Game of Thrones
concluded what’s arguably its best season with one of its finest — and
the bloodiest — episodes, “The Winds of Winter,” which excelled in
dramatic storytelling just as last week’s “Battle of the Bastards”
raised the bar for action sequences. Though the finale shifted from the
battlefield, the events were, if anything, far more seismic, with
game-changing revelations and huge moves from every corner of the realm
that established some very clear new conflicts going into season 7.
Just look at all that happened in
those 69 minutes: Dany set sail for Westeros, Dorne joined forces with
both Dany and the Tyrells, Arya returned to Westeros and crossed a major
name off her list, Jon became King in the North, and Cersei blew up her
enemies and then claimed the Iron Throne for herself. There was death
and destruction galore, but it was also rather gleeful death and
destruction, as favorite characters mostly got exactly what they wanted.
So give this recap your best evil smile and let’s start with…
King’s Landing: The producers and director Miguel
Sapochnik smartly took advantage of the extra length of the finale by
opening with a 25-minute sequence all set in one location instead of
jumping around the map.
Thrones normally only does a sustained
focus on one setting for a battle. In a way, a battle is exactly what
this was, yet a very unique kind of battle. The entire tone, pacing and
score of this sequence is unlike anything we’ve seen on
Thrones before.
We start by hearing church bells, which is appropriate, because
there’s a whole lot of funerals coming soon – including the death of the
church itself. We see Cersei put on a black leather dress with a chain
across the front that’s unlike anything we’ve seen her wear before. Have
you ever wondered what Cersei would look like in armor? That’s sort of
what this is; she’s preparing for war and this is her battle-dress. Only
instead of being on the front lines like Jon Snow, she’s a general who
has set her plans into motion and is going to sit at her window, drink
wine, and watch and wait — finally looking like the Disney-esque Evil
Queen we’ve always suspected was in her.
In the king’s chambers, Tommen is ready to go to the trial and seal
his mom’s fate. The Mountain blocks him from leaving. The Mountain
doesn’t say anything, but also doesn’t need to. There has been so much
speculation over The Mountain’s ultimate purpose this season. Many
assumed he would fight for Cersei in trial by combat because that’s what
the characters told us would happen. Maybe he would fight The Hound?
But while fun to watch, that would have also been repetitive — he
already fought for the crown vs. The Viper in season 4. Nobody — and
this is how truly unpredictable
Thrones is — nobody has guessed that The Mountain would spend the season 6 finale creepily babysitting Tommen.
Pycelle gets a message that the
king wants to see him, and he goes to Qyburn’s lair. The Grand Maester
has survived in the Red Keep’s court for a very long time. He’s one of
the few whose services goes all the way back to the Mad King. He’s
craftily acted the part as a weakling sycophant — nonthreatening and
supportive — always ready to switch allegiances when the crown is placed
on a new head. This time, however, Pycelle chose poorly, picking Tommen
over Cersei. He pays for it now.
Throughout this build-up, Ramin
Djawadi’s score, with delicate piano, has been ebbing in and out of
these scenes. The music now ramps up as the bloodshed begins. The chorus
of children singing makes what happens next all the more
creepy: Pycelle gets shanked to death by a gang of children.
In the Sept, we see the major players have gathered. There’s the High
Sparrow, Lancel Lannister, Margaery Tyrell, and Ser Loras. Ah, poor Ser
Loras. He’s a broken man, ready to say anything to stop the pain. He’ll
be put out of his misery soon. Loras says there’s no need for a
trial; he’s ready to “confess” everything. He’s willing to sacrifice his
title and future to become a member of the Faith Militant. The High
Sparrow has their cult’s star carved into his forehead to help keep him
on board. Margaery is upset — that wasn’t part of their deal, she says,
which confirms for us that there was indeed some backroom haggling going
on between them. The Sparrow says he’s fine, he’s joining the faith,
that’s their mark, what’s the big deal? He has a way of making whatever
he wants sound reasonable.
But then, Margaery starts to get concerned. No Cersei? No Tommen? That’s not good — for them.
“Something’s wrong,” she tells the Sparrow, who sends Lancel to fetch Cersei.
He takes a few Faith Militant to get her. You would think after their
previous attempt to extract Cersei from the Red Keep they would have
brought more men. On the way out Lancel “catches” one of Qyburn’s
“little bird” spies. Lancel gives chase and he’s led to a dungeon by the
Sept. The Little Bird stabs him in his spine, which looks horrible.
