But then that ending. Catelyn was still alive somehow?
I stopped the books ~#4. Does that plot-line ever come to fruition?
I gotta say, when I read that scene so many years ago I thought GRRM was making a mistake. Felt the same way about Arya training with the shape shifters (and don’t even get me started on the time travel bullshit from the show). This series is at it’s best when the magic is at its lowest. Melisandre having to sacrifice royal blood and then go through an extended birthing process to cast that spell vs. Renly suits the asoiaf universe so much better then people shape-shifting and resurrecting willy nilly.
Season premiere was great. Revived what had been a waning interest on my part.
Edit:
the decision not to bring Catelyn Stark back as Lady Stoneheart.
Ah my bad- didn’t read far enough back.
David and Dan made a decision not to go in that direction in their story, pursuing other threads.
GRRM lost his way with these books, and I’m super thankful these show-runners will be finishing the story for me.
Why a Walder flashback?
What a goofy looking bunch of uglies.
Hrmm… he didn’t drink. The heck is he up to?
Does he realize he just called himself a sheep?
OMG THIS IS AWESOME.
I didn’t see that opening coming until the actual reveal. Loved it. Loved the whole episode, especially the continued redemption of The Hound. Sansa has also become a really interesting character.
Yeah, I don’t get any hint of her being naive/too trusting. She just murdered dozens of Freys and walked out of the Twins without a scratch - I’m pretty sure she knows what she’s doing here.
This episode almost makes up for the shit battles and what-not we had to deal with last season. Can’t wait to see where this season goes since it’s all new and I’ve avoided all show spoilers on it. I’m going to try to care less about the unrealistic crap and plot devices this season and just enjoy the ride.
Absolutely. The camera went into Ary’s POV a couple of times and when it did, it showed she was assessing the camp, pointedly looking at where the soldiers had their weapons stacked, etc.
I get what you’re saying but there’s really no reason for a group of 5 or 6 soldiers to poison a little girl out of the blue . They certainly wouldn’t let her eat their only rabbit first in any case.
It’s pretty easy to pretend to drink from an opaque container like that. Like you would, if you were trying to lull them into a false sense of security.
I am pretty sure the scene was just an excuse for the Ed Sheeran cameo. When she asked him about the song and he said “It’s new”, I expected him to follow-up with “available now on iTunes and Amazon.”
Hopefully, awkward celebrity cameos are not a thing for the entirety of the last season.
I suspect BOTH. You get to tuck Ed Sheeran in there nicely, including a song. And let’s face it, nobody wants them to kill off Ed Sheeran in a horrible fashion, so more than likely Arya’s original intent on stopping may have been to kill the soldiers since they were Lannister men, but within moments of talking to them I think she may have changed her mind.
This is probably part of a character growth arc for Arya, recognizing that perfectly average and normal people are caught up in the events that have unfolded, and that while her quest for revenge against the major players is justified, she needs to be careful not to leave a path of innocent dead in her wake. This is something the Faceless Men emphasized in their training, they don’t just take lives out of convenience or personal feelings, they try to cause as little collateral damage as possible while taking out their intended targets. The fact that Arya kept Walder Frey’s young wife from drinking the wine, and now her seeming change of heart about the Lannister soldiers, would indicate that some of Arya still exists in her new persona.
Or, she could kill them all in their sleep at the start of the next episode.
Also, she did the face reveal thing in the Frey castle scene, so word will get around that a Faceless Man assassin did for the entire Frey clan. The rest of the Faceless Men won’t be too happy about that, so I expect Arya’s quest for revenge may come up just short when it’s interrupted by a certain someone showing up. I suspect Arya’s face may end up in the collection in the end. It’s hard to imagine a happy ending for her.
It seemed to me that Arya was planning on slaughtering all those men somehow and was evaluating/reconnoitering their situation so that she could murder them in the most efficient manner.
But much as in the recon scene with Lady Crane, Arya gets new information that may or may not cause her to reevaluate her plans: these are not hardened, brutal soldiers but rather a peacekeeping force that being sent to tamp down on the chaos that she herself has a hand in causing; most of them are unaware of the larger geopolitical leaning of their commanders; many of them would much rather be at home fishing or raising kids than cleaning up Cersei/Jamie’s mess.
And of course one of them espouses the girl-power theme that the season seems to be flirting with.
Still – even money as to whether next week shows her riding away from a campsite where everyone’s throat has been cut in the night.
There’s a reason why Arya comes upon the soldiers and has her interaction that ends in laughter in the same episode that The Hound returns to the farm to see the end result of his callousness. It’s contrasting their emotional paths that ultimately lead to measures of mercy. Her deciding not to kill the soldiers and his bumbling but sincere effort to make amends.
Exactly. I think she and the Hound are both on similar story arcs. It would be cool if they somehow met again by the end of things, though I suspect neither will live to see the end of the story.
I think it’s going to be the Greyjoy brother-sister. Dany can’t have everything go her way, and the Lannister army doesn’t stand a chance against the Dothraki and her dragons, so to keep things from being too one-sided Euron is going to sail toward Dorne and defeat Dany’s navy, entrusted to Asha and Theon, and capture them and maybe some Sand Snakes and haul them back to King’s Landing
That opener, I told my wife instantly what was up. As soon as I saw Walder I knew what the score was.
Contra others here, I think Arya lives. Or at least dies with her sword in Cersei’s gut or something. I could see her doing a suicide mission to take her out, or someone of equal value.
