*some explicit content may be covered in this recap*
Let's begin the six week run of episodes by reviewing and ranking them each week from best to worst! The best is also the worst this week because we only have one to rank. Want to see our full rankings for Season 8? Go ahead, but there's only one for now.
Recap and Analysis:
The most notable part about last night's episode was the intro. Not only did it feature three locations, but it was totally remastered and ran through the inside of both Winterfell and King's Landing. When I saw this intro I realized that this seasons budget will be bigger and better than every season before it.
This episode primarily featured reunions and characters talking in rooms. I personally think GOT is at its best when it is about the politics and characters debating each other so I was very satisfied with this first episode. So while it was very light on action, it had some great character moments. The show jumped around and covered every single main character interacting with some other character in some ways. Because of that, the episode was a little rushed and I wish we had some more time with some more reunions, but I also understand how difficult it is to bounce around with all of these different characters. After all, we have been doing this for seven seasons now.
The show also did a good job of reminding us about the threats to our heroes both in the north and south. This re-contextualized how real this threat truly is. I think it was important for them to do that since it had been over a year since the last episode and not everyone had re-watched the whole show like I did.
The episode began with Jon and Dany's march in unison to Winterfell. The show subtly referenced the pilot episode throughout it and the show's first season as a little boy tried to climb higher so he could see the army arriving - this reminded me of Bran and Arya in season 1 . It was also cool to see Arya watching and waiting for Jon like she did as she waited for the Baratheons to arrive as she had done so many years ago. It reminded me how far this show really has come.
However, once the marching stopped and Jon and Dany actually arrived in Winterfell they could not have had a colder reception. As we would expect, the northerners were not pleased to see a Lannister and a Targaryen marching with Jon. The last time the Lannisters were north they pushed Bran out of a window and the last interaction the Starks actually had with the Lannisters - until Jon and Tyrion met at Dragonstone - was the Red Wedding.
The last time the Targaryens and Starks interacted was before and during Robert's Rebellion in king's Landing. There the Mad King killed Brandon and Rickard Stark in his throne room. The north also still believes that Lyanna Stark was kidnapped and raped by Rhaegar Targaryen. Obviously the north has every reason ever to distrust both the Lannisters and Targaryens. I would be pretty pissed if I was them riding north with the man I named my King.
The Sansa and Dany meeting was good as I could have expected. Dany tries to play Sansa by complementing her and Sansa is just not having it. Dany has never really had to deal with another powerful female ruler before so this will be interesting to see how Dany deals with this new dynamic. This isn't the first time though Dany has had ruled in a place where she was not accepted. This was basically the entire plot of Season 5 in Mereen. Dany usually burns with adversarial foes by burning them. She can't do that this time around so she will have to adjust her strategy in order to win the North over. I'm curious to see how she does and how her tactics play out.
In the Great Hall in Winterfell Lyanna Mormont immediately calls out Jon for bending the knee and for trusting the North's sworn enemies (she's not wrong for pointing this out). Tyrion tries to calm everyone by saying his sister is coming north to help them and he gets booed off the stage like a bad stand-up comic.
Sansa and Tyrion have a rather cold reunion in the next scene and Sansa calls Tyrion dumb because he actually took Cersei at her word that she would help him and Daenerys. This is another loss in Tyrion's long list of Ls dating back to last season.
Arya and Jon's reunion was up next and it was absolutely the best. She jumped up right into his arms like she did in season 1. It was absolutely adorable and it made me so happy to see it! Their warm reunion was short-lived though as Jon realized that Arya is even on Sansa's side and not Dany's so he will have to work hard to win her over as well.
On to King's Landing as Cersei awaits her Golden Company and is disappointed to find out she will not be getting the elephants she expects. Also the news from Qyburn that the dead have gotten through the Wall doesn't seem to phase her at all which is terrifying to see because it is so stupid on her part. It's also scary because she must have something planned if she said "good" in response to finding out about the dead. In these scene we also find out Yara Greyjoy is alive and that Euron plans to have sex with the queen.
We also meet Harry Strickland, the captain of the Golden Company. In the books Strickland has some plot-line involving Jon Connington and the fake Aegon Targaryen but that probably won't come up in the show so don't worry about his baggage. What is important though, is his history. He was born in exile after his grandfather's support for the Blackfire rebellion in Westeros failed. He was ten raised amongst the Golden Company where he rose to the rank of Captain. In "A Dance with Dragons", Aegon and Jon use the Golden Company as an army to try to conquer Westeros. It seems like Cersei is taking their place in the show.
