Dany’s season one arc were to be expected, though probably not in episode four. I assumed there would be some kind of trial, but am pretty happy that there wasn’t. Dany now commands the largest force of anyone besides the White Walkers. It’ll be interesting to see what kind of opposition the show puts against her, given the mess in KL.

It is worth noting that GRRM has said that Dany is not immune to fire in the books. This is obviously different in the show, which is a good thing. That was a great way to end the episode.

Side note: Aggo, one of the Dothraki mentioned, is one of Dany’s bloodriders in the books. I’ve often been critical of how the Dothraki just disappeared after the Unsullied were introduced, but it was nice to see a tiny throwback.

That’s it for this week. No Arya, Bran, Dorne (yay), or Sam & Gilly, but this was a very strong episode. See you next week!

Monday

9

May 2016

0

COMMENTS

Game of Thrones Season 6 Recap: Episode 3

Written by , Posted in Blog, Game of Thrones, Pop Culture

This recap features analysis from a devoted book fan. As the show has largely deviated from the books I’m not sure how much this matters, but if you hate spoilers you should probably not read these articles. I encourage you to subscribe so you never miss a recap. Thank you for reading. 

The title of this episode, “Oathbreaker” is important as it’s just about the only defense that can be offered for Jon Snow’s desertion from the Night’s Watch. Many fans, including myself, expected Jon to leave the order, with the justification being that his death released him from his vows through the second line of the oath, “it shall not end until my death.” Trouble is, not only was this reasoning nowhere to be found, it was kind of irrelevant at that point.

The show could still reference the vows and it probably should, but that defense became moot the second Jon used his status as Lord Commander to execute Ser Alliser, Ollie, and the other conspirators. Jon’s death is an acceptable loophole, but he didn’t use it. He just resigned, breaking his oaths. This signals a big change in Jon’s character which should be very interesting to watch moving forward.

Samwell is back… The only reason I’m even remotely interested is because his father, Randyll Tarly, is one of the best tertiary characters in the books. What will be interesting to see is how the show handles the fact that becoming a maester takes years, which Sam doesn’t really have. I don’t expect to see Archmaester Marwyn in the show, but that would be very exciting as well.

Despite the great sword fighting, I was not a fan of the Tower of Joy. This is a major event in the books that was almost treated like a throwaway. While I understand show fans who aren’t familiar with the books aren’t going to have the same reaction, this is still a crucial element on a certain someone’s parentage. Howland Reed was also just kind of tossed in there like it was nothing.

In defense on the show, there are advantages to covering this flashback stuff through Bran’s dreams. In the books, we see glimpses of The Tower of Joy through Ned’s perspective in the first book, often through fever dreams. Obviously the show can’t do that with Ned dead and all, and it wouldn’t have made sense to do it back in season one. It just didn’t feel as important as it should have.

I’m not in love with the Dany storyline, mostly because I don’t think it’s necessary to add in the bit about the Khals needing to decide whether or not she can stay. The dialogue was a little weak, a common problem throughout most of the episode. I do suspect that Dany will use that opportunity to unite the Dothraki behind her cause, which forgives this current lackluster elements of the plotline.

Meereen improved slightly. Varys actually did something and to top it all off, there were actually guards present! You know who didn’t do anything? Grey Worm! The show even acknowledged how boring he is. If only the four amigos could go on a field trip somewhere. Maybe to Asshai? A man can dream.

Part of my dislike of the Meereen plotline comes from knowing that the show can’t really get into the huge war with Yunkai like the books, which makes Tyrion’s presence in Meereen a bit of a waste. I also hated how the show expects us to believe that the Unsullied are capable of fighting a war after how weak they were made to look all last season. It’s just lazy.

King’s Landing continues to be a mess, even with the return of Olenna Tyrell. Diana Rigg is a superb actress, but the whole plotline lacks any clear direction. The returns of Kevan Lannister, Pycelle (finally!), and Qyburn was nice and all, but still made me wonder why none of them seem too particularly concerned with how dismal the current state of affairs are, even though their combined forces could easily wipe out the Faith Militant.

