season five trailer!!!!!!!!

it' been a sad game of thrones-less year but I WOKE UP THIS MORNING FEELING LIKE A KID AT CHRISTMAS BECAUSE HALLELUJAH THE FIRST FULL-LENGTH TRAILERS FOR GAME OF THRONES SEASON 5 HAS SURFACED.



ok the quality is a bit shaky but hey ho im just gonna go with it. i will avoid any huge spoilers. righty ho i got my glasses on, my pausing finger poised; let's do this

[edit: the sods law of this is... a minute after posting this, the official hd trailer has surfaced. FML]

trailer breakdown

0:10: jaime watching over the body of his father, tywin, who (as we remember from last season) got a crossbow arrow in his belly mid-shit, grim. brienne (?) saying: "nothing's more hateful than failing to protect the one you love."  brienne <3s jaime. sad cersei face. sad jaime face.

0:20: shot of the wall. PETYR BAELISH: "there's no justice in this world." still inexplicably irish. can't tell who the guy pulling the sword out is. maybe bronn? petyr baelish cupping sansa's (?) face. dark hair suggests it is sansa, as she transformed in the last series to dark-sansa.

0:25: woman whipping a barrel. she is most likely one of the 'sand snakes', the illegitimate daughters of oberyn martell (guy who got his head smushed in last season, r.i.p) in the kingdom of dorne (new place! new place! new place! cant wait to see it on the intro map)

0:29: yep it's sansa. petyr baelish grabbing her face eww. "avenge them". most likely he means her family, who are all still pretty much dead.

0:32 cannot figure out who the blonde woman cutting her finger is. 

0:33 margaery and tommen getting hitched. we have a new queen (again). third time lucky, margaery.

0:34: wildlings? 

0:38: varys pep-talking tyrion. who has just rolled out of the box he was packaged in at the end of last season after escaping the dungeons of kings landing (accused of poisoning joffrey).

0:42: gallows? i think? looks like the courtyard of castle black at the wall. possible (potential) execution scene. no spoilers.

0:48: varys and tyrion travelling through the streets. possibly missandei behind them.

0:50: gratuitous shots of jon snow and sansa having a bath.

1:00 ser jorah!!!!!!!!!!!! having a battle!! ahhhh! :(  danaerys giving another badass quote.

1:02 i have literally no idea what popped out of the box cersei is looking at. torture device????

1:04: melisandre continuing to burn shit. probably people. cersei still wants tyrion dead. bitch needs therapy.

1:11: jon fighting. probably fighting more wildlings. probably where the wildlings from 0:34 were marching to.

1:13: jaime in an exotic looking location. probably dorne. visiting the sandsnakes mention above. plot deviation from the books.

1:20: weird mask thing. probably someone in braavos (where arya was headed). theon still suffering. 

1:22: riders, most likely in dorne again.

1:23: 'knock down the statues'. possibly religious upheaval in kings landing.

1:25: arya outside the doors of the house of black and white (in braavos). later, picking up her sword (needle). 

1:30ish: varys and tyrion discussing daenerys's claim to the throne. made obvious by the shot of dany's face. DRAGONS. 

1:46: sandsnake kissing someone? melisandre getting her boobs out again. 

1:57: the harpy being pulled down in meereen. the flashing fight scenes of people in masks could be meeren aswell, all hell broken loose?



ok, so what we (kinda) know: cersei still wants tyrion dead. jaime is (possibly) in dorne and has some sort of interaction with prince oberyns bastard daughters. varys and tyrion are in meereen, searching for daenerys. meereen is still pretty volatile, riots and whatnot. dragons are even BIGGER. sansa and petyr baelish are.. somewhere. possibly further north, judging by the landscape. arya is in braavos. jon is still fighting wildlings. melisandre is still burning stuff. that's all, until the next trailer! eeep!



s1 e1: winter is coming (part one)


HELLO
welcome to the official (but not technically) of my game of thrones episode posts. i say not technically because ive already done all of season 4 whilst it was airing, but basically i cannot live without game of thrones in my life for the next year so im watching them all again and continuing my little project from the very beginning yayyyy. so if you want to watch along with me then do so, if not then just read or look at the pretty pictures whenever you feel like it, i guess. 

so i am a huge game of thrones fan. and i mean HUGE. well not like im a fatty but as in it is basically what keeps me going through this shit little farce we call life. i started watching game of thrones when it was roughly halfway through the second season, having never heard of it before seeing a post of tumblr with pretty medieval-y dresses and sean beans face and thinking mmm yes i want to watch this. watched the first episode and was HOOKED. ive read all the books but will try to keep book references to a minimum, as the show and the books are kinda 2 different entities now. however, i will mention book stuff when and where it is relevant ie, back story, character motivation, history, etc.

as much as i love game of thrones, i know that alot of people can get lost and sit there thinking what is going on, who is this joker, why are they doing that, etc. so i'll try and clear stuff like that up wherever possible. from what alot of people have told me, one of the main causes of confusion with game of thrones is the fact that alot of the catalysts for peoples behaviour, attitudes to others and their actions happened wayyy before the show starts, involving a lot of characters that are never seen as they are now dead but played a huuuuge part in the story. so i'll do a brief backstory to the main events.

backstoryyy

OK, so before the events of the show begin we're going to go back to about 12 years previously.

game of thrones is set in a fictional world, the main story happening upon a large continent called 'westeros' which is sort of european. westeros is split into seven kingdoms, each of which was once an actual kingdom ruled by its own monarchy until 300 years ago when this guy called aegon the conqueror (like william!) flew over on his dragon (yes! dragons!) and defeated them all. after that, the kings seceded their crowns and bent the knee, pledging allegiance to aegon because lets face it, its pretty difficult to beat a dragon. 

