Season 4, Episode 9: The Watchers on the Wall

In the penultimate episode of Season 4, a historically bloody chapter in every season thus far, “The Watchers on the Wall” features the long-awaited battle between the wildlings and the Night’s Watch. Like the ninth episode of the second season (“Blackwater”), this one focuses solely on one location, culminating in an epic battle sequence that takes place over the course of a single night.

“Night gathers, and now my watch begins… I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls. I am the shield that guards the realms of men. I pledge my life and honor to the Night’s Watch, for this night and all the nights to come.”

But this episode is more than just a well-choreographed and well-shot action film. It makes us care about characters whose names we could never quite remember, like Pyp and Grenn, and characters we may have actively disliked, like Ser Alliser Thorne. It ruminates on duty, love, leadership, and masculinity, all while delivering intensely fun visual spectacles (like the giant arrow piercing the man over the Wall or the huge scythe shaving the climbers off the Wall).

It’s amazing that no one else on the continent knows that this battle is taking place, since there is so much at stake for them should a hundred thousand wildlings succeed in breaching the Wall. As the oath says, “I shall wear no crowns and win no glory.” The men of the Night’s Watch fulfill their duty in spectacular fashion– for now.

Season 4, Episode 8: The Mountain and the Viper

In one of the most anticipated episodes of the season, aptly titled “The Mountain and the Viper,”Game of Thrones takes another look at the power of families. “Family, honor, all that horseshit. It’s all you lords and ladies ever talk about,” the Hound says to Arya. What he doesn’t acknowledge is the overwhelming affect that families have– not only on the course of events in Westeros, but also over the individuals within.

For starters, Gilly’s very life is spared because Ygritte finds her with baby Sam in her arms and takes pity. Grey Worm and Missandei, who never had an opportunity to really know their own families, are beginning to cultivate a relationship and find comfort in each other. For Ramsay Snow, the bastard of Roose Bolton, it means so much to be officially acknowledged as a Bolton: heir to the North, but more importantly, a legitimate member of the family. Theon uses his family name to invade and influence the otherwise-impregnable Moat Cailin and the immovable Greyjoy forces stationed within. Sansa reveals her family name in order to gain the confidence and compassion of the powerful lords of the Vale, but later sheds the Stark name in order to take on a new identity that is all her own. Tyrion and Jaime bond as brothers right before the trial by combat, and Oberyn Martell fights bravely because he demands justice– not for Tyrion, but for his sister. In the game of thrones, family is an important, ever-present source of power.

Season 4, Episode 7: Mockingbird

When Arya and the Hound come upon a dying stranger in Sunday’s episode, he expresses regret for the way the world has changed: “Fair. A balance. No balance anymore.” It’s hard to imagine that this is possible, that the world shown in Game of Thrones has ever been fair or balanced. He has seen, at the very least, four kings in his lifetime. Several wars have been fought over the throne, the current War of the Five Kings being only the latest of many.

Even on a personal level, few adults in Westeros have made it out of childhood unscathed. It’s almost impossible to imagine that a fair and peaceful society made any of these characters. These people seem to have been “born to woe,” as historian Barbara W. Tuchman writes in her book A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century. Like the medieval man, the characters of Game of Thrones have grown up in a world where a “habit of violence” and adversity rule more effectively than any government.

In “Mockingbird,” we see several adults who have survived a childhood of violence, abuse, and misery, but not without scars, both physical and emotional. This episode shows how these adults revert back to childishness to cope when present traumas aggravate old wounds. Meanwhile, the actual children, Arya and Sansa, continue to experience the brutality that has already begun to make them into scarred adults.

Season 4, Episode 6: The Laws of Gods and Men

In “The Laws of Gods and Men,” one of the series’s most tragic episodes to date, Tyrion Lannister stands supplicant before a court of men appointed to determine his fate. Prior to that, Daavos and Stannis arrive as supplicants to the nongovernmental power of the Iron Bank, and Daenerys hears the petitions of many who have been negatively affected by her naive rule. Even Reek, the man formally known as Theon Greyjoy, appears as a postulant to Ramsay Snow’s torturous household reign, refusing to even acknowledge his sister when she comes to rescue him.

In the end, in all of these cases except for the most beaten man (Theon), it’s the supplicants who manage to take the upper hand. Each of them proves to even the most rational and calculated leaders that “plain” stories told in “books filled with numbers” do not account for the emotions of grieving and aggrieved sons.

If last week was all about how women are able to wield power in a man’s world, this week was about the men. Even Yara, Theon’s sister, is praised for her “balls” when she dares to rescue her brother from the Dreadfort. (“You’ve got bigger balls than he ever did.”) But these aren’t men who fit into the continents’ typical molds of masculinity. Varys and Theon are both eunuchs, Tyrion is a dwarf, Stannis is the forgotten and unloved king, and newcomer Hizdahr zo Loraq is a noble’s son who has recently lost not only his father, but also his ruling power. Despite this, all but Theon manages to subvert those in power in both subtle and overt ways.

Though we visit with several other characters, the core of this episode’s narrative is Tyrion’s trial in King’s Landing. The whole second half of the episode focuses on the fan-favorite, but the beginning still managed to unite many very disparate storylines under several key themes. Not only are there power dynamics at play in each scene, with one party bowing to the authority of a higher power at first (before unsettling it in the end), but we also revisit a couple of Game of Thrones‘s well-worn themes: justice and history in context. With fantastic direction from Alik Sakharov, the camera reinforces the themes of Bryan Cogman’s script throughout.

“The Laws of Gods and Men” was a great episode. Everyone seems to agree that the writers wrote a tight narrative that worked on both a thematic and emotional level. And Peter Dinklage acted the hell out of it.

Season 4, Episode 5: First of his Name

In “First of His Name,” we begin with a coronation, when official power in Westeros is transferred to Tommen, the “first of his name” to rule on the continent. However, de facto power in the land is held elsewhere, taking as many different forms as there are people who hold it. “You really think a crown gives you power?” Tywin asked Joffrey last season, and this episode further proves that, though many people are fighting to hold it, the seat on the Iron Throne is not the most powerful position in the land.

One of the most enduring themes of the show has been the examination of power and how it can change over time and circumstance. In the second season, Varys presented Tyrion with a riddle to show that power is an illusion, a “shadow on the wall.” Power means different things to different people, and is often little more than a perception. It is not fixed, as even Cersei has come to realize (the woman who once professed that “power is power” now admits, “What good is power if you cannot protect the ones you love?”), and it comes in different forms. According to Littlefinger, one man (or woman) “can be worth ten thousand,” and this sets the theme for the episode.

One woman could become queen through force (Daenerys), another by playing politics (Margaery). Sometimes the greatest swordsman is no match for an armored man with a big sword. A Kingsguard can be killed by a squire who can’t even cook a rabbit or ride a horse. Power is not transferred through a crown alone; even though women are often marginalized and abused (“Everywhere in the world, they hurt little girls”), this episode highlights the many different ways that they, too, can find power in a masculine world.

Season 4, Episode 4: Oathkeeper

In the latest installment of Game of Thrones, the show takes an interesting new direction, with a couple storylines deviating from the original source material. While some book fans are up in arms, “Oathkeeper” will hopefully prove to be an interesting and unexpected new take on several plot lines. After all, as Littlefinger would say, “If they don’t know who you are or what you want, they can’t know what you plan to do next.”

Season 4, Episode 3: Breaker of Chains

If Game of Thrones has one strength over many, it lies in the moral ambiguity of its characters. Characters have the chance to debase and redeem themselves in the matter of episodes. There are no fully “good” and “evil” characters; moral absolutism is a cruel myth that you believe only at your own peril (just ask Ned Stark).

In “Breaker of Chains,” we once again visit the “problems of the human heart in conflict with itself” (as said by William Faulkner). Last season, Jaime lost a hand to stop the men who wished to rape Brienne; this Sunday, he raped his sister, who also happened to be the love of his life, in front body of his dead son. A couple of episodes ago, the Hound decried thieves (“A man’s got to have a code”), then went on to justify stealing from a dead man walking. Jon Snow, ever a Stark, once struggled to kill a single man (Qhorin Halfhand) for the greater good, but last night was unblinking as he suggested killing several of his own brothers in order to maintain a tactical advantage over Mance Rayder’s wildling army.

People change. Not always for the worst, but not always for the best, either. Each character’s arc may not be– should not be– a straight line upward towards morality and redemption, but rather a sine curve of peaks and troughs. You hope that your favorite characters are on a generally positive trajectory, but you’ll forgive them for a few mistakes along the way. In “Breaker of Chains,” we get down into the ditches with the horrifically flawed Westerosi, and potentially lose a fan favorite in the process.

Season 4, Episode 2: The Lion and The Rose

In “The Lion and the Rose,” an episode that featured the wedding of Joffrey (a Lannister lion) and Margaery (a Tyrell rose), we are treated to an early season shocker of the most satisfying variety.

Game of Thrones started as a wildly unpredictable show, then became almost predictable in its unpredictability. We came to expect that the biggest twists would happen in the penultimate (second to last) episodes of the season. First, there was “Baelor,” when we lost who we thought to be the main character, Ned Stark. It was then we knew this show was going to be different. Then, there was “Blackwater,” where the Lannisters were able to successfully defend King’s Landing against Stannis Baratheon’s assault. The episode subverted our expectations, featuring only one setting instead of the many different parallel storylines. Last season, of course, was “The Rains of Castamere,” also known as the Red Wedding. Though it was a devastating episode, by this point we had come to expect the unexpected. Over the last few years, seasons progressed swiftly to the climactic ninth episode, leaving it to the season finale to roughly tie things up until next time.

The Purple Wedding, as it’s come to be known by fans, kills off a major player in the series in only the second episode of the season. Once again, fans of the show are reminded of their initial sense that nothing in the series can be anticipated. Though Joffrey had it coming for a long time, his death is another bold signal that, in the game of thrones, no one is safe– not even the villains.

Season 4, Episode 1: Two Swords

After great hype and even greater anticipation, Game of Thrones’s Season 4 premiered to record numbers, and for good reason. This season premier was much better than last season’s “Valar Dohaeris,” which many thought spent too much time catching viewers up on the previous season’s events. This season’s opener moved with a fresh pace between the many different characters and introduced some intriguing (and bloody) new storylines.

In Game of Thrones, power is often a zero-sum game. One house’s loss is another house’s gain. In “Two Swords,” Tywin Lannister literally and figuratively reforges the history and prestige of the Stark family into his own.

The episode opens on a shot of the Stark’s sword, Ice, enveloped in fire: a clever homage to the name of the book series, A Song of Ice and Fire. This greatsword was passed down through the Stark family for over 400 years. It was made of Valyrian steel, which is harder, sharper, and lighter than other swords because it is made with magic. Since then, the ability to forge Valyrian steel has been lost to time, and only less than fifteen weapons still exist.

Tywin Lannister has spent his whole life trying to reestablish the once-great history of the Lannister family after the misrule of his father. The aging Lannister is obsessed with the legacy of his family and what he will leave behind, which is why Tyrion’s very life is such an insult to him. It only makes sense that after having Robb Stark murdered, Tywin would take the giant sword and have it reforged into two smaller blades, bestowing the greatness of ancestral Valyrian steel swords onto his own family. To further this theme, the musical score in this scene brilliantly morphed from the Stark theme song to the Lannister’s “Rains of Castamere” just as Ice was reforged into two separate blades. Though the expression on his face belies nothing, Tywin clearly takes great pride in the fall of House Stark, and is using what’s left of them (Ice, Winterfell, and Sansa) to enhance the standing of his own family.