‘Game of Thrones’ Recap: A Farewell to Heads
(Photos: HBO)
Warning: This recap for the “No One” episode of Game of Thrones contains spoilers.
The quip is instantly iconic: Cersei, when directed to obey the High Sparrow’s orders is presented with the threat of violence, and responds “I choose violence.” But guess who else chooses violence? THIS SHOW. Yes, violent things have happened on Game of Thrones before, but this episode in particular used it to solve a surprising number of problems! For various reasons it was hard to get overly excited about the various Mortal Kombat-esque brutalities on display in “No One” this week, but at least the violence had the decency to be cartoonish as hell. Not one but TWO people were beheaded on-camera and “No One” featured enough grievous bodily injury to make an episode of Itchy and Scratchy be like, “Relax.”
Still, “No One” was a brisk and eventful late season episode of Game of Thrones. While nothing particularly shocking happened plot-wise, it further moved characters into position for some inevitable showdowns. Let’s talk about it!
We began in Braavos, where everyone’s favorite pro-Joffrey variety show was climaxing with an angry ‘Cersei’ monologue about vengeance.
Clearly she had taken Arya’s acting notes to heart! In related news, Arya had very nearly taken a dagger to heart and was now chilling in the actress lady’s dressing room backstage bleeding all over EVERYTHING.
Arya was not looking great, but at least she was alive. That was more than could be said for the unfortunate band of marauders who had ticked off The Hound last week:
They’d just been trying to enjoy a nice pleasant campfire nonconsensual fingering when The Hound walked up and axed them all! He had had it.
Over in Meereen, Varys suddenly came to his senses and got the hell up out of Meereen. But where was he going? Doesn’t matter. He was now on a boat headed to a city that would surely not be as terrible as Meereen. It was a clever plan.
Then a band of all your ex-boyfriends showed up at Cersei’s pad and demanded that she take a quick meeting with the High Sparrow, but she was like, “Nah.”
And this was where the “I choose violence” thing happened, which resulted in one of these dudes stepping to The Mountain, awkwardly lodging his hatchet in The Mountain’s armor, and then having his head ripped off like it wasn’t even a big deal.
For some reason this bunch of skinny bros in tattered robes suddenly didn’t feel quite so brave and they all ran out of there like somebody had set off a stink bomb at Sizzler. They don’t get paid enough for that! Victory: Cersei.
Brienne showed up in the Riverlands to cut a deal with her old bestie and possible OTP counterpart Jaime. Basically, if she could get the Blackfish to exit his castle (and also go help Sansa’s cause in the North) then Jaime would allow their safe passage. Also, Brienne tried to give Jaime his sword back, which, yes, was obviously a very erotic metaphor. But Jaime wanted Brienne to keep his sword, and if your computer screen doesn’t get fogged up by this steamy turn then I don’t even know what to tell you.
Unfortunately Brienne couldn’t get The Blackfish to budge. Yes, he read Sansa’s letter, and yes he got kinda nostalgic for a time when most of his family was still alive, but this was his home and he wasn’t going anywhere. So no, Brienne didn’t get her way, which meant she was probably going to have to be Jaime’s enemy now. Very unfun.
One of the big events this season’s been building toward has been the eventual trial of Cersei Lannister for crimes against the gods or whatever (the biggest one being her Carol Brady wig). But she hasn’t been stressing about it too much, because she just figured that it’ll be a trial by combat, and her 8-foot zombie friend would probably be winning that match. UNFORTUNATELY the High Sparrow got crafty and forced Tommen the boy king to outlaw trials by combat!
So Cersei was now effed. But Qyburn had a trick up his sleeve. Though we didn’t get an explanation just yet, he promised Cersei that he’d looked into some “rumors” for her and what he discovered was major. I love it when Cersei gets to scheming, as it’s arguably her main talent. (Well, her Sparrow scheme wasn’t very well thought out, but still.) So what could the rumor be? Will it be related to those rumors about her dead husband fathering tons of bastards? We may never know. (We’ll know next week probably.)
