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hoopslab · 7 years ago

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Game of Thrones S7 Ep2 Stormborn : Where is Ghost?

SPOILERS FOR GAME OF THRONES ON HBO, UP THROUGH EPISODE 2 OF SEASON 7

On Sunday nights, two of my favorite TV shows come on that both prominently feature a character named Ghost. Ghost is the name of the alter ego of the main character on Power (which you should absolutely watch, if you’ve never seen it before). But on Game of Thrones, Ghost is the name of Jon Snow’s direwolf. Who hasn’t been seen on screen in quite awhile, now.

On Sunday’s Episode 2, we got to see Arya Stark finally reunited with her direwolf, Nymeria. Who was HUGE! Nymeria was the size of a horse, at least, and looked like she could swallow Arya whole. She looked way bigger, to my eyes, than Summer...Bran’s direwolf that met its end last season against the White Walkers. All of the other Stark direwolves are dead...Sansa’s Lady in season 1, Robb’s Grey Wind at the Red Wedding, and Rickon’s Shaggy Dog last season. But Jon’s Ghost is still around...only we haven’t seen him, despite Jon getting lots of airplay.

I found a reference that in real life, the producers of GoT didn’t include Ghost in last season’s Battle of the Bastards for cost considerations. But with WunWun the Giant gone and Jon heading into the Den of Dragons, I’m hoping that we get to see Ghost back on screen and intimidating like Nymeria before long.

Arya decides to go home and meets old friend

As mentioned above, Arya briefly reunited with her direwolf Nymeria this episode. But before that, she made a decision that made me breathe (at least a short-term) sigh of relief...she chose family over revenge. As I mentioned last week, Arya’s eradication of the Freys was a guilty pleasure to watch. But I worried that her on-going mission to take down Cersei, and thus continue through her famous death list from seasons ago, could signal that she was succumbing to the Dark side.

Thus, when Hot Pie told her that Jon Snow was alive, and that he was the King of the North from Winterfell, I found it to be a moment of truth. The departure scene was well played, and I almost cheered out loud when she turned North to go home.

Of course, along the way, she meets back up with Nymeria...her direwolf, that she had sent away in Season 1 so that Cersei wouldn’t kill her for attacking Joffrey. Arya has dreamed of Nymeria since, so we had seen that Nymeria was leader of her own pack, but this was their first meeting in the flesh. It was bittersweet to see Arya ask Nymeria to come back, which would have fit with the homecoming theme, but Nymeria has a family of her own now (and may just remember Arya throwing rocks at her to get her to leave), so she didn’t follow. It does seem, to me, that Nymeria will end up coming back around at some point, though. As the only live Stark direwolf outside of Ghost, she seems like she’s got a part to play.

Why doesn’t anyone know Bran is alive yet?

As I mentioned last week, when I first started reading A Game of Thrones 20 years ago Bran was my favorite character. The kid that gets thrown out of the window early on, and is a cripple, but that was using his mind to expand his boundaries and had unlimited upside in the story was electric in 1997. Unfortunately, he’s probably the character that (to date) has lost the most luster in going from print to the screen, because so much of what makes him cool goes on in his mind and it doesn’t always translate to the screen.

But, be that as it may, he’s clearly a powerful wildcard in the story. In addition to his unknown magical pedigree and role as the new Three Eyed Raven, he is also the oldest living son of Eddard Stark (and thus the rightful heir to Winterfell). I’m not expecting him to come down and displace his siblings, but...everyone thinks that he’s dead. And we saw, last episode, that he made it into Castle Black...so...why haven’t they sent Jon Snow a message telling him that his little brother is alive? Jon received messages from Sam Tarly and Tyrion Lannister, both much farther away than Castle Black. So...why no word of Bran? I’m curious if there’s a bigger reason for this secrecy, and if so I want to see how it plays out.

Grey Worm’s weakness

When the episode was coming on, HBO gave the warning that it contained nudity and strong sexual content. When I saw that, I actively speculated who in Westeros was in the position/mindset to be thinking about sex. Outside of a random tossaway scene at a brothel, which GoT has done in the past, the only characters I could think of were either Yara and Sandsnake Mama (more on them later), or Grey Worm and Missandei.

I’m glad it was the latter. We all know that Grey Worm gave up...a lot...to become Unsullied, and that therefore the union couldn’t be as fully satisfying to all involved as it could have been. But the two of them have had mad chemistry for years now, so it was good to see their emotions play out like that. And if Grey Worm was going to develop a weakness, Missandei seems like a great weakness to have.

Is Jon reliving old Stark mistakes, Sansa & Littlefinger

Ned Stark’s father and older brother Brandon underestimated Littlefinger. Brandon was to marry Catelyn, and he beat up Littlefinger for having a crush on her. Brandon and his father were very honorable. Both went south to meet the Mad King, and both were killed.

Ned Stark underestimated Littlefinger. He was married to Cat, went south to become Hand for King Robert. Ned was very honorable. Ned is dead.

Rob Stark didn’t deal much with Littlefinger. But, he went South, and while there went to see Cat’s brother get married...at a little venue called the Red Wedding. Yeah, he’s dead.

