Poor Little Rich Man, Telling Jokes and Paying Them to Laugh

[netgirl_y2k]

Well, that was underwhelming. I mean, coming after Blackwater it was always going to be. But that was Let's Kill Hitler, the end of Mockingjay, and every time the producers of Merlin say that it's going to get darker and more complex next series, honest, levels of underwhelming.


-I have been giving the Robb/Talisa storyline the benefit of the doubt, assuming that it was going somewhere, that the changes were for a reason. Apparently, not so much. First thing, Talisa doesn't even make sense as a character in this world. This is meant to be a world where the patriarchy is all consuming. Where you can become queen, the most powerful woman in the country, and still have no bodily autonomy or control over your own life, which is how you end up with a character as fascinatingly bitter and twisted as Cersei Lannister. Where you can escape the trappings of traditional femininity, but only at the cost of becoming a traumatised child soldier like Arya, or a laughing stock who is afraid to go to sleep for fear of being raped like Brienne. Then Talisa turns up and says that she didn't want to waste her life reciting poetry and playing the harp in favour of being a battlefield surgeon, oh, and she's decided to leave her family and entire prior life in a slave city for reasons of morality. Now this could have been an interesting story if there had been any sense that these decisions had cost her or were putting her in danger as would be true of, oh, any other women in that universe.

As it is it looks like the changes were only made to give Robb a more suitably plucky love interest than Jeyne Westerling or the nameless, blameless Frey girl. Which is where I have a problem because I don't want him to have a plucky love interest, I don't want him to have any nice things. I want him to sit in a dark room and think about his choices.

I don't have any great love of book!Robb but I can sympathise with him. This young boy, under an outrageous amount of pressure, grieving for his brothers, trying to live up to an unrealistic standard of honour, decides to marry a girl he believes he's taken advantage of, sacrificing his own honour to save hers.

Show!Robb marries Talisa because, well, he's a git. He's not a boy, he's a grown adult who has sat down with another grown adult and had enumerated for him all the reasons why this is a bad idea that may have dire consequences for them all. This is maybe because I have no romance in my soul (seriously, none; as girls I've been involved with in the past have cheerlessly informed me) and a never-ending hatred for this trope that seems to be everywhere in pop-culture that says that everything can and should be sacrificed on the altar of romantic love. But, for fuck's sake! I'm not saying that Robb doesn't love Talisa, I'm just saying that at least 50% of that wedding is him having a giant fit of pique at his mum. It ties in with this thing - which the books are guilty of too - where we're forever told that Robb is this brilliant strategic thinker rather than being shown. And I'm no great lover of Lord Tywin, but seriously, if Tywin Lannister has lost so much as a game of tiddliwinks to this idiot of the highest order then it's sign of a world gone mad.

-Also, House of the Undying, wtf? Okay, it was never going to be - and shouldn't have been - like it was in the book. Too many of Dany's visions were book specific or were never going to translate that well to screen. And there were some really gorgeous visuals - Dany walking through the gate at the Wall, Dany in the burned and snow (or possibly ash?) filled throne room. But, mostly, it felt like they'd filmed it with what spare change they had kicking about after Blackwater.

The scene with Drogo and Rhaego in the tent fell a bit flat for me, possibly because I'd never seen the Dany/Drogo relationship as anything other than a textbook example of what untreated stockholm syndrome looks like.

The whole thing just felt like it should have been longer and the sorcerer harder to defeat seeing as it was the culmination of Dany's S2 arc.

Doreah, curse your sudden yet inevitable betrayal! I sort of knew it was coming because the show has been on a streak this season of ruthlessly stripping Dany of her support network - even though I notice that a large number of her khalasar miraculously came back to life in time for the looting - still it bugged me. Partly because I'd really liked their friendship (shipped them, even) but mostly because there was no lead up to it. And Dany's whole thing is that she has no army, no kingdom, no particular evidence that she'd be a good queen, but what she does have are three dragons and a massive massive cult of personality.