One thing I do think is about Harry Strickland important though are the thoughts Jon Connington had regarding him in the "ADWD". Jon thinks to himself "Harry looked little like a warrior" - Connington, Ch 24, pg 324. He also notes that Harry was "better at hammering out contracts that hammering on foes". So he appears to be sort of a coward when it comes to war. We'll see how this plays out in the show. As for the Golden Company they are famed sell-swords who have never broken a contract. They are probably better than the Unsullied in terms of skill but as of now we do not know the exact terms of the contract since they were made with Euron and not Cersei herself. Will he betray her? Euron promised the Iron Islands the Seven Kingdoms. Does that mean he and Cersei will be married as they rule together? Or does that mean he plans to take her out and rules by himself? I guess we'll see as the season unfolds.
Back to the plot though; surprisingly, Cersei actually consents to having Euron in her bed and they have some weird banter about how he compares sexually to Jaime and Robert. The biggest takeaway from this scene is that Cersei is definitely pregnant because she clearly fakes drinking wine so Euron is not suspicious.
Qyburn also gives Bron a crossbow to kill Tyrion and Jaime. Will he do it? I doubt it.
Meanwhile, Theon rescues Yara from the ship and in the ultimate form of irony as Euron loses a key piece because he was having sex just as Yara lost her ships because she was busy hooking up with a Sand Sister. Also good job Theon. You did something good! Not only did you rescue Yara but now she's going back to conquer the Iron Islands which means we'll probably never have to see them again. First B-plot resolved!
Back to Winterfell as Tyrion talks to Davos and Varys about how he's starting to feel left out because no one is listening to his ideas. Varys tells him that's what happens when you get old so just deal with it. Good advice if I do say so myself.
Then a huge moments happens! Jon rides a dragon with Dany! The CGI wasn't great but we did get some iconic moments as Dany said some words that eerily mirrored Ygritte's in the cave from Season 3 and you can tell that makes him a little uncomfortable.
What really does it though is Drogon watching them hook up.
This scene did a good job of showing us that their relationship is still young and that they do really care for each other.
Then we get another reunion! Gendry, Arya, and The Hound meet up again. I wish we would have had a few more minutes with these three because they have all been through so much together. I thought that this reunion had the most potential but had the weakest execution of them all.
Next we have a spirited debate between Sansa and Jon and they argue over whether Jon simply bending the knee to Daenerys was the right thing to do. I thought this scene worked well for two reasons. First, it really shows how much Jon has flipped to being on Dany's side. Before he left for Dragonstone last season he was (besides a few arguments) completely in-line with Sansa and was skeptical of Daenerys as a queen. Now he is defending Dany against a skeptical Sansa. He also reminds us that he didn't want to to be King and that Dany will be a good queen. I'm not sure about that but they do need her to defeat the Night King.
This next scene is one of the best in the episode as we get a character meet-up we needed but never knew we wanted. Sam met Dany and reunited with Jorah. This meet-up was absolutely essential because it went from a great scene full of thanks to one full of heartbreak for Sam as he learns about the death of his father and brother. Sam had such a complicated relationship with his family because they hated him but, because Sam is such a nice person, he still loved them anyway. This scene also make Sam despise Dany and motivates him to tell Jon that he should be the ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. Finally this scene works so well because you can see the disappointment in Jorah's eyes as Dany has to tell Sam the news of his family. I hope that this scene serves as a way for Dany to truly understand the consequences of her actions. She sees firsthand the effects of her reign can have on innocent and lovable people.
And now we have the moment. "It's time to tell Jon the truth", says Bran. The camera stays on Jon the whole time as Sam tells him the news in front of the crypt of Ned Stark (which made me think of this little nugget).
The scene is complicated for Jon because, not only does he find out about his parentage (which he initially denies), but he also has to deal with the consequences of Dany's executions as well.
Their reunion, when they first embraced is almost as touching as when Jon and Arya were reunited. This scene is complicated and goes from happiness to sadness to anger to confusion so quickly for Jon. Now Jon must deal with the fallout of this news. To end it, Sam once again doubts Dany's ability to rule. Now everyone Jon has ever cared about in the North - Sansa, Arya, and Sam - doubt Dany's ability to rule which may start to plant the seed of doubt in Jon's mind as well. Like Sam says: "you gave up your crown to save your people. Would she do the same?". The short answer to that is no. No she would not.
