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turtle-paced · 6 years

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GoT Re-Watch: Fine-Toothed Comb Edition

Ah, the end. I’m free until 2019.

Yeah, no, tune in Sunday for the most recent numbers and my proposal for what I do next.

7.07 - The Dragon and the Wolf

(2:02) The Unsullied have reappeared in the plot.

(2:24) And with a shot of Jaime looking out over their ranks, we establish that the Unsullied are now at King’s Landing. What Riverlands? What Reach? Who’s running them now? And did anyone notice hostile forces marching through?

(3:21) This is, I think, one of the worst conversations in the entire series, due to its combination of indulging a favoured actor and trying way too hard to be cynical, irreverent and witty (but overshooting two of those marks and undershooting the third, landing firmly in “juvenile” territory). “Maybe it really is all cocks in the end,” says more about the show than it does about the characters.

(4:45) Here we have a long establishing shot showing us some real nice work modelling the Red Keep, plus Euron’s navy, and the few ships Dany sent. Perfectly legitimate use of establishing shots - especially given the political situation these characters are heading into, and the purposes for which they’ve each assembled these forces. This time, the length of the shots is well justified, and we’re looking at something more attractive and interesting than a damned stone corridor.

(5:15) Yeah…the book!North has more than a million people living in it.

(6:24) Woman called bitch: 1. Note Jaime’s shocked expression as Cersei says “if something goes wrong, kill [everyone in a certain order].” I do not know why this is supposed to be surprising to him - the only thing that leaps to mind is that he’s horrified she’d order such a thing under a flag of truce with so little specification as to what “if something goes wrong” means.

(6:42) People start walking to the Dragonpit here.

(8:05) We start in earnest with the reunions here. Tyrion and Pod, this time. It’s nice that they get to see each other again and catch up.

(8:18) Look, writers. Bronn saying the word “cock” is not inherently funny. Please stop.

(8:29) Similarly, Sandor doesn’t have to swear at everyone for no reason at all to maintain his hard man cred.

(8:37) Now Sandor and Brienne get to see each other again and catch up. That’s also nice.

It’s well worth mentioning, from an adaptational perspective, how telling it is that Brienne and Sandor speak fondly and admiringly of Arya, without mentioning Sansa. This is pretty much a product of the show’s lack of interest in and understanding of Sansa’s book material - her refusal to become jaded and cynical affects Sandor deeply, but was barely adapted in the show. It did, however, preserve Sandor’s repeated speeches to Sansa in praise of cynicism. As far as the adaptation can tell, there’s no reason for someone as “badass” as show!Sandor to care about Sansa. As opposed to Arya, of course he’d like Arya, she’s a scrappy tomboy. What’s not to like?

The knock-on effect is that it was that much harder to show Sandor’s own character development. The scene where Sandor buries the farmer and his daughter did a bit of that catching-up, but not much, and it doesn’t erase the fundamental problem of Sandor returning to violence - and hence the story - after the massacre of the peaceful farming community he was living in.

(9:46) Varys chimes into Tyrion’s reunion with Bronn (another nice thing!) to remind us that Bronn works for people when he gets paid. And he hasn’t been paid.

(10:54) And they finally arrive at the Dragonpit. Weren’t those reunions nice? Wasn’t it fun? Couldn’t we have used those four minutes of screentime telling the story instead?

The plot going on here is the peace talks. If there’s tension here, it needs to be directed towards “will these talks be successful?” and “will Cersei believe us?” If we have to see four minutes of characters walking to these peace talks, the conversation on the way needs to be Tyrion sounding Bronn out over Cersei and Jaime’s current attitudes, or Jon going over what he has to say and how. Also acceptable is Jon asking Brienne how Sansa was doing (to give him a chance to react to the news Bran and Arya are at Winterfell; this is new information pertaining to several major characters), or the minor named characters talking about the wight-in-a-box. Even then, we don’t have to have conversations about conversations we’re going to have.

Tyrion, Bronn and Pod reuniting? Fanservice. Cut it. Brienne and Sandor encountering each other again? Fanservice. Cut it. You’ve got a story to tell, gentlemen, move it along.

(11:42) Especially cut it, because we’ve now spent a minute watching the first set of arrivals at the Dragonpit file into place. On top of the four minutes of useless walking to places, this kills the pace of the episode. It’s supposed to be tense waiting; by now it’s more like “get back to me when the plot starts up, ‘kay?”

(12:30) Man called cunt: 1. Sandor’s swearing again. He’s maybe a little Flanderized.

