VALAR DOHAERIS
Hey Game of Thrones fans! Welcome to the premier of season 3. This season I’m going to be bringing you all weekly recaps, and I will start each week by saying the same things. One, obviously… spoiler alert in each recap. Two, I would rather you watch the episode that read this. The show is amazing and worth the viewers. Three, that being said, if you can’t watch it or just want a second point of view, then read on. I will also try point out differences from the books that I see in the production (for the little I remember after all this time) – sometimes its interesting to see the changes, and why they went that way.
So, season 3 starts off exactly where 2 left us – the White Walkers. Last season we had seen them marching onto the Fist of the First Men; the outcrop of land where the men of the Nights Watch had made camp. All 300 of them. Enter, black screen, sounds of battle. Then, Sam… running… clearly from the White Walkers. But he’s out of breath and stops. And right before a single shadow takes him out, Ghost saves the day. Behind Ghost follows his brothers… what’s left of them that is. The Lord Commander Mormont appears, with literally only a handful of soldiers, all beaten and bloody, and running as well. Sam failed to release the ravens with the messages, so now they need to keep running – if only to warn the wall that the White Walkers are marching south.
Jon Snow is brought to the Wildling camp, and we even get to see a Giant… how awesome was that? He finally meets the King Beyond the Wall, Mance Rayder himself. After speaking for a few, his motives are questioned on why Jon wants to join the Wildlings. To make Mance believe, Jon answers with something that clearly has bothered him since… the fact that he is upset Mormont knew Craster was giving his baby boys to the Whites, and did nothing about it. Mance accepts him.
Meanwhile, Tyrion has become a recluse. He is paranoid of everyone, especially from his sister – which is clearly noticed when they meet. He then meets back up with Bronn (who is a badass btw), and re-hires him as his personal bodyguard… the only one he could trust.
Davos has survived the battle of Blackwater Bay. Somehow, he is stranded on a tiny rock, what seems to be miles away (having been brought there by the current). He is sunburnt, full of blisters, and a mess (in the book, he’s much worse, borderline crazy). A passing ship sees him. He proudly admits to be a man of Stannis, which turns out to be the right answer, so they save him.
Robb and his army make it down to Harrenhall, ready to take out The Mountain (Gregor Clegain). But the Mountain and his men have fled, leaving behind all the corpses of the northmen prisoners.
Tyrion meets with his father Tywin. It seems if he’s not going to be Hand of the King, then he wants to go be the Lord of Lannisport (the home of the Lannisters). This is technically rightfully his, but his father would have non of it. In fact, this scene is pretty dramatic and almost depressing, to see how harsh Tywin is on his son. Just makes me feel sorry for Tyrion and all the shit he needs to deal with.
Sansa is still a prisoner. She sits watching the ships sail out, daydreaming of how nice it would be to leave. And along comes Littlefinger (Peter Baelish). He tells her how he cares, and how he will do his best and try to sneak her out when he gets a chance. Shae, now Sansa’s handmaiden, does not trust him at all.
Daenerys has finally purchased a ship and is sailing West. Imagine if Qarth was around Syria – well, she’s sailing West along the Mediterranean, toward Astapor (which would be somehwere along the West coast of Greece). Her dragons are growing (and look amazing), but not growing fast enough. Danny is getting tough, and realizes she can’t wait for her dragons to grow… She needs an army and she needs it now.
Davos meets with Stannis, who basically feels like the Red Priestess’ puppet, and when he makes an attempt to kill Mellisandre, her guards are ready to stop him. Stannis sends him to the dungeon.
King Joffrey continues to be a weakling, and Margaery seems to be quite the interesting “princesses”. She handles herself perfectly with the low-borns in Fleebottom – so perfectly, that you can tell, she know how to play her cards. During a dinner, Cersei notices this… it more then just a good heart. It’s a clever mind. And you can tell, she doesn’t like it too much.
Danny gets to Astapor, which is known as the city of slaves. It was always seen, but now you start to really notice how much Danny hates slavery. Unfortunately, she also needs an army, and one of the slavers in town, Kraznys, owns 8000 soldiers for sale. And these are not any type of soldiers. They are born and bred for war. The Unsullied are the greatest warriors alive, fully trained, without any emotion, and all of them eunuchs, to cut out any temptations from their life.
As she walks away, considering this, she is almost assassinated by a little girl who had some crazy looking Scorpion attack her. A man in a cloak saves her. The girl “magically” (and creepy I might add) gets away. When Danny and Jorah turn to meet the man in the cloak, it turns out to be Barristan Selmy – the very same knight who was “kicked out” by Joffrey for “failing” to protect both the mad king, and King Robert. Barristan apologizes for failing to protect her father (Aerys), and wishes to be her personal knight now. Can he be trusted? In the books, Barristan stays in disguise for a while before revealing himself. Of course, this is harder to do when using an actor, and in the end, the revelation happens non-the-less, so, just seemed easier in production to just not bother hiding the character.
Thats pretty much it for this episode. Great story, great drama, great production. I will admit, not action packed and eventful, so a little slower, but trust me – this story needs to build up. And depending on how they spread it out, the next episode (possibly the 3rd), things start going crazy.
See you next week. Shoot me a message if you have any questions!
~mozeus
