Gamer Throons (SPOILERS for S6Ep5 The Door)

Old Man rating: 10.

Yes, even despite the Littlefinger Teleporter(tm) which seemingly enables him to travel unlikely distances in impossible times.

The Wall stuff has been consistently strong this season and that continued. Sansa is growing into her role and future as Queen and is taking the lead more and more. I do enjoy the Brimund/Torienne thing. Loved the fact that Sansa made Jon his cloak - some of the old Sansa still lives in this new, reforged Sansa. Dolorous Edd fantastic as always - though you have to wonder if Jon will ever see any of those left behind alive again, as the Wall is surely coming down, either at the end of this season or (more likely) in Season 7. Sansa said all the things to Littlefinger we've been thinking - though I think ultimately she will need the Vale's armies. Lord Commander Edd :-)

Arya's plot advanced nicely too - there seems to be genuine resentment by the Waif of her and we've seen a big fight between those two in trailers/set photos which hasn't happened yet. From the episode blurbs (ep 6 "Arya faces a difficult choice", ep 7 "Arya makes a plan") I'm tending to think she will decide not to kill the actress and ultimately leave the House of Black and White, with Needle but on her own terms, this season. Whether that marks her for future engifting vy the Faceless Men as a punishment I don't know. Loved her reactions to the play - clearly she is not no-one.

Kingsmoot - we kind of knew what was going to happen (or we did if we'd all read the books). Nicely done, though, and Yara and Theon will now try to get to Dany first.

Mereen - loved the way Varys was blindsided and visibly shaken by the red priestess. Made me wonder what will happen as different sects of that religion clearly believe they have found different Messiahs. In real life, that usually doesn't end brilliantly, for anyone concerned.

Loved the Dany-Jorah scene. Two good actors and they had something a little more to do than has so often been the case (yes you're a complex three dimensional character with shades of light and dark, insanity and insecurity - but just for now you're a single-minded X-machine, whatever X is at the time). Well written and beautifully acted by them both.

White Walker origins - didn't come as a surprise that the CoTF created them to fight against men. The last(?) of the CoTF sacrificed themselves to save Bran so clearly that relationship didn't work out in the long term.

Hodor. This plot point was straight from GRRM (and it showed). Brilliantly executed - that last scene was one of the most powerful the show has done. The score, as so often this season, really added to the scene - just superb.

Loved Max von Sydow's delivery of "No" when Bran asks "but am I ready?". In fact I loved his delivery of every line he had.

Musings:
- now Bran has "the mark", will The Others now not actually try to kill him, but herd him south of the wall so that they can break that magic and get through the wall? In the books there's another option (Horn of Joramun) but that's never been referenced in the show.

- Bran's abilities are still obviously raw, and his mentor died before they became mature (cf All The Other Stories Like This, e.g. Luke Skywalker - is Benjen Stark going to be Yoda? Can't really see that...)

- Very sad that Summer died. Wolves:

Ghost - not so much in the show but in the books Jon wargs into Ghost, so his Ghost is very much in the wolf
Lady - her death signified the end of Sansa being treated as a Lady and the start of her traumatic journey into what I'm convinced will ultimately be queenhood, as well as the death of her childish fantasy of what being a Lady entailed

Summer - his death marks the end of Summer, the beginning of Winter

Grey Wind - more tenuous, but grey is a Stark colour and Robb lived in a world of black and white choices but flipflopped between them; he also broke an oath by marrying someone other than La Freyette so words are wind kind of thing (OK, this one's a bit of a stretch)

Shaggydog - will Rickon's arc ultimately be a shaggy dog story? Seems very likely he will die this season

Nymeria - in the books clearly Nymeria has a large part to play in some way along with her sidekicks. In the show I just hope we get a reunion and that she gets something to do - they've shied away from showing Arya with any warging abilities so it's unlikely to be anything like the books (when Arya was blind was the obvious time to introduce that if they were going to - so they're probably not going to). Nymeria was a queen who united Dorne but I don't think that's quite it - more, she represents(ed) Arya's wild side which she needed to let go of a little to progress (first with Sylvio Forel, later with the FM).

What I'm not quite clear on (well actually quite a bit, but in particular) is the limit/extent and nature of Bran's power. He seems to be a mechanism where different places/times can bleed into each other - Bloodraven knew he had to take him back so that Hodor could bleed into Wylis, and vice versa, as the last thing necessary to keep him alive for the next little bit. But it all feels very raw and uncontrolled. Will he influence something that happens at the Tower of Joy? Probably not - but you don't just drop an ability like that into the plot for no reason, and I can't wait to see what that reason is. Well, OK, that's going to be a season 7 thing isn't it...

Posted By: Old Man, May 23, 10:23:43