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shapinglightJust watched this and :whimper:
Spoilers behind cut.
Have to say, this was rather a horrid episode and I no longer want someone to slap Joffrey. I just want them to chuck him off the nearest battlement. In an episode with an awful lot of very nasty scenes his scene with Ros and the other whore (which I bet wasn't in the book) was by far the nastiest. I say this because the scene with the Lannister soldiers and the rat in the bucket wasn't quite as nasty as I thought it was going to be, because I thought they were going to put the bucket on the poor bloke's head.
Thank goodness Lord Tywin turned up and put a stop to all that, even if it was for purely practical reasons. I almost cheered when he saw straight through Arya's disguise and rescued her from her horrible situation (for now), again for purely practical reasons. Also, Charles Dance has such presence as Tywin. He's just brilliant.
Elsewhere, Tyrion is still trying to behave like a human being (I loved his rescue of Sansa, and Bronn's one liner this week was laugh-out-loud funny - would like an icon of it, but I'd never dare use it). Even in his dealings with stompy, petulant Cousin Lancel he tried to behave not too cruelly. Poor Tyrion. It's not that he's naive or stupid (quite the opposite), but he really is too good to have to put up with all these idiots (except Sansa, who somehow or other is still functioning despite Joffrey's cruelty).
I was glad to see Dany and Jorah again. Dany's attempted face down of the Thirteen of Quarth was a terrific scene (and Jorah did look particularly handsome in it), but I do have a very bad feeling about that Quarth place. Wouldn't surprise me if the inhabitants turned out to be cannibals or something equally horrid. Also, why did that one member of the Thirteen decide to stick out his neck for Dany? He looks nice and kind, but this episode left me suspecting everybody.
This was not helped by the fact that it started off with one of Robb Stark's men suggesting that a good prisoner flaying would make everyone feel better. With people like that around, you know it's not as simple as one side being good and the other bad.
Finally, Renly, Stannis and their followers, currently including Catelyn. I thought Michelle Fairley was brilliant in the scene where Littlefinger gave her Ned's remains but unfortunately found Aiden Gillen once again a little unconvincing, except when he was being all 'do you want your daughters back?' devious. It's not that I don't believe in Littlefinger's feelings for Catelyn exactly, but more that I felt he would be too clever to play the 'I love you' card at that juncture. I dunno. I just think Littlefinger hasn't been that well written so far.
Anyway, in view of the - yet again - very unpleasant final scene with Melisandre and the phantom pregnancy (literal phantom pregnancy, that is), I am now officially worried about Renly and co. We've only just met Brienne and Margaery, and only just been reintroduced to Renly and Loras. I now have a nasty feeling they won't be sticking around for very long. Also, that no matter how nasty things were in this ep, they can still get nastier. I can't believe they introduced the flaying!yay! bloke for no reason.
Like I said: :whimper:
Trivial stuff:
Why doesn't that attractive young healer lady Robb met on the battlefield have to wear one of those stupid headdresses the other women were wearing?
Aside: Not trivial at all. I'm not sure how old the kid playing Joffrey is, but anyone else concerned that he'll be traumatised for life by having to act scenes like that one with Ros?
Spoilers behind cut.
Have to say, this was rather a horrid episode and I no longer want someone to slap Joffrey. I just want them to chuck him off the nearest battlement. In an episode with an awful lot of very nasty scenes his scene with Ros and the other whore (which I bet wasn't in the book) was by far the nastiest. I say this because the scene with the Lannister soldiers and the rat in the bucket wasn't quite as nasty as I thought it was going to be, because I thought they were going to put the bucket on the poor bloke's head.
Thank goodness Lord Tywin turned up and put a stop to all that, even if it was for purely practical reasons. I almost cheered when he saw straight through Arya's disguise and rescued her from her horrible situation (for now), again for purely practical reasons. Also, Charles Dance has such presence as Tywin. He's just brilliant.
Elsewhere, Tyrion is still trying to behave like a human being (I loved his rescue of Sansa, and Bronn's one liner this week was laugh-out-loud funny - would like an icon of it, but I'd never dare use it). Even in his dealings with stompy, petulant Cousin Lancel he tried to behave not too cruelly. Poor Tyrion. It's not that he's naive or stupid (quite the opposite), but he really is too good to have to put up with all these idiots (except Sansa, who somehow or other is still functioning despite Joffrey's cruelty).
I was glad to see Dany and Jorah again. Dany's attempted face down of the Thirteen of Quarth was a terrific scene (and Jorah did look particularly handsome in it), but I do have a very bad feeling about that Quarth place. Wouldn't surprise me if the inhabitants turned out to be cannibals or something equally horrid. Also, why did that one member of the Thirteen decide to stick out his neck for Dany? He looks nice and kind, but this episode left me suspecting everybody.
This was not helped by the fact that it started off with one of Robb Stark's men suggesting that a good prisoner flaying would make everyone feel better. With people like that around, you know it's not as simple as one side being good and the other bad.
