Game of Thrones Series 7 Episode 6: Beyond The Wall (The One Where We All Said 'Holy Shit' A Lot)

Ok, let’s all just take a minute to focus on the positives: IMMINENT JAIME/BRIENNE REUNION. If my jaw literally dropped in a cartoonish manner when The Thing happened in the episode (the first Thing, not the Coda Thing), it dropped harder and faster when I realised Sansa was sending Brienne to King’s Landing. Inevitably this leads to heartbreak, but I have poor impulse control and boundless optimism when it comes to my stories, so here we are.

SO LET’S TALK ABOUT THE THING. I’ll tell you one thing this episode did really well: a series of Events We* Did Not See Coming mainly because they were batshit insane. I did not expect to see Dragons v White Walkers: The Ultimate Showdown at this stage**, mainly because I’d heard the theories/rumours about the bringing-a-wight-home plan AND the ice zombie dragon plots before they happened, and I thought they were fucking ridiculous. But let’s be clear: they’re only mostly fucking ridiculous. The wight plan has been very much the wong plan (wait, where are you going) from the minute it was brought up. It should have been met with a healthy dose of NOPE FACE from everyone in that cramped Dragonstone map room. The entire point of it was to convince Cersei of the reality of the threat, like Cersei has given any indication that she’s prone to rational thinking, now or ever. What’s painfully clear now is that it was all in the service of creating the ice dragon, which is either a) an important plot point from a future book that we’ll absolutely definitely see next year eh George or b) something Benioff and Weiss wanted to do so much that they didn’t much care how it happened (I’m inclined to think it’s a bit of both).

And hey, it’s only mostly fucking ridiculous because as an idea ‘ice dragon’ levels the playing field a little bit (remember how unstoppable Daenerys looked at the start of this series? Way to fumble a 3-0 lead), and also is, yes, very cool. I’m upset that it means we probably won’t get the three heads of the dragon/three dragon riders motif but maybe I’m expecting neatness from a show that actually has been at its best when it blurs the lines of things where the expectation is that they’ll be more clean cut (witness the Flaming Baggage Train Attack being a high point of this series - any of those characters could have died, and we’d have been sad).

It also moves forward the Jon/Dany*** romance, and with a lot of big clanging lines being dropped all over the shop about how Dany can’t have children, I really hope Jon doesn’t have magical undead sperm or something. I’d be way more on board if it turns out that Mirri Maz Duur - the witch who tricked Dany back in the first season and killed her unborn child with magic, also delivering the news that she would never again give birth - was just straight up lying to fuck with her. Either way, it turns out that if you imagine Jon saying “Auntie” at the end of each line from his bed of pain, the scene feels less like sexual tension and more like an aunt caring for her sick nephew WHICH IS WHAT IT IS. I have such a horrible feeling that the show is planning to get them together and *then* reveal Jon’s parentage, presumably accompanied by a sad trombone noise.

"Who's auntie's brave little soldier, eh? Poor wee thing, all tuckered out." 

Ad - on every level - nauseam.

Probably overarching plot-wise, the important thing here is that, as Beric pointed out, the White Walkers have a borg-style arrangement where killing one of them also kills the wights that it animated, and thus killing the Night’s King would take everyone out, Chitauri-style. This gives a clear endgame for either Jon or Dany or both, but also highlights one of several Idiot Balls that characters in this episode were holding at various times: even without this knowledge, the NK is clearly still a pretty big deal up on that totally exposed platform - why didn’t Danaerys target a little more strategically? Why didn’t the NK, for that matter? Why javelin the moving dragon instead of the stationary one that everyone is planning to make their escape on? Why would the Westerosi Maginficent Seven head out beyond the Wall without backup (literally anything - Wildlings, Night’s Watch, their own fucking raven that they could send off so Gendry didn’t have to do a Mo Farah-beating distance sprint back to Eastwatch) beyond a few Obvious Red Shirts who got Red Shirted so hard and so obviously it made Gene Roddenberry go “oh, honey” from his grave? Because it would destroy the story, seems to be the only reason, and that’s distracting enough to be annoying.

