Jackson Jambalaya

WOW!!! Team Targaryen showed up after getting knocked around for a few weeks.  No more misdirection plays or reverses.  Dany used the try and stop it offense and unfortunately for the Lannisters, no one figured out how to stop an honest-to-goodness fire-breathing dragon backed up by a Mongol horde.  Some thoughts on "Spoils of War".




*This was definitely a top-five episode.  It didn't quite best Hardhomme or the Red Wedding.  Hardhomme was just pure shock delivered every other second.  There is a reason no music played during the ending credits.  The Rains of Castermere (Red Wedding) delivered a similar blow to the psyche.  The Red Wedding was a plot twist no one saw coming but boy did it deliver.  The Winds of Winter delivered a series of staggering punches as well.    The horrors of war were shown all too well in Spoils of War.  One moment the Lannister soldiers are lined up in their pretty Lannister armor looking oh so soldierly and then are complete ashes in the next moment.  The scene did a great job of showing the shock and awe experienced by Jaime and his cohorts as they struggled to comprehend what was happening right in front of them.

*Bronn.  The man did it all.  Saved Jaime, wounded a dragon (was that bolt poisoned?), coined a new term- "fancy lad school", and still got screwed over by Jaime.  "Castle I promised you? What Castle?"  He deserves this award:

*Arya.  Our little assassin fought Brienne to a duel although I thought she was toying with Brienne at times.  Think about that.  Little Arya is playing with one of the best sword fighters in Westeros.  The Valerian dagger looked like it belonged on her as well.  However, one reviewer on Watchers on the Wall referred to her as "f'ed up" because she is quite the assassin.  Oh really? Let's take a look at Arya.

Her father was beheaded in front of her although her head was turned away by someone else.  She has been captured several times. She was enslaved.  She makes it to the Twins only to find her mother and brother butchered while most of the Stark army is wiped out.  The Hound kidnaps her and hauls her around the countryside.

The truth is Arya lives in a very dark world.  Will Durant wrote that Christianity softened the downfall of the Roman Empire as the barbarians had adopted the faith.  There was no such softening in GRRM's world. Good people who can't defend themselves are easy prey and often suffer the fate of such prey.  Arya learned some harsh lessons at a very young age.  She grew on the streets instead of a castle.  She was forced to adapt, improvise and overcome.   Only the strong and the cunning survive in her world.  However, keep in mind Arya has a code.  She doesn't kill anyone who doesn't deserve it and has spared innocents such as Lady Frey when she could have killed them.  Turning the other cheek in this universe means you exposed your neck to a sword.  One wonders if the female reviewers at the Washington Post and Watchers on the Wall would feel such anguish if Arya was a boy.

*Bran Muadib Stark.  Bran died from information overload but we still don't know what took his place.   Bran is now the Three-Eyed Raven but it seems there is very little Bran left.  It is similar to the path taken by Paul Atreides.  Paul was another gifted member of a royal house until he went through The Agony.  He gained the power to see the past and the future.  However, the transformation made him more distant, cold-blooded, calculating as his power to feel fell away from his soul.

*Jaime.  He lived but was he captured?  What would Danyres do with him? Hostage? Payback for killing the Mad King? Demand allegiance? Did the Tarlys survive? Dany might want to wear some armor the next time she visits the battlefield.  One well-placed arrow would have added another description to her long list of titles: dead.

*What was that little mention of the Golden Company by Cersai? Does she intend to hire the Golden Company? Does she mean to use them to wipe out the North? Attack the Dothraki or Unsullied? Or will she use it to wipe out Bravos?

*Littlefinger.  Bran knows when he has been bad or good.  Does he make Littlefinger be good for goodness sakes or does he out him to the rest of the Starks? His little lie about that dagger started a whole war.  He also knows that Littlefinger was behind the death of Joffery and Cersai's imprisonment which led to the Walk of Shame.  Run, Lord Baelish, Run.  

The New Rockstars posted its usual entertaining recap:



while Alt Shift X provides his usual concise but penetrating commentary.