(12:34) Man called cunt: 2.

(12:37) Ahahahaha, wow. We get a good look at Cersei’s outfit here and I get to return to laughing at how terrible her costuming’s been this season. In a better show an outfit this bad would be a tip-off that Cersei’s not taking this at all seriously. In this show, well. The outfit’s too plain to make a point of Cersei’s wealth and power, and too fancy to make a point of its plainness. I’ll get back to costuming again once Dany shows up.

In the meantime, say hi to Euron! He’s back!

(13:23) After another minute and a half, we’ve got the second party to arrive seated. Chop chop. We don’t have all day if we’re going to get through some plot here.

(13:32) Sandor’s really being highlighted here. We have several characters with established tension, and it’s Sandor who marches across the stage to confront Gregor. I worry that we’re going to get Cleganebowl, I really do.

(14:48) Dany loses political competence here to enable future plot point, coming with two of her dragons.

(16:06) And our third and final party finally seats herself. It’s been almost ten minutes since these characters set out on the path to the Dragonpit. Nothing of interest has been said. Nothing has been done. There’s building tension, and then there’s pacing the episode badly.

Now that Dany’s here, I’m also going to point out the costuming thing that’s now super obvious. Every named character here, with the exceptions of Jaime and Varys, is wearing black. (Jaime and Varys are both wearing very dark, dull colours.) This lack of range in colour actually subtracts from the worldbuilding. Why are Tyrion and Cersei dressed as Tywin-clones? They’re just about the only people there who’ve so much as seen Tywin; there’s no point in dressing to copy him (except to make a point to the audience, what’s a fourth wall?), and these black costumes are still too blinged out to effectively do the job anyway. Why is Jon not in grey and white (not that we’ve ever seen Starks in grey and white)? Why hasn’t anyone got Davos something a bit less shabby to wear? Did all of these people join the Night’s Watch when I wasn’t looking?

Little things - bits of jewellery, chasing on armour, and so forth - have all the house symbols that should be loud and proud on clothing and conveyed through colour. Jaime’s is possibly the best costume here. Check the details on it. They’re nice ones.

(16:29) As if to spite us, when Tyrion starts talking, Euron interrupts. Dammit. We were so close to getting the episode started.

(17:10) Thank you, Jaime! Forty seconds of bad joke and explaining why the bad joke is bad. Aaaaaaargh. We know. Get a move on.

(18:26) At least this time Jon seems to have practiced his “the zombies are coming” speech.

(18:50) Dany’s first line since she apologised for rocking up late. She’s barely had a reaction shot. It’s pretty much what happened in her meeting with Theon and Yara at the end of s6; Dany’s been shoved into the background so that Tyrion can take centre stage (because his own plot vanished into the ether and all he’s got to do is speak for Dany in political situations). Seriously, she doesn’t have to speak all the time - you just have to keep checking in with her visually so we know she’s got opinions and those opinions are important!

(19:18) Cersei calls someone else a usurper. Um.

Note again that Dany hasn’t made an argument. She’s confirming things and restating them. The work of the appeal, for her faction, is left to Tyrion. Jon Snow gets to speak for himself.

(19:28) On perfect dramatic cue, Sandor emerges from the basement here with the wight-in-a-box.

(19:50) We watch Sandor carry it to centre stage and start unboxing it. It’s a slow roll within a slow roll. It’s a slow roulade. A turducken of unnecessarily dragged out dramatic moments. I have died, and I am in pacing hell.

(20:33) Oh it’s a wight in the box! Wow, that only took a FULL MINUTE.

(20:43) Great reaction times here. That wight covered some distance.

(21:21) Qyburn’s reactions here are excellent. This is well done.

(21:39) Davos Seaworth, brought along to light a torch for Jon. Jon, meanwhile, handles this like an airline safety demonstration. While I love ADWD-timeframe Jon’s boring-but-practical attitude, this is pretty comical.

(22:12) Deaths: 1. Jon kills a wight. Still trying to catch up to Dany.

(22:38) At last! Dany contributes! Took her long enough!

(22:44) Again, something genuinely good - we can tell that Jaime is convinced, no tricks. He’s had the reaction shots to show this, and he’s asking follow-up questions. (Dany being able to estimate numbers is a good way of showing her competence and interest in the matter.)

(23:03) “Can they swim?” Interesting question there, Euron…

(23:24) “This is the only thing I’ve ever seen that terrifies me.” At first I thought this was both bad acting and bad writing (show, don’t tell!). Now we know that Cersei had plans within plans going and this is aaaaaaallll just a ruse to get Euron clear to ferry the Golden Company across the Narrow Sea.