Also distracting enough to be annoying is how poorly the other plot of the episode was handled, namely the ongoing Arya and Sansa conflict. I just don’t get what’s being achieved here: either Arya and Sansa (or Arya or Sansa) are doing a massive fake-out of Littlefinger to expose him once and for all as a Lying Liar who Lies, in which case this is a painful disservice to watch these characters go through these motions, or they’re really actually being strung along by him, which is a painful disservice to seven seasons of character development. Notably absent from the series has been any conservation about what exactly the women have been through while away - if it turns out that they’re playing Littlefinger and this conversation happened offscreen, that’s shitty as I’d rather have seen that conversation than almost anything else; if they haven’t, then that’s even shittier as why the fuck not instead of dropping oblique hints you don’t all have to be Bran, and that includes Bran and where the fuck is Bran and his all-seeing eye anyway is he still on a comedown in the godswood because I swear to the old gods and the new I will cut a bitch. Any which way, I’m inclined to think Sansa is sending Brienne away to protect her from Littlefinger, who clearly has her in his sights as a big obstacle to his Happy Gaslighting Ending with Sansa.**** I’m now rowing back on Cersei as one of my big death predictions for this season (unless next week takes A Turn) but it’s still possible that Littlefinger will get it. It’s fine, he’ll still have a rich and compelling story line when we get the next book (*laughs bitterly forever*).

As a note to end on, I just want to register that Jorah was really the only person I cared about not getting killed in that episode (and Gendry, but that’s more because it would be mean to bring him back after so long only to kill him). I fully expected both Thoros and Beric to go down swinging, and honestly I’m a little surprised that Beric didn’t also - but I guess the Lord of Light isn’t done with him yet (RIP Thoros, a drunkard among drunkards). In my most Most Unpopular GoT Opinion, I was sort of hoping for a swift goodbye to Tormund and an end to all this Brienne nonsense, but that’s a deep indicator of how unpalatable I find that particular plot, because away from all that Tormund is delightful and #pure #ginger #kissedbyfire.

But then also, maybe I’m just a massive hypocrite because I love Jorah, and that is hundo p because Iain Glen plays him with such dignified gravelly pain. I really shouldn’t love this character because isn’t he just another man desperately hanging around an uninterested woman hoping that she’ll love him through sheer persistence? Is it really any better than the Tormund and Brienne storyline? But the first four to five seasons of gradually building trust, of yearningly intoned “Khaleesi”s, of betrayal and friendship and uncertainty, are one of my favourite relationships in the show, and probably one of the most complexly drawn, or at least one of the longest lasting. Their reunion earlier in the season felt textured and complicated in a way that was entirely earned, and it’s a hallmark of the pace that these final two seasons are moving at that we likely won’t get such relationships from any of the new alliances being forged.

Oh buddy.

Anyway, the stage is set for next week’s season finale (a whole 90 minutes of it!) to be some good old fashioned vintage Intrigue At The Red Keep style GoT with it being literally anyone’s guess how all this goes down. I’ll leave you with a single word of excitement though: CLEGANEBOWL.


*We = self (have read books) and partner (has not read books, plays on phone during show, asks me what just happened at a rate of knots, is still alive only because I really like explaining Game of Thrones)
**For a hot minute there I thought we were going to get The Climatic High Fantasy Battle then and there, and the subsequent final season would be given over to King’s Landing intrigue and people skulking in corridors, and in that moment I really, strongly wanted that to be the case. It won’t happen though, mainly because it’s harder to write, and B&W want to go and make their super sensitive hot take on slavery (it was bad, you guys).
*** Look, can you be bothered to type and spell check ‘Daenerys’ every time?
****By the way, did we ever get any follow up on Littlefinger’s ‘I want to be king of everything’ speech? Like, how he was going to make that happen? Because he is so far from the Iron Throne. The throne is a dot to him. (I think probably this is just another indicator of the show not quite knowing what to do with him in open warfare storylines given that castle-based skulking is more his metier.)

Game of Boners Returns! Series 7 Episodes 1 & 2 ('Dragonstone' & 'Stormborn')

Game of Thrones is back! Let's be having you.* (Content warning: Game of Thrones, so contains discussion of both rape and violence.)

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DUM DUM da da DUM DUM da da DUM DUM da da daaaaaaaaaa and etcetera FOREVER (literally forever now that they've added lengthy 'previously on' bits before the credits, you fully have time to make a cup of tea). Oh show, I've missed you. The most problematic of the faves.

