GOT Review: Episode 27 – The Bear and the Maiden Fair
January 15, 2019Barristan Selmy: The Yunkish are a proud people; they will not bend.
Dany: And what happens to things that don’t bend?
Throughout the series, Dany becomes a conqueror, though you can argue if some of the cities really needed to be. I’m looking at you, most of the plot following this season. Dany’s mentality to free all slaves is noble, idealistic, and often at times a storyline crutch to prevent her from getting to Westeros.
Here, Dany is pointing out that it’s up to the Yunkai leaders to bend to her demands or she will crush them. She’s not wrong, though how she gets there is unexpected. She’s pretty rigid in how she deals with the free city leaders, which makes sense given they revolve around slaves. But it’s this stubbornness that gives her all sorts of trouble as the series rolls on.
What Worked:
Blackfish has jokes – Due to rain, Robb’s travel to the Frey’s is slowed. The Blackfish lets it be know he’s seen wet shits he enjoys more than Walder Frey. A fair assessment. In fact, I’d argue this is one of the truer statements in the entire series.
Cat believes that the delay will be a slight for Walder. He also reminds the groups he wanted a king. Robb says Edmure is the best match the Frey’s ever gotten, which is a huge lie as Edmure sucks. I wish Blackfish took another shot at his son, but unfortunately he didn’t. Still, the wet shit line fit so well, I gave a somewhat meaningless scene a thumbs up.
Margarey being a bro – I know Margaret isn’t a bro, but saying she’s a sis doesn’t make any sense.
Depressed, Sansa tells Margarey all she ever wanted to do was leave Winterfell and go to King’s Landing. Now, she’s paying for those dreams and feels stupid. Margarey consoles her, saying she wants her to be happy. She also says women like them must make the best of their circumstances.
Margarey asks if Tyrion has been unkind to her, and cites Tyrion is far from the worst Lannister. Sansa seems extremely scared of sleeping with Tyrion. Margarey calls him good looking, shout out to Peter Dinklage doing work, but Sansa can’t get past the dwarf side. Margarey pretty much says everyone has their own tastes and don’t know what they like until they’re tried it. Is she low key recommending her to sleep around?
Margarey seems to know a lot about sex and when Sansa asks how, Margarey covers with “her mother taught her”. Are they implying Margarey isn’t a perfect angel? How dare they! Down with the show runners!
Still, Margarey cheers up Sansa, even if only temporarily, just through sheer politics and personality. I don’t think we understand how dangerous this girl is at times.
Bronn the realist – While Tyrion frets about the marriage, Bronn delivers some hard truths to him. First, Sansa is a foot taller than Tyrion and any children they have together becomes the king in the north. When Tyrion worries about what Shea will think, Bronn says marrying whores hasn’t worked out for the Lannister before. Harsh, but fair.
Tyrion worries about having two women who hate him. Bronn says that worrying if people love him will make him the world’s most popular dead man. He has some points, however twisted they might be. Tyrion is right to have his reservations, but there’s no denying there are benefits for him.
Tywin balls out – Tywin, with a borderline wrestling entrance, only missing the theme music, enters the throne room to speak with Joffrey. Seriously, just watch this scene if you can and play Stone Cold’s music. It fits.
Joffrey summoned Tywin to get summaries of the small council meetings, which Tywin tells Joffrey he’s allowed to attend. Joffrey stumbles, and then asks why the meetings are in the tower of the hand. Tywin justifies saying it saves him time to complete some work. Joffrey doesn’t want to climb the tower of the hand’s stairs. Tywin menacingly stands over Joffrey and says “we could have you carried”. I mean, there’s like 12 alpha moves from Tywin hear.
Joffrey asks about Dany, but Tywin doesn’t worry about it. Tywin believes the dragons aren’t as much of threat, saying the skull of the last one was the size of an apple. Tywin shoots down Joffrey’s fears of dragons, and says he will make sure Joffrey is consulted on matters when they are necessary. AKA Tywin isn’t telling Joffrey shit. All that was missing was a Stunner, two beers and the theme again. This is one a huge verbal undressing.
I’m going to let Tywin’s total miss on Dany’s dragons a pass because of everything else, but Jesus Christ, for a cool, ruthless, calculated man, he missed the mark by about a dragon sized gap here. The season 7 dragons to be specific.
Dany Deals With Trash – Say what you will about how long is takes Dany to get to Westeros (way too frigging long), she accumulated a lot of badass moments on the delayed journey.
Dany is debating whether to take Yunkai, which sounds like a huge hassle for her MO. However, when she is told the city has 200,000 slaves, she is determined to take it. The Unsullied all line up as a man being carried in a little travel basket walks toward Dany for counsel. The man comes to bargain for peace, and is greeted by screeching dragons. I’d be pissed to if my “honored” guess was too pampered to freaking walk. Enjoy the gout asshole.
The Yunkai leader talks to Dany about their lush history, while she casually feeds her dragons, scaring the crap out of the guy. As a peace offering, the leader gives Dany a chest of gold, and offers all the ships she needs. All she needs to do to receive it is go to Westoros.