Also, locking them in that vault to suffocate. Sometimes the only difference between Viserys and Dany is the resources to carry out their threats, yes? It should be noted that this is no way diminishes my desire for her to win in the end.

-Still, here are some things I did like:

Ice zombies!

Revenge of the Theon feels!

Ygritte bopping Jon Snow on the head with his own sword!

The look of distaste on Loras' face when he's proposing the match between Margaery and Joffrey, the little glance between Sansa and Margaery, and the fact that Sansa couldn't even make it to the door before she starts grinning.

The Arya & Jaqen scene. I have to find my sister, her too. All the Stark girls feels!

Jaime and Brienne, and when he sees her killing those northmen being the point when Jaime starts subconsciously drawing hearts around the words Brienne of Tarth in his head. If I were being a book purist here I could complain about how easily she took to killing, but I actually liked the two quick deaths and a slow one in revenger of/mirroring what happened to the tavern girls. Even Brienne's younger and more naive book counterpart was most frequently moved to violence by rapers/men who hurt women, presumably because she could so easily imagine it being her.

Comments

[karatam]

*cries over Doreah's character assassination*

BUT SANSA'S HAPPY FACE AS SHE WALKED AWAY

LEGIT THE FIRST TIME WE'VE SEEN HER ACTUALLY HAPPY SINCE MAYBE MID SEASON 1

And her scenes with Margaery next season are going to be amazing.

[netgirl_y2k]

Did you see the list of new characters for S3? We've got ourselves a Queen of Thorns. I am already playing out that scene in my mind, it's going to be INCREDIBLE.

Dany's overreaction, though. This is clearly not a woman you scorn. Take note for the future, Sansa.

[karatam]

I'm doing a little dance in my seat at the thought of Sansa hanging out with the Tyrells. (ngl I find the Tyrells kind of hilarious for some reason. They just so often give no fucks and it's glorious)

Just, they could have done so much more with Doreah's whole character. It seemed like something they just slapped together at the last moment.

Well, at least someone wrote good fic based on (something similar to) my Doreah headcanon.

[fly_to_dawn]

...even though I notice that a large number of her khalasar miraculously came back to life in time for the looting

Ha! I lol-ed. And I really needed that after this episode...I think the Robb and Cat (and Jeyne, I guess) storyline has been the most disappointing thing for me about this season, Robb stop being an idiot this instant. I kind of wish GRRM had a chance to write for Cat as well as Cersei and Sansa in Blackwater.

Ah well, I console myself with Ygritte/Theon/Margaery & the Tyrells (good band name)/the last shot of Winterfell which made me remember I'm not dead either and gave me too many Stark feelings.

[netgirl_y2k]

I read the suggestion that GRRM might write the Red Wedding episode, which, I'm pretty sure that episode is destined to break my heart either way, but still, I think that would be awesome.

The thing about Robb's recent idiocy is that I'm still on Team Stark, I just want some other Stark to win. Hey, Bran, you wanna be king in the north?

Margaery & the Tyrells is a great band name, they could tour with Karen & the Babes.

[fyrdrakken]

Bran may have some trouble producing an heir, meaning after him it would go to Rickon anyway -- might as well let Rickon have Winterfell and Bran be doing his greenseeing. Especially if Sansa gets to be co-queen with Dany and Arya gets to be a sellsword or whitecloak or right hand of her brother in Winterfell or some such.

[miarrow]

Hey, Bran, you wanna be king in the north?

Sansa for Queen of the North, tbh. I think there's enough backing in the books that might not completely ruin that (breaking out the patriarchy has to be end game, HAS TO BE, cries).

[netgirl_y2k]

I have said it before and I'll say it again, if this entire series isn't subversive propaganda about how Sansa Stark is better, stronger, and smarter than everyone else then there will be angry blog posts written. ANGRY BLOG POSTS, I SAY, IN ALL CAPS.

[miarrow]

With the Martells and Asha, and just well SANSA, I can't believe that it's not that way. I don't understand how people read it otherwise.