(23:49) And that was Euron, everyone! He sure did add a lot to the season. Most of it comedic. Unintentionally comedic.

(24:04) Here’s something that again, in a better show, I would like a lot - Cersei starts monologuing in pretty much the same words as Jon and Tyrion. In a better show, I’d have the trust that this was Cersei deliberately reflecting back what she knows the others want to hear, deliberately mimicking their rhetorical devices. In this one, I’ve got nothing more than that the general intention of the scene was “Cersei convinces the others she believes the threat is real.” There have been too many clunky speeches for what looks like it could have been an effective idea to work.

(24:51) “I ask it only of Ned Stark’s son.” This is closer to the sort of irony that the books give us with Jon and Ned. The emphasis is on Ned, and what Jon is not.

(25:22) I have the strong suspicion that Jon swearing allegiance to Dany last episode was done first and foremost to break negotiations down right now. I’ll be interested to see how it plays out next season, combined with the inevitable internal R+L=J reveal.

(26:16) Wait what? Brienne said what? Brienne of Tarth? “Fuck loyalty”? Are we looking at the same character here? Full line’s worth examining, too. “This goes beyond houses and honour and oaths.” Only realpolitik can confront the army of the dead, in Game of Thrones, and honour is an obstacle.

(27:28) Surprisingly, Jon Snow actually advances a good argument for honesty! Which, much like his position on amnesty back in 7.01, is rather undercut by the action this argument was paired with. Not much good having these arguments if everyone around him is going “yes, Jon, but that was daft.”

(27:49) Here’s one of the best examples of what I’ve been talking about. We’ve only got one chance, Tyrion says. He goes to talk to Cersei alone. And yet, in order to maintain the plot the showrunners want to write, Tyrion can’t succeed. Just like with the Masters in Meereen, just like with Jaime ditching Casterly Rock earlier, Tyrion’s plan fails. I’ve got no faith that the showrunners are going to start pointing this out and have people’s opinions of Tyrion change for the worse because of this track record of failure. Yet if Tyrion doesn’t do this, he doesn’t have anything to do.

(28:11) “Or we all go home and we’re right back where we started.” Which is a huge failing of this plot. After six and a half episodes of war, very little has been accomplished vis-a-vis Dany and Cersei.

(28:22) Tyrion starts walking here.

(28:40) Cut to Tyrion in the Red Keep here. But it wasn’t just Tyrion walking. We had reaction shots to Tyrion walking. Totally worth eighteen seconds.

(28:48) And eight seconds of just Tyrion’s face before we see that he’s walking next to Gregor Clegane. I could just cry. Please, please, get to the story.

(28:59) Cut to Tyrion turning the corner of this corridor. Thrilling action! Stunning development!

(29:52) After a brief stop for Tyrion to do some nonsense like ‘converse with his brother, whom he loves yet knows he must oppose,’ we get yet more shots of Tyrion walking!

(30:16) Tyrion finally makes it into the same room as Cersei here. In terms of scene-setting, we saw that Tyrion was nervous because Gregor Clegane escorted him part of the way. In terms of new information, we learned that Cersei and Jaime argued until she kicked him out of the office.

Here’s a thought. Maybe we could have had about eight seconds of Tyrion being escorted by Gregor Clegane and nervous on account of this and its implications, and actually see Jaime get kicked out of the office by a furious Cersei? Rather than burn almost two minutes watching Tyrion walk a hundred metres?

(30:43) Woman called whore: 1.

(30:48) Woman called whore: 2.

(31:42) Again we see that it’s the loss of Tywin that caused the fall of the Lannisters in show-verse, as opposed to Lannister actions creating their own enemies and removing all incentive to make peace. True, this is out of Cersei’s mouth, and Cersei’s not reliable, but we have corroboration in the structure of the story elsewhere. To me it looks like this is supposed to be a moment where the stopped clock is right.

(33:04) Tyrion drinks: 1.

(34:02) Tyrion drinks: 2.

(34:38) We’ve changed topics a bit here, into “why is Tyrion working for Dany.” He believes she’s going to make the world a better place.

(34:47) And the example of Dany’s good governance he gives Cersei is that Dany chose him as an advisor. That’s…that’s some ego. Worse, the dynamic Tyrion asserts the existence of, that he checks her worst impulses, has not been in shown. We have instead seen Dany acting against Tyrion’s advice (at least once because she quite reasonably believed that he advised her badly), but often in a way that makes him very concerned that she’ll turn out to be a tyrant after all.