Finally, Renly, Stannis and their followers, currently including Catelyn. I thought Michelle Fairley was brilliant in the scene where Littlefinger gave her Ned's remains but unfortunately found Aiden Gillen once again a little unconvincing, except when he was being all 'do you want your daughters back?' devious. It's not that I don't believe in Littlefinger's feelings for Catelyn exactly, but more that I felt he would be too clever to play the 'I love you' card at that juncture. I dunno. I just think Littlefinger hasn't been that well written so far.
Anyway, in view of the - yet again - very unpleasant final scene with Melisandre and the phantom pregnancy (literal phantom pregnancy, that is), I am now officially worried about Renly and co. We've only just met Brienne and Margaery, and only just been reintroduced to Renly and Loras. I now have a nasty feeling they won't be sticking around for very long. Also, that no matter how nasty things were in this ep, they can still get nastier. I can't believe they introduced the flaying!yay! bloke for no reason.
Like I said: :whimper:
Trivial stuff:
Why doesn't that attractive young healer lady Robb met on the battlefield have to wear one of those stupid headdresses the other women were wearing?
Aside: Not trivial at all. I'm not sure how old the kid playing Joffrey is, but anyone else concerned that he'll be traumatised for life by having to act scenes like that one with Ros?
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Date: 2012-04-23 02:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-23 03:24 pm (UTC)I'm impressed by Melisandre's final scene.
Tyrion, Dani and Arya: <3
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Date: 2012-04-23 03:25 pm (UTC)Heh! Yeah, I"m really glad they introduced Lord Bolton for precisely that reason. It was definitely clear in the books that one side in a civil war doesn't have a monopoly on cruelty but on the show thus far, they've really played up the heroic Northerners versus the effete, cowardly and ineffective Southerners!
Why doesn't that attractive young healer lady Robb met on the battlefield have to wear one of those stupid headdresses the other women were wearing?
This is totally something you'd only get from the books, but the headdress ladies are Silent Sisters who tend to the corpses of the dead. (I don't know if you remember but they had some in the very first episode around Jon Arryn's corpse and another one was sewing up the young knight who got Gregor Clegane's spear through his throat.) They're sort of combination nuns/embalmers, but Talisa was just a nurse. Although why she thought a man's leg was "rotting" ONE DAY after the battle and why amputating it in the middle of a mud puddle without even the sketchiest attempt at hygiene was going to make it better sort of escapes me :P
I think the Joffrey-Ros-other girl scene was basically to show that while Joffrey can't directly challenge Tyrion, he hates him and will do anything to harm him. His face/behavior totally changed when he was told that Tyrion had sent him the whores, basically. So I think he was sending a message to his uncle. (And also in the books, there's mention of him torturing cats; he's much younger than he is on the series so the sexual perversion is probably just a later stage in his development.) I actually think the comparisons to Mad King Aerys are very apt; I believe he's criminally insane!
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Date: 2012-04-23 03:27 pm (UTC)And hi *waves* Ive just caught up with this series so can read your posts and understand now. Yay! Though i wont be back on LJ with any regularity until after my exams. Boo! Hope youre well. :)
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Date: 2012-04-23 04:10 pm (UTC)No the Joffrey/Ros scene wasn't in the book. But I can sort of see why it was inserted as it does reaffirm that he's a sexual sadist, something only hinted at by the Sansa beatings in the novel. This makes it literally explicit. But I can see where additional though it is, it isn't without purpose.
The 'nice' Qarth character... I remember him, but I can't remember whether I'm simply mis-remembering him, because I thought he was in a different location. I'd have to go back to the books to know for sure, though.
And, minor spoiler, my main memory of Dany's time in Qarth is that she's given a huge (multi-season plot-fortelling) prophecy. I always enjoy those. It should be "Restless" worthy.
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Date: 2012-04-23 04:18 pm (UTC)One thing I appreciated about Arya's story in the book (which seems a bit condensed here) is that as she, Gendry, and PotPie (eta: *snerk* Brain fart. Not "Pot Pie" but "Hot Pie". Pot Pie takes on a whole new meaning) try to make their way though the war we're given a ground- peasant eye view of what this "war of five kings" mean, making Ser Jorah's words more true than ever that the peasants don't care about the elite's game of thrones. They want peace and a good harvest. They want to be able to live without being raped, tortured, trampled, and destroyed at every turn. All of the "Lords" games are ugly when seen from the view of the collateral damage.
(That said, I've always held a grudge again Tywin as Tywin specifically ordered The Mountain to go out to bring terror on the Riverlands. The Mountain wasn't acting solely on his own initiative (though he certainly had nothing against it). They were there for "shock and awe" on the general's orders).
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Date: 2012-04-23 04:49 pm (UTC)He looks maybe 13!!! How? What? Yikes!!
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Date: 2012-04-23 05:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-23 06:01 pm (UTC)Yes, I do hope the poor kid's not a method actor. He'd definitely be traumatised trying to think himself into that mindset.
I agree the final Melisandre scene was impressive. I think I would have found it more so if there'd been a little less female nudity in this ep. That said, I agree with the posters below that the Joffrey/Ros scene, while very unpleasant, did serve some function in the story, unlike the Ros/Littlefinger scene in ep 2.