Lancel realizes he’s by a massive cache of wildfire, that infamously
explosive napalm-like substance Tyrion used to sink most of Stannis’
fleet during the Battle of the Blackwater back in season 2. The Mad King
had an enormous stash created when he planned to burn the city down
before his order was halted to Jaime. This is the discovery by Qyburn’s
Little Birds that he and Cersei discussed previously, all cryptic-like.
Lancel crawls forward toward a candle burning down, he’s trying to
blow it out and stop what’s about to be an enormous explosion. He almost
makes it. In a terrific shot, you see the green flash in the reflection
of his eye.
Back at the trial, Margaery tries to leave, but she’s blocked by the
Faith Militant just like Tommen was blocked by The Mountain. Nobody is
leaving their respective rooms! Margaery doesn’t know what’s going to
happen, exactly, but has correctly calculated they are somehow totally
screwed. “She’s beaten you; she knows the consequences of not being
here,” she tells the befuddled Sparrow. He’s too proud to admit he’s
wrong, brought down by one of the seven deadly sins, and it’s ironic
given that the reputation he tries so hard to cultivate is that of a man
who is humble.
Margaery doesn’t want to spend her final moments with the High
Sparrow, so she goes to her brother. She holds onto Loras as the
explosion comes. We see the High Sparrow obliterated. The entire Sept
explodes. Crown beats church. Don’t mess with Cersei.
And then we see Cersei, wearing a little gleeful smile. Green
wildfire for her green eyes. Looking out her window, it’s like she’s
watching the
Game of Thrones finale along with us, and loving
how it’s all turning out. All her local enemies have been wiped out, all
at once. I wonder, if Cersei could have opted to spare Margaery from
the fire, if she would have? Probably not.
Actually, they’re not
all her local enemies. There’s one left. And somehow Cersei made certain she wasn’t in the Sept when it went boom.
In a dungeon, she has Septa Unella captive. She promised Unella last
season that her face will be the last she ever sees. This scene could be
the most guilty of guilty pleasures that
Thrones has ever
served up. Consider: A woman is tied to a table being tortured. We
should be horrified. Yet we’re almost as giddy as Cersei, who
waterboards her with wine. Confess! Confess! “Confess it felt good
beating me, starving me,” Cersei says. And then, Cersei herself
confesses, to all her sins — killing King Robert, having kids with
Jaime. “It felt good to watch them burn … even confessing feels
good under the right circumstances,” she marvels. Oh academy voters,
confess you love Lena Headey’s performance and give her an Emmy
already.
Unella says she’s prepared to die. Cersei assures this won’t happen for a long time. “This is your god now
,”
Cersei says and brings in The Mountain, who we can be confident will do
all sorts of horrid things to her. As Cersei exits, she says,
perfectly, “shame, shame, shame…”
This is a scene that’s sure to explode the mind of anybody attempting to lasso
Thrones
into a simplistic frame. Cersei is the Strong Female Character who just
took control, without her brother or uncle’s help, and solved her
immediate problems by killing truly evil and totally innocent people
alike. Then she gets revenge on a sadistic woman by subjecting her to a
gruesome fate that we can probably assume will include every variety of
assault. Cersei is a complicated and oft-vicious character doing what
she wants to survive. The show isn’t going to tell you how to feel about
it or expect us to feel a uniform or simplistic emotion. She’s our Tony
Soprano, our Walter White, our Michael Corleone — except a woman. Her
gender shouldn’t make a difference. If it feels like it does, it’s
interesting to wonder why it should.
Tommen, like Pycelle, backed the
wrong person, and he knows it. He picked his wife over his mother. He
fully expected his mom was going to die today, or something just as
terrible, and apparently made some kind of peace with that. Instead his
beloved wife is dead. Give the kid some credit: He’s been so indecisive
so many times. For once, Tommen knows precisely what to do. Without
hesitating, he takes off his crown and leaps off his balcony. At least
he gets to avoid an excruciatingly awkward chat with his mom. Who will
feed Ser Pounce?
Once again,
Thrones told us exactly who was going to die in
advance, and we didn’t fully believe it until it happened. Melisandre
cursed the three kings (Joffrey, Renly, Robb) and each died. Last season
opened with Cersei’s flashback showing the prophecy of Maggy the Frog,
who told her she’d have three children who would all perish. Joffrey’s
fate was largely beyond Cersei’s control, really. Myrcella was more
directly due to her actions — worriedly sending Jaime to rescue her. And
Tommen’s fate was the most direct cause-and-effect of all. How much of
this is prophecy vs. free will is left for us to figure out.
Cersei sees Tommen’s body. She’s sad, but not surprised. And, well,
this actually presents an opportunity. She decides to burn him, because
that’s what she does now. Burn them all.
