Game of Thrones, Season 6, Episode 10: Finale

 

 

This episode of Game of Thrones was unquestionably the best thing that has happened to me in weeks. Now, you can take that as an indictment about how lame my life is, or you can accept that this 70 minute masterpiece is possibly the greatest 70 minutes ever to air on HBO, and without a doubt – the best episode of the entire show by a wide margin. I finally understand why sports fanatics yell and scream and cry at victories/tragedies that belong to other people and have no effect on their daily lives whatsoever: Game of Thrones is my spectator sport, and I will continue to invest an obscene amount of my personal happiness in it because that. was. fucking. AMAZEBALLS.

Let us begin. I’m just going to throw Emmy’s at the opening 20 minutes because this sequence was exquisitely executed. We follow all the players as they get dressed on the morning of Loras and Cersei’s trials. Getting dressed is a universal experience in this world, but your clothing says a lot about you, and as we watch Margaery being laced into her conservative gown, the High Sparrow throwing a white sack over his head, and Cersei being upholstered in a black leather number that looks like it was stolen out of the costume trailer from the set of Hellraiser: IV, we are meant to witness the roles everybody is going to be playing today.

 

The Sparrows waste no time starting Loras’ trial: the Sept of Baelor is stacked with nobles and Faith Militant alike. Mace Tyrell has a meltdown as he helplessly observes his heir and beloved son forsake his name and title as penance for his crimes (all of which he admits to, most vocally the ones involving his homosexuality) and become a Sparrow; Margaery gets pissed because Lancel carves the 7-pointed star in Loras’ forehead which she feels disregards the “promise” the High Sparrow made not to harm him.

All while this is happening, we see that Tommen is being held captive in his bedroom by Franken-Mountain, and that Grand Maester Pycelle has been lured under the Red Keep by one of the “whisper” children; tricked into thinking he had been asked there by Tommen, but what he finds is Qyburn and a room full of whisper children. CUE HORROR MOVIE MUSIC. For some reason, the writers decided that Pycelle would be murdered by the orphan children of Kings Landing; I can’t even guess as to why except for the notion that it would be terrifying to watch an old man be brutally stabbed to death by kids. Cold blooded murder by children is the only twisted fucked up thing Game of Thrones hasn’t tried (Olly and Arya don’t count; they had personal motivations for their murders), therefore: it had to be done. So long Maester Pycelle: you won’t be missed.

Loras is dripping blood on the floor, his trial concluded, but there’s still no sign of Cersei at the Sept. Margaery, clever little Margaery, has an epiphany: Cersei is MIA. Tommen is MIA. There is a reason for this, and it can’t be good. We briefly get a glimpse of the old, pre-cult ideology Margaery as she confronts the High Sparrow with these facts: She blasphemes about the stupid gods and tries to clear the sept to get everyone to safety, but the High Sparrow isn’t having it: the Faith Militant bars anyone from trying to leave. The insipid, arrogant moron ignores Margaery’s warning and sends Lancel off to find Cersei, or else he’ll just try her in absentia with half of the nobles in Kings Landing to bear witness to his power.

Lancel leaves the sept, but is immediately (conveniently) sidetracked by a whisper child, who runs into the crypts under the Sept. Lancel follows the boy far into the tunnels, and winds up in the room we saw in Bran’s vision: a room full of barrels full of Wildfire. Lancel gets shived by the boy and is left to witness little candles melt away at the other end of the hallway, moments from setting alight the pool of Wildfire they sit on. Can we just commend this kid on his cray assassin skills? What 7-year old do you know could carefully light some candles, place them safely on the deadliest liquid fuel known to man, and then stab a guy in such a way that the dude gets all the way across the room before realizing he’s too late? Sign him up for the Faceless Men!

