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Archive for Blackwater

Game of Thrones – Episode 20

Jun03

Title: Game of Thrones

Genre: Historical Fantasy

Watched: Episode 20 – June 3, 2012

Title: Valar Morghulis

Summary: Fantastic Wrapup

ANY CHARACTER HERE

The season finale has a lot of threads to cover, the extra long “previously on” clip covers no less than eleven major plot lines! Amazingly, the episode manages to do a pretty damn good job with them — even when many only get one scene.

We open with Tyrion — well his eye — suffering at the tender ministrations of the less-senile-than-he-seems Maester Pycelle. Ty learns he’s no longer hand, and we see what he does not, his father receiving the honors that Tyrion had a hand (haha) in earning. Then in a magnificent bit of public theater, Joffery casts down Sansa and takes up with Margaery Tyrell. Could the third marriage be the charm? With Joff? This begins a running thread about oaths that flows through the entire episode. For Joff, despite his lip service, oaths mean nothing. I do also have to give credit to the actor who manages to make every line, every gesture thoroughly loathsome.

I can't wait for his wedding

Sansa, freed of her engagement, is confronted by Littlefinger. He claims to be an ally, being the second man to offer her a way north. But does she dare? Personally, I would have gone with the Hound.

And speaking of Littlefinger, Varys visits Ros in the interest of plotting against his rival. It’s not entirely clear what the point of this scene is other than an update on everyone’s least favorite hooker and a restatement of the Varys/Littlefinger hostility. I prefered their “manhood” discussion in episode 10.

Jaime and Brienne only get one scene, but it’s a doozy. After the usual banter they run into a bunch of Stark men who recognize the Kingslayer. She totally kicks ass in her lumbering way. But her choices flow from her own oath: to Cat Stark. Her interpretation is literal in the extreme.

Robb and Cat discuss this very topic. He is in love with the nurse, she warns him of his oath, even invoking Ned and his own literal interpretation of said matters. Robb walks a different road.

Stannis broods with the Red Lady, nursing his pride. He tries to strangle her, but cannot. She shows him the secrets of the flames. We, of course, see only some flicking in his eyeballs. Is this hypnotism, or more? Certainly one of the weaker threads, but it has been all along. I guess Davos’ fate will be left to season 3.

Theon is surrounded and in his room with Luwin. The old man honors his own oath and gives Theon solid advice: run for the Night’s Watch. “You are not the man you are pretending to be, at least not yet.” This is a great exchange. “It’s too late to pretend to be anything else,” Theon answers. Then he gives a really nice speech to his troops — only to have them betray him. Poor Luwin is stabbed.

What is dead will never die!

Varys visits Tyrion and delivers news of further humiliations. I swear GRRM looks at every character every chapter and says: “on the way up, take ’em down. On the way down, take ’em up.” The Ty/Varys interaction this season has been great as both actors are spectacular. Shae is next. She removes his bandage. The scar is bad, but nothing like in the book where he has no nose! They couldn’t bring themselves to put Peter Dinklage through that much ugly (and he’s a good looking man anyway, unlike the pre-face-cut novel Tyrion). Shae at least is loyal (so far). Dare I say, honoring her oath? She tries to get him to leave the city with her, but stays when he won’t.

Robb gets married. A nice tiny little ceremony. Oaths oaths oaths. But it is still the second worst thread.

Dany walks through a cool garden to an even cooler tower-like “house of the undying.” She finds a magic entrance. I like these lightly handed mystical moments.

Jorah, don't let her out of your sight!

Arya, having escaped, is found by Jaquen. He tries to draw her to Bravos to train as a Faceless Man. She isn’t ready yet, and still seeks her family. He gives her the coin then as I hoped he might, changes his face. “That man is dead.” Awesome scene.

Osha and the boys emerge to a burnt and destroyed Winterfell. If those wolves are CG, they look pretty darn good. They find a dying Luwin and the old man gets a few final words in. Perhaps not realistic, but he’s been very fine in the role and so they’re well deserved. He sends them to Jon. Bran rolls north in a wheelbarrow!

Dany is back in the House of the Undying. She finds a room of doors and wanders through into a sequence of visions that gave me goosebumps. First the Iron Throne, its hall burnt by dragon fire. Then lured by the sound of dragons, through the door in the wall and into the north. There she finds Drogo’s hut and inside the man himself in a surprise reprise of his role. The Dothraki dialog between them brought tears to my eyes. I always liked the way his rumbly voice read the guttural language. But she is not to succumb to the “last temptation of Danerys Stormborn,” instead returning to the house to find her dragons. All three in fact — for the first time in the entire season. The warlock emerges. He uses the plural, but we only see one — before or now. “With the dragons returned our magic.” It’s nice to hear this reiterated. Makes one wonder. Is this true of the Red Lady as well? Not the White Walkers for sure, they showed up in the pilot before the dragons did. Or do they foreshadow coming of the beasts? Anyway, Dany is not one to take captivity lightly, she lights up the warlock like a bonfire. This scene was cool, but felt light on the effects. I would’ve liked to see the three dragons flying around laying waste to the house and it burning down. Sigh. Budgets.

