'Game of Thrones' recap: Hammer Time

Warning: This recap for the “Eastwatch” episode of Game of Thrones contains spoilers.

Here is the very good, very insightful metaphor we’re going with: The first few seasons of Game of Thrones were like eating quinoa for dinner. It was good, good for you, yet occasionally tasted like dirt. In this here Season 7, it’s cheesecake and puddin’ pops for dinner every night! Almost every scene in “Eastwatch” (and much of Season 7 in general) felt like fan service, but perhaps only because this show has earned that right after years of painstaking plotting and setups. Yes, every new meet-up of characters now begins with those characters recounting their past (sometimes forgotten-to-me) adventures, and yes, every scene should begin with “Six Weeks Later” due to how insane the travel times have become. Still, this show has turned into a sugar rush like never before.

Like, during the dry stretches of Season 3 did you ever dream that we’d one day have a zombie-capturing task force consisting of Jon Snow, Gendry, Ser Jorah, Tormund, and the Hound? The concept alone sounds so silly, yet here we are in the end-run of this glorious show, and characters we’d never dreamed would meet are not only hanging out, they’re exchanging quips and petting each other’s dragons. Again, “Eastwatch” was dessert for dinner, and I am not mad about it. Let’s get into it!

We began with two of the most water-logged soldiers in Westeros flopping out of a pond and rolling around in the mud wheezing for 10 minutes.

As you probably expected, neither Jaime nor Bronn died last week! It was unclear how exactly they swam up to the surface after sinking so low, let alone how they resurfaced so far away from where they’d fallen in, but it didn’t matter. These characters were alive, and frankly a lot less enthusiastic about fighting a war against dragons now.

For her part, Daenerys had to follow through with some tough queen duties. In this case, she demanded that all the surviving Lannister soldiers “bend the knee.” Now, obviously Daenerys is more obsessed with bending the knee than an orthopedic surgeon, but it made sense in this case! She didn’t intend to create slaves, so if they didn’t follow her she would have to regard them as the enemy and execute them. Most of the men bowed down, especially when Drogon screamed at all of them. But guess who refused?

Yup, the damn Tarly men were like, “Nah.” Even when Tyrion borderline begged them to just give up already (and also borderline begged Dany not to kill anyone else), they decided to summarily end their own House rather than serve their new queen. And only minutes later they were reduced to ash!

Aw, poor Dickon. I am personally going to miss getting more of our Dickon every week. If I had to choose, I’d prefer Dickon the person rather than Dickon a pile of ashes. You know?

Back at Dragonstone, Jon Snow had a very sweet bonding moment with Drogon, who clearly has some kind of Targaryen-dar. But as we all know, a good way to flirt with someone is to get along really well with their pet, so guess who was REALLY into this?

Get it, auntie!

Oh, but then look who was back! Ser Jorah had lost a few dozen pounds of skin, but he was back and ready to serve his underaged child-crush. Daenerys definitely seemed happy to see him, which, again their weird quasi-romance has always been a little too weird for me, sorry. But happy for them!

Over in Winterfell, Bran was hanging out by the tree creepin’ on undead warlords.

I loved that Bran used a whole unkindness of ravens to see where the White Walkers were, but then the Night King scared them all away with one side-eye glance. Get outta here, you blank-faced stoner! Night King is busy!

At this point, Tyrion proposed a plan so hilarious I clapped my hands. His idea? Zombie-nap a wight and then deliver it into Cersei’s throne room so that she could see for herself what was coming. And then without blinking an eye, Ser Jorah was like “I’m in.” Wait, what? Like, I’m just as scared of ice zombies as anyone else, but that army of raggedy bones is even LESS equipped to fight dragons than the Lannisters were. Just fly down there right now and lay waste to them! But no, Jon Snow was clearly ready to die, so now we’re gonna get this Ocean’s 11 scenario, but instead of casino cash it’s a bitey skeleton with a sword. I’m sure that’ll go perfectly!

I’m not loving this Winterfell subplot where Arya is suddenly a hater and believes that Sansa is a conniving, power-hungry Future-Cersei. Like, where did THAT come from? I know, I know, the whole “Six Weeks Later” thing, but it still feels like Arya arrived that morning. Relax a little! Don’t be all mad because Sansa wants to sleep in a California King. It’s fine. And of course she’s creating backup plans in case Jon Snow gets killed, that is what smart leaders do. Arya needs to sit down for a second.

Here was an unexpected meet up! Tyrion snuck into King’s Landing via the back entrance, which was, uh, an unguarded staircase. (Go with it.) He somehow managed to get Bronn to trick Jaime into a basement swordfight (don’t ask) only to reveal it was Tyrion who wanted some face time. Though Jaime and Tyrion are brothers who probably love each other, the meeting was plenty awkward.

Their main bone of contention was the fact that Tyrion murdered their father, even though, as Tyrion reminded Jaime, his father was poised to MURDER Tyrion for the (false) crime of poisoning Joffrey. Still, Jaime was not that happy to see Tyrion. But! He seemed to accept at face value that a horde of zombies was heading in their direction and that an armistice was the best call. But guess who did not give a s*** about ice zombies?