The Twins Hey, it’s Walder Frey in his gloomy murder-castle — or what would happen if you made Argus Filch the Hogwarts headmaster.
He’s having a chat with Jaime Lannister, a man who has sex
with his own sister, crippled a young boy and killed his cousin, yet
even Jaime finds this guy utterly despicable. Jaime points out that
Walder hasn’t really accomplished anything aside from murdering
defenseless wedding guests. Whenever Walder needs help he calls the
Lannisters to bail him out.
A comely serving girl gives Jaime a couple looks, almost
flirtatous. That we later learn this girl is actually Arya Stark makes
that so much weirder.
Later, when Walder is alone, the girl comes back. Walder
wants to know where his sons are. The girl says they’re right here, and
reveals they’re… cooked into the food. I didn’t even think Arya had any
baking skills. And I’m not sure how she could have pulled this off
unless she murdered his entire staff unnoticed and then spent hours
single-handedly making dinner. But we’re too enthralled by what’s going
on to think too much about the fact she just chopped up Walder Frey’s
sons and then cooked them into bread. (Also: Christ, Arya…).
It’s like a literal twist on Westerosi “guest right.” A
host isn’t supposed to harm his own guests, especially once they are
served bread and salt, a tradition Walder Frey violated when he killed
Arya’s mom and brother. So Arya here has taken his bread and made it
into a cannibalistic dish, corrupting it literally, like he did
metaphorically.
Arya whips off her mask and reveals herself. “The last
thing you’re ever going to see is a Stark smiling down at you as you
die,” she explains. She’s very closely echoing Cersei to Septa Unella,
which is quite interesting. She slits his throat — precisely like how
Catelyn Stark was killed.
Viewers cheer. The North remembers. Arya smiles coldly. This episode is rather big on evil smiling.
Dorne: Yup, Dorne! We haven’t seen Dorne since the season premiere.
Lady Olenna has figured the enemy of her enemy is her friend and went to Ellaria Sand to make a pact.
One of the Sand Snakes tries to speak up and the Queen of Thorns
smacks her down, and we all chortle happily. “You look like an angry
little boy … do shut up, dear, let the grown-ups talk,” she scolds them.
The Dorne storylines get a lot of flack from fans, but we’re totally
willing to spend time in Dorne if it means Olenna regularly dissing the
Sand Snakes.
Olenna says something quite foreboding: She’s not interested in
survival. She wants vengeance. That’s when that man behind the curtain,
Varys, reveals himself. “Fire and blood,” says Varys, the Targaryen
words.
As if Dany didn’t have enough advantages going to Westeros, now she’s
enlisting Dorne and the Tyrells, too. Cersei always thinks everybody
wants to kill her, and it’s looking like next season that’s actually
going to be the case.
The Citadel: Samwell arrives in Oldtown to begin his
education to become a maester. He enters the library and has a total
nerd-gasm at the rows and rows of books. Beautiful. But poor Gilly.
She’s probably not getting any for a while. Time enough at last,
Samwell.
The Wall: Fans expected Bran to show up at
Winterfell, but no. They get to The Wall, and Benjen / Coldhands says he
cannot stay with him. That’s when we’re reminded that The Wall was
built to keep out the White Walkers, and there’s a spell on it that
prevents anybody who is undead from passing. Then we think about Jon’s
quip to Dolorous Edd about not knocking down The Wall while he’s gone.
Which leads us to think:
Before this show ends, that Wall is so coming down.
Bran then goes to the weirwood tree. It turns out Bran can get online
at any heart tree, not just the one at the Three-Eyed Raven’s cave.
They’re like Internet cafes for his vision-brain.
So Bran decides to finish that really exciting vision that was left
unfinished on his psychic DVR from so many episodes back. You know, the
one at the tower?
Tower of Joy: We waste no time. We’re already on the
stairs following young Ned Stark to the chamber where his sister Lyanna
lays dying amid a pool of blood. And everything happens basically as
fans expected: “Promise me, Ned…” she says. She whispers something in
his ear. We don’t hear what it is. Around the world fans are cranking up
the volume on their TVs. And then we see her baby. Young Jon Snow.