Finally, we return to Jon Snow in the frozen north. Ygritte is marching behind him whacking him on the head with his own sword. That’s got to hurt both the pride and the noggin. The Halfhand grabs a sword and they fight. He forces Jon’s anger and this time, Jon doesn’t hold back and kills him. I’m not sure I bought this important moment 100%. I did, however, like the look Ygritte gives him as she backs him up and then leads him off to see the valley with the Wildling (CGI) camp. This vista looks fantastic as they just painted in the camp in a real Icelandic valley. It felt massive in scale, in contrast with the lightweight troop of a dozen Wildlings in furs marching around in the snow. The Lord of Bones has no presence.

Somehow the captive is the trustworthy one

Xaro is sleeping with Doreah. I guess that explains her absence. Dany and her dragons march in and steal his medallion/vault key. But the vault contains nothing. She locks him and the slave girl away. These are both changes from the novels, but while I will miss the girl on girl on girl action that is supposed to occur later (unless they bring it back with different girls) the relationship with Xaro makes more sense. In the books I never really understood what Xaro was up to or why Dany did what she did with him. Here she loads up with enough gold to buy a ship and move on.

I expected that to be the end, but we have an even better setup. Sam and the brother’s black are gathering frozen turds by the Fist of the First Men when the horn sounds three times. An army of zombies pass, lead by zombie horse riding White Walkers. That was pretty cool. It also helps to explain, at least to me, the difference between the wraiths (zombies) and the White Walkers (something more, and often mounted). This peculiar distinction has eluded me for five books.

Sigh again. The ten month wait begins. But in the meantime I’m heading myself to King’s Landing this summer. Well, Dubrovnik at least. It looked so good in the show that I booked a vacation there!

Overall, a brilliant episode. I was worried that with so many threads each be starved of attention, But the producers saved a good percentage of the budget for these last two episodes. And more importantly the writers managed to draw most of the threads, although not all, to a satisfying conclusion. Still, the biggest flaw this season suffered, and it is a big flaw, is the compression of the large scale novel into only ten hours of programming. While a problem last season, A Game of Thrones is shorter than A Clash of Kings and the compression felt less pronounced. Season 2 did mostly address the problems of visual scope and mystical elements that bothered me in season one, but the new problem is even worse. With twelve episodes they could have mitigated it somewhat, but really the scope of the story needed perhaps sixteen. We can hope that by splitting A Storm of Swords into more than one season this can be overcome.

See my review of A Dance With Dragons.

If you liked this post, follow me at:

My novels: The Darkening Dream and Untimed

or all my Game of Thrones posts or episode reviews:

Season 1: [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]

Season 2: [11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20]

Season 3: [21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30]

Season 4: [31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40]

Season 5: [41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50]

Season 6: [51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57]

Boys like a challenge

Related posts:

  1. Game of Thrones – Episode 18
  2. Game of Thrones – Episode 19
  3. Game of Thrones – Episode 10
  4. Game of Thrones – Episode 17
  5. Game of Thrones – Episode 11
By: agavin
Comments (10)
Posted in: Television
Tagged as: A Dance with Dragons, Blackwater, Characters in A Song of Ice and Fire, Episode 20, Game of Thrones, George R. Martin, George R. R. Martin, HBO, Historical fantasy, House, Major houses in A Song of Ice and Fire, Robb, Television, Tyrion, Valar Morghulis, World of A Song of Ice and Fire

Game of Thrones – Episode 19

May28

Title: Game of Thrones

Genre: Historical Fantasy

Watched: Episode 18 – May 27, 2012

Title: Blackwater

Summary: Tight and intense

ANY CHARACTER HERE

With Episode 19, Blackwater, the normally highly fractured narrative of the show lasers in and focuses on a single place and night: The attack on King’s Landing by Stannis and its defense. Hallelujah, they finally show us a real battle! And not just a little one, but a multi-staged “Helm’s Deep” style battle. Sure, it’s not like Helm’s deep level visuals, but it’s pretty damn great.

This is certainly the most climatic scene from A Clash of Kings, although with so many threads it is but one of many. By choosing to focus, we are allowed to see the play out of emotions in King’s Landing with considerable more depth than the usual 2-3 scenes per thread allows.