[doyle]

So agree about Robb and Cat - I don't see the logic at all in having them not know about Bran and Rickon's supposed deaths. Apart from changing Robb from a tragic honour-before-reason figure and his father's son to a chump throwing away his oaths even while people warn him what a spectacularly bad idea it is, it must be confusing as hell to non-book readers: they don't know about Bolton's betrayal so they must be wondering why Winterfell's been sacked and why there aren't Northmen in the castle looking for the boys.

[fyrdrakken]

I'm really tickled by the end to the Winterfell storyline being left like that -- I think a lot of viewers must have assumed Theon's men set the castle afire on their way out and perhaps Bolton's men are chasing them or some such. All the better to shock and disturb when Ramsay Bolton starts out appearing reasonable and like a loyal bannerman to the Starks, and then turns out otherwise...

ETA: Also, regarding Bran and Rickon, remember that Theon killed all the ravens specifically to keep word from being sent. Ramsay Bolton and his men are going to be the first from outside Winterfell to learn the news -- presumably by capturing and questioning some of Theon's men -- so word won't spread from Winterfell till next season.

[doyle]

But Theon's men - his second-in-command, at the very least, who seems to be in charge now - know that Bran and Rickon aren't dead...

[fyrdrakken]

Yeah, but remember it suited Ramsay Bolton very well indeed to have the rest of Westeros think Bran and Rickon were dead (when he knew damned well they weren't in the books, too), so that he could claim Winterfell for himself by right of marriage to a Northern girl they were passing off as Arya Stark.

[doyle]

Ah, good point - I'd forgotten it was Ramsey himself in the books who helped kill the Miller's boys.

[netgirl_y2k]

Yeah, I've seen some comments from show-only viewers wondering who burned Winterfell, and if it was the Ironborn? Which, the castle was pretty damn burned for it to have been a dozen guys who looked like they were in kind of hurray.

It did feel like there should have been another scene between Theon's men turning on him and Bran and Rickon seeing the ruins of Wintfell. Maybe there was meant to be and it was sacrificed because of time and budget? It does seem a bit weird, I mean it'd be one thing to leave that question unanswered from one week to the next, but from one year to the next...

[doyle]

Yes! It felt like there should be a scene there where the Iron Islanders present a trussed-up Theon to Ramsay Bolton with the expectation that they'll now be allowed to sidle away, and non-book readers think "yay, Northmen have taken Winterfell back, Bran and Rickon are saved! ...why is Bolton killing them all and having the castle torched?!" (Then again, right till the last minute I thought Theon's #2, whose name I can't remember,was Ramsay, or at least worked for him, so I was just calling that wrong all over the place)

[netgirl_y2k]

Yes! Even something like the escaping Bran & co passing Theon's men with, I dunno, their heads on spears. Something that signalled Things Have Not Gone to Plan.

[doyle]

That would have worked really well, and would have let them get away with not showing us Ramsay yet (I assume the actor hadn't been cast when this was filming).

[fyrdrakken]

I continue to cling to the hope that Talisa really is Jeyne Westerling, lying about her name to Robb because of that whole thing where her family is fighting for the Lannisters and if he knew who she really was she'd make a great hostage. I have perhaps placed too much significance on the scene where she felt entitled to the maester's stores of healing herbs at the Crag -- but got this really worried look when Robb announced she was coming along with him to get them herself. Though that's been enough episodes ago that maybe the visit to the Crag came and went and nothing came of it -- but I'm still hoping that this is just an interesting variation of the Jeyne storyline rather than a replacement. (I'm too attached to the scene where Jaime pays off Jeyne's mother for the service done to the Lannisters in breaking Robb's alliance with the Freys -- though it's too late for her mother to be involved in demanding a shotgun wedding, since the wedding's happened and he never met her parents. An unrealistic hope of mine. Also I'm ignoring Talisa's foreignness because I seem to recall Jeyne's mother was not Westerosi born, though maybe it's her grandmother I'm thinking of.)

