Game of Thrones: Stormborn

I will start every one of these posts off with this warning about spoilers. There will be plenty of spoilers. Seriously, if you have not watched the episode, do not read this post. I will also be mentioning stuff from the books. These are not straight up recaps of episodes, nor are they reviews. I will just mention the stuff I liked/disliked and probably give some opinions about what could happen next.

Everyone is talking about Euron Greyjoy. I will get to that stuff in a bit, but my favorite moment of the episode was Arya’s part. First she meets up with Hot Pie, then she learns that Jon Snow is now the King in the North. She decides to give up her quest of killing Cersei and everyone else, in order to head back to Winterfell. She seemed genuinely happy. I half-expected someone to attack her and say “Arya Stark? Cersei will pay good money for you!” But then she ran into another old friend: Nymeria. You know, her direwolf that attacked Joffrey and ran away when Arya realized the king would have her killed.

Not much has been mentioned on the show about Nymeria, but in the books, she has been busy (I think Arya has wolf dreams about her travels). Nymeria has been going around the Riverlands with a giant pack of regular wolves. People who see them claim it is the largest pack of wolves ever. Anyways, Nymeria recognizes Arya, but instead of staying with her human friend, Nymeria leads her pack away. It was pretty sad. Although…my theory is that Nymeria will stay close and that army of wolves will come into play during the major battle against the White Walkers.

What else was happening?

-Daenerys meets with her new council. Olenna and Ellaria Sand want to sack King’s Landing, but Daenerys and Tyrion are against the idea. They do not want to kill all the people in Westeros. They will siege the city with the Dornish & Highgarden armies, while the Unsullied head to Casterly Rock to take down the Lannister seat of power & wealth. See, I was right that Casterly Rock would be a target, just wrong about the timing.

-I liked how Daenerys dealt with Varys. I have read a few times that people think she was a bitch to him, since he just gave her two allies, but Varys has had his own agenda for a long time. I thought it was wise to dig into that agenda to discover what the man actually stands for…and it turns out that they both have caring for regular folks in common.

-Sam is going to cure Jorah! Can you imagine Sam doing that when we first met him? He was afraid of anything. Wasn’t he afraid of blood? And yet here he is peeling the skin off of Jorah Mormont. He could have probably used a hand from Ramsey.

One of the things I saw at Nerdist said how they think that Sam’s cure for Greyscale could possibly be a cure/inoculation against becoming one of the Night King’s wights. I keep seeing all of these theories about how the Stonemen are maybe the possible opposites of the undead wights, however…it would seem that GRMM has said that Beric/Jon/Lady Stoneheart/Victarion are all fire wights (so wouldn’t they be the opposite?).

-I enjoyed how Cersei tried to rally the Tyrell bannerman to her cause by saying how Olenna allied herself with Daenerys who has an army of Dothraki, who will rape, pillage, and plunder. Lord Tarley does not seem thrilled about the prospect, but Jaime waves the idea of being Warden of the South at him and it seems like he might be a little receptive.

-Okay, the Battle of Kraken (does it have an official name yet?). Damn…that happened so suddenly, I honestly did not know how to process it. Euron just shows up out of nowhere and attacks. He kills the Sand Snakes. I kept thinking they might prevail, but those weapons seemed like bad choices for ship fighting. Then he defeats Yara and Theon has a chance to be the hero (I really thought he was going to do it), but then he sees the horrors of battle and reverts back to Reek. He jumps overboard.

The big question at the end of the battle: are Yara and Ellaria dead and tied to the prowl of Euron’s ship, or is he delivering them alive to Cersei? When I first saw it, I assumed it was them hanging there, but now looking at the picture, it looks like that is Yara’s ship (and maybe that is just the Sand Snakes?).

Also, another crazy theory I read somewhere: Gendry finds Theon and takes him to Dragonstone. Jon Snow meets Gendry and brings him North because he needs a blacksmith who can forge weapons with dragonglass points.

Last thing about that battle…and this is for the book readers…how far off has the show went with this story? I feel like if they skipped over the horn and Victarion, then that stuff must not be as important. Just my guess though.

-If I had one problem with the episode, it was the stuff in the North. Why does Jon insist that he be the one to ride to Dragonstone to meet with Daenerys. He couldn’t send Davos first? See that it is not a trap? Probably not, Jon is not really all that good at delegating. I did love his confrontation with Littlefinger, which could come back to haunt him later. Or maybe not. I do not think Jon Snow will take Petyr’s crap. Also, I do not think the lords of the Vale would care too much if Petyr is executed by King Jon.

Now, I do not think Jon’s meeting with Daenerys will go poorly. In fact, I have a feeling they will get on quite well with each other. I also do not think Jon will have a problem bending the knee or making a deal with her. He is pragmatic, he knows that he needs her more than she needs him. He also knows they need the dragonglass. I can see him working out a deal similar to Yara’s. He will remain King of the North, but Queen Daenerys will be his liege-lord. Or they will just fall in love and do it right there on the giant map table.

Author: Ngewo