Game of Thrones, Season 7, Episode 4

Who says you can't go home?

This episode was wonderfully brief in comparison to its predecessors this season. It seemed almost like filler –but it ended epically. Despite its brevity, it was full of important reunions and smoothed out some rough edges from the previous chapter.

It is established that the Lannister army bolstered by Randal Tarley’s forces has sent off Highgarden’s gold to King’s Landing, and are sweeping the countryside of the Reach to collect on the food stores that will feed the city and the soldiers for the duration of the war. Bronn and Jaime bicker because Bronn feels like he’s owed his due (he was promised a long time ago a castle and a rich wife), but Jaime merely rolls his eyes because he literally handed Bronn a sack of gold coins, so how bad is his life really? Back in the capitol, Mycroft Holmes is eagerly awaiting the payment in full to the Iron Bank that Cersei has promised, and is hoping to maintain the business ties they have to fund her war. She mentions to him that she needs to expand her navy and army and expresses an interest in hiring the Golden Company, which is a group of mercenaries based in Essos. This could be a pretty blatant show of the writers’ hand; if you’ve read the books you know the Golden Company was founded by a Targaryen bastard many years ago and is comprised of outcasts and exiles from all over. It’s being speculated that they may instead choose to serve Dany instead of Cersei because of the lineage of their founder, or maybe they’ll agree to be rented by Cersei and turn on her, or perhaps they’re just a red herring and we’ll never see them – only time will tell.

The thing that thrilled me the most this episode (yes – even more than the ending) was the return of Arya Stark to Winterfell. Arya is stopped at the entrance to the castle by a couple of incompetent and rude guards who immediately doubt her claim to be Arya. She easily evades them and is found by Sansa in the crypt, where she’s visiting Ned Stark’s grave. I thought their reunion was quintessentially them – “Do I have to call you Lady Stark, now?” “Yes.” Sansa and Arya were never close, but they’re clearly glad to have been reunited after so long, acknowledging the literally miles worth of insane shit they’ve both lived through to come to that point. Sansa remarks that Jon was happy to have seen her, but will be elated to have Arya back home. Up comes the issue of Bran…

We first see Bran this episode being talked at by Littlefinger, who gifts him the very blade that was used to try to kill him during his coma in season 1. How nice to see you again, catspaw blade! Sort of a morbid memento, but that’s fucking Littlefinger for you. The sleaze goes into a diatribe about how much he loved Catelyn and his life now is trying to express that love by helping her children however possible. He doesn’t know who he’s really dealing with – Bran is the Three-Eyed Raven, and knows full well Baelish is full of shit, just perving on his sister and playing all sides whenever it suits him. It’s never been confirmed who actually hired that assassin – it was blamed on Tyrion, and the War of the 5 Kings happened as a result. I still think Littlefinger was somehow involved, just as he helped plot Joffrey’s assassination – although that hasn’t been proven. Bran checks him by dropping “chaos is a ladder” on him – which was a line from Littlefinger’s monologue back when we found out that Joffrey pumped Roz full of arrows. He’s thrown off his game, struck by the direct quote from a conversation Bran was thousands of miles away from but has viewed in a vision of the past.

The writers really want us to accept that Bran is no longer just Brandon Stark, cripple nobleteen – he’s an all seeing sage in a boy’s body. They show us Meera bidding Bran farewell to make this abundantly clear – for her it’s emotional and momentous, but he seems unmoved, saying a simple “thanks” to a girl who faced incredible hardship (extreme physical exertion, attempted rape, near murder-by wight) for his cause. She explains with frustration: Summer, Hodor, and her brother died for him beyond the Wall – she herself was willing to die – and all she gets is a “thanks?!” But for the Three-Eyed Raven – this is a drop in an ocean of significant moments across many lives; he may be Bran in body, but in mind, he is a collection of noteworthy moments. “You died in that cave,” she tells him sadly. It’s a kind of truth – his singular identity as Brandon Stark is no more.

Sansa oversimplifies this to Arya, whom she brings to meet Bran out by the weirwood tree, as Bran “having visions.” Arya embraces her brother, and he gives her the catspaw blade that Littlefinger presented him with. “It’s wasted on a cripple,” he says simply, and Arya is honored – it is a Valyrian steel blade, after all – there’s hardly any left in the world. Sansa is alarmed – about Bran having accepted a gift from Littlefinger, that is. He gives nothing without expecting something in return, she insists – but 3ER/Bran already knows this. They speak briefly about Arya’s intended journey south, so that she’ll know that he knows about her Kill List. I enjoyed this running bit throughout the Winterfell-set portion of the episode – Arya mentions The List in the crypt, and it comes up that most of the people on it are already dead, save for Cersei.

Arya’s lust for revenge and her ability to carry out this violence is made clear to all parties in the castle. She’s pleased to have acquired such a fine blade, and is eager to use it. Lucky for her, Brienne and Pod are doing their regular sparring (Brienne’s regular kicking of Pod’s ass, really) in the courtyard. Arya requests a training session with Brienne, who defeated the Hound (so far as they all know). Brienne is literally twice Arya’s size, so she seems to go at her with kid gloves: “You can't use [Needle] m'lady, it's too small.” Arya smirks and says: “I won't cut you, don't worry” and proceeds to kick Brienne’s ass, with both Needle and her new blade. When asked who taught her to fight like that, Arya predictably says “no one,” which was delightful.

Observe Arya sticking her with the pointy end

Sansa and Littlefinger watch the sparring in amazement from the ramparts – little Arya Stark just bested the Lady Knight who is supposed to be Sansa’s personal bodyguard. It’s an unsettling moment – Littlefinger should be shitting his pants because if Arya is given a reason, he could very easily be put on and crossed off her Kill List. For Sansa, it’s almost a slap, because her siblings – all of whom have suffered in different ways, as she has – have all come away from their trauma with amazing skills and accomplishments, except for her. Having all of the true-born Stark kids home again was an event years and wars and deaths in the making – and while they are all relieved to be relatively safe in each other’s company, there’s no real sense of belonging or unity between them. The emotional and relational distance is vast, but for now they are optimistic that despite their disparate lives, “our stories aren’t over yet.”

 

The “bastard Stark,” meanwhile, is off in the abandoned mines of Dragonstone, showing Danaerys the ancient wonders carved into the cave walls beneath her feet. Have you noticed that the best conversations occur below ground this season? There are symbols and primitive drawings that tell a story about the Children of the Forest and the First Men, who worked together in spite of their differences to defeat a common enemy – the White Walkers. Jon and Dany don’t know the real story: that the White Walkers were created by the Children to wipe out the First Men, and they only ultimately teamed up when their Frankenstein’s Monster turned on them both – but the allegory is convenient for the message Jon wants to convey to the would-be Queen: the Dead are marching on us and we need to work together to survive.

Dany says that she will help Jon and his people –once he bends the knee. Jon is conflicted – he was appointed King in the North; it would be a betrayal to his people for him to bow to a Southerner. Thus marks the second time in the episode where one character directly quotes the other’s words back to them: Dany asks Jon “Isn’t their survival more important than your pride?”  Jon once said this (almost if not) exact same thing to Mance Rayder about the Wildlings. Jon and Dany seem to be warming up to each other, which gets interrupted by some more bad news – Casterly Rock is taken but the Lannister Army has still won.

Dany fumes – she’s now losing a war she was only recently very poised to win. She cuts down an already bruised Tyrion; accusing him of wanting his family to prevail after all. She’s tired of “clever plans” – she asks Jon directly what he thinks she should do. He’s not happy to be put on the spot, but she recognizes that his opinion would be unclouded in the way Tyrion or Varys’ might be. Jon hasn’t steered her wrong unlike her other advisors. He basically tells her that if she burns King’s Landing – which is what she is proposing – she’ll be no better than Cersei, or her father.  But this dragon is off to take on the Lannisters on her own terms – how will be revealed soon enough.

We don’t see Dany leave, but Jon and Davos are permitted to stay to continue their mining efforts, where they speak more intimately with Missandei about her ruler. She confesses that she was once a slave, and that Dany bought and freed her – and she remains in her service out of loyalty, because like so many others, Dany is the Queen they have chosen, not the Queen they serve because of a birthright across the sea. This erodes away at Jon’s initial impression of Dany as just some privileged brat - she too has a cult following based on her miraculous deeds. They spy a Greyjoy ship in the bay, and Theon sails ashore seeking Dany – only to find Jon fucking Snow. I almost felt bad for Theon – the asshole just can’t catch a break. Jon roughs him up a little and spits out that the only reason he doesn’t kill him right there on the beach is because Theon saved Sansa. Davos is curious about where Yara is – Theon tells them she’s Euron’s prisoner, and he was hoping Dany would help liberate her.

But Dany isn’t there, he learns. Dany has taken her remaining army of Dothraki to the fields of Westeros, where Tyrion and Varys know Jaime and company will be slow moving supplies to King’s Landing. What follows is a battle for the history books, an ambush that completely takes the Lannisters and Tarley’s by surprise. Jaime hears pounding off in the distance; it reminded me of Jurassic Park when the visitors hear the T-Rex approaching, seeing vibrations in the ripples of the glass of water resting in the console.

 

They’re not at all prepared for a full on assault, but they make an honorable effort. There’s just no competing with a mother fucking dragon– Dany barrels down on them with Drogon, and she burns hundreds of men alive, along with all of the grain they were moving. I'm not sure this was all that wise despite its efficiency - if Westeros is in danger of starving come the arrival of Winter, should we be burning food? Jaime and Bronn are blindsided – the only reason they escaped alive is because they had Qyburn’s “Scorpion” ballista with them. Poor Bronn is forced to scramble through the melee to operate the thing because Jaime only has one good arm and it takes two to load the projectiles. Bronn manages to hit Drogon in the shoulder, and for Dany it looks bleak for a minute as they spiral down to the ground. He lands safely though and lights up the weapon, smashing it into splinters with his tail.



LIGHT 'EM UP UP UP

This is where it gets really good, because Tyrion is watching this all happen from the hill with Varys and some Dothraki. “Your people can’t fight,” sneers a Horseman, and Tyrion knows it’s true. He can see Jaime and Bronn, and he silently roots for their escape because they were once his closest companion and admired older brother. But Jaime is enraged by the carnage he sees, so he takes up a spear and charges at Drogon, who Dany is tending to, trying to yank out the spear in his arm. “Flee, you idiot!” Tyrion slips, because Jaime is about to become a golden fried steak- but he’s saved at the last second by Dickon Tarley (I think it was Dickon, but it could have been Bronn), who leapt from his horse, knocking the two of them into the small lake just as Drogon roasted the ground they had only just occupied. We leave off watching Jaime drift further under the water, his defeat plain on his face. He’s most assuredly not dead – Nicolaj was paid in full till the end of the season.

Things are heating up in Westeros – I’m left wondering mostly if Drogon will be okay because his namesake was felled by an infection from a wound in practically the same bodily location. #savethedragons
Only three episodes left this season!