I loved how the show made Qyburn look human with the “little birds,” who can’t talk in the books and are unwaveringly loyal to Varys, even after he left. Qyburn’s motives are one of the great mysteries of the later books and the show is doing a great job with a fairly minor character. It’ll be interesting to see how good he is at Varys’ job, which I’m hesitant to fully label “Master of Whispers” just yet.

Ser Gregor being called Ser Gregor was interesting. In the books, he’s known as Ser Robert Strong, with his true identity serving as a matter of speculation. I’m pretty okay with the switch as Ser Gregor being dead was crucial to the alliance with Dorne, something that doesn’t really matter here.

The show impressed me by adhering to its own continuity quite well at the meeting of the small council regarding whether or not Jaime rightfully had a seat on it. In the books, the Lord Commander always has a seat, but Ser Barristan was not present at the meetings in season one, nor was Jaime when he became Lord Commander, though he was rarely in KL for any of them.

The question of the seat does undercut the decision to dismiss Ser Barristan back in season one. If the Lord Commander doesn’t automatically get a small council seat, why did Jaime even need to be LC at all? That decision, along with appointing Tywin as Hand and Janos Slynt to the small council was all part of Cersei’s power play. Jaime still sort of fits into that, but definitely not as well.

Arya continues to quietly be one of the show’s better storylines. The plotline doesn’t take up a ton of time in the books and this is likely a case of less is more in the show as well, which is hard to do with a character as popular as Arya. The pacing has been superb. I imagine there was a bit of foreshadowing with the mention of The Hound, who is pretty much confirmed to be The Gravedigger in the books.

The Bolton/Umber scene was the worst of the season. Just awful. I get that the Greatjon hasn’t been around since season one and show viewers don’t care about him, but are we supposed to believe that “Lord Umber” is stupid enough to go to Winterfell and insult a known psychopath while asking for his help even though he wouldn’t bend the knee? None of that was even remotely believable, including discovering Rickon Stark and choosing to deliver him to Ramsey. I’d say poor Shaggydog, but it’s probably for the best that he isn’t involved in such a ridiculous plotline. Call it euthanasia.

Finally, I’d like to acknowledge how great a character Ser Alliser was in the show. His plot progression was almost completely different from the books, as he was not at the Battle of Castle Black and did not participate in the mutiny, but Owen Teale did an excellent job portraying him. And now his watch has ended!

That’s it for this week. Still no Littlefinger, even though he was in the “previously on.” I do think that this season is a significant step up from the last one. There’s a bit going on that makes no sense, but it’s been good fun. Just a reminder, I do live video recaps on my Facebook page after each episode. See you next week.

 

Monday

2

May 2016

2

COMMENTS

Game of Thrones Season 6 Recap: Episode 2

Written by , Posted in Blog, Game of Thrones

This recap features analysis from a devoted book fan. As the show has largely deviated from the books I’m not sure how much this matters, but if you hate spoilers you should probably not read these articles. I encourage you to subscribe so you never miss a recap. Thank you for reading. 

He’s back. I’m honestly surprised that anyone is surprised. This had to be have been one of the worst kept secrets in popular culture. Kit Harrington was even listed in the opening credits.

That said, I was pretty underwhelmed with the way Jon Snow’s return was handled. Not only was the reviving ritual fairly lame, I don’t think the show ever did a good job explaining why Davos was willing to give his life to defend Jon Snow’s corpse. You can say that he didn’t believe that Ser Alliser would have actually let him go, but that was communicated.

It all felt too inevitable, including Melisandre’s presence. Which is what you get when you hype something for a year. Considering that every one of the brothers of the Night’s Watch standing in that room knew how important it is to burn corpses before they become White Walkers, I just wasn’t very impressed. It felt lazy. Foreshadowing Jon’s revival in previous seasons doesn’t mean that you don’t need to explain why characters make the choices they make. Davos is probably my favorite character left and the show should’ve given him more of a reason to be willing to put his life on the line on a whim like that.