But yes: Lancel is obliterated, along with every single person within a half-mile radius of the sept. Let’s be real here: Cersei Lannister is now Westeros’ premier terrorist. She just cratered a giant hole in Kings Landing, effectively murdering all of her immediate rivals in the Tyrells and the Faith Militant. And I could. Not. Stop. CHEERING!!! Honestly – I had no investment in Margaery or Mace or any of the countless nobles and dignitaries that were blown up in the Sept, and I couldn’t be happier about the extermination of the Sparrows. I’m not even a Cersei fan – I hate her fucking guts – but this was the most epic act of revenge this show has even seen. It is hugely important because this was Cersei’s official, undeniable, irreversible step into The Dark Side – her declaration of who she really is and what she wants. She took what Olenna Tyrell said to her not that long ago and ran with it: “I wonder if you’re the worst person I’ve ever met.... But the truly vile do stand out through the years.”

Now, some will argue that Cersei held back Tommen to spare him from the fate of his wife and a hundred others, but I think that she deliberately wanted him to see the devastation of his future. She knew he would see the explosion and realize that his wife and the High Sparrow and so many others were dead and that it was his fault: this was the price of his selling out his own mother to a zealot and his devious wife and the other disloyal Lannisters. Did she know he would leap out of his window because of it? I think she did – the prophecy stated that all of her children would die, so either she expected Tommen would commit suicide, or she figured he would snap and become a vegetable and waste away, either way she didn't care because she carried out her plan anyway: leaving a power vacuum for her to seize power. Through nihilism and cruelty, Cersei Lannister just effectively murdered her last remaining child.

As if this wasn’t enough of a bloodbath, we are treated to Septa Unella shackled to a slab in the dungeons, where Cersei freely admits to all of her crimes – and informs the Septa that Franken-Mountain is her new God because the Seven have surely forsaken her, considered the months’ worth of torture this woman has in store for her. Shame, shame – karma is a bitch, isn’t it Unella?

We’re left to wonder what Jaime would make of all of this – he’s far far away in the Riverlands, where Walder Frey and the Lannisters are celebrating their bloodless victory at Riverrun. While Frey wonders out loud where his two sons are, Bronn is jealous that all the serving girls are thirsty for Jaime at the feast (one servant will become important later), so he sets Bronn up with a few girls – only to be cornered by Walder Frey, who immediately puts his foot in his mouth, referring to the two of them as “Kingslayers.” Jaime squashes any kind of camaraderie, fast – reminding Frey that the Lannisters are the true victors here, and that they don’t need Walder Frey to hold the Riverlands if he’s going to keep asking for backup to fight his battles. That knocks the fucker down a few notches; Jaime storms off to brood.

We visit briefly with Sam and Gilly, who have made it to the Citadel. What a change in atmosphere: none of the people in this glimmering city are aware of the carnage in the capital. Sam is positively cheerful, happy to announce that he will now be attending Maester school to the bureaucrat at the main office of the library. For learned dudes they’re a bit behind the times; in fact the Citadel is still under the impression that Joer Mormont is the High Commander of the Night’s Watch (truly, even Sam is incorrect in revealing that John Snow is the current commander – raven mail is painfully slow) and that Maester Aemon still lives. These “irregularities” will be discussed later; in the meantime, Sam gets to use the library, and Gilly gets to fuck off, because NO WOMEN OR CHILDREN ALLOWED. Oh well – at least this small family is safe within the bookish city of Maesters.

A white raven flies for Winterfell, where we finally get to see Davos confront Melisandre about the murder of Princess Shireen. Davos forces the Red Woman to admit to Jon Snow that she burned the girl at the stake, and for what? Because an evil God commanded her to? She admits to being wrong about her visions (but not to having lied: she had full permission from Stannis, dontcha know?), and that’s it for Jon, who’s had enough of child murder– he banishes Melisandre to the South, and tells her if she returns she will be convicted of murder and executed. Davos swears he’ll kill her himself. She rides south with her tail between her legs, but I doubt this is the last we’ve seen of her.