We open at sea with Davos and his navy. I like the puke barrel the soldiers heave into. Then we cut to Tyrion in bed with Shae in a nice intimate pre-battle moment of intimacy. Cersei, in contrast, receives cold comfort in the form of poison from her silly and ancient Maester. Bronn parties with his men and a bevy of the usual whores (we keep seeing the same ones). The Hound enters and the two killers lock antlers only to be interrupted by the bells signaling the invasion.

Varys and Ty banter as usual, much to our pleasure. The master of spiders passes crucial information to Ty, and in a subtle nod to later, Ty admits that he trusts his squire Pod. In the books Pod is an actual character, here in the show, he’s just a role. Still, at least he has one.

The bells on the wall are met by drums from the ships. Ty and Bronn find Joff and the Hound in the throne room. Joff continues his obnoxious streak in saying goodbye to Sansa, and she cleverly appeals to his ego to try and egg him into the most dangerous part of the battle.

Everyone sallies forth to watch from the walls. In a very effective sequence we cut from the battlements to the ships and show the sailor’s surprise at finding only one Lannister ship, unmanned and leaking green fluid at that. Bronn sets the whole thing alight with a single flaming arrow and Stannis’ fleet is obliterated in a cloud of green fire. I do have to say, the green fire looked badass (for TV).

One shot is the charm

But undaunted, Stannis leads his surviving men aboard his medieval PT boats and rows for shore.

Meanwhile, we have been cutting back to inside the keep where Cersei has sequestered herself with all her ladies. This is all the more painful for Sansa when the queen singles her out for more attention. The queen’s dress is very interesting: Mostly medieval ladies gown, it does have a bit of Amazonian breast plate action going.

When Stannis mounts his landing Ty sends the Hound to command a defensive party outside the walls. Men storm toward the walls under fire and do their best with ladders. Lancel takes a flesh wound and heads inside where Cersei orders him to drag the king to safety. Cersei continues to talk Sansa and takes notice of Shae, something doesn’t add up for her.

The Hound goes to town butchering the invaders until the fire grows too close and he starts to freak out. This is certainly understandable considering his fiery encounters with his older brother. Stannis is a leader of the old school, and you can’t say he’s a coward because he storms the walls himself and lays waste to the King’s men.

Does anyone have the armor polish?

When the hold returns inside getting too close to the heat he is ordered back out again. He swears off the King entirely and leaves. The invaders batter at the games with a huge battering ram. Joff runs off with his cousin and Ty finds the courage to lead the men in a rousing speech and drag them out himself.

Lancel returns to Cersei again empty handed, and she runs off. Sansa finds her own strength to rally the women and Shae urges Sansa back to her rooms. But guess who’s there? The Hound, fed up with fighting for Joff the Toff and ready to take her back to Winterfell. But Sansa has been conditioned and she is too nervous to jump ship.

Can you toss me that rope on the dock over there?

Ty leads men through the sewers (setup with Varys and the map), comes out behind the invaders, and lays waste to them. He goes to town with his axe. This time around, the producers don’t shy from battle. Finally. Ty is fighting away only to be betrayed and attacked by one of the King’s Guard. He falls badly injured, although not seemingly as badly injured as in the book. More  troops invade and just as soon as all looks lost, a Lannister army arrives to save the day.

Cersei sits with her younger son Tommen on the throne and is about to take poison but Tywin rides in to save the day. So this is where he rode off too last episode!

Overall, this episode burned a lot of money. While it still feels like TV, it’s epic TV and the mix of wide shots and extra pounding action served well to convey the sense of a fairly large battle. I like the scope and intensity allowed by ignoring all the other threads, but I suspect that the final episode will be one rapid-fire whiplash!

See my review of A Dance With Dragons.

If you liked this post, follow me at:

My novels: The Darkening Dream and Untimed

or all my Game of Thrones posts or episode reviews:

Season 1: [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]

Season 2: [11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20]

Season 3: [21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30]

Season 4: [31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40]

Season 5: [41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50]

Season 6: [51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57]

Things that say boom!

Related posts:

  1. Game of Thrones – Episode 17
  2. Game of Thrones – Episode 18
  3. Game of Thrones – Episode 8
  4. Game of Thrones – Episode 7
  5. Game of Thrones – Episode 9
By: agavin
Comments (4)
Posted in: Television
Tagged as: a clash of kings, A Dance with Dragons, a game of thrones, Blackwater, Characters in A Song of Ice and Fire, Episode 19, Episode Review, Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, HBO, Historical fantasy, Major houses in A Song of Ice and Fire, Television, World of A Song of Ice and Fire
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