The show is obviously setting up a Jon/Ramsey conflict as the Lord Commander is now released from his vows, having died. I don’t mean to suggest that I’m angry that Jon is back. His return just represented the same kind of lazy writing I’ve criticized the show for over the past two years.

Bran is back too! I’ve been critical of how eerily similar Bloodraven’s hideout is to Dagobah, both in the books and the show. Bringing in Max von Sydow to play a more colorful Bloodraven is probably a good idea for the show, but he did seem a little Obi-Wan Kenobi-esque, which is exacerbated by the fact that von Sydow was just in the new Star Wars.

I’d give the show points for how they handled the fact that Bran is now too big to ride on Hodor’s back, but I’d have to take them away for the fact that both Bloodraven and Euron Greyjoy both only have one eye in the books. Not really a big deal, but sort of annoying for book fans, especially since they were both introduced/reintroduced in the same episode.

King’s Landing continues to be a bore, which is a shame considering how many talented actors are involved. The High Sparrow storyline needs more direction. I did enjoy seeing Ser Robert Strong, but wish the show would at least make some effort to explain the current political structure in KL. I’ll give the show some credit for how it’s handled Tommen, who isn’t a particularly interesting character in either the book or the show.

The lack of guards continues to be annoying. Are we really supposed to believe that anyone thinks it’s a good idea for Tommen to walk around with only his one handed uncle/father as protection? The same holds true for Tyrion in Meereen and even Roose in Winterfell. Less people makes for a more intimate scene, but it isn’t very realistic.

Meereen is a mess. Killing off Hizdahr may not have been a big loss, but why does Meereen not have a single local official acting in any capacity? Are we supposed to believe that the Tyrion/Varys/Grey Worm/Missandei quartet is handling everything? I don’t think the show needs a ruling council like the books, but the current situation is borderline laughable. Tyrion did deliver the line of the night with “I drink and I know things.” That makes up for the ease with which he freed the dragons.

Roose’s death was a bummer considering how he was just talking about the Northern political structure, which is one of my favorite parts of A Dance with Dragons, but I get it. As I said last week and in my video, the show appears to be getting rid of characters it doesn’t need moving forward and that’s okay. I loved how Roose mentioned how preposterous it was to suggest killing the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch given how revered the order is in the North. Both he and Fat Walda will be missed. Ramsey got to be a monster in a way that progressed the story.

One thing that really irked me was the introduction of a new son of Rickard Karstark. This might be a minor detail, but the death of his sons was used as legitimate rationale for why he was so pissed at Catelyn for letting Jaime go. Having a new son pop up out of nowhere cheapened that.

Shouldn’t Brienne at least consider killing Theon for treason? Her character’s righteous indignation is appalling. Though we still don’t know for sure if Stannis is dead.

In The Winds of Winter sample chapters, Stannis is currently holding Theon, and Asha/Yara, captive and at least publicly plans to kill him to appease the Northerners, though he’s too valuable of a hostage for that to be fully believable. This has led me to think he’ll at least consider taking the black. I liked how the show referenced that possibility as well, though it’s probably not the best direction for the character.

The reintroduction of the Ironborn was handled quite well. Balon had more personality in this episode than he ever did in the books, though we only see him in A Clash of Kings. It was interesting to see Euron personally kill him as this has not be confirmed in the books, though it is basically a foregone conclusion that he hired an assassin, likely a Faceless Man, to carry out the deed. Like many, I am very excited for the Kingsmoot, which could be the highlight of the season (maybe).

Arya wasn’t in this episode much either, but that’s okay. Her storyline with Jaqen doesn’t need to move faster than it is. As I said last week, I didn’t expect Arya to remain blind for very long.

That’s it for this week. No Dany, no Dorne, no Littlefinger, no Pycelle, but this episode had enough going on. Despite my criticisms of Jon’s revival, I thought the episode did a good job building on last week in establishing the season’s storylines. Very little wasted time.

Just a reminder, I do live video recaps on my Facebook page after each episode. See you next week.