"Game of Thrones" recap: "Kill the Boy"
Call it fitting (or twisted), but Sunday's "Game of Thrones" had a lot of maternal references for an episode that fell on Mother's Day.
There's our Mother of Dragons, naturally, but also references to the mothers of Ramsay Bolton and Sansa Stark. And someone else is now a mother-to-be.
Read on for all the mom (and non-mom) developments from the HBO drama's latest hour, "Kill the Boy." As always, spoilers lurk ahead -- consider yourself warned.
Meereen
Grey Worm is unconscious after last week's big battle, but thankfully still alive -- but the same can't be said for Ser Barristan Selmy (RIP), and Daenerys is not happy about it. So, she rounds up all the heads of Meereen's great families (including adviser Hizdahr zo Loraq) and takes them on a little trip to visit her fire-breathing babies. She forces them to slowly walk towards the dragons, all while giving a speech about children and discipline - talking about her "babies" as much as her subjects. One of the family heads gets pushed forward and becomes a barbecued snack for Rhaegal and Viserion, but everyone else is spared for now. "I don't want to overfeed them," she deadpans.
Later, when Grey Worm does wake, he tells Missandei that when he was wounded in the alley, he was afraid -- not of death, but that he'd never see her again. Aww! It's nice to have a little bit of happiness amongst all the scheming and battles and murder on this show.
And when Dany asks Missandei for advice on what to do, she basically tells her to not bother with her advisers and to just do what she wants. So she goes down to Hizdahr's cell with two announcements. First, she's decided to reopen the fighting pits, to free men only. Second, she's decided to solidify her ties to Meereen by marrying into one of the city's great houses - and, surprise!, she's settled on him. Does this mean we'll see another wedding this season?
Castle Black
Dany's not the only one seeking out council. Jon Snow goes to Maester Aemon (another Targaryen, in case you forgot) to ask for advice on making peace with the wildlings. Aemon gives Jon the same advice Missandei gave her queen, in so many words: Do what you need to do, and don't worry about if people will like it or not. Or, as he puts it, "Kill the boy...and let the man be born." Perhaps not surprisingly, the rest of the Night's Watch isn't keen on Jon's plan at all -- including poor Olly, whose family was murdered when the wildlings attacked his village last season.
The other big development at Castle Black this week involves Stannis, who packed up his army and his family (and Melisandre) to begin marching on Winterfell.
Winterfell
So much happened in Winterfell this week - including the world's most uncomfortable dinner party and further proof that Ramsay and Roose Bolton are both terrible people.
First, a reminder that Brienne is still sticking to her oath to protect Sansa Stark. She asks the innkeeper to pass on a message, and later Sansa is visited by the same old woman we saw earlier this season who told her "the North remembers." She says that if she's ever in trouble, Sansa should light a candle in the highest window of the broken tower.
She also has a run-in with Ramsay's lover Myranda, who is not pleased at being pushed out by the Sansa engagement arrangement. She compliments Sansa's dress, which leads to a conversation about her late mother (again, so many mother references this week). Catelyn taught Sansa to make her own dresses, so every time she wears something she made it will remind her of her mother, Myranda tells her. "I'd rather have a mother," Sansa retorts. Then Myranda adds that there's something in the kennel that will also remind her of her mother.
I was practically screaming at Sansa not to go into the dark, scary tunnel alone, but she did it anyway and discovers Theon, aka Reek, aka her onetime foster brother turned traitor who killed her brothers Bran and Rickon (we know he actually killed two orphan boys and passed their bodies off as the Starks, but Sansa doesn't).
Fast-forward to the most awkward dinner gathering in Westeros and beyond, where Ramsay trots Reek out to apologize to Sansa for killing her brothers and then suggests he give her away at their wedding, seeing as he's the closest thing she has to kin. Sansa holds her ground, but know sees how awful her new fiance really is.
Ramsay's dad, Roose, also has a dinnertime announcement to share: His wife Walda (the granddaughter of Walder Frey, of Red Wedding fame) is pregnant, and likely with a son. This complicates things for Ramsay, who is now technically no longer a bastard but could be displaced by this new legitimate son of two noble houses. This leads to a father-son conversation about the identity of Ramsay's mother, a peasant girl he raped and then almost killed and threw the baby in the river, until he looked at him and saw he was definitely his son.
At Sea
Finally, Jorah and Tyrion (now sober, and not happy about it) are still traveling by boat to Meereen. Their trip is taking them past Valyria, a now-abandoned city that was once the Targaryens' ancestral home. As their boat drifts past, they're ambushed by Stone Men - zombie-like men afflicted by grayscale - and they have to fight them off without touching them, lest they catch the disease. Tyrion gets pulled underwater and the screen goes black for an agonizingly long amount of time before things come back into focus and Tyrion is woken by Ser Jorah. They're on a beach, and seemingly safe....but when Joran gets a moment alone he checks his arm and reveals he's been infected with grayscale. Yikes.
Tell us: What did you think of this week's episode?