Watching all this, Bran Stark is like our avatar, we see
he’s realizing the implications. Jon Snow’s mother wasn’t some rando
battlefield hookup, but rather his aunt’s child. Which means Ned Stark
wasn’t Jon Snow’s father (We can assume that, right? Even in this
show?). And it means, also presumably, Prince Rhaegar Targaryen is the
father. Which, if correct — and we don’t know the full paternal story
100 percent here — Jon Snow is half Targaryen and half Stark. Born out
of wedlock, presumably (Rhaegar was already married), but still: a noble
with a major claim to the Iron Throne. This also means he’s Dany’s
nephew, so chew on that. If you’ve ever wondered what “L+R=J” means but
haven’t looked it up because you hate math, its Lyanna plus Rhaegar
equals Jon (and no, there’s no baby Meera Reed, c’mon, they’re not
Skywalkers, even for fan theories that one was silly). (We get far more
detailed on the TOJ scene in a separate story, linked at the end.)
This point is made eloquently by zooming in on the child’s eyes and then back out again on…
Winterfell: … Jon Snow’s eyes. We’re going a little out of order here, but this is what goes down in Winterfell:
First, Jon has a meeting with Melisandre and Ser Davos,
who can’t hold in his secret any longer. Davos has long had it out for
Melisandre, and he finally has a smoking gun — or charred stag, rather —
suggesting her guilt. He tells Jon she had little Shireen burned alive.
We have never seen Davos so upset. He says he loved Shireen like his
own daughter. His pain is magnified since he’s a man who lost his own
sons to war. So the loss of Shireen too, so senselessly, is particularly
upsetting. “I didn’t lie, I was wrong,” she says, but cold comfort that
would be to Shrieen. Davos wants her executed.
“I’ve been ready to die for many years,” she says, and you
get the feeling maybe she’s actually wanted to die but couldn’t. Jon is
faced with a tough decision: Keep Melisandre, and lose Ser Davos and
have a child-killer in your inner circle. Or kill Melisandre, and
execute the woman who brought him back to life and a potential helper
against the Night KIng. Tricky. So he makes a compromise measure, and
exiles her. But Davos warns: If he sees her again, he’ll kill her. Not
sure he can do that, but it’s a pledge that we suspect carries some
weight. Given her age and overall witchiness, I bet getting banished
from a group is something that’s probably happened to her many times
before.
A white raven arrives from The Citadel, which signals the
meteorologist maesters at the Old Town weather center have made it
official. Winter has come. Jon then gets as close as he ever does to a
one liner: “Well, father always promised, didn’t he?”
Sansa apologizes for not telling him about the Knights of
the Vale. Jon says he’s giving her the big master bedroom (awww). The
bedroomm is probably not much of a sacrifice — even the second-best room
at Winterfell must be like staying at the Grand Wailea compared to the
accommodations at Castle Black. “We have so many enemies now, we can’t fight a war amongst ourselves,” he says.
And speaking of enemies coming between them, here’s Littlefinger with his version of The Secret.
He explains he’s got the Iron Throne on his vision board, with Sansa as
his queen. That she calls this a “pretty picture” is a bit
disconcerting, but maybe that was just her way of stopping his attempt
to kiss her. He’s trying to drive a wedge between her and her brother,
and despite the show suggesting otherwise, it’s hard to imagine this
working. Darth Sansa is no fool. When he says “you’re the future of
House Stark,” she rightly notes that Littlefinger only serves
himself.
Later, we’re in the Feast Hall and all those bannerman who
were wimps about joining the fight against the Boltons have come
crawling back (wait I had something for this — House Glover? More like
House Grovel-er! … ahem). Lady Mormont shames them; a 10-year-old girl
chastises them as cowards. She’s Jon Snow’s pint-sized bad cop, and
terrific at it.
She rallies them to support Jon Snow — “King in the North!” The
men cheer Jon, “The White Wolf,” who looks almost proud for once, and a
bit amazed. When we first met Jon he was an outsider in this hall. He
never felt loved and accepted. Being Ned Stark’s true heir is what he
always wanted. He turned it down when Stannis tried to hand it to him a
couple seasons back because it meant breaking an oath. Instead Jon took
the hardest road and earned all this.
Of course, we’ve now learned there’s a wrinkle — his
parentage isn’t what they think, and we wonder how his bannerman would
react if they knew the truth. Jon Snow isn’t a heir to Winterfell. He’s a
heir to the whole Seven Kingdoms. It’s like being promoted to run an
entire Apple Store but not knowing Steve Jobs was your father …
actually, that probably wouldn’t even matter, but you get the idea.
Sansa is happy for Jon, then catches sleazy Littlefinger
practically rolling his eyes. Maybe a better question is how will
ambitious Littlefinger react to Jon’s parentage? Jon would suddenly be a
huge threat to his plans.
Riverlands: Brienne and Podrick
leave their boat at an icy riverbed. The snow is coming hard since
winter has arrived. They trek through the forest, making their way
toward Winterfell.