seven kingdoms & the political boundaries
each former king in each of the kingdoms still rules, sort of, but is now a 'lord'. so each kingdom is ruled by a powerful family, ie. the starks in the north, the lannisters, the arryns, etc. each lord has several 'bannermen' within his lands, lesser lords that he governs and that swear allegiance and loyalty to him. so pretty much like the traditional medieval feudal system.

anyway, after aegon's conquest, his dynasty (the targaryens) rule for around 300 years. eventually their dragons die out, boo hoo, but the targaryens remain in power. however, due to the unfortunate habit of interbreeding (to keep the bloodline pure) there is the occasional touch of madness in the family. this culminates in the final targaryen king, aerys (known as the 'mad king') who is very much off his rocker. his rule is unbearable. 

aerys has a son, rhaegar, who is a bit of a golden boy. rhaegar falls in love with lyanna stark, who is the daughter of the current lord of the north (and sister to ned stark, our lovely sean bean). lyanna stark is also loved by another man named robert baratheon, neds best friend. rhaegar 'kidnaps' lyanna (the details are a bit sketchy in the books), which is the catalyst for an all-out war between robert and his allies and the targaryens, a war referred to as 'roberts rebellion'. ned stark wants rid of aerys too, as aerys was responsible for the death of his father and brother, brandon (whose fiancee, catelyn tully, ned has now married). the mad king is killed (by jaime lannister), rhaegar is killed (by robert baratheon), lyanna dies in suspicious circumstances, robert becomes king and marries cersei, daughter of the wealthiest man in westeros. ned returns to his home in the north, winterfell, with a baby called jon snow, whom he says is his bastard child fathered during his absence from his wife. the mad kings wife manages to escape with her two youngest children, viserys (heir to the iron throne after rhaegar) and daenerys (still in her mums belly at the time) to live in exile across the sea.

there we have it. a brief pre-history. now lets fast forward about 13 years (its different in the books & tv show). this is how things are now:




so, are you sitting comfortably? then we'll begin

Game of Thrones Season 1 Episode One: 
Winter Is Coming


true to the books, the story begins in the north at The Wall. The Wall basically does what it says on the tin. its a massive bloody wall. 700ft high. so a very big wall. its a couple of thousand years old (i think) and was built to keep out the wildlings (northern 'savages') that live beyond it that have a habit of raiding and pillaging. though legend has it that the wall was built to keep out things much more ominous and much more deadly than wildlings... ooooooooooo........

anyway, so here we are at the wall for what i believe is the best opening scene in any tv show ever. it was this opening that got my well and truly hooked on GOT. because here we see the very things that the wall was built to keep at bay: WHITE WALKERS. aka. ice zombies. there are two different types of ice zombie; wights (which are the dead brought back to life, like the little girl) and white walkers (referred to sometimes as 'others') which is what sneaks up behind the guy and cuts his head off. the wights are literally ice zombies. the white walkers- with their ice white skin and blue eyes- are something much, much more sinister.

come on, ice zombies and beheadings in less than three minutes? pretty riveting stuff, oui? still not convinced? ok wait for the opening credits..

CATCHIEST THEME MUSIC IN THE WORLD

im sorry but it is. 
its so damn catchy that they even play it at the bloody place where the bloody queen lives. it's taking over the world. sometimes i listen to it when im getting ready for work and close my eyes and just hum along and it takes me to a special place, its like my version of meditation, its my own personal 'om'. it's addictive.

i must be calm.

ok so we're away from the wall now. we're in the north, watching as the guy who managed to escape in the opening sequence gets captured. grimmm. and then we come to the first of the seven kingdoms that we are going to encounter: the north, and its capital WINTERFELL. 

northy north time

winterfellllll
with the continent of westeros being modelled on europe (sort of)  the north is therefore similarly cold and bleak, corresponding roughly to england. it's all rolling hills and castles and mud and forests. in terms of culture, medieval england seems about right. the north is the largest of the seven kingdoms, being roughly the size of the other six put together. its huge. the north has been ruled by the same family for thousands of years; the starks. and here we are about to meet the current starks; daddy ned, mummy cat, robb, sansa, arya, bran and rickon. 

i wish ned stark was my dad but we can't all get what we wish for so hey ho. basically he's all super-noble and honourable and true. lovely. his wife, catelyn, isn't from the north. she's from riverrun, a kingdom further south. she was originally meant to marry ned's brother, but he died so she married ned instead. they have an honest, loving marriage. their eldest son robb is heir to winterfell, very similar to his father. sansa, their eldest daughter, is a proper little lady. she likes singing and dancing and stories about princesses, fairytales and songs. arya is a tomboy and hates everything sansa loves. bran in just bran. he messes everything up later and becomes really annoying. and rickon is just rickon.

there are two others in the picture that aren't starks. one is theon greyjoy (played by alfie allen, lily allen's sister). he is basically a 'ward', but is in reality a captive. he was taken by ned to grow up in winterfell after theon's father, balon greyjoy, rebelled against robert in the big war. basically he tried to crown himself king and mesed up, so ned took his son and heir hostage as a means of keeping balon in line. but theon has been well looked after, and is basically a stark now (or so we would think), having lived in winterfell from most of his life. the other non-stark is jon snow. in westeros, the name 'snow' means you're illegitimate. and jon snow is ned's starks illegitimate son, born during the great war. 

ok so ned stark says 'winter is coming', and this is a phrase you will hear alot. it's the stark family motto. seasons in westeros don't quite work like our seasons do, with three months of each. instead, they are irregular. some summers last for years, as do winters. in the past there were winters that lasted for generations. the longer and hotter the summer, the longer and harsher the winter. in the north, the winters are bitterly cold. at this point in time in westeros, it hasnt been winter for a while, therefore the winter is expected to be particularly arduous. so yeah, thats why they seem to make such a big deal out of the seasons. no-one knows how long or how bleak a winter will be. 