(34:56) Cersei subtly puts her hand on her stomach there. Plans within plans.

(35:38) End scene! So. What did that scene actually accomplish? Tyrion was sent there to convince Cersei to give them the truce. We did not see these characters discuss the truce. They barely discussed the meeting. Instead, they hashed out events of past seasons. They talked about events the audience was there for and emotions the audience knows haven’t changed. At most, the scene got Tyrion and Cersei to a place where they could talk about the truce. But what we did not see was any talking about the truce.

More in just a second. Or a few minutes. That will no doubt feel like hours.

(37:22) After a bit more stuff about the Dragonpit, Dany tells Jon that she can’t have children, and he questions it. Again I get this weird foreshadowing feeling, knowing that later this episode this character will be having consensual PiV sex. Though at least this information flowed from the conversation preceding it; it wasn’t quite “by the way, have I mentioned I’m infertile?” “Have you thought that maybe you might not be infertile?” It seems more like the conversation as a whole was engineered to get to a point where Dany could mention this fact a bit more naturally.

We’ll see.

(37:59) “I can’t forget what I saw north of the Wall, and I can’t pretend that Cersei won’t take back half the country the moment I march north.” Yes, that is the basic dilemma we knew existed right from the start of the episode, isn’t it? Stop repeating yourselves and move on to new plans!

(39:12) Cersei declares that she will march north with the others and fight the White Walkers. This after an offscreen discussion with Tyrion. If this solved their problems, it was a bad idea to have their problems solved offscreen. If this is a trick, it was a bad idea to put this offscreen, because it involves a character we’re supposed to believe is intelligent and perceptive being totally fooled by someone he knows very well, yet doesn’t trust. This plot point determines whether there’s a united front or whether the good guys are set up for a nice backstab - you have to show us things this important.

(40:08) “He never asked for my opinion, why would he start now?” We meant to do it! We definitely didn’t screw up the latter half of season six with characters artificially not telling each other important things! That aside, a lot of those communication difficulties were on Sansa. She failed to share important information that people in her situation would be expected to share, and when Jon did ask for her advice and assistance, she lied to him. Not for good or well-written reasons mind you, but she did. Repeatedly stating that s6 communications problems were Jon’s fault does not actually make them Jon’s fault.

(40:33) Finally, someone mentions that a political marriage between Jon and Dany might not be a bad idea.

(41:30) Relax, Sansa! We never saw Arya on an assassination mission she didn’t screw up big time.

The scripting for Littlefinger has been adequate, so far this scene, which cannot be said for earlier conversations between the two. It’s possible to tell where he’s going for manipulation in order to promote Sansa at Jon’s expense, but he hasn’t overplayed his hand much in this particular conversation. Sansa doesn’t look like a total fool for not picking up on this. Right up until…

(41:46) …this moment. “Sometimes, when I try to understand a person’s motives, I play a little game.” This, this is past obvious and past on-the-nose. The only way Littlefinger could get more blatant is if he said, “you should really consider killing your sister and claiming the Northern throne, Sansa.” This is not a situation like in ACoK where Tyrion knew Littlefinger was bad news, and just thought he was slightly less bad news than everything else he had to deal with. This is a situation where Sansa has free rein to do what she likes to Littlefinger, as we’ll see.

The fact that she does not immediately pick up on something so obvious, after several seasons of dealing with more subtle people and armed with the knowledge Littlefinger is untrustworthy, is one of those things that makes it hard to believe this character is supposed to be intelligent, in spite of what other characters say elsewhere. We’re told she’s smart and frequently shown she’s not. We see stand-alone scenes depicting her intelligence, but otherwise her smarts aren’t worked into the plot. This is because the showrunners don’t seem to believe she’s smart in the first place. They’re trying to write against their beliefs and the cracks show.

(42:51) Goddammit! That letter Sansa wrote was proof of life. It’s not proof of anything else. Definitely not of her treachery. Which doesn’t exist.

(43:33) The writers spit in our collective faces by writing a logistics scene.

(44:15) And spit again by having Jon actually consider the political messages he’s sending.

(45:03) Huh, my bad. Davos was wearing dark green. Over black, of course, so he’s not totally off the hook for the mass Night’s Watch-joining.

(45:18) Yes. We know Jon could have lied to Cersei. It wasn’t that long ago. We saw it. We don’t need Theon to tell anyone, much less Jon himself.

