Game of Thrones Season 8, Episode 3

Oh friends… never ever in the history of my GOT obsession have I been so wrong in my predictions!!!  By Sunday afternoon I was 100% CERTAIN that the battle of Winterfell would be won in grueling, bare-knuckle fashion, only to find that the Night King was a no-show.  I had it all figured out - the episode would end with a handful of the most important characters (Jaime, Daeny, Jon, Theon, Sansa, Arya, mebbe Tyrion) standing on the walls of Winterfell with confused looks on their faces as the Night King flew right over them, continuing to Oldtown where he burned the entire Citadel to the ground. This would force our last few heroes South, where they would see that the NK had defeated Cersei. Through some mix of sheer will and magic they would defeat the NK, perhaps resetting history and completing the time loop where Bran became his ancestor, Bran the Builder, the OG Stark.

I believed this because there were some really compelling signs that others had pointed out (namely the NK’s absence in the trailer, the focus on the eradication of knowledge being his mane goal, and the feeling that it really couldn’t be as simple as just defeating him in one episode, regardless of how epic the episode) but also because I really wanted to believe it.  The seasons where the show ran past the books have been pretty rough and “off” from the earlier seasons.  I was willing to give that a big old pass if there was an ending that felt true to the series.  We’ve still got 3 episodes left so I don’t want to call it dead yet, BUT I can’t help but feel that the alternate fan-fic version of events that I and so many others hoped for was actually more consistent with the universe that George RR Martin created than what we got last night.

Here are some things that have me scratching my head:

·      There are too many unanswered questions about the NK and the White Walkers.  All of those symbols and strewn body parts; all of Craster’s boys sacrificed; all of the allusions to Bran and the NK sharing some special bond and maybe being two sides of the same coin… was all for nothing?!  If he was really just slow marching into Bran’s trap this whole time, what was the point of leaving symbols along the way?

·      In a way, this ending means that all of the magical, fantastical elements of this show were all for nothing; or at best were just a weird campy diversion.  My favorite GOT critics, Mallory Rubin and Jason Concepcion, have pointed out that it sometimes feels as if the show is embarrassed by the story’s fantasy elements.  But for big ole’ nerds like us, those elements are the core of the story.  And it doesn’t seem consistent with the core of the story to have the NK undone by one ninja assassin move.  What about the dragons?  What about Bran’s super powers?  What about all those books that Sam stole which we thought contained some mystical solutions to the NK problem?

·      Again, what about Bran?  All this time, we’ve been seeing how powerful he can be.  He can literally alter space and time!  The prior 3 eyed raven told Bran “the ink is dry” but we know that’s not true because of the Hodor phenomenon.  That tells us that Bran is the most powerful force that the GOT universe has seen. And yet his role in this battle against ultimate evil is to sit there and give Theon the worst pep talk in the history of pep talks?!  Even Melisandre was better at pep talks than Bran!  It just doesn’t feel fulfilling to me that we spent so much time seeing Bran become the 3 eyed raven, only to have that role be relatively minor in the NK’s demise.  What’s next for Bran?  He just continues to chill as the 3 eyed raven?  So weird…

·      They did Theon wrong with that lame death.  I am a rare Theon advocate and as you know, I have speculated (very wrongly, it turns out) that Theon would be one of the most important characters to the show, perhaps even the Prince who was Promised.  Going into this episode, I thought he might die but I thought it would be cooler than that.  He spent an hour defending Bran like a superhero only to literally run into the NK’s knife?!  Really?!  A more fulfilling end would have involved some strategy on his part and then as the NK was killing Theon, Arya could have jumped in and sealed the deal. 

·      The body count wasn’t high or significant enough.  I LOVE almost every character that’s left but I feel like most have completed their arcs and don’t really have a place anymore. I hope I’m wrong on that… Either way, it feels convenient that all of our favorites made it out alive just as the Wights were about to overtake each of them in different ways. In my view, Brienne, Pod, Grayworm, Tormund and Gendry should probably have died, both because I think they’ve completed their arcs but also because it would have made defeating the NK feel more earned and like there was some cost paid.

·      We were deprived of a true fight with the NK.  Instead of a showdown between Jon and the NK, we got another raising of the dead, with another near-death experience for Jon, a lame sacrifice on Theon’s part, and then a quick assassination by Arya. It felt like there should have been more meat around his demise given his importance. I also think it would have been more interesting to have at least one or two of the NK’s henchmen White Walkers tango with some of the main characters. Instead, they just stood there like total lame-os, and then exploded as soon as the NK was killed.  Why weren’t they on the attack?

I’m not saying that I didn’t like this episode or that it didn’t have its moments, but I felt (and still feel) a huge sense of “Now what?”  The Night King’s apparently swift defeat has me scratching my head… But here’s what I felt worked best in the episode:

·      Arya!  First, I really liked the interplay between Arya, Beric, the Hound and Melisandre.  I had a strong feeling that Melisandre and Arya would play a role in defeating the NK due to Mel’s Season 2 prophesy about them meeting again.  Even so, the show still managed to surprise me with how they wove in Beric and the Hound.  So much of Arya’s journey has been as a “one man wolf pack” and I love that we see her achieve the holy grail of greatness that is her ninja-assassin move on the NK only after she accepts help from the people that she previously spurned.  At first, I worried that there might not be anything left for Arya after this. But the more I think about it, the more it seems an apt fulfillment of her destiny.

·      The dynamic between Daeny & Jon. I think it made sense that they put all discussions of incest/iron throne goals on hold. I also thought it was cool that there was a little role reversal in that Jon is usually the one going rogue and breaking the plan (for ex., when he charged at Ramsey during the Battle of the Bastards, even though the plan was to hold back and force Ramsey to charge. During this battle it was Daeny who couldn’t stand to see her Dothraki being slaughtered and broke with the plan to lure the NK in.

·      The role of the crypts.  As expected, they were not safe, though they were arguably safer than being anywhere else!  There was a lot of speculation that there would be even more drama with the crypts – perhaps Ned Stark himself would be reanimated and Arya would have to kill his Wight.  Another source of speculation was that in all the bones rising from the crypts, something would be revealed in Lyanna’s crypt that would prove Jon’s parentage – marriage papers or some token of Rhaegar’s that would prove that Lyanna and Rhaegar were married and that Jon was their son. However, I thought that would have been a little too cutesy and convenient. I think the crypts were a nice scary addition to the show without feeling too gimmicky.

·      Sansa and Tyrion.  I like that they resolved some of the tension between them.  I doubt we’ll see a romantic union (and I hope not because I think the age difference is a little weird) but I think we saw an important friendship solidify that might help ease the growing rift between Team Daeny and Team Jon.  I also really like that the show is portraying Sansa as strong and having lots of platonic relationships without pushing a romantic angle for her.  It’s a cool reversal that Arya gets a true love interest before Sansa does!

·      As Shelly pointed out, defeating the NK first means that the show will return to politics and power plays, which is where it all started.  I love the fantasy aspects but the “plots and schemes” are so fun too.

My biggest open question going into next week is whether this is really it for the NK and White Walkers. I kind of can’t accept that it is; it just feels too easy and unearned.  I am hoping that this is a fakeout and there’s some larger mystical event that links the NK to the battle against Cersei.  But if we really are returning to battles of the living, then bring it on Cersei!