A few quick thoughts on Game of Thrones

[beer_good_foamy]

(Please note - I'm unspoiled on the books and want to remain so)

1. Am I the only one who thinks Mance Rayder looks and acts exactly like Tom Baker in Blackadder? I keep expecting him to look at Jon Snow and gasp "You have a WOMAN'S sword, milord!" Whereupon Ygritte would kick his ass, because she's just that awesome. (And Jon would look unhappy, because it's what he does.) Seriously, I loved Ygritte essentially telling Jon she's his now and he better be loyal.

2. A bit disappointed that we didn't get to hear exactly what Tyrion told Sansa and Shae. Then again, I can understand why; that had to be one of the most cringingly uncomfortable proposals in television history.

3. Roose Bolton is a fun villain. So far.

4. Gendry's in trouble, isn't he? Seriously, why would anyone fall for that "You're more important than all of these people" schtick. This isn't a story where being important is a good thing. Look at the title of the show, feroldgodssakes. It's a chess game, and contrary to popular imagery, you don't just sacrifice pawns - the bigger the play, the bigger the sacrifice.

5. Speaking of which, Ros and Gil is dead. Littlefinger is really making his moves this season, isn't he? I knew it wouldn't turn out well for her when Ros was adamant about being a former prostitute the other week.

6. Olenna vs Tywin. Please, sirs, can I have some more? And the Tyrion-Cersei alliance is... very very awkwardly proceeding to almost actual existence.

7. There's something here about what I said in this meta a year ago. Tommy Carcetti Littlefinger is playing the full ruthless The Wire-like politician, playing the system for his own needs - "chaos is a ladder" and all that, subverting the traditional high fantasy story about honour and swords and stuff. But is that the story he's in? There's lots in this season about social climbing - the not-so-merry-men Arya and Gendry have taken up with, the Tyrells essentially setting themselves up as the new dynasty, Ygritte and Osha being working-class heroes (Osha knows how to skin a rabbit; Sam doesn't know how to build a fire), etc. That's a different story, one of power structures changing to a different order, but there's still a climb. And then there's Arya's archery scene (significant, that's how she was introduced in the first place back in s1); don't hold back, don't aim, just trust your eye to know where the arrow will land. Very Stephen King's Gunslinger:

I do not aim with my hand; he who aims with his hand has forgotten the face of his father.
I aim with my eye.

I do not shoot with my hand; he who shoots with his hand has forgotten the face of his father.
I shoot with my mind.

I do not kill with my gun; he who kills with his gun has forgotten the face of his father.
I kill with my heart.

And like Dany (and Buffy), Arya has more experienced men tell her that she isn't as good as she thinks she is, that she needs to stop and learn and do things the right way. The trick is to separate the useful wisdom (how to fire an arrow) from the bits that say "wait for us to handle things the way we're used to." As Joffrey demonstrated, firing an arrow is easy. The trick is to know when and who to shoot. (Right, Katniss?) There's those who climb, and there's those who tear down walls.

These days, of course, we don't use bows and arrows to kill anymore. But we still use arrows as roadsigns, as turn indicators, and in flowcharts. Fire an arrow in an unexpected direction and you can show people entirely new roads. Or old forgotten ones. (Then again, they're used in weathervanes too, turning when the wind changes. And how gorgeous is that shot of the winter wind blowing in over the North at the end...?)

8. Nobody slapped Joffrey again. I can only assume they're saving up for a huge slapfest in the last episode. They'll have to bring in caterers to feed the people waiting their turn.

Comments

[local-max.livejournal.com]

spoilers the books are written by grr martin hes a man oh woops sorry i just spoiled you

...okay, trolling aside, just about to watch this episode, brb in ~an hour.

[brutti-ma-buoni.livejournal.com]

I am largely books-not-telly due to financial constraints. But the consistent slappableness of Joffrey crosses all boundaries.

[jgracio.livejournal.com]

7 - I don't think he's either in or out of that story, not really. His own part apparently conforms to that, for now, poor not so important noble from the bad part of the country makes good, inspirational feel good story (from his POV I'm sure it is).

But GoT has consistently proven that the story you're in isn't the only story around. More than one story going on. And I'm sure that the people who are in a social climb story are going to be very disappointed when they realize they're also in a Zombie story.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I'm both surprised and not surprised they went there with Gendry. This is merging Gendry with another character (which doesn't completely surprise me as they've never introduced Robert's other surviving bastard son so I always considered it to be a possibility that Gendry might be turned into both at once.) Makes me curious about the rest of Gendry's story...

Similarly, I laughed at the Meera/Osha fight earlier in the episode as it seems a bit meta that these two are essentially sharing a character at this point. :)

Poor Arya. Glad she was getting archery pointers (could come up useful someday!) And unnerved by Melisendre's sight re: Arya. I'm wondering how exactly to interpret that.


I also shocked myself at actually feeling sorry for Ros. What a bad way to go. Ughh!

And I was thinking this morning that what works for Sansa is that she's just such a normal girl. The girl has no game and is never three steps ahead of anyone. She just wants what a teenage girl wants and reacts like a normal teenaged girl would react. Loras is her boy band crush (more than that, it was her ESCAPE! Poor girl.) So while we may shake our heads at her naivte, it's a understandable and identifiable naivte. She's just a kid and just behaving like a normal person... caught in hell.

[local-max.livejournal.com]

1. I like Ygritte, but she is also really creepy in this episode -- "I will embarrass you sexually then say hey, at least I'm not spreading the secret that will get you murdered, by the way let's be monogamous and never betray me, OR ELSE" is -- well, marriage-by-blackmail-with-threat-of-death is how everyone rolls in Westeros, but it plays especially weirdly here because it's also framed in terms of her appealing to Jon's honour. Plus, she only got to the position of figuring out he's going to betray her by manipulating him into sex by mocking and bullying him. Jon has actual reasons to be sad, I guess, but he's also too dumb to know he's being played (...which, she probably also has feelings for him, but she is not exactly subtle about essentially holding him at gunpoint and demanding his neverending fidelity).

6. Yes!

7. Yes. Littlefinger might be surprised to know that there are people out there being resurrected after deaths and dragons breathing fire and zombies out there. We don't know exactly what kind of story this is, but certainly the framework he is working in is not going to prepare him for things that have nothing to do with men.

8. I had totally been lulled into a false sense of security about Joffrey -- somehow his abject cowardice at the end of season two made him inexplicably endearing, and the creepy-but-also-weirdly-sweet Margoffrey scenes made him just any other boy with a crush. Of course, he can only express that crush by killing things and he sees people as things, so, naturally.... I mean, ugh.

[smhwpf.livejournal.com]

Oooh, these are such good points!

Also - oooh, you haven't read the books. Heheheheheh.

Littlefinger is Carcetti! I am so bad at these spots, or he's a really good actor. I had no idea that Mrs. Gilflower (?) on Dr. Who yesterday was Diana Rigg. That she and Oleanna are played by the same actor - incredible. But we already knew that Diana Rigg is a really good actor.

Charles and Di Dancing in the Rigging? Absolutely! (Sadly I don't think there's much more of that, at least if it follows the books).