In Meereen, Tyrion got so bored he had to force Grey Worm to get drunk for the first time and he had to teach Missandei how to laugh and smile. They weren’t exactly great at either thing, but at least they were doing something.
Unfortunately their awkward good times were short-lived…
Because that’s when the Masters decided to break their compromise and return to Meereen for WAR. Yes, it was cute that they sailed their sailboats so close together like a bunch of baby ducklings seeking warmth, but they weren’t here to act cute. They were here to get real.
Back to Riverrun for a sec. So then Jaime decided to attempt a last-resort option, which was to brainf*ck Lord Edmure into going into the castle and demanding to be the man of the house again. He technically had more seniority than The Blackfish, so all he needed to do was command his officers to open the doors for Jaime. So how did Jaime get him to do this? He touched Lord Edmure’s heart by proclaiming his love for his sister. Also he threatened to throw Lord Edmure’s baby at the castle via catapult. Next thing we knew, The Blackfish was dead (!) and Jaime had quietly retaken the castle. Kinda anticlimactic, but that’s how things go sometimes.
I liked when Jaime and Brienne waved goodbye to each other, that was adorable.
These two.
Wanna see something beautiful? How about MEEREEN BURNING DOWN? I’ve been begging for this to happen for years now, so it was nice to see the Masters finally make my dreams come true. But just when all of Dany’s former posse was cowering in fear at the top of their pyramid, guess who swooped in to save them?
Dany! Dany was back in Meereen! And she had flown a damn dragon to the top of a pyramid so that she could hang out with her friends! That is something very few of us ever do and may never do in our lifetimes. Makes you think.
The Hound had murdered four men with a hatchet, but he still had to find the three dudes who had ACTUALLY massacred his church group. When he found them, they were already waiting to be hanged by their friends. As it turned out the mean killers had been former members of the Brotherhood, and now the Brotherhood (including ol’ one-eyed Berric) were going to take out their own trash. But The Hound still wanted justice for the late Ian McShane, and was able to get them to allow him to murder two of them. But no axe! Which was a bummer. Anyway, they all were killed, and it seemed like the Brotherhood really wanted the Hound to join their posse and head north to battle White Walkers with them (I think?). There was also no mention of Lady Stoneheart, which, if you don’t know who that is, don’t Google it. Don’t even Bing it. But these guys would’ve been the plotline where Lady Stoneheart would’ve happened, so that was slightly disappointing. Oh well. Can’t win ‘em all.
Speaking of can’t winning them all, Arya woke up and discovered that the actress lady had been straight-up murdered in her own kitchen! The Waif was at it again!
This lead to a very long chase sequence where Arya dragged her bleeding self through the streets while the Waif followed her like a twiggy Terminatrix. It was actually a very action-packed, painful-looking chase, especially when Arya fell all the way down the stairs and knocked over all the oranges.
Eventually, though, Arya found herself cornered in her old bedroom with the Waif promising to kill her quickly. But that’s when she unsheathed Needle and the picture cut to black. What had happened? We only found out a minute later when Jaqen noticed a VERY familiar-looking face among his menagerie.
The Waif had LOST! And not only that, but Arya hadn’t done a very good job of peeling her face off. Just sloppy craftsmanship all around. Where were the eyelids? And couldn’t she have mopped up afteward? Honestly very rude. F+ for effort.
But Arya did NOT care about any of this, because she was DONE with the House of Black and White. She made her declaration to quit official when she reclaimed her name (Arya Stark, in case you maybe were wondering) and announced that she was going to return to Winterfell. So basically A LOT of people were heading to Winterfell now. This was shaping up to be quite a Stark party. A Starty. And who doesn’t love a Starty?
“No One” was fun and gory without being overly memorable. I don’t know. I liked it, but next week’s episode feels like it might be a doozy. This one was just getting us ready I bet. Only two more episodes this season! (And only 15 more episodes left total?) I may not be super stoked about mindless violence lately, but I sure wouldn’t mind some of it being directed at Ramsay Bolton and you can quote me on that. Let’s do that next week okay? Okay.
What did YOU think of “No One”?
Game of Thrones airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on HBO