Jon and Sansa bond; she apologizes for not telling him about the Knights of the Vale or Littlefinger. Like a good older brother he isn’t actually upset about her lying to him (or the deaths of countless men because of the misinformation) – but he is worried about her dalliance with Baelish. John senses that certain influences (aka Littlefinger) will work to pit Jon and Sansa against each other – she agrees that only a fool would trust Littlefinger. As an aside Jon tells Sansa she is the Lady of Winterfell and as such he had the Lord’s bedchamber prepared for her; she demurs and says John is a Stark in her eyes – which is exactly the topic Baelish brings up when he visits her at the Weirwood tree later on. This is the most upfront Littlefinger has ever been on camera: he admits to Sansa that all of his schemes are motivated by one dream: him sitting on the Iron Throne, with her by his side as his Queen. He tells her her claim to the Throne of the North is truer than Jon’s and that she should step up as the de facto ruler here (the irony here is, he isn’t wrong! More on that later…). Sansa dismisses Littlefinger’s plan as being “a nice dream” and walks off, effectively making him the new Lord Friendzone. Niiiiiiiiice! Sansa is no longer that bratty teen who left Winterfell in a hurry all those years ago with delusions of romance– she’s a grown ass woman who isn’t about to jeopardize what she’s regained for herself back in the North – a home and a brother – for the whims of her mother’s lovesick former stalker.

Next, we return to a very unexpected place – Dorn! Ellaria Sand and the Sand Snakes are meeting with Olenna Tyrell – the only Tyrell to have escaped the bombing of Baelor, because Margaery had warned her off to High Garden. This was pure pandering to the audience, because Olenna is in full insult mode, shutting down the doofy Sand Snakes (as if directly on behalf of us at home for the bungled handling of this side plot last year and in episode one of this season) so that she and Ellaria can discuss a way to make Cersei pay for her crimes against the Seven Kingdoms/their own families. Ellaria is interrupted by an old comrade - Varys - who has found the friends he was seeking in Westeros for Dany’s cause. The plan to topple Cersei and the Lannisters is really just a plan to help install Danaerys Targaryen on the Iron Throne, then – and all those present are on board.

As such, Dany is sitting pretty in Meereen, preparing for her conquest of Westeros. Task one: dump Daario Naharis. I almost felt bad for the poor bastard, who couldn’t believe what was happening to him; Dany sidelines him and the Second Sons to keep order in the Bay of Dragons (“we can’t keep calling it Slaver’s Bay, can we?”) and she later admits to Tyrion (whose idea it was to cut Daario loose) that she isn’t at all upset about it. Dany and Tryion have a touching heart to heart in the pyramid, where Tyrion confesses that as a lifelong cynic he has finally found something he can truly get behind – Danaerys Targaryen on the Iron Throne. Dany is warmed by this, and gifts Tyrion with something he’s all too familiar with: the pin of the Hand of the King. Or Queen, in this case. I can’t tell if this is a sort of sibling love the two share (considering both Dany and Tyrion have siblings of the opposite sex who hated and abused them), or if Tyrion is pulling a Jorah Mormont and falling in love with the Queen of Dragons. Either is entirely plausible.

Back in the North, Bran and Meera are saying farewell to Uncle Benjen, who has brought them to the Southern-most weirwood tree north of The Wall. Uncle Benjen says he can’t come with them back to the Seven Kingdoms because the spells that are woven into the brickwork of The Wall won’t allow it – an interesting tidbit that makes me think that in order for the Night’s King to advance, that architectural juggernaut is going topple at some point next season. Bran promptly resumes his greenseeing as the new Three-Eyed Raven, and sweet sweet SWEET VINDICATION!!!! We are back at the Tower of Joy, where two decades worth of speculation is confirmed: Jon Snow is not Ned Stark’s bastard: he is Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen’s bastard!!! Lyanna correctly assumes that Robert Baratheon would murder any bastard children sired by Rhaegar Targaryen, so she makes him promise to keep baby Jon’s true identity safe…

 

Cut to adult Jon Snow, who is presiding over a room full of arguing lords in the grand hall at Winterfell next to his cousin, Sansa. The Northern lords have ousted their Bolton overlords but are still bickering over the presence of the damn Wildings, whom Tormund vehemently reminds were invited south of The Wall in exchange for their allegiance – their presence at Winterfell is sanctioned by the powers that be. Young Lyanna Mormont has had enough of the bullshit – her ten year old ass stands up and shames the older lords for their cowardice and infighting – proclaiming Jon Snow to be the true King of the North, despite his bastard heritage (propped up by a woman who was named after his mother – how poetic!).