Dany’s gift to the leader is his life – in exchange for freeing every slave in the city. If he doesn’t accept, there will be blood (featuring Daniel Day Lewis). The leader threatens Dany, saying that everyone in her party will be enslaved. This is a poor move when surrounded by dragons who speech at him. The leader says he was promised safe passage, but Dany says she didn’t promise if there was collateral damage. The leader tries to grab the gold, but the dragons prevent it being recaptured. The leader promises to kill them all with his powerful friends, which seems unlikely as his clothes are definitely tinted brown.
King Gendry? – On a ship with Melisandra. Gendry notes he’s back where he started. Melisandra reveals to Gendry that his father was Robert Baratheon. Melisandra also briefly talks up her history where she was a slave sold and branded until the Lord of Light came into her life. So that background info was pretty nice.
Could Gendry be king if recognized? That would be a nice twist to the end of the series, no? Granted, I think his involvement will be more of the “drool at his muscles” type of character, I’m just throwing out of the possibility. It’s also nice Gendry finally got this confirmation as it makes a lot of sense why so many powerful people have been after him.
Arya Begins to Transform – Arya calls Thoros and Beric traitors and won’t sit by them. She calls them out for giving up Gendry for gold. Beric justifies it as part of believing in the Red God but Arya says the only god she believes in is death. If I was the brotherhood, I would have taken that as a threat. The brotherhood confirms they still intend to drop Arya off with the Starks, for a nominal fee of course.
Anguy enters and says there’s a Lannister raiding party. The brotherhood say they need to take care of this first, putting Arya’s reunion on hold for days and maybe weeks. Arya decides she’s had enough and takes off. Beric sends Anguy after her, but Arya gets a solid lead and escapes the pursuit.
We’ll sort of. The Hound catches her. This shouldn’t be a good thing, but boy do we get the Westeros version of the odd couple for the next 12 or so episodes. This is a treat and has the biggest impact on what Arya becomes.
Jaime’s goodbye – In her room, Jaime comes to say goodbye to Brienne. Jaime tells her that he is leaving, as is Bolton (for the wedding, gulp), and Brienne is staying with Locke. Jaime says he owes Brienne a debt but she says all he needs to do is return the Stark girls. Brienne calls him Ser Jaime, probably the nicest thing somebody has done for the kingslayer in years. Jaime is so moved, he can’t even speak before leaving. Not going to warn her she’s frigging screwed Jaime? No, I suppose not.
As he tries to board his horse, Jaime is assisted by Qyburn. He is hoping to have his chain giving back. I mean, good luck with that one. Bolton wants to make sure Lord Tywin is given his regards (phrasing). Jaime tells Bolton to let Robb know he’s sorry he couldn’t make the wedding and that the Lannisters send their regards. I’m pretty sure this is confirmation at what happens at the Red Wedding. I have a lot of thoughts on it but we’ll save that for a few posts from now.
Locke also has some parting shots at Jaime, who stays quiet. Locke promises to take good care of Brienne, as Jaime looks on sadly. This is his guilt racking up. It’s not going to be pretty for her. I don’t like how Jaime was ready just to leave, but he makes up for it.
Gold Hand the Just – I’m really jumping the gun with that title, but work with it.
Jaime hears that Brienne’s father offered 300 gold dragons for Brienne, but he won’t take it after believing she is from the land of sapphires. Somehow, Jaime’s lie backfired. Jaime decides to go back to save Brienne. The man leading them refuses, but Jaime correctly points out he could pin the maiming on him. They return to Harrenhall.
Jaime returns to see the men at Harrenhall are gathered around to fight Brienne fight a bear. Locke gave Brienne a wooden sword, which infuriates Jaime. Locks refuses to do anything, saying the torture of Jaime and Brienne is what makes him happy. Jaime decides to jump in the pit and protect Brienne, putting himself between the two. The man tasks with delivering Jaime shoots the bear with a crossbow to stall for time. Brienne is escorted out and Jaime is pulled up to safety by Brienne, just out of the reach of the bear.
Afterwards, Locke says Brienne stays with him, Lord Borton’s orders. There is a showdown, but ultimately, Locke thinks better of it. Jaime gets one final jab at Locke before leaving.
What Didn’t Work:
Jon’s warnings – So after that climb up the wall, apparently the A-Team is still a week away from Castle Black. Was that really a shortcut? I’m going to say no, but I have no idea. Travel time will become one of the dumbest things in Game of Thrones, and this could be the first instance of that.
Ygritte and Jon talk about how war goes in the south. Men carry banners and play drums which Ygritte doesn’t understand. She makes some good points – why waste men to carry these thugs when you could have them hold weapons. Jon talks about honor and tradition, you know, the usual crap that gets Starks killed. Ygritte proudly states that Mance’s army just attacks without warning but Jon says the watch would be ready and would warm the South. Ygritte gets pissed and tells Jon he knows nothing. Sounds angry she was wrong to be honest.