Now, Jon rules the North. He’s very honorable. He keeps butting heads with his sister, who is much better at politics (though they could really use some help in having their disagreements NOT before the rest of the nobles). He keeps making political mistakes that can (and actually did) get him killed. And, this episode, he dared lay hands on Petyr Baelish before agreeing to go south to meet a Targeryen monarch.

It seems unlikely at this point that Jon is just going to go and get killed while talking to Dany. But...he certainly seems to be caught in the same traps that have taken out the last several generations of Stark men. At the very least, it’s a disturbing trend.

Why was Yara caught so off-guard by Euron’s attack?

Yara and Ellaria were well on their way to giving the episode a second nudity/SSC scene when her fleet was attacked by her uncle Euron. This led to the big fight sequence in the episode, showed off Euron’s pirating chops, saw the death of two Sand Snakes, and gave us the poignant scene of “Yara’s protector” Theon showing that he is still both cowardly (always was) and broken (has been since his time as Reek).

But, before all of that...how on earth did Euron catch Yara’s fleet so off-guard? Yara knows that Euron is a pirate, that he claimed the GreyJoy crown, and that he was homicidally crazy. Plus, Yara is an accomplished captain in her own right, and her fleet should have been a crack crew. So, how did Euron ambush them with NO idea that he was coming? I know it was dark, and the weather wasn’t great, but...seems to me that there should have been a bit more warning than that, if Yara’s crew was worth anything at all.

As it happened, it looks like Euron may actually have deserved the Iron crown for proficiency, even if he sucks as a human being. Moving forward, it looks like he has the “gift” that he promised Cersei, in Ellaria and Yara. May he find all of the happiness that he deserves in the loving embrace of his new mistress, Cersei.

Cersei’s dragon killer & Jamie’s recruitment of Sam’s dad

Speaking of the Lannister Queen, Cersei spend episode two trying to bring new allies aboard for her war. She used half-truths to try to sway several of the secondary nobles in the land, led by Randyll Tarly. Jamie continued to try to recruit Tarly after Cersei’s scene, trying to approach him in a “man to man” kind of way that Sam’s dad initially rebuffed but seemed to be considering at scene end.

But potentially the biggest outcome of Cersei’s scenes was her time with the mad scientist, who has apparently developed a dragon-killing super crossbow. This is huge, because the dragons have always been Dany’s ace in the hole. The Targeryens originally conquered the Seven Kingdoms with three dragons, that no one else could find a way to counter. Dany returned with a fleet, the Unsullied and the Dothraki...but her biggest trump card were her dragons. Giving Cersei’s crew a realistic way to possibly counteract that threat gives the first sense that Cersei actually has a shot here. At the end of last season, it looked like Dany could come in and walk over the Lion Queen. Now, it’s more interesting.

Can we get a facemask for Sam?

So, yeah. There’s no other way to put it...Sam’s surgery scene with Jorah Mormont was just gross. I’m a doctor scientist that has participated in my fair share of nastiness, but that scene (and morphing it right into the guy eating a gross-looking soup/stew) was ick-worthy.

That said, I was watching the scene as a scientist, and I don’t see any way that Sam could avoid getting stone man disease. It’s highly contagious, and it’s transferred by contact, right? Sam had on the gown and gloves, but his face was wide open and right in front of the yuck-skin that he was peeling off with juices oozing. Some of that stuff had to splash in his face (speaking from experience, here...unfortunately). Which means that, while Sir Friend Zone now has a realistic path at living in the short term, it seems to me that Sam may need his own flaying in the near future to remove his own stone disease.

The Prince/Princess Who was Promised vs Azor Ahai

Of course, the biggest scenes in Episode 2 revolved around Jon Snow and Dany, as they are on a collision course to finally meet. Jon and Dany have been, without a doubt, the two biggest potential protagonists and most talked about characters over the course of the books and the show. They have always been the leaders in the clubhouse for the title “most likely to be the hero”, and even in the story there are prophecies that can fit either/both of them as the ultimate messiah for the Seven Kingdoms.

Melisandre, the priestess for the Lord of Light, brought one of those prophecies up again in Ep 2. She had originally thought that Stannis Baratheon was Azor Ahai, the prophesied leader that would be reborn in fire to wake dragons from stone. However, even when Stannis was alive, we the readers/watchers knew that there was another character in Dany that sounded like she fulfilled the prophecy to a much better degree.

However, there’s another prophecy that has floated through the books and show, about a Prince that was Promised (PtwP) to be born and lead the world in their time of need. This is the prophecy that Melisandre brings up in Episode 2, while talking to Dany and trying to get her to invite Jon Snow to Dragonstone. Missendei corrects the translation to mean that it could be “Prince or Princess” that was Promised, so Dany could fit that one as well. Melisandre is non-commital, though, and she was previously convinced that Jon Snow is actually the fulfillment of that prophecy.

All told, there’s a lot we don’t know. The PtwP and Azor Ahai could refer to the same person, or different. Dany certainly fits the “born in salt and smoke” and “waking dragons out of stone” parts of the Azor Ahai prophecy, while Jon Snow fits some some of the PtwP descriptors. Maybe it’s the two of them, together, that are prophecied. Or, maybe we’re in for one more GoT curveball and one or both will be killed off before the end. It’s still up in the air, even 5 books and now 7 seasons in, which is part of what makes this show (and the books) so epic.