After ten months, it's back... and Jon Snow is still dead.
Lots of plot lines this week. Probably too many.
Dornish Coup
Ellaria and Doran reminisce fondly about Oberyn until they receive a raven message saying Myrcella has been killed. Then Ellaria shanks the prince while Tyene stabs Areo in the spine. The prince was a weakling, and his people hate him for not avenging his brother's death, so mama Sand and the Snakes are taking over. Meanwhile, in King's Landing, Obara and Nymeria stroll into Trystane's room and murder him, so he can't return and assert his claim to the throne.
The Adventures of Grumpy Dwarf and Baldy No Balls
Meereen is pretty fucked up after the Sons of the Harpy attacked everyone at the games, and it's going to take Tyrion and Varys a while to clean things up. Tyrion accidentally tries to buy a woman's baby so he can eat it, then all the ships in the harbour catch fire, since guards aren't a thing in the Game of Thrones world.
Temporary Blindness
Arya is now a blind beggar on the streets of Braavos. The girl from the House of Black and White shows up to beat her up with a stick. It's going to be some kind of a training thing. I hope there's a montage.
The Widow Drogo
The Dothraki who picked up Daenerys all want to fuck her, but you're not allowed to bang a Khal's widow. It is known. So Khal Moro vows to take her back to Vaes Dothrak to live in a sort of Khaleesi retirement home.
Elsewhere, Daario and Jorah had no trouble at all tracking where Drogon went, even though he hid from everyone quite successfully last season. They'll probably catch up to the khalasar in the next episode.
Worst Kingsguard Ever
Jaime returns with Myrcella's body. Cersei is sad, but the old witch told her that her kids would die, so she's not surprised.
Prisoner of the Faith
Margaery is still in prison, where the septa apparently whomps her ass with regularity. The High Sparrow drops by for a visit, but won't give out any information on Loras.
Lady Stark-Lannister-Bolton and Her Merry Band
Myranda's dead and Ramsay's a little upset. Roose is rightly pissed that Ramsay has lost Sansa, since she's the key to controlling the North. Fortunately for them, some of House Bolton's best hounds are on the trail. Sansa and Theon are on foot and not really dressed for the weather, so the dogs catch up to them pretty quickly. Theon tries to throw them off the trail, but as he is a miserable failure, he fails miserably. When all seems lost, Brienne and Podrick ride out of nowhere to save the day. Brienne kills four or five guys, Podrick gets one, and even Theon manages to stab a guy in the back. The worst knight ever then swears fealty to Sansa, which probably means she's going to die soon.
Jon is Dead, Jon is Dead, I am the Walrus
Ghost is whining, so Ser Davos steps outside to see what the trouble is and finds Jon's corpse lying in the snow. He, Edd, and some loyal members of the Night's Watch take the body into a secure room and try to figure out what to do next. They're hopelessly outnumbered, so Edd is dispatched to try to bring back some wildling reinforcements.
In the meantime, Ser Alliser and the rest of the conspirators hold a meeting and explain their actions. Everyone seems to more or less forgive them. Alliser then tries to negotiate the surrender of the remaining Snow loyalists, but Davos is fairly certain that the offer of amnesty is a lie and they'll all be murdered if they surrender, so they resolve to hold out as long as they can.
Melisandre is despondent because all her visions are apparently false. It turns out that she's also really an old lady. It probably won't be terribly important to the plot.
What I Liked
-Davos asks for mutton. I hope he makes more demands in the next episode.
-"What is best in life? 1. Crush your enemies. 2. See them driven before you. 3. Hear the lamentation of the women. 4. Mutton. 5. Seeing a beautiful woman naked for the first time."
What I Hated
-Trystane is apparently travelling without guards. Because that's something princes totally do all the time.
-They had no idea where Drogon went, but Daario and Jorah find the spot where he landed and let Daenarys off in like 20 minutes. Half the previous season was spent wondering where the fuck that dragon was, and they tracked him without issue.
-The Night's Watch seems to be mainly composed of idiots. Alliser wants to be Lord Commander, even though the previous two have been murdered by their own men, and no one really seems concerned about the giant army of dead people that's coming to kill everything.
-The episode ended with a "twist". It's Game of Thrones, not fucking Lost.
Final Thoughts
Davos could've remained neutral in the whole Jon Snow thing and saved himself a lot of trouble. He's not a member of the Watch, and it's not like he and Jon knew each other for a long time or anything like that. Of course, if he had simply buggered off, that would've been the last we'd ever see of him, since there's not a whole heck of a lot for him to do with Stannis dead. Although, we don't really have confirmation that Stannis is dead. He's probably dead, but until we see his head on a pike, we won't know for sure.
Olly had a real shit-eating look on his face. I hope someone kills him soon.
Littlefinger's been missing for four episodes. When he comes back, he'd better have some explanation as to what the hell his plan is. At the moment, leaving Sansa with the Boltons hasn't actually accomplished much of anything.
Apparently, the concept of guarding things hasn't yet reached maturity in the GoT world. Every guard on the show seems to be completely ineffective at actually protecting anything, and important people, places, and things seem to be left unguarded with alarming regularity. Lords and Ladies are killed with such frequency that it's surprising that there are any left at all.
The whole Dorne plot makes no sense, and I hope they drop it without explanation. The fact that Jaime continued on to King's Landing after Myrcella was murdered is reason enough to dump the whole plot line. There's no reason at all why he wouldn't have immediately had the ship turn around so Ellaria and the Sand Snakes could be arrested. Or sent a row boat back to the dock to tell everyone that Myrcella died. Or stabbed Trystane himself in a murderous rage. And, what's the endgame for Ellaria and her daughters? They've essentially declared war against a vastly superior force. At best they'll completely destabilize the seven kingdoms, leaving a power vacuum that'll kill pretty much everyone who's not already dead, including a fair number of Dornish.
Ultimately, this wasn't a good episode. Six minutes per plot line is not nearly enough, so although all the plots advanced, they moved forward so little that it seemed like almost nothing happened. The writers still seem a bit lost now that they've more or less exhausted the story from the books. Character motivations are often unclear and their actions are frequently nonsensical. Of course, the finale from last season won Emmys for writing and directing, so what do I know?