ok back to the story. so this guy has fled from the nights watch after seeing the ice zombies. nobody believes him, because the white walkers are the stuff of myth and legend. no-one is said to have seen them for thousands of years. believing in them in westeros is as fanciful as us believing in fairies and vampires. so they don't believe this guy. the penalty for deserting the nights watch is death, and so ned has to do his duty. he believes, however, that the one giving the sentence should also deal the death blow, and so he takes his big family sword, Ice, and performs the execution as a true lord should. 

squeeeeeeeeeeeee
on the way back to winterfell, the party discover a dead stag that they assume has been killed by a mountain lion. further on, they discover the body of a direwolf (basically just a massive wolf) that has been killed by a stag (obviously, as it has an antler in its belly). the symbolism is being laid on pretty thick here. each of the great families has a sigil, a sort of medieval logo for their house. the kings family, the baratheons, are stags. his wifes family, the lannisters, are lions. the starks are direwolves. so its all very ominous. ooo. 

BUT WAIT LOOK ITS JON SNOW HOLDING A FLUFFY BABY WOLF. 

THERES A BABY WOLF FOR EVERYONE, YAYY. jon snow gets the albino runt of the litter coz he's a bastard, but he still gets one too yayyy. 

KINGS LANDING

so now we're in the south, nearer to the equator so therefore warmer, a little more mediterranean in terms of climate and custom. we're in the capital city and the seat of political power, kings landing yayyy. ok yes its a weird name, but it literally is a kings landing. it's the place where aegon targaryen, called 'the conqueror' (nudge to william the conqueror and english history there) landed on his dragon when he came to, you know, conquer. the city was built where he landed and flourished under the targaryen dynasty that he founded. the targaryens were the ruling family for around 300 years before robert took the throne. the targaryens are therefore not native to westeros. they originated across the sea in a place called valyria, an empire which was destroyed. like the romans. george r.r martin tends to nick a bit from history but who doesn't. we love him from it.


anyway, we're in kings landing and oh no jon arryn is dead. jon arryn was the hand of the king, a position kinda like a prime minister, i guess. basically the hand of the king is the second most powerful man in the seven kingdoms after the king. he does all of the kings dirty work, plays a part in ruling, passing laws, administering justice, offering advice, etc. he plays a pretty big part in the government of the realm, and this one has just unexpectedly popped his clogs. 


here we meet cersei lannister, roberts wife and therefore the queen, and her brother jaime. they are twins, though cersei is a bit older by a few minutes, making her the eldest of the lannister clan. jaime is the spitting image of prince charming in shrek, i think. not that its relevant at all but interesting.


prince charming

jaime lannister

anyway, back to winterfell. a raven has arrived with a message for cat. in westeros, letters and messages are sent using ravens, i don't know why. i suppose its quicker than the british postal system. ravens in this world are like super-ravens, they are highly intelligent and can be trained to fly to different places delivering notes. though thats not so unusual, i guess. coz pigeons do that in real life and pigeons are idiots.

cat stark isn't a northerner. she was born in riverrun, another of the seven kingdoms much further south. she was originally betrothed to ned's elder brother, but married ned after he died. their marriage was a political match, but they none the less grew to love each other. her sister was married to jon arryn, who was kinda like a stepfather to both ned and robert, as they grew up together under his protection (hence the brotherly affinity between them). so it's all a bit of a family affair really.

the king is coming to winterfell dun dun dunnnn

TIME PASSES

OK yes a few months will have passed by now, as the road from kings landing to winterfell (called the kings road) is looooooooooong so the wolves are older and everyones had a bit of time to prepare for a royal visit. 

bran stark is climbing the walls of winterfell keeping an eye out for the procession, but gets caught by his mum and told not to climb. now the first thing i learnt as a child was ALWAYS LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER. NO MORE CLIMBING. BECAUSE DISOBEYING HER MIGHT JUST BE THE CATALYST FOR AN AWFUL, AWFUL TURN OF EVENTS THAT WILL JUST RIP THE ENTIRE PEACEFUL WORLD TO SHREDS, OK.

joffrey.
where do we even begin with joffrey.
he is cerseis eldest son, and therefore heir to the throne when robert dies.
and he is such a little shit i cant even
he is the justin beiber of westeros
you'll see.

HAVE A FEATHER, MY DEAD LOVE.
aaaand here we have robert baratheon, the king! yayy! one of the very first things he wants to do is visit the tomb of the woman he loved (and still loves), neds sister lyanna, who died during the rebellion. his determination to visit her tomb straight away is a very public snub of his wife, cersei, and pretty much sums up their entire relationship. cersei loved robert, for a time, until she realised she would never be able to compete with a ghost. anyway, there are some very suspicious circumstances surrounding lyanna's death, but i'll get to that in another post.  


with jon arryn dead, robert now wants ned to be his hand, which means leaving winterfell for kings landing. it's a bit of an offer that ned cannot refuse, especially as robert is offering to make ned's eldest daughter sansa queen. but that's all pretty much self-explanatory.

here we meet another lannister, tyrion, the brother of cersei and jaime. tyrion is obviously a dwarf, a 'deformity' which means he is reviled by most of his family (well, cersei, joffrey and their father, not so much jaime who is actually quite nice to his brother). tyrion is one of the best characters, hands down. he likes to drink and sleep around and be a little bit rebellious but he is extremely clever and witty, a trait him which gets him both into trouble and out of it. 

so that's it, we've met pretty much everyone important so far.
wait did someonne just say 'the targaryens are gone'?
erm no they're not



TO BE CONTINUED.....












