Many of the players in the
Game of Thrones hold honor paramount—that's how
we got into this messy clash of kings. But in this week's episode, deceit and
betrayal reign.
Who betrayed their family and friends? Who had their prized possessions
stolen from them? And who came thisclose to losing everything? Find out now:
If Daenerys Targaryen's three baby dragons are the metaphorical equivalent
of the atomic bomb, we've got some rogue nukes out there in east.
Dany spent the episode, entitled "The Old Gods and the New," trying to buy
ships and an army for her triumphant return to the Seven Kingdoms, only to
return home to Xaro Xhoan Daxos' palace to find her prized possessions stolen
and many of her men slain.
It appeared that one of those nasty, corrupt warlocks was carrying the
toddler dragons off as the episode ended. Dark magic and dragon fire could be a
pretty destructive combination, one thinks.
"Where are my dragons?" a distraught Dany shouted. (Poor Dany. Can't she
marry Jon Snow already and take over the world as its true king and queen?) While Dany was suffering in the east, the west, as usual, was full of
traitors.
The episode opened with the turncloak Theon Greyjoy seizing a lightly
guarded Winterfell with a skeleton crew. "You don't give commands any more,
little lord," Theon told Brandon Stark, whom he once might have considered his
brother.
Winterfell: Theon Greyjoy (Alfie Allen) is working really hard to win the
prize of most despised character. He comes raging in to take Winterfell from
sweet little Lord Bran (Isaac Hempstead-Wright). In the process of flexing his
new power, Theon gruesomely beheads Rodrik (Ron Donachie). Fortunately for
Rickon (Art Parkinson) and Bran, Theon is largely still led by his libido and
falls for Osha's (Natalia Tena) savage distractions. Osha, we've never loved you
more.
Stark Camp: We know that no good can come from Robb's (Richard Madden)
infatuation with Lady Talisa, the battlefield nurse. And in case we forgot, Mama
Catelyn (Michelle Fairley) shows up just in time to remind Robb—and us—that he
is promised to another. But there are more important things to worry about: Robb
finally learns of Theon's treachery and Winterfell falling to the Greyjoys.
Rage, rage, rage.
Qarth: For someone as awesome as the Mother of Dragons, it's really hard
for a Khaleesi to get some damn ships and get started in this war. Daenerys
(Emilia Clarke) is denied, propositioned and then—as if things couldn't get
worse—she returns to find her people killed and baby dragons stolen. Who took
them? We don't know. Who killed her people? We don't know that yet either. RIP
Irri (Amrita Acharia). By the way, where was Jorah (Iain Glen)? We missed his
pretty face and confessions of love admiration.
King's Landing: Well Joffrey (Jack Gleeson) didn't get torn limb from limb
by an angry mob like we hoped, but fingers crossed for next week. On the upside
Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) did get to slap him again. So satisfying. Of course,
Joffrey has absolutely no regard for anyone, including his hostage/fiancée.
Fortunately for Sansa (Sophie Turner), Sandor Clegane (Rory McCann) was there to
save her from a gang rape. Family-friendly programming here, people.
Beyond the Wall: Jon Snow (Kit Harington) & Co. are working up in some
pretty bleak territory when they come across some wildlings. Sweet dear Jon Snow
who can't kill a woman, even she'd love to see him dead. Ygritte (Rose Leslie)
gives him a run for his money, literally. By nightfall they are snuggling up.
Granted she is tied up and trying to tease him. That oath of chastity has got to
be bothersome. P.S. While we love Jon Snow's beautiful mop of hair, why does he
never wear a hat?
Arya Stark, meanwhile, continued to impress Lord Tywin Lannister in her
duties as his cupbearer at Harrenhal. Through not in the books, this Arya-Tywin
interaction has had some of the show's best character development to date. Tywin
revealed that Jaime Lannister has dyslexia and he used to tutor his son four
hours a day. (Tywin is also more likable on the show than in the books.) He
praised Arya's smarts ("Maybe you should devise our next battle plan") and when
Tywin asked the Stark girl what killed her father, she said, "Loyalty." How
true. Sad, but how true.
The moment where characters start to lose control is an exciting point in
every story. And on tonight's Game of Thrones, some of our favorites battled to
hold onto power in the face of naked rebellion. Theon struggled to control his
captured Northerners, Joffrey struggled to control bitter mobs, Arya struggled
to protect her identity and Jon Snow struggled to capture a hot Wildling
prisoner. Perhaps most surprising, Dany will now have to struggle to keep her
dragons (that last line is still echoing in my ears).
So let's stay calm as we make our way to the lifeboats, breaking down "The
Old Gods and the New."
What drives Theon, and what we heard in his boastful, showy speeches yet
again, is a need to trumpet not just his importance, but his existence. As the
hostage/guest in the large, busy household of a lord with many other children,
and as the son his father all but forgot, Theon always feels the need to assert
himself, as if the world was constantly trying to forget about him (which, given
his prickly personality, it probably was). His words and actions are all about
trying to convince others that he matters -- and trying to convince himself
too.
But you could see that he really didn't want to execute Cassel: Killing men
in combat was one thing, but this was a very different affair. But he was in an
impossible position, which you could see by the look on his face. He risked
alienating his own men with one choice and the people of Winterfell with the
other. That's to say nothing of the chunk of his soul that's been carved away by
turning on the house he grew up in. He didn't always hate them, one surmises,
which is why he couldn't answer Bran's question. The tragedy of Theon is that
he's never had a safe place to put his love -- not with his family, not with his
foster family -- and so his need for affection and attention slowly curdled into
resentment and a tendency to bully.
"You are truly lost," Cassel says with a sneer, and even though Theon
manages to eventually separate the old man's head from his body, Theon does look
lost in that moment. There's no triumph in what he's done; his customary swagger
is gone. He's torn between the Stark code he grew up with and the iron price his
father demands. The old gods and the new give him no peace, and thus he retreats
further behind a wall of brutality and posturing.
When he wasn't looking, Arya stole a note from Tywin that contained her
brother Robb Stark's name, and is forced to use a second of the three deaths
Jaqen H'ghar promised her covering up the theft.
Her half-brother (if anyone truly believes Ned Stark would father a bastard
son, which your humble author does not) Jon Snow meanwhile refused to kill a
wildling woman he captured named Ygritte, and she quickly develops something of
a crush on him. You can see a line being drawn between Snow and Greyjoy, who
were both somewhat of outsiders at Winterfell. Snow can't bring himself to
execute a woman, while Greyjoy is pathetically chopping the head off an old
man.