Cersei! Which, oh by the way, she’s pregnant now. Which just means pretty soon there’ll be one more inbred blond child for Cersei to cause to die. (That witch’s prophecy was harsh but true.) Anyway, she revealed that she kinda-sorta KNEW about the White Walkers, and she was already scheming ways to steal power from Daenerys once the ice zombies were obliterated. She hinted that her method of winning the Iron Throne would be sneaky and devious, which, duh. Considering her previous strategy was paying strangers to become her army, it’s pretty clear that traditional military power is not Cersei’s strong suit. It’s gonna be subterfuge and terrorism all the way! Anyway, congrats to the future mother-aunt and father-uncle on their future niece-daughter or nephew-son. Although let’s be frank, it’s gonna be twins, and they’re already f***ing in the womb.

And then just as quickly as he’d left it, Gendry was back in our lives! Ser Davos had accompanied Tyrion to King’s Landing with the agenda of recruiting Gendry. Why? Because! Don’t ask questions. Just know that Gendry already had his suitcase packed and his gilded hammer polished. He wanted IN on the action, and so did WE.

Within minutes he was bludgeoning royal guards and being the quippy hunk of our dreams. This guy knows what I’m talking about:

For anyone feeling let down by Jon Snow’s meet up with Daenerys, his SIZZLING sexual tension with Gendry should make up for it! These two bastards bonded over their dead fathers and even cracked wise about each other’s hotness! (Jon Snow did not appreciate being called short, however.) But seriously, if they aren’t best friends (or more!) by the end of this series, we should all feel cheated. Finally a duo worth ‘shipping!

Because Ser Jorah had only been home for a few minutes (just kidding, he arrived like six weeks ago, right?) it was surprising to see him immediately volunteer to leave again so that he could almost certainly get himself killed north of the wall. And this moment in which Tyrion reminded Ser Jorah of the time they were slaves was (a) a plotline I had totally forgotten and (b) cemented my feeling that Ser Jorah ain’t gonna survive long. Yes, he survived a terminal illness, but let’s see him try and survive a zombie bite! Sorry guys.

Because Bran had ordered the maester of Winterfell to send ravens out to everyone, word had begun to spread about the White Walkers. Unfortunately, people were just writing it off as the ravings of a teenage stoner. Samwell, however, had met Bran and vouched for his credibility… which the other maesters of the Citadel did not give a dang about. They did not care. They were like, “Beat it, Tubby” and he had no choice but to frown, steal a ton of s*** and get the H out of there.

Thus ended Sam’s time at the Citadel! On the upside, at least he still gets to discover that his father and Dickon were incinerated, so that should be a fun trip home. Aside: I loved that Gilly was digging up important exposition in Sam’s books… Like, he didn’t register it as anything important, but I think WE just found out that Jon Snow’s biological parents were actually MARRIED. Meaning he isn’t and never was a bastard, but the actual proper scion of Rhaegar Targaryen. That might be an important tidbit for later, but don’t quote me on that.

Um, wasn’t Arya a master spy and secret assassin at one point? Why is she now the worst at it? Here she was following Littlefinger around “spying” on him while standing in plain view. He very obviously obtained some important intel in front of her, and then planted it in his room for her to find.

And we didn’t get to see the whole scrap, but it had something to do with Sansa secretly plotting to gain power either from Joffrey or in service to Joffrey? I don’t know. But Arya didn’t like it. Littlefinger, who was smirking around the corner, DID like it. Sisters are heading for a showdown!

Up at the wall, we visited a castle called Eastwatch, which was like Castle Black but with zero people and very poor central heating. There they discovered the Hound and those two religious dudes he’d been hanging around with were all locked in a jail cell. The trio had arrived at the wall on orders from their Lord of Light, and it became clear to them they were to all team up and capture a zombie TOGETHER. Yes, they were all strangers, but think of it as an ice-breaking exercise. Because ice. And breaking (zombie bones). I don’t know.

But it was hard not to be excited to see this insane collection of bros head out into the tundra! The Hound, Tormund, Ser Jorah, Jon Snow, AND Gendry? How’d we get so lucky? Unfortunately at least one of them is gonna die next week, so start updating your dead pools ASAP.

“Eastwatch” was jam-packed with crowd-pleasing moments that drew upon years and years of character work and plotting. Yes, this season has been almost overwhelming in a greatest hits mixtape sort of way, but if this show was ever gonna pay off all its threads, now is the time! “Eastwatch” may not have had expensive or shocking battle scenes, but it did have almost nonstop joy and excitement, so more of that please. And you know something, assuming it’s well-made with high-quality ingredients, a cheesecake can be a very nourishing meal! The quinoa was fine, but I’m loving this dessert.

What did YOU think of “Eastwatch”?

Game of Thrones airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on HBO.

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