I feel like Arya's been very front and centre in the first two eps, so let's start there. First of all, I must reluctantly announce that Maisie William's woefully bad casting in the last but one series of Doctor Who has had a bit of an Emperor's New Clothes affect on me, so I'm not quite as on board with her as an actor as I have been in previous seasons, especially since her Tiny Badass routine has been usurped by TINY LADY MORMONT WHO IS THE TINIEST OF THEM ALL. But it's also the show's fault, because they do quite shamefully trade on how much we want to see a preteen psychopath Fuck Up Dem Lannisters. (Ed Sheeran cameo sidebar: just the worst. I at least thought Arya might kill him, which would then have made the whole thing instantly gratifying and completely justified, but no. She bonded with him instead, which I feel is the worst thing you can do with Ed Sheeran.) Secondly, every time she says "I'm going home", I become more convinced that the Starks are ♪never ever ever getting back together♪. Was this the purpose of the Nymeria cameo? Will being disowned by her direwolf, a hugely powerful symbol of her connection to her family and the north, change Arya's mind again and send her riding south for vengeance instead? I kind of hope so, and her entire role this season is just ping-ponging back and forth between the Cheery Humanising Lannister Soldiers and Byemeria the Direwolf until she gets dizzy.

Speaking of T'North, there's an untenable leadership situation a-brewing between Jon Snow and Sansa, as they continue to have massive public disputes about how to proceed in front of the entire CLP group of assembled Stark bannermen. Could they not have had these chats prior to the town hall? Are there no other rooms in Winterfell? Anyway, I'm default on Sansa's side on most of these because how is she not Queen in the North already? Surely her claim is more legit than Sad Jon Snow's? Anyway, I feel like Dark Sansa is being foreshadowed pretty heavily, which I am here for, so long as nothing tragic happens like she becomes an actual antagonist and Jon Snow kills her in battle. I don't think I could take that level of lip-wobbling woobie-age from Everyone's Favourite Secret Targaryan.

Down Saaf, Cersei is legit terrible at queening, and that is shame because she was at least semi-competent at some point (I think? It was all so long ago. I've done a whole degree since this show started.) I hope she gets some better stuff soon because Lena Headey is one of the best actors left on the show and she looks bored af. You can put it down to the natural entropy of a show in its seventh season but it's HBO. These characters should be getting *more* complex and layered, not walking across presumably still wet floor paintings of Westeros and wilfully misunderstanding what a dynasty is. I also may never get over how much the show has mangled Jaime Lannister, who I swear on my Star Wars posters is one of the books' most interesting characters. Any hope I had of them resurrecting his sort-of redemption arc is pretty much dead in the water by now. Thank god for Nikolaj Coster-Waldau anyway, who is manfully doing A Lot.

My jury is very out on Euron Greyjoy. On the one hand, it's always nice to have a villain on the show who actually seems to understand, nay, enjoy some of the requirements of being a villain (camp delivery and leather trousers, I guess), but on the other say with me now the sacred words of House Jane Shakespeare: No-one cares about the Greyjoys. Something something Batman.

HAVING SAID THAT, Yara is 100% going to die this season and I'm super bummed about that because it definitely discounts Dany & Yara: Sapphic Queens of All Westeros. What with their capture at the end of episode two, I think it's pretty clear that she and Ellaria Sand are going to suffer before they get strategically cut from the show to streamline the narrative killed off: I think there was a showrunner comment along the lines that Euron was going to make Ramsay Bolton look like a kitten so like oh good yay I'm sure we're all super enthused about seeing more women die horribly. (Serious side note: Are we still at this point, show? I genuinely think you believe you're doing something positive for women by constantly representing how shitty their lives are, but that's the least fantastical element of a fantasy show so cut it out, I come here for back-stabbing also front-stabbing ifyouknowwhatImean.)

At the other end of the map, Dany et all have finally arrived, having stayed in strict formation on that boat across the entire season break.

