The Wars to Come

Throughout this season, I'll reign in the book-to-show comparisons as much as I can.  From the trailers alone I know that this fifth season of Game of Thrones is going to diverge from the books more than ever before, a trend likely to continue as David Benioff and D.B. Weiss enter increasingly uncharted territory, book-wise.  So indulge me a brief reflection as we commence, since things are very different this year in the adaptation department.

"The Wars to Come," showed that this season is going to spoil the books as well as diverge from them.  I think it will be manageable this year - I can point to many more things that are following the trajectory of the books to date than things that have moved beyond them.  By the end of the fourth season, several characters had all but reached the end of their written story.  For example, Bran and Hodor will not be returning this season, a decision I applaud.  Other characters are in uncharted water, but more on that in the review itself.

The tale first penned by George R.R. Martin and now adapted by HBO is becoming a very unique storytelling experience.  Nobody will experience it in quite the same way.  I myself watched the first season and found that it filled a hole in my soul that I didn't know was there.  That summer I devoured the first five books and have been a fervent ASOIAF fan ever since.  I understand that the show cannot achieve the full complexity of the novels, but I do think it can and does do an admirable job capturing the series' characters, themes and mood.  Like all readers, I'm tearing my hair out waiting for The Winds of Winter.  Like all readers, I'm sad to be coming to the end of my rope in foreknowledge on the upcoming events of the show (though we'll maintain our edge at least for this year).

It is now all but inevitable that Game of Thrones will end long before A Dream of Spring is published.  Martin has spoken about the snowball effect of changes the show makes - an alteration made in the first season could make unexpected waves in later years, resulting in significant departures from Martin's story.  I thought about not watching anymore.  I'm considering not watching after this season, but in all likelihood I won't stop.

This is a television show.  It's a different medium than books.  One day, The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring will be published, and the results will almost certainly be infinitely richer and more emotionally rewarding (or punishing, let's be honest) than the show.  At the end of the day, they aren't quite the same thing, and we need to stop treating them as such for our own sanity.  Game of Thrones is an excellent show on its own terms, and if it has ever struggled, it has done so with the need to stay faithful to Martin's labyrinthine plot.  Adapting A Feast for Crows and A Dance with Dragons simultaneously (can you imagine a season without Tyrion, Jon or Daenerys?) allows D+D much more freedom with their story and pacing.  I genuinely think they'll be the better for it.  They are creative, intelligent writers and plotters, their productions are fantastic, and they are working with a phenomenal cast.

Furthermore, Thrones as event television is too important to me to give up.  I celebrate having an hour of pure exhilaration on those ten glorious Sundays that Thrones airs, and sharing it with my good friends.  I love recapping the next day with everybody else.  It's just not something I would give up.  Practically speaking, I could not stay off the Internet for the years required to completely avoid spoilers.

So I'm going to the best I can to sit back and enjoy the ride.  Welcome to the new world.

The Wars to Come

Thrones remains the most densely plotted show on television, and every premiere requires a lot of catch-up, a reminder of who everybody is and what their priorities, as well as laying the groundwork for the sure-to-be-shocking events to come.  "The Wars to Come" is no different in this respect, but it is more exciting than the usual opening hour of Thrones, and it may be their most engaging premiere since "Winter is Coming" (that said, the tavern fight at the end of "Two Swords" remains one of my favorite fight sequences on the show to date).

Westeros is wading in the wake of last season's finale, "The Children."  Generally the shit hits the fan in the ninth episode ("Baelor," "Blackwater," & "The Rains of Castamere," and the survivors pick up the pieces.  The explosive fourth season instead ended with a three-episode climax that was almost emotionally unmanageable.  After enduring the deaths of Oberyn Martel (Pedro Pascal) and the monumentally high-stakes invasion of the hundred-thousand strong Wildling horde, "The Children" wrapped things up with the stunning defeat of the Wildlings at the hands of a resurgent Stannis Baratheon (Stephen Dillane) and the death of the show's most powerful figure, Tywin Lannister (Charles Dance), at the hands of a vengeful Tyrion (Peter Dinklage).  It was perhaps the single most powerful and shocking episode in the entire series, excepting "The Rains of Castamere."

Given these fundamental shifts in Westerosi power structure, it's unsurprising that we also need to pick up the pieces in the fifth season opener.  But because so many of the show's characters are in different places and because so much has changed, it feels refreshing and diferent.  Despite little real plot development (except at Castle Black), I found the episode very exciting.

The episode opens with a flashback, a Thrones first.  A young Cersei (Nell Williams nails Lena Headey's smirking arrogance) invades the home of a witch and demands to have her fortune read.  "Everybody wants to know their future...until they know their future," Maggy the Frog (Jodhi May) muses.  She predicts misery and ruin for Cersei and her children.  It seems that Cersei will be a major focus of this season.

She certainly has a lot on her plate.  With Tywin dead and Tyrion missing, Cersei (Lena Headey) and Jamie (Nikolai Coster-Waldau now hold the Lannister legacy in their hands.  They seem to have some help from Kevan Lannister (Ian Gelder), but they also have the emboldened Tyrells to deal with.  She and Jamie are already a house divided; she deduces that Jamie let Tyrion out of his cell and chastises him for it.  "At least Tyrion killed our father on purpose...you killed him by accident," she quips.  Expect little more lost love from television's favorite incestuous couple.