IM NOT DEAD

hello and welcome to my first post in what is now my 100% official game of thrones blog! yayyy! the title i decided on was 'ned's dead, baby' (for which the comma is very, very important) which i believe to be a very witty reference to the famous line uttered by bruce willis in pulp fiction but if its too vague and obscure and you don't get it then go and watch pulp fiction because you haven't lived.




so i'll be continuing my little project of doing a summary/analysis/fangirl-freakout of each episode starting from the very very beginning! episode 1 is still a draft at the moment but should be up soon, so if anyone wants to watch along with me then i'll be doing an ep summary each week! yayy!!

for now, though, we have TWO game of thrones related stories, one of which is currently trending on fb.

first, we have casting announcements for season 5 which you can read here! looks like attention will be very much focused on the kingdom of dorne and the martell family which i am soooo excited for! if oberyn martell is anything to go by, they are going to be some excellent characters!

second, we have an exclusive look at some of the bloopers in season 4, which has just made me miss game of thrones even more than i already do. definitely worth a watch, just for the little jaime/tyrion dance scene. here we go:


that's all for now! but episode summary for season 1 episode 1 WINTER IS COMING is coming soon. like winter.because winter.

s4 e10: the children

so here we are. after ten weeks (or 11, really, counting the weird week-long break) season 4 of game of thrones has come to an end. and what an end. this little blog project has followed the series through, starting off as pretty well-informed and finally just degenerating into absolute chaos as i got more and more obsessed and frantic. so it is with a heavy heart that i must post this final entry. game of thrones is loaded, ready to stream; i have a jar of reeses peanut butter and a peroni

 i legit shed a little tear as the opening themetune played. i watched it last night live and wasnt sad but now im sad whats going on



Game of Thrones Season 4 Episode Ten: 
The Children


1. jon at the wall

so after the end of last weeks episode in which jon snow wanders off into the snowiness (in a scene very reminiscent of 'prologue' in the first ever episode) we manage to catch up to him again and oh yes he's still in the snowiness of course. jons off to meet mance rayder, the 'king beyond the wall', who is commanding all of the wildling armies and the attack on the wall. mance has a proper grumpy cat face, its hilarious. but anyway, mance is a bit miffed at jon snow for lying to him and betraying his trust after mance allowed him to live amongst the wildlings.


jons there to try and assassinate mance in order to bring an end to the fighting. he knows that, if he kills mance, his own life will be forfeit, but he's taking one for the team. like jesus. he doesn't get the chance too, though, because before you know it theres suddenly loads of riders streaming in from all sides in what is probably the most deus ex machina and un-tense/lacking in build-up arrival of riders ever. i'm not quite sure if they were going for a 'gandalf turning up at helms deep' kinda thing here but it didnt work, it seemed a bit slapped on. BUT IT'S STANNIS SO WHO CARES.

i love stannis.

stannis arriving at the wall is part of the 'big plan' that melisandre predicted in her fires. he is the only one of all the supposed kings in westeros who actually turned up to help the nights watch (or the kunigits watch, as ser davos called it when reading the letter). melisandre believes that this is their true task, to fight the forces of darkness; that is stannis's purpose as the king she belives the world has been promised in a prophecy.

the prophecy in the books is this: ""When the red star bleeds and the darkness gathers, [the promised king] shall be born again amidst smoke and salt to wake dragons out of stone."

it sort of obviously (almost to obviously, so im probably wrong) seems to be referring to daenerys. the red star is a comet in seasons 2, and she is 'reborn' amidst smoke and salt (tears) when she survives the fire of drogos funeral pyre and hatches the dragon eggs, boom. but as i said, probably too easy, george r. r martin probably has something else planned for that prophecy.

anyway, hello stannis. nice to see you doing some actual king stuff instead of moping around.


2. clan lannister

my absolute favourites on the show. i never would have thought, when i started watching, that they would end up being my favourite family, but they are. i thought i'd be team stark 4eva idst but i am a lannister now and i love them. the scene between cersei and tywin was brilliant, in my opinion. i love lena headey's acting, she is usually so cool and calculating but in this scene her mask breaks. still in mourning for her first born, separated from her daughter and now threatened with the potential loss of her second son, tommen, she threatens to reveal the truth about his parentage (which would topple the family from power, as tommen would not be the rightful king) if she does not get her own way. tywins like umm what truth? err the incest, tywin, the incest. brilliant scene.

gonna skip forward to the ending now, as it makes sense to keep the lannisters together (even if they dont want to be *chortle chortle chortle hahahaha*). ok here be spoilers.

SPOILERS SPOILERSSPOILERS

so if you havent seen the episode yet then obvs dont read. but if you havent seen it yet then WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?????! 

first of all; shae. im not sure what to feel about shae dying. i think i mentioned in an earlier post that the shae in the books and the shae in the show are two completely different characters with different motivations. bookshae is just a prostitute who is only interested in tyrion for his money, so we dont really care that she dies. showshae appears to have genuinely loved tyrion and turns against him when she thinks he is trying to get rid of her (once he's married to sansa). so im sad that showshae dies. but im even sadder for tyrion. like, bad enough that she betrayed him but to then find her naked in his fathers bed. and to hear her say 'my lion' (her nickname for him) when she thinks it is tywin approaching.. oh its horrible. 