We end that scene and cut to Last Heart home of the Umbers where we learn that they definitely regret not coming back to Winterfell to fight with Jon. This scene had a good jump scare, some humor with Tormund and the men of the Night's Watch
Plus we learn some more about the White Walkers. Baric tells us that the symbols the White Walkers have been making all mean something and that it is a message. So what does the message mean? Is it for someone? Is it a house sigil?
I noticed a striking similarity last night as I watched the episode:
It is highly possible that these two symbols are entirely coincidental. I think that it is more likely that not that they are. It could also be a message that they are coming for Dany because she is the only one to stop them. It could also simply be an intimidation tactic as it has been in the past.
As you can see this message has been used over and over again by the White Walkers. I think it's probably just their version of a house sigil. Maybe it means something more? The show showed us this for a reason and we have seen it over and over again so it must be important.
In the final scene of the show Jaime arrives at Winterfell and, in the most Curb Your Enthusiasm way possible, sees the one person he didn't want to see: Bran.
The episode had a ton of expectations and hype going into it. I thought this episode, as a whole, handled most of the expectations well. Many of the reunions were very touching and it was really nice to see characters together again that have not seen each other in literally years. We got some good hugs but we also created some tension with Dany and the northerners. It sets up some drama for next week and I am interested to see if they can all resolve their differences by the time the White Walkers arrive or if their inability to cooperate leads to the loss of Winterfell in Episode 3 or 4.
Thing to watch for going forward that you may not have noticed:
Tyrion continued to take loss after loss this weekend and I wonder how long he can keep this up before people see him as just a useless Lannister with no good ideas. Essentially since Season 5 Tyrion has had bad idea after bad idea. He thought he could outsmart the masters of Yunkai. He was wrong on that front. He was outwitted by Jaime in war, he had the dumb idea to go north of the Wall which resulted in Dany losing a dragon, and he was played by Cersei into thinking she would actually help him. When Tyrion mentioned an idea of a succession plan to Dany (Season 6, Episode 6) she looked like she was ready to kill him for what he said so she has an inherent reason to distrust him now.
Now Sansa is doubting him, Dany and Jon aren't listening to him and everyone in the north hates him because he is a Lannister. Will Tyrion rebound or will he keep getting boxed out of important roles within Dany and Jon's council. Will this cause a change in Tyrion's character going forward. We all know he has a very dark side to him which could start to come out. He said he wished he could watch everyone in King's Landing burn at his trial, he killed Shae and he killed his father. His brother Jaime is showing up at the right time because he can help Tyrion in a land where he is a foreigner to the political ways. However, with Jaime on trial next week, this could potentially isolate Tyrion even more or even turn him against Dany and Jon if they imprison of kill Jaime as a result.
This may be nothing and I may have been over-analyzing with Tyrion. It was just a theme I noticed this episode and it seems like something that has been coming for a while. If Tyrion does continue to have problems influencing the actions of others will this have dire consequences for the rest of our heroes? Will Tyrion propose a plan to fight the White Walkers that no one listens to because no one trusts his ideas anymore? What if thousands die at Winterfell needlessly because of a bad plan Tyrion put together or because of no one listens to a plan Tyrion had that could have saved everyone? This would create even more strife and divide our protagonists even further. It would be a very Game of Thrones move to create divisions and make the audience choose between Dany, the north, and Tyrion with only one or two of those three coming out on top. For the record, this is all heavy speculation and theorizing. I could be wrong. I'm just saying though, GOT is very good as dividing our main heroes and making us pick a side or at least feel empathy towards either side of a conflict.
Little thing I liked from this week:
Baric was clever and used his flaming sword as a flashlight. I'm glad he had the intuitiveness to do so.
Sometimes the little thing is really that little. Also I like how Gendry wasn't just a master at forging dragonglass yet. It'll take him some time to get it perfect.
Reunion Power Rankings:
1. Jon and Sam
2. Jon and Arya
3. Jaime and Bran
4. Arya, Gendry, and the Hound
5. Tyrion and Sansa
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Episode Rank:
It's the only one in the season so far, so...
1. Winterfell
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