The one problem I have with the scene with Catelyn telling Robb what a bad idea this is has to do with the show having not built her up as having much political wisdom the way the books had -- we haven't seen her being proved right that much, her good ideas were given to other characters, all she gets to be is nagging mother, and then there's the trade of Jaime for the girls that comes across as typical for TV!Cat rather than a departure from pattern out of maternal desperation. Though I'm pretty comfortable with the way the show is letting the non-book-reading viewers float along with Robb's assumption that the Freys will be reasonable about this disappointment and allow him to make it up to them in some other way. Fit of pique with his mother or youthful hormones and an overdeveloped sense of personal honor, I'm okay with Robb having a splendid sense of battlefield tactics and strategy (that the show didn't have the budget to show us) but drastically misinterpreting Walder Frey here because he assumes his allies have honor of their own. (Same mistake he makes with the Boltons, after all. Also, IIRC he didn't actually go to the meeting Catelyn had with Frey, did he -- he's never actually met Walder Frey...)

Agreed that Dany's scene in the House of the Undying was stripped down, but they did a good job of being eerie on a budget, and I liked what they were doing: Tempting her with the Iron Throne, and then with her husband and son back alive and whole, and both times the dragons called to her more than the things she thought she wanted the most. She's earned the Mother of Dragons label here. And they did a really impressive job of flaming the fuck out of that chamber.

I was delighted that Olenna Tyrell is one of the characters mentioned as being cast for the third season -- I'm really looking forward to seeing her onscreen.

And, yes, that scene where Jaime is standing there boggling at how Brienne just casually kills three men single-handedly. Respect, she has begun earning it in his eyes.

I'm also charmed that the show let the non-book-reading viewer quite probably assume Theon's own men torched Winterfell on their way out, so there can be a nasty surprise next season when Ramsay Bolton reveals his true colors.

[netgirl_y2k]

I had a brief hope of that as well when they mentioned the Crag, but now I think too many episodes have come and gone for Talisa to be anything other than what she seems. And, oh, I wanted to like Jeyne/Talisa, I was delighted with Oona Chaplin's casting and really thought that was a storyline that could do with being expanded for the screen. Which is possibly why I was so disappointed in what we actually got. And add in giving Cat's good ideas to other characters and that entire storyline has become supremely irksome to be, and I had such high hopes for it at the end of S1. And I don't think it's so much that Robb hasn't met Walder frey, it's that Robb would break his word, and so casually, that's such a drastic departure from who I thought Robb was supposed to be.

Oh, yes, I liked what we got of the House of the Undying - the temptation of Daenerys Targaryen - I just wish there had been more of it.

I was pleased with all the new characters they've announced for S3, but especially Olenna Tyrell; elderly, non-fuck giving Tyrells for the win!

[fyrdrakken]

I don't think I'm going to give up entirely hoping Talisa = Jeyne until the Red Wedding. Like Ramsay Bolton, I think that's a revelation that could well have been deliberately postponed to the third season.

But, yeah, it was absolutely stupid and adolescent of Robb to throw away an important alliance in a fit of pique because he'd rather marry a girl he'd just become infatuated with than the one he felt like his mother and Walder Frey were conspiring to stick him with against his will. The book just camouflaged that by having Jeyne's mother forcing a shotgun wedding on them, so Robb could frame the matter as a question of honor while actually following his own inclinations. And the baldly practical "honor" of maintaining a commitment with a grasping ally (especially an agreement made under a certain degree of duress and without his personal input as to the terms) was held in a certain degree of contempt -- not unlike Ned's opinion of politics, as being something filthy he wanted as little to do with as he could possibly avoid. On further reflection, I can see why the showrunners played it that way -- it was a selfish and shortsighted decision of Robb's, and I think I'm okay with having that made more plain and less excusable. Besides, we've seen so much more of Robb on screen than we had in the books -- he's not some distant effigy of a noble would-be king, we already like him, the showrunners can afford to have him do something a bit tawdry and human.

[miarrow]

My irritant with Tailsa's foreigness wasn't the casting (I was excited for Oona what she was announced), because Jeyne was implied as half Bravosi or something, I can't recall exactly, but that they changed her name and made her ~exotic~ to lure Robb from his duty. They made such a big deal about it (which I think they do in the show for everyone that's not Westeros white so far).