GAME OF THRONES STOP TORTURING TYRION I DONT THINK I CAN TAKE ANYMORE HEARTBREAK. 

then its off for a chat with dad. ok so i knew tywin dies in the books. and, just like oberyn, i was hoping and praying that the show would somehow change the plot and keep him in but- JUST LIKE OBERYN AGAIN- his death is the catalyst for some future plot points, so of course he had to go. but that doesn't make it any easier for me, or for any of us. because tywin lannister as played by charles dance was hands down one of the best characters on the show, and im not quite sure what im going to do without his beautiful deep voice and his sage wisdom from now on. 

so tyrion kills his dad. and its not suprising really. this whole season has been a massive build-up of bitterness for tyrion as he learns just how much his family (except jaime) despise him and want him dead. i mean, they've always been pretty cruel to him, but they've been laying it on especially thick this season. i still havent emotionally recovered from tyrions trial and that speech he gave, it was heartbreaking. 

why does tywin hate tyrion so much? because he's a dwarf. because he isnt the valiant and beautiful warrior that jaime is. because he killed his mother in childbirth. tywins wife, joanna, was the only woman in the world that tywin truly loved, that made him truly happy. i think theres a quote somewhere in the books that the only time he ever smiled was the day he married her. however (and i think i mentioned this before) there is a theory that joanna may have been a bit naughty. there is a theory that tywin is the illegitimate son of king aerys targaryen (making him danaerys's half-brother). so all that talk about 'all dwarves being bastards in their fathers eyes' may be more than just talk. and do we remember the coversation between tywin and tyrion when tywin says how he cannot prove tyrion is not his? i don't know, it's speculation. but it adds an extra layer of meaning to the discussion they have before tywin gets shot.

tyrion is smuggled out of the city by varys, who has been his ally all along. tyrion thought that varys had betrayed him too (remember at the trial, when varys testified against him?) but varys is good at playing the game, and he was on tyrions side all along. now they are both sailing off, away from kings landing, away from the lannisters, away from westeros. where/who to? we'll see next season. 

3. daenerys

wow. for once, the season didn't end with daenerys. but did anyone else notice that her hair was wonky? really bothered me.

so the whole 'freeing the slaves' thing isn't really going to plan. particularly when the slaves want to return themselves to slavery because their lives as slaves were better than they are now. oops. plus her dragons are getting huge and uncontrollable and have killed a child, so she decides to trap them in the catacombs so they cause no more harm. only two of them, though, because the biggest and fiercest (drogon. yes the dragon is called drogon) is M.I.A. where could he be.


4. bran. i dont care about bran

haha no one cares
jojens dead. stabbed in the gut multiple times by a snow skeleton. does anyone care? no. 

so they finally have got to the place they were looking for, the home of the 'three eyed raven'. who of course isnt a raven at all but a super old guy on a tree-root throne thing. because, like everything in game of thrones, 'three eyed raven' is a metaphor. and there's a reason he's called a raven, which i wont disclose now as that'll probably come out in next season and i dont wanna spoil it. 

we know that bran is a warg, aka. he can put his soul into other living things, which is why he can control his direwolf and hodor. note: living things, not necessarily just animals.

but who is the creepy little girlchild with the throwing fireness? she is part of a race we have heard of but never seen before; the 'children of the forest', otherwise known as just 'the children'.this is where game of thrones is going to get a liiiiiittle more 'fantasy'. ok yes i know it's always been fantasy (dragons being the major clue) but this is where it all gets a little bit more weird and surreal. i was a bit dubious about how the producers would deal with this plot point, whether they'd cut it out altogether and keep things a tad more 'real' (minus the dragons) but it looks like they're planning to roll with it, so here's a wee explanation. ceebs typing it all out though so i'll copy and paste from a game of thrones site. 

"The Children of the Forest are a mysterious non-human race that were reportedly the original inhabitants of Westeros. They were already living in Westeros when the First Men migrated to the continent, 12,500 years before Robert's Rebellion."
- so they are the indigenous people 

"The Children of the Forest worshipped nature gods, the countless and nameless spirits of every tree, every rock, and every stream. Their religion devoted to the Old Gods of the Forest had no complex temples, but according to legend it was the Children that carved faces into the sacred Weirwood trees.These carved heart trees were the closest thing to a  shrine in their religion." 
- weirwood trees are those special trees we see every so often with the white bark and red leaves, like the one bran touched that gave him a vision.
"The Children of the Forest weren't very technologically advanced, though they were very woodcrafty and had a great knowledge of the plants and animals of the forest. They hunted using bows made of weirwood and used blades made of Dragonglass." 
- dragonglass is another name for obsidian, which (along with fire) is the only thing that can kill whitewalkers. sam tarly used a dragonglass knife to kill a whitewalker in season 3

5. arya
the custody battle is pretty self-explanatory, so i wont go into that. but we don't see the hound die, do we.
fabulous jaqen
it looks like arya is finally making it out of westeros, hooray. poor girl. she managed to buy her passage on the ship with that coin that jaqen h'gar gave her wayyyy back in season 2. jaqen was the guy with the fabulous white highlight in his hair that referred to himself as 'a man'. 'a man has a thirst'. 'a man must know'. 'a man has good hair' etc etc. he told arya that if she ever needed to seek him out, she should give that coin to anyone from braavos and say the words 'valar morghulis' {all men must die}. i dunno, its like some sacred motto or catchphrase. but, just like jaqen said, it works. arya is on her way out of westeros at last. poor girl. think she is definitely in need of a little time out of the country after all she's seen. 


so there we have it. game of thrones season 4. we've laughed. we've cried. we've made friends, we've lost friends. we've had to hug ourselves tight and rock backwards and forwards to console ourselves as YET ANOTHER FAVOURITE CHARACTER IS STRUCK DOWN IN THEIR PRIME. i don't think i can bear to let go just yet. might be time to have a marathon from the beginning of the season. or maybe season 1. yeah i havent seen season 1 in ages. i cant cope. im in pain. ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. 

s4 e9: the watchers on the wall



so for once i am NOT HUNGOVER whilst writing this. im actually ridiculously relaxed and calm because im trying to be a serene person and i just had the aussie conditioner in my hair for about half an hour so it's sort of like im pamering myself. so im not hungover. im just drinking milk and eating muesli.

anyway, this post will be a bit different to the normal ones. basically theres no need to break this one down into scenes, as all the action takes place on the wall in this episode. im just going to kinda ramble on with random thoughts and whatnot, cannot be bothered to make it particularly coherent or w/e.