(45:29) And we know why Jon didn’t lie. You’re not even paraphrasing previous episodes now, you’re repeating conversations from earlier this episode!

(46:05) Congratulations you have character arcs please continue the actual story

(46:41) “It always seemed like there was this impossible choice I had to make. Stark or Greyjoy.” Like an author was scripting events out to examine the meaning of family and displacement through my experiences. Like I was a character in a popular TV adaptation of a novel series, and then the writers got lazy and decided to make me recite my central dramatic tension for the class, just in case someone hadn’t understood the point of most of the scenes I was in.

Even Alfie Allen can’t save this.

(47:00) Recapping season two is not progress!

(47:15) Then Jon tells Theon that Ned’s a part of them both, because we hadn’t had enough obvious rammed down our throats.

(47:52) Now that the closest thing Westeros has to Jesus has forgiven Theon of what sins he can and told him the endpoint of his character development, can we please get back to the story?

(48:05) “When I was Ramsay’s prisoner, Yara tried to save me.” Now we’re going over season three. We are all in pacing hell.

(49:26) “She’s your sister, and you left her to die.” This fundamental position is one the narrative never challenges - the equation of a PTSD episode in the middle of a fight with a conscious, deliberate choice to abandon Yara out of cowardice. If it was the latter instead of the former, the shot selection and acting at the time did not convey this. It’s a profound difference. “Would have tried to help Yara but couldn’t,” versus “could have tried to help Yara but wouldn’t.” And yes, this is the narrative speaking, not the Ironborn who can’t be expected to know about PTSD. Theon’s “abandonment” of Yara is the event he has to overcome in this season. If it was the characters speaking, the narrative would be Theon grappling with the fact that despite what his society tells him, there was nothing he could have done.

That’s setting aside the fact that really, what was Theon supposed to do there? Euron already had a knife right at Yara’s throat. If Theon had moved towards them, Euron would have killed her. Even if Theon had been thinking clearly, jumping over the side may well have been the best call.

I’m also quite uneasy with the fact that Yara’s been captured to give Theon something to do going forwards. I’m hoping Yara’s more than a MacGuffin in this storyline.

(51:31) Theon is kneed in the crotch. Surprise! It doesn’t work. Just like Jaime stopped a sword with his golden hand back in season five. I’m not sure I can unpack everything going on here - but let’s just say that a knee to the crotch hurts no matter what you’ve got down there (and we saw that in the Brienne vs Sandor fight, where Brienne realistically screamed in pain when Sandor kicked her between the legs). In Theon’s case, scar tissue can be very sensitive. The writers still aren’t actually thinking about what Theon’s mutilation means beyond “hur hur, no penis.”

(51:48) It’s also quite upsetting that the narrative says that Theon proves his courage through physical violence. Another part of a greater pattern - this season alone has already told us that Sansa was a coward for being held hostage. We can see this through the fact that Theon getting up after being told to stay down doesn’t get the lingering shots - it’s Theon withstanding a knee to the crotch and then beating the guy up that’s the climax of the scene. In other words, the scene conveys that Theon hasn’t done anything worthwhile until he’s actually won the fight.

(52:00) I’m not sure if this guy is dead. I don’t think so.

(54:03) Urrrgh, I can’t mention enough that I hate Maisie Williams’ direction this season. It’s just so goddamned smug. She’s capable of more and better, and we get this instead, because she’s “badass” now.

(54:19) It’s clever because every line here applies to Littlefinger better than Arya. Bait aaaaand…

(54:46) …switch.

(55:00) Littlefinger every bit as confused as the audience, I see. I wouldn’t have thought the writers wanted the audience asking the same questions as Littlefinger in relation to what’s going on. Maybe they should have considered writing a scene or two where the Starks worked out what was going on, and made the focus of the storyline managing to corner Littlefinger into a confession?

(55:25) Ah, the murder of Lysa Arryn. The first time that Littlefinger was arbitrarily gagged and rendered neither able to plan for contingencies nor improvise despite demonstrated skill in both areas. Also should be raising questions amongst the Valemen why Sansa testified so emotionally to the contrary back in season four.

It’s worse than Littlefinger just being gagged - he outright confesses to this one. Further note that Sansa provides no evidence, not even mentioning that she saw him do it, nor giving him the opportunity to respond to her assertion that he murdered Lysa to gain power in the Vale. I know showing a real trial wouldn’t be much fun here, but we’re already skimping on basic fairness.

