Game of Thrones: Kill the Boy Recap

Synopsis of 5×05: Jorah and Tyrion continue to head towards Meereen, as things there slowly crumble around Dany’s feet. Sansa is trying to protect herself while in the Boltons’ clutches, as her brother Jon prepares the Watchers on the  at the Wall for the upcoming battle.

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

My coworker who watches the show and I have a theory- this season won’t get intense until the last moments of episode 7 and then the last three will be a doozy. That or it will be that way starting at the end of the 8th. Saying that there’s a lot of exposition this season compared to every other is a bit of an understatement.

This episode has some beautiful scenery and some of the shots were utterly breathtaking, but overall for me this episode fell more flat than the others had. Maybe I’m getting a little worn down by the multiple plots, but it’s not the easiest to watch this season, and I understand why many people are giving up on the show until the season ends so they can binge watch it.

Oh well, onto the recap!

There were three stories told this episode, Sansa’s, Jon’s, and Dany’s. The other characters associated with them at this point appear as well, and that’s where the intrigue begins. Starting with Sansa, she’s finding herself not feeling quite as “at home” as she had in the past at Winterfell. As she roams around the grounds and keeps to herself in her room, Ramsay is off with his paramour, declaring that no matter what he’d still have time for her on his wedding night. The glimpse of this scene in the preview from last week honestly left me a little concerned as to what was going on but it just ended up being two crazies and their idea of sex. His paramour does encourage Sansa to go down to the kennels by herself, and what she finds at the end of the tunnel leaves her in disgust – Theon Greyjoy himself.

Before dinner that evening, Ramsay “forgives” Reek for revealing himself to Sansa but then humiliates him by making him apologize for killing her brothers. Obviuosly Theon hasn’t killed the younger Starks but he does as told. There’s another surprise at dinner though – Roose has announced that his wife is pregnant with a boy, and that doesn’t settle well with Ramsay, who sees this as a roadblock to his claim to the Bolton name. Sansa of course, is pleased by this and we know that worse comes to worst Brienne has her back, since she has promised that if she ever signals for help (by placing a candle in the window of the tallest tower AKA where Jamie nearly killed Bran) that she would be there in an instant.

Her brother is facing some backlash over at the Wall. While Jon thinks it’s smart to team with the Wildings and keep them safe to ensure their loyalty if a war is to come, many others push back at this and refuse to follow if they take that path. While he believed that he was going to have Stannis with him for awhile, Stannis declares his intent to go to Winterfell and confront the Boltons. Shireen is slowly starting to come to the forefront of Stannis’ life, and his love for her is slowly bubbling up too, since he says that even she would be joining him on their journey.

The main thing about all of this though is that – MASSIVE SPOILER – is that when Aemon Targaryen said that he was a “lone Targaryen in the world,” Jon walked in, which has been the most overt clue of the bastard’s real roots. I mean, I’m all for it, but that’s not going to be revealed for a while if the rumors are true. -END SPOILER-

Speaking of Grey Scale, Jorah and Tyrion are making another pair of unlikely travelling companions even though Tyrion is tied up and stuck on a boat with him. Jorah decides to take them on a short cut that kind of ends up being like the time that Belle’s father Maurice had the option of going down the nice safe road or the dark scary one and it being a horrible mistake (BOOM! Disney reference for the win). The two end up sailing through the Rhoyne waterway and end up sailing past the ancient and decrepit city of Valyria. This sequence was by far the most exciting part of the episode – the tales of the failed city and the overall feel for this scene was dark and foreboding, and when Drogon himself appeared overhead you knew something was about to go down.

Little did we expect it to be an attack by the Stone Men, those who have been afflicted by Grey Scale completely and had been discarded by the rest of humanity. As Jorah fends them off, Tyrion jumps into the water to escape since his hands are bound and there’s nothing he can do to help. Jorah eventually saves him, but as the two go off we see that Jorah has been afflicted by the Grey Scale himself, and that it’s already starting to develop… If Shireen was only saved by calling in every single master and healer in the country to her aid, we can only wonder what will happen to Jorah.

The other candidate for the throne that had a lot of growing up to do in this episode was Dany, who’s found herself at the end of a losing battle if she doesn’t do something about the Sons of the Harpy. Greyworm lies in the infirmary recovering from his wounds but Dany is taking matters into her own hands. “A mother never gives up on her children,” she declares as her dragons are brought out into the square and she has them burn and eat many of the former nobility of Meereen.

You read that right, she straight up just has her dragons go off and eat up as many of the noblemen as possible. Her current idea is that if she asserts her power 100% that the others will learn that she means business. She also has apparently been told that marriages are really the way to make sure that you stay in power in this world because she approaches Hizdahr zo Loraq (the guy who was the voice of the former nobility) and as he begs for his life says that she has decided to reopen the fighting pits, and that he will also be marrying her as a sign of unity to the people. Dany took an interesting approach to displaying her power after her other attempts fell flat.

Overall, it was an episode that was actually really hard to write about. While it wasn’t necessarily bad, it was just overall uneventful in a way that we’re used to by this point in the season with Game of Thrones. A lot of different story lines are about to come together, but it’s still confusing to see how that will actually play out.

Until next week!