Game of Thrones Season 4 Episode Nine: 
The Watchers on the Wall


It was pretty obvious that this episode was going to be a big episode, simply because of the pattern that each series of game of thrones has followed so far. The 'BIG EVENT' always happens in episode 9. In season 1, it was Ned Stark getting beheaded (still not OK with that). In season 2, it was the Battle of Blackwater. In season 3, the Red Wedding. OK this season has had a couple more 'big events' throughout (with more to come, nudge nudge) but the producers are sticking true to form and having this season's episode 9 as a stand-out episode in the series by having all the attention focused on one particular event. It's only the second time they've ever done it, the first being 'Blackwater' in season 2. always a bit of a risky decision to completely ignore all the other characters (especially as we're all dying to know whats happening in the aftermath of oberyn's death) but i think it works. not quite as well as 'blackwater' (which is still my favourite episode ever, ships wildfire boom) but a good attempt nonetheless.

ok so the wildlings are coming. We have two groups of wilding at the moment. One the north side of the wall, the massive wildling army of around 10,000 (or is it 100,000?) and on the south side a smaller host consisting of Ygritte (Jon's luvahhh), Tormund (epic beard) and the slightly sexy Thenns (cannibals). Apparently Tormund had sex with a bear. Interesting. They are both going to attack at the same time. Oh, by the way, I am really, really upset that the word 'minge' made it into game of thrones. not ok. the writers are american, i didnt even know they used that word in america. 'minge' is not a game of thrones word. never use 'minge' again.

Maester Aemon (old blind dude) = basically a bit of a player in his youth. he says something like 'don't you know what i could have been'. err game of thrones does this sometimes, refers to something mentioned aaaaages ago that people have probably forgot but THATS WHY IM HERE. he is basically referring to the fact that he could have been king. He is a Targaryen and was in line for the throne, but he declined it. Everything would have been different if he had said yes and become king. There would have been no 'Mad King' Aerys (Daenerys' dad), the Targaryen dynasty would still be in power and the land would probably be at peace. Aemon would have made a cool king. I love Maester Aemon. I am super curious though.. who was the woman Aemon was in love with? What if they had a baby? WHAT IF THERE IS ANOTHER ILLEGITIMATE TARGARYEN FLOATING AROUND, DESCENDED FROM SOMEONE IN THE LINE OF SUCCESSION BEFORE DAENERYS'S FATHER? WHO?! WHOOOOO?!!!!

I hate Gilly. I cant even call her Gilly. she is Cassie from Skins. Sam's trying to be all noble and brave and manly and she's whining for him to stay with her. Her storyline bores me to hell. But NO-ONE IN GAME OF THRONES SHOULD EVER UTTER A PROMISE THAT THEY WON'T DIE BECAUSE LOOK WHAT HAPPENED TO OBERYN. "today is not the day i die" wambam watermelonheadsmash. anyone who likes sam tarly must've had a suddenly clenching of the sphincter the moment he promised cassie from skins that he wouldnt die.

MAMMOTHS!!

wait did grenn tell a little fib to get rid of janos slynt? slynt who doesnt believe in giants, even when theres a giant riding up to the wall on the back of a bloody mammoth. clever janos slynt. well janos slynt is a douche. he's the guy that tyrion had sent to the wall in season 1 (maybe 2, actually). he was the guy responsible for killing all those children, including the baby in the brothel, because they were king roberts illegitimate children. so we don't like janos slynt. janos slynt is a douche.

not impressed.
so now jon is in charge hooray.

anyone else think the thenns face after he gets a hammer to the head is absolutely hilarious? looks like grumpy cat.

OK SPOILERS HERE

ygritte wahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. i love ygritte. she is basically bianca from eastenders without her silver puffer jacket and a gaggle of ginger kids. she gets shot with an arrow by the kid from a couple of episodes ago. the one who the thenn said 'im gonna eat your dead mama and your dead papa' to. i think ygritte killed his mum and dad, so he's got his vengeance now. but super sad. 

for ages all ygritte has talked about is killing jon snow, its been the driving force behind her participation with the attack. she wants to kill him for betraying her and, though she never says it, for breaking her heart. but when the moment comes, she doesn't do it. jon smiles, accepting death at her hands, and you see the flicker in her face; she hesitates, and we never know whether or not she would have actually done it.



and so we lose more comrades. george r.r. martin is basically that special kid that crushes beetles that tyrion was talking about in the last episode, except instead of beetles it's characters that martin is crushing along with our hopes and dreams. sigh. what with all these characters dying, wouldn't it be lovely if someone came back from the dead. 




s4 e8: the mountain and the viper

for some reason i always tend to be hungover when writing these, oh dear. currently in bed (in my NEW SUPER COOL COCA COLA JIMJAMS BECAUSE I ACTUALLY WENT CLOTHES SHOPPING YESTERDAY AHHH) drinkinh ice water and eating left over wagamamas because i am so hip and cosmopolitan now im a london girl that of course i eat japanese food for nutritional sustainance.


ready to rumble.

BRILLIANT episode this week after two that have been a bit slow. i dunno, just watch it as soon as you can. realllly good.



