CletusMusashi

Yeah, I'm guessing that maybe Sansa looks more like young Catelyn to him than to our TV screens. Maybe Cat used to be a foot taller? In any case, Sansa seems to be the official replacement for the love of his life. There has to be a loneliness factor to his stupidity. Much as I hate his Bond villain speeches, he doesn't do them at everybody. Sometimes at Varys, when he's really desperate for peer approval, but mostly just at Sansa. Also interesting, the only female employee who we've seen him elevate to elite second banana status, no matter how temporarily, was Ros. He obviously likes having a redhead around to listen to how brilliant he is. Too bad Margery's out of his league. Hey, what color hair does Varys have, anyway?

Interesting. Mark Metcalf also played the Maestro on Seinfeld. As far as I'm concerned, his name until otherwise revealed is FreezeMaestro.

I used to think maybe he'd use her and then send her off, but he isn't the one who can make that call. Besides having honest-to-fire-god superpowers, including enough ability to look into the future that she'd be awfully hard to surprise, she is also far more charismatic, manipulative, pragmatic, and quite possibly intelligent than he is. Red ain't going any place she don't want to. It's too bad. I can still look at Stannis and see the remnants of a good man. But I think he was already half crazy from watching his drunken fool of a brother squander the throne for 17 years, and his desire to make things more organized than that had his desire for power so precariously balanced that Mel only had to tickle it a little bit to get him to swing all the way into full-on righteous conqueror mode.

I think Horny is new. If not, I certainly haven't noticed the horns before. The growth factor is a complete mystery. Maybe they grow quickly by eating people? Maybe only babies can be turned, but after that they can jump into a new body? Or, considering how long it's been since the last problem with these guys, maybe they have an insanely long maturation cycle, kind of like uberlocusts. In that case, these would the babies who were turned last time, rising up to turn a bunch of babies into more White Walkers for the next far future cycle.

I think Locke was the only one who they mentioned not having taken his vows yet, so he's probably in there alone. How well he does, I think, will depend largely on how many people are watching and how much restraint he's capable of once he has the upper hand. Fooling Jon? Probably quite doable. He's very charismatic when he wants to be. He's got Jon fooled so far, and he also had no trouble fooling Jaime. But from what we've seen so far, he likes to play with his defeated nemesis once he gets the upper hand, and that could easily earn him set of wolf teeth in the neck.

Random thoughts about the episode: So much for shipping Brienne and Jaime. Besides the fact that eventually he'd try to rape her and get beaten into a coma, in about a week she's going to be pregnant with a litter of baby Podricks. You do NOT send Podrick off with a woman who you are trying to get with! Why is it that, even with all the dragons and dire wolves and warhorses we see all the time on the show, I still gave a big dorky smile and yelled "KITTY!" Tommen was able to protect his cat from Joffrey, therefore he has my respect. And also my jealousy, but somebody was gonna get Margerine spread on them anyway; it might as well be somebody with a cute fluffy kittycat namd Ser Pounce. The baby walkers confuse me. Even crazy-ass Lizzy on "Walking Dead" was willing to hold off on turning the baby into a zombie once people reminded her that "non-walking dead" aren't nearly as effective. Even if they can walk, at that size, what do they do? Stand on top of each other and sneak around under a hat and trenchcoat? I think Grey Worm just got some plot armor. Kind of a long language lesson scene, unless he makes to Westeros and actually gets to talk to some people there. Especially considering how sped up the whole Essos part of the ep seemed to be. It's like at this point they're saying "Fuck it, you know she wins. Let's just get to the punchline." The head mutineer needs to be hanged for overacting. I thought Ramsay was overdoing it. This guy is worse! How many KIngsguards are there, anyway? I thought there only were about four. Littlefinger, shut the hell up. Then go back and watch some Season 1 episodes. Remember back when you used to lie onscreen, instead of just making speeches afterwards about how evil you were? Give Sansa some lemon squares and apologize to her for killing the jester. Deemphasize the "Who Wants to Date a Supervillain?" show, because I think she's already been there. Or, forget the Season 1 idea, just watch Lady Olenna!

Much earlier, like in late Season 1, he had my vote for Iron King. Joffrey was Joffrey, Tommen would have to face the same incest-bastard accusations as Joffrey, Robb didn't even want the southern throne, Balon was a turd sandwich, Renly was dead, and while I liked Daaerys I thought she was too much of a loose cannon to actually rule a continent. I'm all for dragons and boobies and random acts of kindness, but for functional administrative skills Stannis seemed like he'd be the person to go to... if only somebody would kill off that red-headed whack job. The problem is, they've done such a good job of explaining why he endorses her, as well as showing how powerful and real her magic is. I don't see her going any place for a while. And viewing them as a package deal...he's tainted. Even Joffrey, as horrible as he was, never got around to burning the trees of the northern gods, much less all the followers. Stannis' regime wold target not only both major religions, but also atheists, agnostics, "minor" religions, foreigners who still follow the majority religion of their homeland... the only people left in the kingdom would be those who have no problem with burning everybody else alive. Screw that. I did toy with the fact that having the Red Woman around might be handy for White Walkers, and then worry about getting rid of her afterwards. But screw that. Wildfre works on them too, I bet. And so, I believe, would dragons. For a while I was worried that if dragons are reptiles they wouldn't be effective at the temperatures where Walkers become a threat. But it sounds like the only place the Dragons had trouble was Dorne, in the south, so maybe dragons are endothermic. My vote, unless Tommen impresses me, is now for Dany. Stannis may go through the motions of being Mr. Logic and Duty, as emotionally distant people often do because they're uncomfortable simply admitting "I want that!" but ultimately he is more dangerous to his own people than any other king in Westeros that we'e seen. The guy's wound up tight enough as it is. Last fucking thing he needs is a crown on his head. A toupee, now that might cheer him up a little.