[fyrdrakken]

Agreed that they've exoticized her as part of the ongoing trend of not handling POC very well on the show. Still haven't entirely given up hope that Talisa is Jeyne telling tales of her mother's (or grandmother's) homeland and pretending to not be Westerosi because A) she doesn't look Westerosi and B) being taken for highborn (albeit foreign) is still an important layer of protection. But, yeah, I'm grasping at straws here because I really liked that Robb was caught in a Lannister trap that way and I don't want the Westerlings to be entirely written out.

[miarrow]

Agreed. I, mean, I liked the idea of Jeyne maybe not being in on it. But the bits that came afterwards and finding out about Tywinn's involvement and planning (and I was like I hate you, but DAMN you are so smart) and/or taking advantage of and then Jeyne's mother and the Westerlings. I feel like it's probably going somewhere anyway, but bah.

They've completely disconnected me from the upcoming Red Wedding, because none of the characters I like are recognizable anymore.

[miarrow]

I don't have any great love of book!Robb but I can sympathise with him. This young boy, under an outrageous amount of pressure, grieving for his brothers, trying to live up to an unrealistic standard of honour, decides to marry a girl he believes he's taken advantage of, sacrificing his own honour to save hers.

I can't quote everything or I'd be just highlighting all your paragraphs, but yes, this is everything I felt with all my feelings about book Robb and I was willing to give the show the benefit of the doubt, because the ages had changed, but they completely murdered his character. He was basically this great version of all the best and worst things about Cat and Ned, which is why the Jeyne situation happened and why he reacted so well to Cat's mistake, because he had enough self awareness to know he'd made one of his own.

And the show murdered it. Murdered all my love for Robb and made Jenye into an exotic girl who is "not like the other girls" who could lure him away from his duty. AADFSLKFJD Plus I think it's a POINT that they didn't get married in the light of the seven (plus doesn't Robb honor the Northern gods?)

but mostly because there was no lead up to it

Yes, exactly. Also she has no more handmaidens which means Emilia is never going to talk to women again in this show and it makes me furious. It was lazy. LAZY.

Also, agreed on the things you enjoyed. This episode was much like this season, moments of OMGWTF GLEE (like with Shae especially) and moments of just plain I want to punch them in the face.

[netgirl_y2k]

And with Robb running off and marrying her secretly in the dead of night, it's not like he even thinks Cat's wrong, he knows that it's a mistake and that it'll give him problems with his men, he's just doing it anyway. Git. Especially after he cited the reactions of his bannermen as the reason for not trading the kingslayer for the girls. Again, git.

And the whole "not like other girls" characterisation of Talisa was, frankly, insulting, especially from a show that had previously been good at showing there was no such thing as a generic "other girls."

The thing is, I love Dany, I love Emilia Clarke as Dany. I am Team Eventual Dragon Queen all the way, which is why I kind of want Aegon to be a fake, because if this series really is about the prodigal prince returning to claim his throne then I am going to feel severely fucking duped. But a lot of Dany's stuff in S2 felt lazy. The books are guilty of it too; her arc is the one that suffered most from the books turning from a duology into a however-many-it-is-now-ology, because grrm doesn't have enough for her to do and obviously doesn't feel able to go "so that's Dany, remember her, she'll be important when I bring her back at some more plot-relevant point." It's the story I most want the showrunners to take some liberties with.

[miarrow]

Aegon has to be false. If he's real, I don't know what I'll do with myself, because, well, because! It would feel like the rug being pulled out from under me.

I may be in the minority of liking Dany's arcs in the books. They're very seperated from the main plot threads, so I COMPLETELY understand why people would be frustrated and I was wondering how the show was going to handle that (not well apparently), but they show a lot of why there are so many good Queenly (well Kingly, Sansa can be her Queen) things about her and how things can get messed up no matter what you do. It's a sympathetic viewpoint of leadership that is a running theme through the books, I feel. But you know, anyway, yes AEGON MUST BE FAKE OR I SHALL CRY.