(55:34) Sansa pulls out the fact that Littlefinger conspired with Lysa to murder Jon Arryn.

(55:58) Then Sansa elaborates on the consequences. This is bad, bad storytelling. Jon Arryn’s murder kicked off the political plot. Sansa (and Arya, and Bran) lost their parents and two brothers as a result of the war this started. We didn’t see them learn this. We didn’t see them react to this. The Starks are the heart of this story, and we didn’t see the survivors learn who bears so much responsibility for their misfortunes. We didn’t see how they learned it. We just see that they did.

The priority in this scene is not the long game - the fall and rise of House Stark. That can only be done through developing Sansa, Arya, and Bran, showing their individual journeys before bringing them back together, each contributing their talents to rebuild their home and family. This is very nearly a seven-season internal mystery, touching most of the main characters! It deserved reactions! Especially when the people affected discovered what happened! Instead it’s just brought out to get rid of Littlefinger, with no foreshadowing or development so it remains “shocking.”

Continue to note that Littlefinger denies things and Sansa just rolls on.

(56:04) The lack of reaction-to-information becomes worse as Sansa reveals that they know Littlefinger conspired to betray Ned. They found out who’s responsible for their dad’s death and didn’t get a reaction shot. Didn’t get a scene.

(56:23) When Littlefinger brings up this whole lack of evidence thing, Bran brings up his visions. The audience knows they’re credible, certain people believe them to be credible (including Sansa), but why should anyone else put any stock in them?

It’s fine if the pressure of the situation makes Littlefinger crack and betray himself even in the absence of hard evidence, that could be a tense and exciting scene. But one of the things that makes him such a dangerous opponent, a worthy endgame villain, is that this is a damned hard thing to do. In ACoK, Tyrion told him he was looking into Jon Arryn’s true murderer - and all Littlefinger said was “Jon Arryn’s true killer? I confess, you make me curious.” Show!Littlefinger’s crumpling like soggy newspaper. There’s got to be some fight to this.

(56:42) So…if that really is Littlefinger’s knife, does that mean Littlefinger tried to kill Bran? That makes no sense whatsoever (as he would have had to have learned not just that Bran fell, but also the circumstances in which he did), and is pretty hard on logistics besides.

(56:59) This scene does give Aiden Gillen the chance to prove that yes, he can act. Another person whose direction has been pretty atrocious really.

(57:19) Littlefinger’s master plan revealed! He was trying to sow strife in the Stark family. Man, did his plans ever get smaller scale throughout the series.

(57:32) “I’m a slow learner, it’s true.” Oh, fuck off. Not content with just plain old character bashing, they now have a character bash herself. This is what I mean by the writers truly believing that Sansa isn’t clever. Incidentally, you know what was cut from this storyline? Scenes where Sansa actually worked things out.

(57:38) Littlefinger asks for a chance to defend himself. He outright points out that this is a kangaroo court. Held by the nominal heroes. If the heroes don’t have enough evidence to get him nor the wits to trick him into providing that evidence himself and instead have to rely on corruption to do away with an enemy...I don’t end up thinking highly of the story.

(57:51) I do like Royce refusing Littlefinger’s authority as Lord Protector of the Vale.

(58:28) Also that Sansa’s crying.

(58:30) So now that we’re done reading out the charges and detailing the allegations against Littlefinger, when’s the trial going to be? There are clearly some questions of fact in dispute here -

(58:35) Or not.

This setting is not big on justice. Bullshit trials have featured throughout the series. I would not be complaining about this one being bullshit were it not for three things. First, the people we’ve seen running bullshit trials thus far are the bad guys. That’s literally one of the things that makes the bad guys bad guys, they run unfair trials, and people can’t get fair hearings in them! It is on our heroes to be better than Lysa Arryn and Tywin Lannister even when dealing with the guilty. Second, Sansa literally just tried to pass this off as justice - after denying Littlefinger all rights to defend himself. No evidence, no right of reply, no opportunity to ask for trial by combat. Nothing. Some justice that was. Finally, the series proper opens with an execution and a goddamned discussion on how they should be fair and contain a semblance of due process, even when the facts are as manifestly apparent as the case of a Night’s Watch deserter! This is not a good fantasy series to be fucking up your discussions of justice in!

That said, I do still think it’s clear that Sansa did the bit where she looked into Littlefinger’s eyes, heard his final words, and still knew that he deserved to die. She was not hiding from her responsibility in sentencing Littlefinger.