Loved the Varys scene, very sneaky rehabilitation of a character who mostly had skulk-offs with Littlefinger in the Dark Places of King's Landing in the early seasons. I guess there's a salutary political lesson for us all: despise the monarchy but work from within, you get a yearly bonus, despise the monarchy and try to bring them down, you get deaded with wildfire. We also had some fire of the in-the-pants variety with the consummation of several seasons of really lovely scenes between Nathalie Emmanuel and Jacob Anderson as Missandei and Grey Worm. You need someone to have a little fun sometimes, and I thought it was really well done, not to mention historically notable for maybe being the only instance of boobs on the show not to feel totally gratuitous. *fans self*

I haven't really talked much about Tyrion. Huh. Well, that maybe says a lot.

Who else? Sam Tarly, working' nine till five, what a way to make a maester. I'm not a huge Sam Fan but actually the scenes with Jim Broadbent have been pretty great and overwhelmingly gross. Good thing Oldtown Library has that Restricted Section, I think we've all been tired of waiting for a) someone to finally piece together that Dragons + White Walkers = crispy undead barbecue, and b) Iain Glenn to get his fine face back and take those gravelly tones off to Dany's side where he belongs so he can gloomily yet yearningly intone "Khaleesi" to his heart's content.

Elsewhere, RIP Sand Snakes, you were an absolute disaster from beginning to end, and that's all the eulogising I'm going to give. They died as they lived: confusing, superfluous, and tackily written.

The #GiveBrienneMoreToDo2017 campaign starts here. We all love Gwendoline Christie, we all love Brienne, she's one of the few truly honourable souls in a corrupt world going through a painful awakening yadda yadda yadda, GIVE HER MORE STUFF.  And by 'more stuff' - and I think this is my only legit *rant* thus far this series - I do not mean this Tormund eye-fucking disaster. I find it so uncomfortable, both in the way it's done and the response to it in reviews and on Twitter**: it's not sexy fun tension, she has repeatedly looked uncomfortable with his advances, Gwen Christie has said as much herself, and yet. And yet. Do you know why "Nevertheless, he persisted" would never become an iconic phrase? Because THAT'S WHAT MEN DO. (Also, yes, Brienne hearts Jaime 4evs and you can't take that from me.***) My worry is that it was originally intended as a bit of levity (though, again, I don't really find a huge dude making creepy faces that funny, even if Brienne can obvi take care of herself) but it's had such a weirdly positive reaction that the writers will just run with it and throw in something wildly out of character like a stormy we're-about-to-die battlefield snog, which would absolutely be the worst thing the show has ever done, including the Sand Snakes and entirely all of Ramsay Bolton.

Anyway, Christie's nailed it so far, obv, especially re Littlefinger, "Why are you still here?" She spoke for us all. Having said that, it's been rumoured that Littlefinger might die this season and please, show, no. He is a sad imitation of BookFinger but I would be so sad not to have him around anymore, even if his entire role this season is for the population of Winterfell to form an orderly queue to punch him in the mouth (yas Jon). As much as I know I should be grossed out by his Sansession, I am morbidly curious to see how far it goes.  I don't feel like there's a potential rape lurking down that avenue, not least because of the uproar the last time that happened to Sansa and how much it would derail the character she's being built into, but there is an interesting question over a character who has essentially managed to achieve everything he's tried thus far, so it would be great to see what happens when he's absolutely, finally denied the thing he wants the most. And maybe it would revive Aidan Gillen from the dead, because he's looking like he checked out two seasons ago.

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So that's all for now. Will I do this every week? I have quite a lot of work to do, so probably. We are heading into the endgame now and some real heavyweights are going to start getting offed before we get to the Dragons v White Walkers smackdown next year. My predictions for this series: Cersei, Grey Worm, and yeah, maaaaybe Littlefinger. But, excitingly, it's still really anyone's game.


*I am trying to write a Moffat retrospective, which may encompass some kind of (excited) response to Jodie Whittaker's casting, but I keep getting sidetracked by peak This Blog shit like making dumb jokes about Littlefinger's accent.
**Also on Bafflingly Popular GoT Opinions: it turns out many people are rooting for Jon Snow and Daenerys to get it on. I know it's all but inevitable at this point (it's A Song of Ice and Fire, I get it George) but, like, she's his full aunt. Guess y'all are fine with it when it's not Lannisters, huh?
***Just to end on a more fun note than unwanted sexual advances, go and watch this four minute video of Gwendoline Christie and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau interviewing each other in actual real life and I defy you - I defy you - not to come out shipping Jaime and Brienne.