Welcome my fellow Viners to the first entry of our review series of the Game of Thrones tv show! I figure I should have done this a long time ago, in this episode Tyrion welcomes a guest to King's Landing. At Castle Black, Jon Snow finds himself unwelcome. Dany is pointed to Meereen, the mother of all slave cities. Arya runs into an old friend.
In King's Landing
Okay, there is a lot of focus on KL this episode, perhaps a little more than it should have. Jaime gets two swords forged out of Ice (that is Ned Stark's sword, not literal ice) and a brand new golden hand. It doesn't make up the fact that almost everyone in his family decides to sh*t for whatever reason. Tywin wants him to return to retire as Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, but he refuses, Cersei admonishes him for not returning earlier, because nobody's feelings in the world matter, but her own and Joffrey belittles him for the loss of his hand and lack of accomplishments because he is a daft c*nt like that. except for Prince Oberyn Martell's intro. You know, I will be really surprised if this character doesn't became a fan favorite. Other than that, all scenes set in KL were rather uninteresting to watch... Well except for Prince Oberyn Martell of Dorne's of course. I will be really surprised if he don't turn out to be a fan favorite. His introduction scene establishes what we needed to know about him and it couldn't be more appropriate: he is selecting a prostitue to sleep with him AND his mistress Ellaria Sand, and if that wasn't enough he decides that the male handler should join the fun too ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) however when some Lannister goons interrupt it by singing the Rains of Castamere and then talking sh*t about him and his beloved, Oberyn puts them in their place by casually stabbing one of them in the hand.
Oberyn then explains why the Martells hate Lannisters. You see, way back into Robert's Rebellion, Oberyn's sister Elia was married to Prince Rhaegar Targaryen, the one who provoked the war. When King's Landing was sacked at the end of the war, Elia's children were butchered, while she was raped and murdered by Tywin's enforcer Gregor Clegane aka the Mountain. Oberyn believes this was done on Tywin's orders and so he tells Tyrion to warn his father that "the Lannisters aren't the only ones to pay their debts". Admittedly, this can be very hard to understand or follow for some viewers, especially the ones that stay away from the books or likely never watched the DVD extras to take this bit of infodump. Anyways, I was a bit upset they didn't get Oded Fehr to play Oberyn Martell, but Pedro Pascal does an impressive job and I can't wait to see more of him in the future.
Other than that though, two little scenes that symbolize the complete and utter downfall of House Stark got me more than it should: one where Ned's greatsword Ice is melted into two swords (representing the obliteration of the last physical remnant of Ned Stark) with Tywin throwing a wolf's pet into the fire, and a quick pan to a statue of Joffrey holding a crossbow with a dead direwolf at his feet.
At the Wall
Jon Snow has recovered from his wounds and is questioned by the Night Watch's commanders over Qhorin Halfhand's death and the time he spent infiltrated among the Wildlings. While he almost gets beheaded for his troubles, he is dismissed when he tells that Mance intends to invade the wall from the North and the South, using the "biggest fire the North has ever seen" to signal the attack. I find the scene weird because, who the hell put Alliser Thorne in charge? Don't the Night Watch members vote for their leaders? Eh, I also noticed Janos Slynt is back too you know, the City Watch commander who carried out the massacre against Robert's bastards and was sent to the Wall by Tyrion as punishment? This guy is going to be pain in the ass believe me...
I am disappointed with this scene because I hoped to see more of Jon's reaction to the fact his entire family may be dead - more poignant by the fact that in the first season, Maester Aemon reveals how the exact same thing happened to him in the past. In here, he just reminisces how Robb was better than him in anything and should hate him, but never brought himself to. I hoped that he would fully realize his house is apparently extinct for all he know, just like the Targeryens were for Aemon.
Somewhere in the Gift
This was very short sequence so I will wrap it up quickly. The wildling group is encamped after Jon had deserted them. Just as Tormund is questioning Ygritte over if she managed to kill Jon or not, they are interrupted by the Thenns, creepy-looking, tattoed bald, cannibal wildlings that even other wildlings feel uneasy around them. This scene was and almost not worthy mentioning if it was not for these guys at least, because they look really promising as bad guys.
At Slaver's Bay
Daenerys and her army keep their march to Meereen, the last great city of Slaver Bay. Her dragons have grown a lot since the last season, they are now the size of horses and I wouldn't be surprised if one would be able to ride. That is, if they would allow such thing to happen, since the dragons have become so unruly that at one point, Drogon almost bite her face off.
Also I got to address the fact that Daario Naharis was recast with a new actor that just doesn't feel right to me... I want to say this guy doesn't have the swag as the old one had, but if I would I had to strangle myself. I really dislike when characters get recasted, specially when the actors don't look that similar to begin with, though I want to make some exceptions in Gregor Clegane's case (the new actor seems way more bigger and badder than Conan Stevens in Season 1).
Well, knowing how well the previous cities had fared against the Mother of Dragons, Meereen's masters decide that the wisest course of action would be to leave a grisly message behind, crucifying kids every milepost along the with their arms outstretched pointing the direction to their city. How much miles is long from Meeren? F*cking 163 miles. F*cking 163 crucified children in the way.
Did I mention this show is so hardcore and mature?!?! On all seriousness though, this is just cartoonish villainy right here, we've seen some really despicable characters in this series before like the Mountain, Walder Frey, Ramsay Snow, all of House Bolton and Joffrey f*cking Baratheon, but these slave masters are so over-the-top eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeevil I picture every single one of them having dastardly-whiplash mustaches, pointy forked beards while drinking their victims' tears from their cups. Which incidentally is how most of them look like and act are in the books anyway...
Somewhere In the Riverlands
The Hound and Arya are marching east toward the Vale, where he hopes to ransom the girl to her aunt Lysa. They stop on a inn where Lannister soldiers are. Arya recognizes one of them: Polliver, the man who captured her and Gendry, took them to Harrenhall, killed their friend Lommy and took her sword Needle. When she decides to barge inside the inn to take her sword back much to Sandor's frustration, he is recognized by Polliver. He offers to rejoin them and go back to the plundering, murdering and raping in name of the Lannisters. However, Sandor rebukes his offer.
I DON'T KNOW WHAT HOUSE CLEGANE'S WORDS ARE, BUT I HOPE IT IS "F*CK THE KING".
The thing goes down hill fast and soon with the Hound fighting all of them. Arya cleans up after him, attacking people as they try to get up off the ground. Clegane beats them all, and in the end Polliver lies wounded on the ground. Getting her hands on Needle, she stands over him, reciting the words he said when killed Lommy. Polliver doesn't know what she is talking about, only too late he realizes who the girl is when she shoves her sword in the throat, the exact way he killed her friend.
This was easily the best part of the episode and a contender for one of the best parts in the series. Not only the Hound's fight with the soldiers was both exciting and tense to see, this one dude going one-man army and winning, Arya shows her fair share of badassery by avenging her friend's death. This is also a big departure from the book, where she killed an entirely different character called the Tickler to reclaim Needle back, while asking him if "Is there any gold in the village?", the exact same thing he told his victims of torture. But since the Tickler died really early in the second season, they had to rework it with Polliver and I am totally cool with this.
Closing Thoughts
This was a really great premiere episode; A real step up from "Valar Dohaeris" in the previous season. There is what the premiere really needed, some memorable character moments instead of picking up the plot where the last season ended. I really loved this episode and I hope that the series keeps the same quality too.
Next episode will be "The Lion and the Rose" and lets pray that the moment we are all waiting happens ;) See ya next time, folks...
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