Estelindis

A lot happened in this episode, but the pacing felt very weird... I think that's because it was nearly all discouraging stuff. Or maybe it's because, even though there were tons of developments, they felt as much like setup for the future as events in themselves. The episode as a whole was very cliffyhangery, unusually so for Game of Thrones. Cersei's walk felt very true to the books. I thought it was executed fairly perfectly. Just like the scene earlier in the season with Arya choosing not to throw Needle into the sea, you can see the character's internal thoughts in her face. I didn't feel much when Arya took her revenge on Meryn Trant. However, the scene that followed in the House of Black and White was great. I didn't anticipate "Jaqen" poisoning himself - and, when that happened, I didn't anticipate his face appearing on someone else. Ditto Arya's face then appearing on him. I didn't think one face could appear on more than one person. Maybe it's a show/book difference? Or maybe it was just done to achieve a certain shock effect, without thought for the wider repercussions? Wouldn't be the first time. I'm glad to see Sansa take some initiative and show courage to Myranda - and very glad to see Theon intervene and send Myranda to a timely end. Will Theon and Sansa now converge with Brienne and Pod? Can't see any other options. Overall, I feel like some mistakes were made with Sansa's storyline this year. It wasn't all bad, but there was far too much Sansa of previous seasons. She should have been capable of much more by now. All the Meereen stuff seemed decent. I miss show!Hizdahr's presence in that plot, but I'll take the current dream teams instead, quite happily. Tyrion and Varys, with Grey Worm and Missandei, should be interesting. (After all, Tyrion and Varys gave the show some of its funniest lines earlier this season.) Ditto Jorah and Daario. I am intrigued by where things will go with Dany too. She didn't have many minutes today, but it all seemed fine. Jon's story has been truer to the books than I was expecting. While he never finds out about his half-sister's presence in Winterfell, and thus doesn't add another reason for the Watch to be peeved, the plot was pulled back on-course. Sam going to Oldtown, "For the Watch" - we are now roughly where we expected things to be. If Jon is perma-dead, we still have some point-of-view characters at the Wall, but I have no idea what Davos or Melisandre would do there with Stannis being finished. Stannis's story turned into a bit of a trainwreck. Ramsay's victory was depressingly easy. It's not that I wanted Stannis to win after what he did to Shireen, but the swiftness of his downfall after that was hugely anti=climactic. And Selyse was disposed of almost as an afterthought. I expected more from Dorne too. No "Fire and Blood" speech? Jaime's touching-turned-tragic moment with Myrcella gave Coster-Waldau some time to shine, but what's going to happen to Trystane? Last but far from least, every time the show kills a character who's still alive in the books, I feel like the creators are saying that they know that character's plot thread will come to nothing. And I find that really kills part of the hopeful experience of waiting for the next installment. Stannis, Shireen, Myrcella: all removed from being candidates for the Iron Throne. But there's no point trying to avoid the show... Spoilers proliferate as soon as an episode is done. I'm sad that it's reached the stage that the book experience from which the show grew is starting to suffer somewhat because of the show.

Thank you for stating this so eloquently. I agree completely.

I have absolutely no idea. If Dany's advisors just leave Meereen in chaos, it speaks very poorly of the whole Meereenese arc. It implies that, in future, whenever things don't go Dany's way, she and her followers will just ragequit. On the other hand, I can't see the show lingering for very long in Meereen. There's no battle with outside forces that needs to be resolved. As for Meereen's inner conflict, Hizdahr's death means that there are no known Meereenese characters left to engage with. Anyway, the show's overall truncation of the Meereen storyline implies that they'd rather conclude it and bring Dany to Westeros. I'm just left confused as to whether the writers think we're supposed to like Dany at the end of all this. She freed the slaves, which was great, but she made so many mistakes afterwards that I can't help feeling she's been shown to be a better conqueror than a ruler.