Suddenly they realize they are not alone. Brienne takes out Oathkeeper, and she tells Pod to hang back. Their breath turns icy. Uh-oh.
Through the trees, a hooded figure approaches. An old woman. She seems familiar somehow.
Brienne is stunned. This is impossible, she thinks. And yes, it is impossible. Because
it didn’t happen, and probably won’t happen, and that’s perfectly okay
if it doesn’t happen. But I do wish other TV writers would stop writing
stories on how Lady Stoneheart is “almost surely coming this time!” in
the run-up to every Thrones season
finale making everybody think it’s going to happen. You click on those
stories, I click on those stories, and we feel like Lucy being fooled
into trying to kick Charlie Brown’s football yet again.
Still, though: No Brienne or Pod. Which is surprising. And
no Night King or White Walkers, which is quite unusual for a finale.
Usually there’s a “Great War to come” reminder scene. Given how much
ground the show had to cover, I suppose that’s understandable.
King’s Landing: Jaime and Bronn arrive in King’s Landing just in time to witness a rather momentous occasion.
They see the ruins of the Sept and hurry to the Throne Room. There
the lords and ladies have gathered. And Jaime sees Cersei taking her
seat on the Iron Throne. Qyburn is her Hand of the Queen. We thought
Dany would become the first female ruler of Westeros, but no. It’s
Cersei. We have a new winner of the “Who’s going to end up on the Iron
Throne next?” game. And for the first time since season 1, the official
ruler of the Seven Kingdoms is an actual grown-up.
Cersei and Jaime share a look. He’s like:
What the f— have you done?
The mood is grim. The lighting is dark and menacing. Notice the
reaction among the lords and ladies in the Throne Room is quite
different different than when Joffrey and Tommen were crowned. This
time,
no one claps.
Meereen: Dany dumps Daario. She doesn’t want him to
be a distraction, and she might have to marry somebody when she gets to
Westeros (um, how about a nephew? Or is that too weird? Not for
Targaryens, right?).
Daario is frustrated. He’s not getting what he wants and finally blurts out that he loves her. All of Dany’s men say that when she sends them away.
He says their breakup must have been Tyrion’s idea, and she says it wasn’t.
But it seems like it totally was. Dany and Tyrion have a chat. She’s
wearing all black, which is unusual – and just like Cersei. She’s
rebranding Slaver’s Bay into the Bay of Dragons, which is a much cooler
name, though you wonder if tourists will be disappointed to discover the
dragons are now over in Westeros. Dany confesses she felt emotionally
detached from dumping Daario, which is another note in the show’s
ongoing suggestions that she’s becoming less empathetic the more
powerful she becomes. But maybe she’s just annoyed by breakups and
wishes she could simply stop texting her lover until he gets the hint
like most people too.
Tyrion hasn’t had as many great scenes as usual this season, but he’s
given a good speech here. “I’ve been a cynic for as long as I can
remember. Everybody was always asking me to believe in things …[But]
I believe in you.” It’s good timing, because she’s got a pin for him —
she made him her Hand of the Queen. It’s another mirror of Cersei in
this epiosde (making Qyburn her Hand).
And then they set sail for Westeros. Epic shots of the fleet. It’s
happening, at last. Dany is going home. We say goodbye to the pyramid.
Hell, we say goodbye to Essos, there’s nobody left on that continent
that we care about. Dany stands on her ship and looks out to the open
ocean, excited for her future.
So much was resolved. In another place, another time, these last two episodes could have functioned as the
Game of Thrones series
finale. What happens when the ships hit King’s Landing could have been
left to our imagination. It won’t be, of course, which is great, because
our imaginations are lousy. And we do have so many burning questions:
Will Dany make it directly to Westeros — or will Euron and his fleet trip up their plans? Will
Sansa make a power play? Where will Melisandre go? Where will The Hound
go? What will Cersei do as queen? Will Jaime accept Cersei’s actions or
think of her as a new Mad Queen? Willl Bran be able to stop the Night
King’s advance on The Wall? How many books will Sam read? Will Brienne
and Pod join Gendry in the sea of eternal boat-rowing?
The
Thrones showrunners’ plan of having just two more
shortened seasons after this year now makes more sense. With Dany coming
to Westeros, we’re really and truly heading into the final chapters of
this tale. Along with the demise of the show’s greatest villain, Ramsay
Bolton, the events of this season set up two great battles — one is
between the living and the dead, and the other is where the stars of the
show, the lead characters we have followed for so long, begin to take
aim at each other…