One more thing I do honestly like: even with his throat cut, Littlefinger keeps trying to talk. Deaths: 2. At Sansa’s behest, Arya kills Littlefinger.

What an anti-climax.

(59:39) “What are you doing?” “Preparing the expedition north.” And for that, Cersei calls him stupid. What a fool, thinking that because Cersei pledged in public to march north and never informed the commander of her armies otherwise, that she was planning to march north!

(1:01:17) This is a novel variation on the “you do know we’re in a dire situation, right, Cersei?” “yes, but we have the writers on our side, Jaime” conversation these two have been having over the course of the season.

(1:01:41) Just pointing out again that Dany made a rookie mistake in bringing two of her dragons and succeeded only in tipping Cersei off that one got killed.

(1:02:06) These armies just keep coming out of nowhere for Cersei, purely to keep her as a conventional threat. This plot has not progressed. We started this season with Cersei under threat from all sides, but with an army at her disposal; we end this season with Cersei under threat from all sides, and an army at her disposal. All the battles have been wasting time until Jaime breaks up with her. The development here has been in Jaime and Cersei’s relationship alone.

(1:03:03) I think the idea here is that Jaime breaks up with Cersei for two reasons - one, she doesn’t trust him as he trusts her, and two, she’s telling him to break an oath. The former’s fine, but seriously, most of Jaime’s relationship with Cersei was breaking oaths. The writers passed up the logical reasons for Jaime and Cersei to break up and stuck themselves with less logical ones.

(1:04:07) Favourite scene of the episode by a mile. Jaime in plain clothes, riding away from King’s Landing as it starts to snow.

(1:05:41) Sam and Gilly make it to Winterfell. Seems the Kingsroad is fine to travel. Never mind the armies.

(1:06:14) Huh, that’s funny, robo-Bran doesn’t seem to have trouble saying nice things to Sam like he had trouble being kind to Sansa and Meera.

(1:07:02) Sam came to Winterfell to help Jon fight against the dead. So, does that mean he’s deserting the Night’s Watch? Or have the writers just forgotten that the Night’s Watch is a thing?

Actually, considering all the black people are wearing, maybe everyone really did join the Night’s Watch, and when everyone is in the Night’s Watch, nobody is.

(1:07:20) Apropos of nothing, Bran says “Jon needs to know the truth” and gives us all the exposition. It’s…a bit graceless. Pretty much what the word “infodump” describes actually. Combined with the fact that Bran isn’t emoting over the fact that his dad lied to everyone for years, it makes it hard to see why this is an emotional bombshell as well as a plot one.

(1:07:44) Bran asserts that since Jon was born in Dorne, his surname is Sand.

(1:07:58) Sam hits us with the other part of the exposition! Jon is (*gasp*) actually legitimate!

(1:08:34) “Robert’s Rebellion was built on a lie.” No it wasn’t. Rhaegar’s apparent abduction of Lyanna was only one cause.

(1:08:53) “He loved her. And she loved him.” First, Lyanna going with Rhaegar willingly doesn’t mean she stayed willingly once Aerys murdered her father and eldest brother, and Rhaegar left to fight against her family. (Also, I sincerely hope that show!Lyanna is a bit older than fifteen. That is an improvement the show could easily make.) Second, ohhhhhh boy does this ever erase Elia from the narrative. Rhaegar was married. He had kids. Even if he didn’t love them, he had responsibilities to them. In his situation, abandoning those responsibilities was damaging and dangerous to those human beings. How romantic is this, when an innocent woman and two innocent children suffered for Rhaegar’s decisions? Just because they’re in love doesn’t mean everyone else in the world ceases to exist -

- Oh, wait. Sam and Gilly. I forgot. Don’t mind me then.

Third, I know the show’s done plenty of incest normalisation with “you can’t choose who you love,” but seriously why cut to Jon Snow going to Dany’s bedroom just as it’s exposited that they’re aunt and nephew? Is that really what you want the audience to have on their minds?

(1:09:16) Epic love story you two, but perhaps consider smiling at each other? So we can see you make each other happy?

(1:09:24) Cut to Tyrion lurking around outside, very creepy, no possible way to tell what he’s thinking from what’s shown here.

(1:09:35) Bran asserts that Jon’s real name is Aegon Targaryen.

This is ridiculous. If Rhaegar wanted to name Jon “Aegon,” he made this plan when his first son Aegon was still alive (on account of the fact he predeceased his children). If Lyanna wanted to name Jon “Aegon,” that means she was still on board with her relationship with Rhaegar, not giving a fuck about her father and brothers.