Margaery (Natalie Dormer) seems to be plotting to remove Cersei from the capital.  Meanwhile Lancel Lannister (Eugene Simon) returns to the capital, with a fresh haircut and newfound faith in the Seven.  He entreats Cersei to repent her sins - she scoffs, not realizing the threat Lancel and his knowledge poses.

The young Lannisters face immediate difficulties ruling, but the troubles of Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) seem likely to exceed theirs.  One of Daenerys's Unsullied is savagely murdered in a seemingly innocuous bedroom scene.  The perpetrators; the Sons of the Harpy, a menacing insurgency against Daenerys's regime.  Daenerys's scenes this year show that she will have trouble ruling a people who fundamentally disagree with her policies.

Faith will likely be an important theme this season.  Serving the cruel Lord of Light, Melisandre (Carice van Houten) remains ardently faithful in the promise of Stannis Baratheon to repair the wounds wrought upon the Seven Kingdoms over the last four years.  Stannis, Mel and Ser Davos (Liam Cunningham) are now at Castle Black with Jon Snow (Kit Harington) - seeing them all in the same shot at the top of the Wall is an example of how thrilling this reconfigured Thrones is.  The show gets more cohesive and interesting as story threads merge.

Stannis asks Jon to entreat Mance Rayder (Ciaran Hinds) to bend the knee, so that Stannis can offer freedom to the Wildlings in exchange for helping him retake the north from the nefarious Roose Bolton (Michael McElhatton, not sighted just yet).  The subsequent conversation between Mance and Jon is the best scene Ciaran Hinds has had on the show, and among Harington's best too.  Despite the insane spread of story in this premiere (typical of Thrones these days), the show finds the time to stage a deeply thoughtful meditation on pride and duty.  Mance, Jon and Stannis all respect each other, but at the end of the day, none of them will serve the other.  Its at the cores of each of their well-realized characters, and the closing scene at Castle Black takes on the cathartic horror of Greek tragedy.

Mance refuses Jon's offer on personal grounds, knowing that Stannis will burn him alive if he doesn't kneel.  He can't stand to betray everything he's believed in.  He says it's not about pride, but it is; for Mance, its the legacy that matters.  So Melisandre burns him alive in the courtyard of Castle Black.  Mance struggles not to scream.  Fire is a cruel way to die.  Jon can't stand it, and shoots Mance with an arrow before the fire takes him.  It was an extraordinary climax.

To put it bluntly, Thrones already appears to be on top form.  The writing was as sharp as it has ever been this year.  There were almost none of the characteristic "my father hates me, me sister hates me" plot-summary monologues.  As usual, Tyrion gets those worst lines, but he really only gets one, and Peter Dinklage and Conleth Hill crush their scenes so much that it doesn't matter.

Anticipating this season, I felt pure dread.  Not only for the book-to-show horrors but for the catastrophes that comes in the climaxes of A Feast for Crows and A Dance with Dragons.  "The Wars to Come" fulfilled the dread in the best way - I am filled with dread for the events of this season.  However the show diverges from the books this season, this episode finds the entire production in terrific form.  In a seemingly low-key episode, disaster looms.

A-

Bits

- Robin Arryn sparring is one of the funniest scenes Thrones has ever shot.

- Brienne is in a worse mood than we've ever seen her.  I don't know if the near-miss of Sansa was funny or sad.

- Daenerys really jumped back in with Daario.  But I liked how she kept her clothes on and Daario got the nude shot.  Power dynamics.

Book Bits

- The introduction to the Sons of the Harpy could hardly have been better.

- I'm pretty sure Mance is dead for good.  I doubt the show has time to explore his bard of Winterfell thread.  It doesn't fit in with the show's characterization, in any event.  I wish we'd had more time with Ciaran Hinds, but at least Thrones gave him a terrific sendoff.

- I skipped Tyrion because as awesome as he is, he wasn't the thematic focus of this episode.  Dinklage and Hill crushed their scenes nevertheless.  Dinklage nailed Tyrion's guilty self-loathing, as well he should after having murdered his beloved and his father.  I really do look forward to his storyline this season.  Hopefully it will be intelligent and meaningful while providing a regeneration against the total disaster to come.

- The Sansa bit is already beyond the books.  I truly have no idea where she's going.  As a book reader that is shaping up to be the biggest spoiler of the year.  That said, I liked both of the Sansa and Littlefinger vignettes, low-key as they were.  Again, Robin Arryn sparring.

- On the whole, I thought this episode did a great job setting up the most important themes of the beautiful mess that is A Feast for Crows and A Dance with Dragons.  Daenerys's dragon identity was emphasized - and damn, are those chained dragons scary.  Drogon's hotly anticipated appearance should be incredible.  The Cersei emphasis was also on point.

- Jon Snow's storyline deserves an anticipatory post of its own.  I can tell that eventually the show will diverge from the books enormously in this plotline.  Again, I am filled with dread.  I don't know what is going to happen when Jon Snow goes to Hardhome, though of course I have the betrayal in mind.  What little we can see from the trailers looks horrifically violent, and it scares me.  Against all odds, I have the feeling that the final episodes of this season will be the most devastating climax the show has ever seen, and the pure terror I feel about events in the far north exemplifies this best.  In this sense, this was a great Jon Snow episode.  He was assertive and interesting, and Kit Harington was in great form.

- Edit: On that terrible death not in the books that the EW on-set article alluded to...I'm putting in an official prediction for Jamie Lannister.  God oh god, I hope it's not true.