Game of Thrones Season 4 Episode Eight: 
The Mountain and The Viper


shit's going down at the wall

she mad.
here's a lesson to all men. hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. so probably not a good idea to get into a relationship with a woman who can wield a club, snog her atop a giant ice wall whilst basking in the glow of a beautiful sunset (which would 100% make her love you) and then abruptly leave her. because that's what jon snow did, and now ygritte is pissed. you can literally see it in this scene when she is marching through the town, she has got a proper pace on and a face that says "im coming for you jon you bastard and you are a dead man." men, if you ever see a woman walking towards you that fast and with a look on her face like ygrittes: run. run fast.

anyway, mance's army is on the way. they've done alot of talking about mance's army and its taken a bloody long time for them to get to the wall, but that isnt really suprising seeing as they have 10,000 people to move across what is essentially a big block of ice populated by bears and the frozen undead. the army is basically everyone who lives north of the wall who wants to no longer live north of the wall because it's cold and there are lots of snowzombies and apparently also a big blue darth maul ice king that steals babies that nobody bloody knew about. where are the snow zombies, by the way? i want to see more. i demand at least one snowzombie every two episodes and any episode without a snowzombie should have a dragon in it. take note, hbo. 

anyway, judging by the trailer for next weeks episode, the army will actually arrive and we will finally get to see the battle, thank god. we havent really had a proper one since the battle of blackwater (SHIPS! WILDFIRE! BOOM!) and i love a good battle. 

more heartbreak for ser jorah

alot of attention given to this little missandei and grey worm love story. i don't seem to remember there being any relationship between them (or at least not alluded to) in the books. can't tell whether this is just filler or will actually be relevant to future plot points. lets wait and see. i don't mind anyway, it's quite cute. it's nice to have a little love story going on amidst all the endless betraying. and if essentially saying 'im glad i was brutally castrated as a child because it means i got to meet you' doesn't win a girls heart, nothing will. n'aww.

i cant.
but anyway. just to make things a little bit worse for ser jorah, it's time for daenerys to discover that he betrayed her. see! betraying. betraying everywhere. endless betraying. i think i went over this in my last post about 'but who is the real jorah mormont???'. basically he sold slaves back in westeros and was exiled. in order to recieve a royal pardon that would allow him to return home, he spied on daenerys and her brother and sent reports on them to king's landing. he has finally recieved his royal pardon, only a couple of years too late. and in pretty sneaky circumstances too, as the pardon was delivered to barristan selmy. perhaps, as jorah suggests, an attempt by tywin lannister to create discord between daenerys's men?

anyhoo, daenerys is miffed and sends him away. i genuinely, hand on heart, no word of a lie, wailed out loud. i wailed 'noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo' at my laptop screen. i honestly cannot deal with how much i love jorah mormont and i cannot handle seeing his heart being torn to pieces week after week after week, he is like a faithful labrador that just wants to be rubbed on the belly but no-one will love him. he is so sad all the time and it makes me sad. "i have loved you" oh my god i cant handle it i need to stop typing

ramsay becomes a bolton

i think ramsay is fast becoming my favourite character. mainly because he is being played so ridiculously well by iwan rheon. and i slightly fancy him, wont lie. this time we're at moat caillin, woohooo. it's basically a big northern castle being held by the ironmen, who are theon's people.  the ironmen took over alot of the north around the time that theon took over winterfell (season 2? why cant i remember?) and now roose bolton and ramsay, his bastard son, are trying to get rid of them all. ramsay offers them safe conduct to return home but oh no wait this is game of thrones WHO'S READY FOR A SUDDEN SHOT OF A FLAYED HUMAN BEING

kudos to hbo for getting a cool little shot of crows picking at dead bodies too, which is probably a reference to the book title this season is based on, A Feast For Crows. Basically, there are so many dead bodies lying around now that the crows are having a feast, simple.

A wild Roose Bolton appears! I will never forgive Roose for stabbing Robb Stark. Never. I think I will go to my grave rueing the day that George R.R. Martin ever put pen to paper and created Roose Bolton. Roose and Ramsay go off for a little father son chat involving a speech that is slightly reminiscent of mufasa talking to simba whilst looking out over the pride lands in the lion king. Roose tells Ramsay that he has been legitimized, meaning that he can now call himself a 'bolton' and will be roose's official heir. Roose is filling the vacancy left by ned stark and is acting as warden (essentially, ruler) of the north, a role that ramsay will now take on when roose dies. 


they ride off together towards another castle.... is that winterfell?!?! i cant tell. 

sansa stark becomes awesome

what is the show called? game of thrones. it literally sums up the entire point; it is all a game, and they are all a part of it, whether as players or 'pieces' that the players manipulate- metaphorically moving them across the board- for their own gain. up until now, sansa stark has been a piece. all of sudden, she's about to become a player.

i love sansa. she gets so much stick but i actually really love her character. and there's a definite change in her character in this episode. even her acting seems to have changed. she's gone from being a bit stumbly and confused looking to being sleek and a little bit suggestive. she lies perfectly, whereas before she would stutter and blush and become flustered. she's learnt a thing or two from petyr baelish, and is begining to lie to and manipulate people herself. 

just to hammer home to fact that she is a changed woman, she also gets a makeover. we always see her in pink and blue, pale 'girly' colours and dresses. all of a sudden, wam bam leather and feathers. i think they darkened her hair too, but that happens in the books anyway as part of her 'disguise'. anyway, i loved old sansa, but i think im gonna love new sansa even more. how brilliant would it be if she became the ultimate player of the game of thrones.  





the mountain and the viper

this obviously involves spoilers, so dont read if you havent seen the show yet.

ladies and gentlemen it's time for oberyn martell versus gregor clegane, aka. the red viper versus the mountain!! this is like an onyx versus a hitmonlee.

ive said it in pretty much every post so far but yeah this is what oberyn has been waiting for, the chance to kill the mountain (gregor clegane) in vengeance for killing his sister and her children. but it all goes tits up. i dont really need to say more. it's all pretty self-evident. 

i knew what was going to happen, but there was a part of me that hoped against all hope that the producers had decided to change the outcome and keep oberyn and that he wouldnt die and we could continue being happy and carefree and watch him enjoying all of the worlds delights with ellaria but no. this is game of thrones. and the moment you start to love a character, they gonna die. because if you think this has a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention. and whilst i hoped and pleaded with all the gods that oberyn wouldn't get his head smashed to smithereens, i knew it was a lost cause. oberyn needs to die, because his death is the catalyst for the events in the next season. [speaking of next season, its been leaked that an actress has been cast for the role of young cersei. which means..........FLASHBACKS. I AM TOO EXCITED.]