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Date: 2012-04-23 06:08 pm (UTC)Hm, I'm not sure I agree that the southerners have been shown as effete and cowardly. Nothing about Tywin Lannister is either of those things. I think perhaps that up to this point we were meant to see the Northerners' war as just, because it was - again, up to a point. But Robb didn't call out his bannermen to become king, but to rescue his father, so the righteousness is rapidly leaking from his cause, so introducing this flaying!yay! person is probably very apt.
Must say, given what
Re: Talisa, if that's her name in the show, I agree with you that her field amputation made no sense at all. A bit like Tywin butchering a deer in his nice, clean tent, the scene was there more to show how well-hard she was and give her something to do while she talked to Robb.
I also agree that the Joffrey/Ros scene had a point, unlike her scene with Littlefinger. And I'd probably rather have this - especially since they faded to black before it got too awful - than see him torturing cats.
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Date: 2012-04-23 06:13 pm (UTC)I think they got that point across pretty well. What the Lannister soldiers were doing had no point beyond sheer cruelty. I suppose they were the Mountain's men and therefore took their cue from him, but, glad though I was to see Tywin turn up and put a stop to it, I agree that the Mountain wouldn't try this stuff if he hadn't been allowed to get away with it before.
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Date: 2012-04-23 06:14 pm (UTC)Yeah, I'd forgotten that. And he really was a kid too. I hope he didn't get teased about it too much at school. :(
Nice to see you, Tam, and good luck with your exams.
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Date: 2012-04-23 06:16 pm (UTC):whimpers some more: I hope they'll rein back on showing their depredations. For me, in this case, telling would be much better than showing.
I agree that the Joffrey/Ros scene served a purpose. I just hope they feel they got their point home about Joffrey in that scene and won't be inclined to repeat it.
And, minor spoiler, my main memory of Dany's time in Qarth is that she's given a huge (multi-season plot-fortelling) prophecy. I always enjoy those. It should be "Restless" worthy.
Ooh, interesting. I'll look forward to seeing more of that.
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Date: 2012-04-23 06:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-23 06:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-23 06:36 pm (UTC)Well, there are the multiple scenes of dozens of Lannister men-at-arms being required to take down ONE guy in opposition to them - for example, the soldiers outside the brothel when Jaime attacks Ned, or although Syrio's not a Northerner, the way he cut down all THOSE men-at-arms, or Yoren's last stand. So I think they're definitely portrayed as always being cowardly and only being able to prevail by massively outnumbering the Northerners. And although I agree that Robb's cause was initially a just one, it's definitely true that as Talisa tells him, he's kind of lost track of what he actually hopes to accomplish by continuing the fighting.
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Date: 2012-04-23 06:39 pm (UTC)Unfortunately it's pretty inescapable that they will, but the vast majority of it will be seasons into the future. They introduce Roose as relatively innocuous (which was a great introduction BTW. Perfectly in character) but don't believe in that inocuousness. If Boltons were in another century... they'd be serial killers.
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Date: 2012-04-23 07:11 pm (UTC)If it wasn't gutwrenchingly, shudderingly, unbearably horrifying it would miss how permanently scarring this becomes to her mental landscape. This is something she never forgets or forgives.
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Date: 2012-04-23 07:21 pm (UTC)There's a similar scene in American Psycho, so nothing they could do with it would make it more horrible than I already knew it could be.
Melisandre's birth scene was creepy as hell, especially with how little actual fantasy there's been in this fantasy story so far. Nicely balanced with Dany refusing to bargain with her dragons (and Gendry saying there's no such thing as dragons).
Also, with you on Joffrey. Bleak, nasty, brutish and (hopefully) short.
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Date: 2012-04-23 08:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-23 09:13 pm (UTC)The Jeoff scene was added, but it fits his personality...
I loved Bronn in this episode and I also liked the introduction of Xaro Xoran Daxos. There is quite a lot on the Tyrion and Dany side of things that I am looking forward too in this season.
I wonder what they have in mind for Arya since they seem to deviate from the books here too (in a good way though).
If I remember correctly she and Tywin never really interact in the book.
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Date: 2012-04-24 01:12 pm (UTC)Yes, it can't end well, especially as Theon is about to stab him in the back.
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Date: 2012-04-24 01:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-24 01:15 pm (UTC)I don't think the Thirteen were any more camp and OTT than the Dothraki, were they?
I do agree about Mrs Renyly's outfit. She seems to favour some very odd necklines.
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Date: 2012-04-24 01:18 pm (UTC)I haven't, of course, seen that. Don't like horror films.
Melisandre's birth scene was creepy as hell, especially with how little actual fantasy there's been in this fantasy story so far. Nicely balanced with Dany refusing to bargain with her dragons (and Gendry saying there's no such thing as dragons).
Yes, good point. The birth scene was on a par with Mirri Maaz Duur nasty shenanigans on Drogo's tent in season 1. You just don't expect anything good to come of anything supernatural in this world.