They can't have, surely. For one thing, the panoramic views of the arena don't show many empty seats. Whoever the Sons of the Harpy are, they're probably in-place from the start. I reckon they bringing in their masks, concealed in their robes, with a dagger wrapped up in the cloth part, and put them on at a previously-agreed-upon moment. Anything else strikes me as a bit daft. The thing is, Hizdahr initially brings up the fighting pits not on his own behalf but as part of the peace mission to Yunkai that Dany sent him on. He negotiates a good settlement, with only one concession requested by Yunkai: the reopening of the pits. He then argues that the pits are part of the cultural traditions that bind people together in this part of the world, and thus can help remake the foundations of peace following her conquest. And, frankly, no matter how distasteful I find the idea of fighting to the death as entertainment (and I find it utterly barbaric), I find it very hard to disagree with his assessment when I look at the crowds of people in Daznak's Pit. It looks like tens of thousands, dressed in various different ways, showing different social backgrounds, all totally immersed in the spectacle and happy to be there together. I don't like, but that's how it seems. And especially now that it's been agreed that only free people will fight (which was in the conditions he proposed from the start - he never asked for a return of slavery), it's not consistent for Dany to say that she's freed the people of Slavers' Bay but only to do the things that she approves of. And Hizdahr pretty much makes that point to Dany: the combatants think that fighting in the pits is worth the risk of death, and they have the right to make that choice for themselves. How can Dany claim to know their own minds better than they do? As for him arriving late to see to last-minute details, that wouldn't surprise me at all, but I wouldn't see that as bad. (Please just let me re-emphasise that I could never watch a spectacle like the fighting pits myself.) He can't rely on Dany and her crew to see to the details. She doesn't even know that she claps her hands to start. Stuff needs doing, so I guess he goes and does it, hoping that a smoothly-run event will keep people in the city together. Hizdahr doesn't so much try to protect Dany (he seems to have no combat skills whatsoever) as he tries to show her another exit of the arena. Given that he's very familiar with the arena and probably had access to some fairly exclusive noble-only areas, he might know exits that the Sons of the Harpy wouldn't. But he's literally trying to show her how to get out when he's grabbed and stabbed. So yeah: the last thing he ever did was try to help the person who had his father crucified and nearly burned him alive. Shireen was that rare quality on Game of Thrones, a being of pure love and innocence. That was tarnished somewhat by being forced to watch her uncle burn (and Mance too, do I misremember?), but she still has so much faith, love, and positivity that she's brimming over with it, casting light into the lives of people around her. Burning anyone alive is horrible, but it's especially ghastly to do it to such a sweet, trusting little girl. I cannot see Stannis coming back from this. I know, in general, Game of Thrones isn't a show that punishes evil and rewards the good... But it had better make an exception for this monstrosity, or I will be deeply disappointed. Also... I'm starting to get somewhat weary of character deaths. It's shocking the first dozen or so times, and very important in making sure that the sense of danger around the characters is real... But I'm tired of it. I've seen too many nice characters die and too many ruthless ones survive. The Boltons, in particular, seem to have encountered no speed bumps in their rise to power. I'm hoping that changes soon. I don't even know if I want the sacrifice of Shireen to be what accomplishes it. What's worse: that he sacrifice was in vain, or that it actually did what Stannis so mistakenly wanted?

Shireen's murder was an atrocity that has turned me against Stannis utterly. I admired many qualities of his, but now I hate him more than I ever hated Joffrey or Ramsay. For me, this was the most brutal moment of the show's entire history. It made me heart-sick. This sweet, clever, kind girl, who should have only ever been loved and protected by her parents, was betrayed in every possible sense. Not only was she subjected to physical agony, but her sense of being loved and valued was stripped away. She was completely forsaken - one of the last beacons of pure goodness and innocence in the show was subjected to unspeakable evil. I do not have words strong enough for how much this appalled me. Kudos to all the actors involved, especially Kerry Ingram. The way she screamed tore my heart out. And the way she performed in every scene in the lead-up to her murder, showing such love and kindness, just twisted the knife. Poor Shireen. Poor, poor Shireen. The only other thing that's capable of standing out to me, beside Shireen's ghastly fate, is the turn of events with Hizdahr in Meereen. Trif, I agree with the following: Yeah, I felt really sorry for Hizdahr, seeing him lying there, bleeding out. He already lost his father; we don't know of any other family or loved ones. And yes, it doesn't look like anyone will mourn him. Earlier, on the dais, Daario engaged in knife-play around his neck. The woman who was making him marry her seemed to find this amusing (but, given that she nearly killed him earlier, she hardly has much respect for his life). This is the same woman who had his father crucified. Yet his last act was to try to get her to safety. I mean, seriously, regardless of the individual merits of what they were discussing on the dais, Hizdahr behaved with far more regard for them than they did for him. I can't help but feel bad for him.