NEVER MONOLOGUE.

R.I.P OBERYN MARTELL






we loved you, and we will miss you. we cannot handle the feels. but dont worry, game of thrones fans, if you heart is in tatters. only two episodes to go before we can all relax and breathe easy knowing your favourite will last another year. if they don't die in the next two, that is ;)


s4 e7: mockingbird

i was meant to write this one up yesterday but i had a work night out on monday night so yesterday i was basically dead to the world. free cocktails all night got me drunk enough to think it was a good idea to go for a little adventure on my own. i ended up on a boris bike cycling the streets of london pissed as a fiddle at 2 in the morning, crashed into a wall and fractured my little finger, bought two big macs, climbed over a locked wall to sit by the river near the shore in front of the london eye, then wandered around westminster. almost gave up on getting home and seriously considered finding a bush in the grounds of westminster abbey to sleep in, or maybe even trying to sneak inside and go up to the bell tower and be quasimodo for the night, because his bell tower pad looks so warm and snug. eventually made it home after finding a bus stop and had a little cry because i was so happy to get on the bus. but so yeah, yesterday i slept off my mojitoverdose.


Game of Thrones Season 4 Episode Seven: 
Mockingbird


1: the imp, the mountain and the red viper

so tyrion is still in prison following his little outburst. he is awaiting a trial by combat. in game of thrones world, a prisoner can request a trial by combat to prove his innocence. essentially, it's the belief that, if you are innocent, the gods will make you win. if you're guilty, the gods will make you lose. each side is allowed to select their own champion. this is how bronn and tyrion becames friends in season 1; when tyrion was cat's captive, he demanded a trial by combat, and it was bronn who offered to fight for him. as bronn won, tyrion was considered innocent in the sight of the gods, and was therefore allowed to walk free.


so noble
of course, tyrion has few people willing to risk their necks for him this time. without his sword hand, jaime knows he is certain to lose. bronn won't fight. he's been offered the hand of lollys stokeworth, a noblewoman, and can therefore expect to live comfortably (especially as he might get a castle of his own in the bargain once he bumps off her elder sister). in fact, there is no-one who seems willing to take on the opponent that cersei has arranged; gregor clegane. He is often referred to as 'the mountain' due to his immense size, and he's an absolute beast. gregor is the hound's brother, the one who burned his face (which the hound refers to later in the episode). he's the guy in season 1 who lops the head off a horse with a single stroke during the joust. he's massive, freakishly strong and merciless. gregor is the one that killed oberyn's sister princess elia, the one who was married to rhaegar targaryen, the last targaryen heir. gregor killed her children, raped her and then killed her. 

and then oh hoooray along comes oberyn. yep, he's gonna do it. i like how he picks up a torch as he announces he'll fight gregor for tyrion, just to hammer home the 'im a hero' sentiment. also, how sad was the story he told tyrion about meeting him as a baby. it explains why cersei hates him so, so much; their mother died giving birth to tyrion, and so cersei hates him. we knew that. but it's sad t0 hear that her hatred was so strong and vile even when tyrion was a tiny little baby, pinching him and wishing him dead. just when you couldn't feel anymore sorry for tyrion, the feels. the feels. 





2: arya and the hound meet another dying person

i swear to god this is the tenth dying person they have met along to road. anyway, dying man is dying. so they help him die. he dies. then some crazy man comes up behind the hound and bites his ear off. 

these two blokes, rorge and 'biter' are nasty bits of work. they were the ones in the cage with jaqen h'gar one the way to the wall. (jaqen is the guy with the fabulous blonde strand in his hair that can change his face and who gave arya the special coin she has).

there's an interesting theory about jaqen. he can change his face, so he could be any of the newest characters that have popped up since he swaggered off into the sunset. the most popular theory, however, is that he is one character in particular, one that has already changed his face: DAARIO. 

also, kudos to game of thrones for getting in a line that is possibly the saddest line ever in the show. i welled up:

heart = broken.



3: ser friendzone gets further friendzoned

whilst on the subject of 'who is daario' theories, there is another one worth mentioning, although it is a tad far-fetched. it basically sprung up after his character was recast with such a difference in looks. the first daario had long blondish hair and blue (i think) eyes. this one has dark hair and dark eyes. as the game of thrones producers know certain plot points that havent been published yet, there has been suggestions that the recast (and change in appearance) had something to do with a future development or 'reveal' about the character. some believe he may actually be a stark in disguise, possibly benjen stark (neds brother) from the night's watch, who went missing in season 1. far-fetched, probably, but interesting. 


ser jorah sees daario leaving daenerys' bedchamber after the two of them have obviously got it on. poor jorah. poor poor jorah. if there was ever anyone i was rooting for to get the girl it is definitely jorah mormont. look at his little face. so full of hope and sadness. who is jorah anyway? he's been around since season 1, it's easy to forget. what the hell is he there for? jorah mormont is a northman who was originally pledged to ned stark. his story from the book is that he married a beautiful woman who was used to riches and luxury and soon tired of living the bleakness of the north. he spent an awful lot of money trying to make her happy, paying for entertainers and singers and buying beautiful dresses and jewels. eventually he had so little money left, he was forced into selling slaves. his wife left him, and when ned stark discovered that jorah had been involved in slavery (the punishment for this usually being death) he was banished from westeros. living in exile, he originally spied for varys in hopes of gaining a pardon and being allowed to return home. eventually he became completely devoted and loyal to daenerys, and stopped sending reports back to kings landing. 

daenerys also has another new dress.


ok the rest can be summarised:


HOT PIE IS BACK



WOLF BREAD ATTEMPT #1
WOLF BREAD #2 AKA. NAILED IT

JOHN SNOW IS IN THE SNOW

SNUH.

DON'T EFF WITH PETYR BAELISH



basically.


AND NEXT WEEK: