Beyond the Wall: This Week on Game of Thrones (S3 Episode 10/ June 9, 2013)

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EPISODE 10: Mhysa

THE PLOT : The long summer is at an end, winter truly is coming and with it the cold winds of war as five self proclaimed Kings claim dominance over Westeros, but there can be only one winner when you play the game of thrones.

THE LOWDOWN: (The following column contains MAJOR SPOILERS, so I don’t recommend reading this if you haven’t watched this episode). It’s been quite the entertaining week following the ridiculous online blubbering concerning the Red Wedding. I’m sure after what happened to Ned Stark, many people wanted Robb to sit on the iron throne, but as anyone familiar with the books knows, he’s barely a cohesive thought in the books. Show runners David Benioff and D.B.Weiss admit to giving Robb more screen time simply because they loved actor Richard Madden. Let’s be real here folks, only two characters are contenders for the iron throne, Daenerys and Stannis, and not because they’re brilliant or best suited or the job. It’s because they both have an edge. Danny has her dragons, and Stannis has Merlin’s evil twin sister, Melisandre. That said, we must move forward. Roose Bolton looking out over a field of burning Stark banners was a terrible thing to see, no more so than seeing what they did to Robb’s body. I hoped they wouldn’t, but they did. There’s a special room in hell waiting for you boys.

There’s a lot going on in King’s Landing…too bad we got shorted on the good stuff. So yeah, we’re all waiting for Jamie Lannister to get home, and he’s in the episode for about thirty seconds (crickets). Nice. As always, I thoroughly enjoyed Tywin Lannister’s every word, the highlights being his condescending scene with Joffrey, but his back and forth with Tyrion was no less moving—especially when he schools Tyrion about how he nearly went swimming with the fishes when he was born. Ouch. We get a short bit of boasting from the Frey camp, with Frey and Bolton pretty much sucking each other dicks as his people mop the blood soaked floor. And I also enjoyed seeing Varys. I could care less about Shae and her problems, but Varys’ quote about having only one name, when family names are the ones that matter, was pretty slick. I still think Shae should’ve taken the diamonds and bolted.

Bran and crew bed down for the night…again. Only this time in the den of the Rat Cook. Sigh. But it was a nice little wink in the direction of Frey and Bolton. My question for Bran is this: If you felt/saw your father die, why the hell didn’t you feel/see your brother and mother go? Doesn’t make a hell of a lot of sense considering he’s A: getting better at wielding these strange powers, and B: Jojen (who also saw Ned die) should’ve seen it too. But at least they got to meet Sam and talk about white walkers…you know, the gargantuan threat we were led to believe was coming with winter (I still don’t understand how anyone survived the attack from the season 2 finale, I mean damn, there was an army of them and the Night’s Watch hadn’t figured out the dragonglass angle yet). Speaking of which, thank god Sam actually did have the dragonglass on him. Nice work, Sam.

GAME OF THRONES SEASON 3’s finale sadly had its thunder stolen last week by Frey’s f*cked up after party, which isn’t to say tonight’s episode was flat (it wasn’t) or as bad as that other finale (yes, I’m looking at YOU, Walking Dead), it just didn’t feel much like a finale is all. Stannis made plans to hit the wall, Theon got tortured a bit more (the sausage imagery made me cringe), Davos flexes his reading chops (Go Davos!), and Cercei got to bicker with Tyrion and stare at Jamie’s stump. It all happened way too fast. Although, Balon Greyjoy’s mystery box scene was interesting. So much for Theon’s sausage. For me, Arya stole the show with her roadside confrontation. Pure brilliance. Jon and Ygritte felt a bit forced, and as much as I’m a of Jon Snow, it was kinda funny seeing him confess his love only to have her shoot his ass full of arrows. We see Daenerys crowd surf (odd that they’d named the episode after such a small scene). The dragon’s looked badass though. So ends another season, and so begins the long wait till next April.

SEX/NUDITY: Images of Theon’s sausage will haunt my dreams.

VIOLENCE: The last of the Stark men are killed off, we get some torture, and Arya and the Hound take care of business on the road. Oh, and Jon gets shot full of arrows. Good times.

SHARPEST QUIP: Tyrion serves up one of his best quotes yet at the small council meeting when Joffrey calls him a monster. “Oh, a monster, perhaps you should speak to me more softly then. Monsters are dangerous and just now kings are dying like flies.”

MOST EPIC SCENE: Like I said, Arya stole the show when she put that Frey soldier in his place. That place being six feet under.

FINAL VERDICT :

TELL US WHAT YOU THOUGHT OF THIS EPISODE BELOW!