Later, Ygritte confuses a castle for a windmill, which is really a dumb thing to even add to the episode and Jon laughs at her lack of knowledge on things south of the wall. The two kind of mock each other for a bit until Ygritte says life will be a lot better when the wildings take lands back. Jon shifts gears completely and says that the wildings will die, either to the watch or the armies south of the wall, who are actually trained and not a bunch of rough hoodlums. Ygritte corrects Jon by saying he would also be killed and since they are together, he’s a wilding now too.
And then they make out for 2 minutes straight to close the episode. Great. I mean, this is a disaster for Jon, who knows so much better, but gets sex out of it, so he’s fine with it.
Orell, meddling dickhole – Orell Starts the episode by taunting Jon for almost dying. Jon calls out Orell for cutting the wire. Orell says it’s not a big deal and Ygritte isn’t sulking about it. He says people use each other when it’s suitable for them, and kill each other when it’s not. I mean, he might as well curl his mustache after that speech. He tells Jon he’ll never hold on to Ygritte. I think he wants to be kissed by fire personally. And by kissed by fire, I mean have sex with Ygritte.
Orell continues to try and break up Ygritte and Jon later. He tells Ygritte that Jon won’t bring her into a castle and raise her right. Ygritte calls Orell jealous, which he confirms saying he’d treat her better. But Ygritte says she loves Jon, which puts Orell is a huge defensive position, bashing Jon for being pretty and that he’s not one of them.
This whole sub plot seems completely pointless since Jon and Ygritte arent staying together for much longer. It’s just takes on to add more conflict. Don’t we have enough conflict already? But logically, how could he not die in this situation? There’s no realistic way for survival.
My aching heart – When everyone leaves the room after discussion weather patterns, Robb and Talisa have sex. Cause I mean, why not? There’s a dual butt shot of the two afterwards to please all fans of the show. Enjoy it while you can watchers.
Robb looks over his battle map while Talisa writes to her mother. She’s telling her mother for the first time that she is a queen, and also that she’s pregnant. Now things are getting real. Robb doesn’t understand it at first, but becomes overjoyed. There is an heir to Winterfell, which would certainly be an issue to all the enemies. Keep in mind that Talisa is pregnant for the next, oh let’s say 115 minutes of tv.
Heartbreak Round 2 – Tyrion tries to give Shea golden chains as a sign of appeasement. Shea is incredibly pissed with Tyrion for getting married. She cites that Tyrion called Sansa a beautiful girl. She does not give any credence that Tyrion didn’t want this arrangement and gets blame for what Tywin set up. She’s doesn’t believe in Tywin’s power and believes Tyrion could say no. Good luck with that angle Shea.
Shea wants to run to the free cities with Tyrion but he refuses. Tyrion says he’s a Lannister and will not be a side show there. Tyrion promises Shea a great home with fine clothes and would take care of any kids they have, which insults Shea. To be fair, discussing bastards is probably not the way to go, especially in this situation. That was a big no there, T-dog. Shea wants nothing to do with Tyrion, saying that when he is tired of her as his whore, she will be discarded. Based on Tyrion’s attachment to whores, I doubt it.
A really bad adult film – Released from his binds, Theon is given water by two women. They also begin to treat his wounds. Then, this scene turns this into a low budget porno, with both women begging to see his penis. It’s so bizarre. The women says that they came on their own, but Theon is terrified about Ramsay returning. The women are going full out on trying to “comfort him”. They decide to play with one another to get Theon in the fighting mood. I mean, this became a full on porno. Despite knowing it’s a trap, Theon gives in.
Then, as if on cue, Ramsay enters saying he was jealous. Theon tries to run but Ramsay smacks him with a horn. Ramsay then talks an uncomfortable amount about Theon’s penis. Theon begs for mercy, but Ramsay isn’t one for that. We don’t see anything, but we know what’s happening.
I think the worst part of the scene is Theon says that he knows this is a trap, which is correct, but ultimately goes along with it and gets punished all the same. That sounds about right for this plot line.
Osha’s Double Standards – Osha is pissed off that Jojen continues to talk to Bran, filling his head with “black magic”. She has trouble believing this stuff is real. Wait, what? She was the one who told Bran his dreams and visions were real in season 1. Not liking the visions is much different than not believing in them. I do believe we have a hypocrite here.
Osha forbids him to talk to Bran until they meet Jon. Jojen says they can’t go to Castle Black and need to search beyond the wall. Bran thinks he might have fell from the tower for a reason – to find the raven. Osha wants nothing to do with this. She tells a story of how her partner up at the wall once disappeared. He came back as an ice zombie to attack but Osha defeated it/him, via a stab and then burning down her home. That’s how she ended up at Winterfell. Osha will abandon the team once they arrive at Castle black. Being honest, it’s not like this group needed as many characters as they had anyway. Plus, it ups Bran’s death odds. I’ll take my chances.
Boobs – 2
Death – Theon’s Junk
Needlessly Graphic Sex – 2, though Robb’s is more of an ish