The other reason it’s ridiculous is because Jon Snow’s real name is Jon Snow. Jon is the name Ned, Jon’s father, gave to him. Ned picked it to honour someone he loved very much, which in turn shows his love for Jon. The “Snow” part Ned didn’t pick so directly, but he went with that rather than Sand because Jon is Northern. Like his family. Jon grew up with that name. He answers to it. Everyone knows him by that name. It’s his real name.

Also, there’s nothing inherently special about being named Aegon Targaryen. Jon Snow can save the day just as well with a bastard surname.

(1:09:50) Consensual sex: 1.

(1:09:59) Male butts: 1. Most definitely for the fanservice. This season has been a real refreshing change as far as the sex and nudity numbers go.

(1:10:12) “He’s never been a bastard.” Yes he has. That’s the point. Whether or not his parents were married (book or show), he’s never lived as anything but the bastard of Winterfell. (This is in pretty direct contrast to Aegon so-called Targaryen in the books, who might have been raised on a poleboat but always knew he was a prince.) He’s been a bastard the whole time, and no discovery of legitimacy can change how Jon was raised.

(1:10:18) “He’s the heir to the Iron Throne.” That’s as may be. This looks to me like it might be a point of conflict with Dany later. However! The qualities that will help Jon assist in saving the world rest first and foremost with his upbringing as Ned Stark’s (bastard) son. Which, again, is rather the point.

(1:10:28) If Tyrion hanging round Dany’s door earlier wasn’t creepy enough, what’s even creepier is that he’s still there now. Still watching. Please leave…

(1:11:11) Sansa and Arya up on the battlement having a supportive chat about what happened in the last Winterfell scene. Ah, good times, good times. Remember that time Arya threatened to murder Sansa and take her face? It was last episode! When did they make up?

The action in the last scene hinged on Sansa and Arya working together. We did not at any point see them working together. We did see death threats. Yet another important bit of character work that took place offscreen.

(1:11:31) “I never would have survived what you survived.” “You would have.” Uh. No. Again, the point. No surviving Stark would make it through what any other surviving Stark did, and it’s most apparent in the case of the sisters. Moreover, it’s not a freaking competition! You do not get points for surviving worse things!

We also see here that Sansa compliments Arya, but no compliment is given to Sansa in return. In isolation? Innocuous. In an episode where two people who know both sisters praised Arya without mentioning Sansa once? Less innocuous. Combined with off-air statements about Arya always being tough and shrewd while Sansa had to work for it? Downright suspicious.

(1:12:21) Quoting Ned about the need to work together would be so much more heartwarming if these two hadn’t only been working together offscreen, and the writers hadn’t well and truly established a pattern of all these siblings being utter dicks to one another for no good reason! I think Arya and Bran are the only two who’ve spent any time together recently who haven’t had dire communication issues.

(1:13:19) Good use of Bran’s crows to go to some nice establishing shots at Eastwatch. I wonder what’s going to happen here.

(1:14:21) And some nice shots of the army of the dead at last starting their advance on the Wall. Longer shots definitely justified here, since we’ve been working up to this from episode one.

(1:15:04) Three horn blasts is for wights - nice job with the homework, writers!

(1:15:42) The other half of why we just had to go North of the Wall. Needed to kill a dragon…and raise it as a wight. Well, if you edit out the horn that will bring down the Wall…

(1:16:35-37) Deaths: 3, 4, 5, 6. A few people fall from the Wall.

(1:16:41) Deaths: 7, 8, 9. A few more.

(1:16:57) Deaths: 10, 11. Two more.

(1:17:08) Nice shots of the Wall coming down thanks to wight-Viserion’s fire.

(1:17:42) And likewise, nice shots of the army of the dead moving through the breach. Not a bad way to end the season - competent visual storytelling.

Game of Numbers S07E07

Deaths: 11. Mostly people falling from the Wall, but Jon kills a wight, and Sansa and Arya team up to kill Littlefinger.

Male butts: 1. Meant to be sexy.

Female butts: 0.

Consensual sex: 1.

Rape: 0.

Woman called ‘bitch’: 1.

Man called ‘bitch’: 0.

Woman called ‘whore’: 2.

Man called ‘whore’: 0.

Woman called ‘cunt’: 0.

Man called ‘cunt’: 2.

Tyrion drinks: 2.

Cersei drinks: 0.

#anti got #fine toothed comb edition #cw: violence #in pacing hell you never get past the third circle

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