What happened to Jeyne Poole is worse than what happened to Sansa. I doubt anyone would argue that. But why did the showmakers have it happen to Sansa? What is the purpose of this in her character arc? She had some time to get settled in, to get a feeling for the relationships between the Boltons and those who serve them, but she hasn't yet acted. She didn't even try to say anything to Ramsay that might have led to an easier wedding night. Why? Is it all about waiting for the right time to strike? When will that time be? I'm just so tired of Sansa being a victim.

Yes, thank you for the very interesting discussion! I'm super-keen to see what happens in Meereen next. For full disclosure, I think it's likely that Hizdahr actually does have something to do with the SotH, or will reach out to them in response to Dany's recent actions, but I only think that's likely because he's the show's single named Meereenese character, so there aren't really any other candidates. It's not because of how his character has been portrayed so far. I dislike meta issues like these and the one you raised about Dany having dragons and thus us needing to see them BBQ some people, but somehow I can't stop myself from noticing them.

I'm no expert on Batman. I don't know if his code is totally against killing or if he's okay with killing if it's necessary to defend the lives of others or himself. All I can say is that when I draw the distinction between killing because one has to and because one wants to, I'm pointing to a difference between killing in the heat of combat in order to protect people (which is constructive) and killing in order to satisfy emotional urges like the lust for vengeance (which is destructive). Hizdahr hasn't condemned slavery, to our knowledge, but he hasn't defended it either. Whenever he speaks about respecting traditions, he never mentions slavery. He's only had a few lines so far in a small number of scenes, so we hardly have the opportunity to see what he thinks about many things. "I cannot defend the actions of the Masters" was his comment on the murder of the slave children. Also, his words when he comes back from Yunkai might imply that he's onboard with Dany's new, slavery-free world order: "In the new world that you've brought to us, free men would fight free men." Interestingly, he also speaks on behalf of the some of the people she freed: "The pit fighters you liberated plead for this opportunity. Bring some here and ask them for yourself." However, she's not interested in their perspective if it doesn't fit into her own views. They're free to do what they want, as long as it's also what she wants. She's a mother who knows what's best for her children. Dany mightn't believe people are property, but she can still treat people as if they are. I think that's how she treats the family leaders who she arrests, by acting like their lives are disposable. I think that's how she treats Hizdahr when she dictates that she will marry him, regardless of his views. Her own introduction to "slavery" was an arranged marriage, after all. In terms of whether pro-slavery people can ever be innocent, it depends what you mean by "innocent." They're obviously not innocent of taking part in a system that deprives many people of their freedom, but to what extent would alternatives have been possible in their particular circumstances? Since Meereen was a city apparently ruled by several families rather than one, any given family wouldn't have been able to make huge, sweeping change, like abolishing slavery. Probably the best any well-intentioned nobles could do would be to work for better treatment and some freedoms for slaves. The other families wouldn't let them win other concessions, since they wouldn't want their power, built on slavery, to be eroded. That would be compatible with a situation where Hizdahr's father unsuccessfully argued against crucifying the slave children. His position was clearly a minority among the Masters, no matter how beloved a citizen he was. (And, really, Dany doesn't just have to take Hizdahr's word on this. His family's famous. It should be possible to find out what kind of person his father was, how he tended to vote, etc., if she wanted to look into it. Since she could find out so easily, it'd be surprising if Hizdahr would lie about it.) Dany has troops and dragons that let her seize power, allowing her to use brute force to implement her will (not that it's implemented perfectly as she wants). Any Meereenese noble who wanted to end slavery didn't have the benefit of dragons and an army. Or... let's imagine that all the noble families had some warriors, household guard, or what-have-you. If the ones that want better lives for slaves are in a minority, they're going to lose any fight involving troops. And maybe the group that would suffer most in such a conflict would be the slaves anyway. Maybe slaves would be forced to fight each other in those struggles. It's a classic dilemma between order (or oppression?) and freedom (or chaos?). A certain tyrannical order might be abolished in an armed struggle, but will what replaces it make the lives of most people better? Now Dany arrives, with the ability to fundamentally change the situation in Meereen by force. It seems to me that someone like Hizdahr, who chooses to work with her, is likely in favour of a situation in Meereen where the freedom of the liberated people is balanced by an order that gives structure and security to society. However, he's unlikely to have had much influence on the matter up to this point, given that his father had been the head of his family previously, and even then couldn't win a vote on something really morally important! How much influence, then, can we attribute to Mr. Dragonchow? If the nobles Dany brought down to the dragons were the heads of all the noble families, then there aren't hundreds of such families. This means that, on average, each family must have lost several members to Dany's crucifixions. It's quite probable that all, or nearly all, of those responsible for making decisions in pre-Dany Meereen are already dead. So... he'd have to be pretty innocent, in that sense. Of course, it's possible that he was secretly working with the Sons of the Harpy, but there's no evidence supporting that. The alternative is that there are way more heads of noble families than the ones she brought before the dragons, and she just put the other ones in cells initially (which, of course, we can't rule out completely).