Looks like Jon has found his equivalent of Brienne of Tarth!

 

Other lords take a knee in solidarity – naming Jon the “White Wolf,” chanting “the king of the north!” Jon seems reluctant of his new found legitimacy as the ruler of the North, but doesn’t do anything to refuse the title either – the same can be said of Sansa, who allows Jon to become the Big Stark on campus. As Bran showed us, and Littlefinger pointed out: Sansa is the only (present) true heir to the Stark name- Jon is factually a Targaryen bastard, despite is dual noble heritage – which makes his ascent to power that much more ironic. Sansa and Littlefinger exchange a look – Sansa’s passive acceptance of Jon’s “crowning” is also a firm refusal of Littlefinger’s offer to make her Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, and while he seems calm, you can see the gears turning in his mind. I suspect next season Sansa will spend a lot of her time blocking the target that Baelish has just pasted on Jon Snow’s back – but I bet she does it like a boss.

Speaking of bosses – we cut back to the great hall of Walder Frey, who is alone, waiting to be served mincemeat pie from a new attractive serving girl. He lecherously harasses the girl, and asks her where his sons are – because servants apparently know everything. She replies: they are here. The old man is confused – the two of them are alone. The audience catches on before Wader does; the servant lifts up the crust of the pie to reveal a severed finger – she means they are here in the meat pie, because she grounded them up to be served to their father! Walder Frey recoils, and Arya Stark emerges from under the pretty stolen Face from the House of Black and White and reveals herself as such before slitting Frey’s throat. ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST!!! I was dancing in my chair at this point, because Arya is most likely going to be taking over the mantle held by Lady Stoneheart in the books as the avenger of the Red Wedding. Zombie Catelyn Stark may never have been utilized on the show, but her role as Stark/Tully avenger will be carried out by our favorite rogue assassin – Arya Stark. People will inevitably be horrified that Arya has been “reduced” to a bogeyman killer: but I think Arya has suffered enough, and it’s time for the people on her kill list to get what they deserve.

Considering Cersei Lannister is the only original member left on Arya’s kill list aside from the Hound – I’m not so sure Arya will have the honor of completing that checklist. I’m thinking Jaime (or at the very least, Tyrion) will have the honor of killing Cersei, because he is positively horrified by what he sees upon his return to Kings Landing: the Sept of Baelor is a smoking pile of dirt, and Cersei has just seized the crown from the not-even-cold-yet-grasp of their dead son, and is now Queen Cersei, the first of her name, Queen of the Andals and the First Men; her royal ass firmly planted on the Iron Throne with no one present to challenge her.

No one yet, that is – Danaerys and company are at sea, with a full navy and three dragons soaring overhead to wipe the Lannister usurpers from the face of the planet in what promises to be the most epic showdown in television history – the final conquest for the Iron Throne.  Until the showdown against the Night’s King and the White Walkers, that is – I have a feeling that will happen after Cersei’s inevitable defeat, whether it is carried out by her own lover/brother Jaime, or by her arch nemesis Tyrion via Danaerys – the witch’s prophecy says as much. My bet is on Jaime, because he killed The Mad King to prevent the very thing that the Cersei just did, albeit on a smaller scale. Take bets with me now: ten bucks says before he kills her, his last words to her are “the things I do for love…”

Lastly: I love that Game of Thrones performed a coup on itself, usurping its own place as a misogynist haven and reinventing itself as a world in which all of the main aggressors (except the Night’s King) are now women.  Cersei, Dany, Yara, Olenna, and Ellaria (and to some extent, Sansa) are directing all of the forces that will soon clash in southern Westeros, and Arya is now the continent’s most driven assassin. I can’t wait to see what changes are in store for the Seven Kingdoms now that women literally run the world.

I still have tons of feels and a heart full of excitement that will hopefully hold me over until next season – the end is nigh, and I couldn’t be more pleased with the way this season ended. Winter is officially coming!!! Valar Morghulis!