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. Personally, I think that the moment we kill because we want to, as opposed to because we have to, we become no better than the ones we're punishing. That lines up with what Barristan said to Dany: when the Mad King punished his enemies, it made him feel powerful. In lashing out against the Masters, I think Dany fell prey to that. I think Barristan's advice was better than what she did, and I'm glad that she seems to have recovered some perspective, though I suppose we'll see where that goes. Even with the killing of Mossador, I'm not sure that she was right. It was clearly something she didn't want to do, something that didn't make her feel powerful, but I don't know if that can be the only gauge of these things. Should she have shown him mercy? If so, what would've been his punishment? Imprisonment? Whether she killed him or took his freedom back, it would've been difficult.

If they are better, it wouldn't be because of any legal issue (since something can be illegal but still moral) but due to deprivation of freedom and forced combat being better than torture and rape (if that is indeed the case; it is, of course, arguable). My point is that local traditions are different, but the underlying moral issues are the same. On the basis of a common morality, we can assess the situation both in Westeros and Essos, looking at problems related to slavery and feudal systems of government. In any situation where an elite holds power over the vast majority of society, people's freedom is severely curtailed. If, in your view, the Masters deserve to be executed universally, what do you think the lords and ladies of Westeros deserve?

Slavery is against the law in Westeros, but not in Essos. As such, Ned is entitled to punish Jorah for breaking the law. That said, one could argue about the relative freedoms of peasants/serfs in Westeros and slaves in Essos. Take a look at the horrific reveal from Roose in this week's episode: he had a miller killed and raped his widow because they married without his permission. I would've thought that "free" men and women could marry as they pleased. Actions like Roose's would fit more with what I expect of slavery. And then, on the other hand, you have the ex-slave tutor who pleads with Dany to be able to go back to his old position, who felt valued and respected in spite of being a slave. Those are probably extreme cases, but I think it remains true that freedom is a relative value in both Westeros and Essos. Ordinary people suffer a lot in Westeros due to the actions of powerful noble families, not entirely unlike the way that slaves suffer in Essos due to the actions of the Masters. As such, painting all the Masters with one brush is wrong, just as it would be wrong to paint all the nobles in Westeros with one brush. There are good, kind lords and ladies who try to do the best for their people, and there are clearly at least some Meereenese nobles who speak out against injustices (even though, from the fact that the children were crucified, the ones who spoke out must have been in a minority - but what if good lords and ladies are in a minority in Westeros too?). I think that Dany fails to appreciate those shades of grey. Maybe she's taking some steps now towards rectifying her mistakes, but I can't help but feel very uncomfortable about her telling Hizdahr he's marrying her (no choice?) when she could've just as easily had him killed horribly, just as she'd killed another family leader who might've been innocent. Clearly Hizdahr was expecting to die, given the way he pleads for his life in the cell. Actually, he probably had every reason to think he'd be the next noble killed by her dragons. Back in the scene with the dragons, she first spoke to all the nobles in Valyrian, but when she said "Don't want to over-feed them; tomorrow, perhaps," she spoke in the common tongue of Westeros, which she knows he understands. That's as good as telling him "You're up tomorrow." It's really not entirely unlike Ramsay. Dany is clearly a far better person with much nobler intentions. However, there's still not a million miles between the way Ramsay makes Theon think part of his hand will be flayed, but then says "I forgive you," and the way Dany makes Hizdahr think he's going to be burned alive and eaten, and then tells him that actually he's going to marry her. Obviously Ramsay did that to manipulate Theon, whereas Dany thought about her actions and decided that she'd made a mistake that she needed to fix. But from the point of view of Hizdahr, he's at her mercy, and couldn't have stopped her from doing whatever she wanted, which must've been a pretty awful feeling. Actually, I would love it if this experience made Hizdahr genuinely realise at a deep, personal level why slavery was so wrong. Hate having no agency in your life, being subject to cruel whims? Gee, I wonder what that feels like...