Angelus would have had to fight the original Big Bad Wolf suit. A season 3 matchup would have been Gorilloz versus naked crying just-back-from-hell Angel.

As I said before, it bothers me that he's acting like some mustache-twirling comic book villain instead of as an actual competant sneaky person. But I think I understand why they've made that change. With Joffster out of the spotlight, there's a huge vacuum to fill. Waiting to see Joffrey get killed, or even slapped, was a huge draw for viewers. Nobody else inspires that level of hatred, even though others most certainly are just as horrible. Who's gonna be the most hated character now? Cersei? Please, not even close. Cersei geting raped still upsets us. Joffrey geting raped? Might have been funny. Littlefinger getting raped? In the early seasons, we'd have felt that was a bit much. Nowadays, the way he's depicted, I don't know. I think that if, right after his "chaos is a ladder" speech, or right after he killed Don Toes, if right then Shagga had popped out of the shadows and raped Littlefinger while shouting "Squeal like a suckling boar, tiny Frank Zappa man!" a lot of us would have laughed. So that's my "worst villain" test. The goal is to find someone so hated by us that other characters can do whatever the hell they want to them, and we'll be fine with it. Ramsay Snow is also top-tier horrible, but he's not particularly unique. The Mountain, who we rarely even see, does more torturing and killing in a day than Ramsay does in a week. But Littlefinger is a powerful, far-reaching, entirely out for himself douchebag, and by frequently removing the more interesting human layers from his personality I think they might be setting him up as our new Joffrey. The upside is that channeling some of our hatred elsewhere allows people like Cersei and Theon to still be sympathetic. The downside is that his character's whole schtick seems to be making people trust him so that he can screw them over, and it becomes increasingly hard to believe that anyone whatsoever would trust him. Well, okay, except maybe Sansa...

Is it Aerie or Eyrie? Sounds more "airy," and that would match Jon Aeryn's name, but an eyrie is an eagle's nest; I thought that was what they were calling it. I'm sure I saw it spelled right in closed captions back in Season 1, but I can't remember which it was for sure. And nowadays... let's just say the "channels" I watch new episodes on do not have a captioning option. Either way, I think the trip there is going to be interesting, because the hill tribes are back home and presumably they are waging war against the Ear-ache or whatever it's called with all those weapons that Tywin supposedly paid them with when Tyrion was in a coma. So what do you say to them? "Hi, we're here to visit the insane family you're at war with?" "Hi, I'm the niece of your enemy; please don't take me hostage?" Tyrion can talk his way through a lot of situations that the Hound can't, simply because he is not as immediate a threat. The best I can think to say would be something like "Hey, I remember you. We fought at King's Landing together. Where is who going? Um, nowhere nearby. No, you don't have to come along with us; we'll be fine... hey, you know what I heard? There's a haberdasher in Dorne that just got a new shipment of water buffalo horns, first come first served!"

Either that or Osha could be Alice and The Hound could be Sam the butcher. Just don't try to get any chickens from him. Or, skipping Sam entirely, Hodor could be Alice and The Hound could be Tiger. Casting the Joffster as Jan Brady was great! Will somebody please give me a football to throw?

"Blazing Saddles" Tyrion Lannister as Bart. Nobody wants him there, but he saved King's landing anyway. Bronn as the Waco Kid. Great fighter, best friend of the protagonist. Shagga, son of Dolf, as Mongo. Big dumb tough guy whose respect is earned by the hero. Shae as Lily von Schtupp. Both have German accents, work in the entertainment industry, and are all over the protagonist's body. Joffrey "Baratheon" as Taggart. I know, Taggart's a second banana and Joffrey was a king, but Joffrey, at heart, was still just a small-time bully with little to no interest in real planning. Littlefinger, of course, as Hedly Lamarr. The slimy manipulative liar working behind as much corruption as possible. And Robert Baratheon as Governor William J. Lepetomane, the drunken fool whose underlings get away with murder.

Poor season 3. It was so good that crappy late seasons end up getting all the discussion. I mean, what's the worst thing you can say about 3? Maybe that Seth Green in a gorilla suit crawling around on his hands and knees was not the scariest of werewolf upgrades, but after that I haven't really got much.

It was literally overshadowed. I mean, S7 Buffy was so crappy that the only reason she or anybody else survived the season was because S4 Angel actually came rolling into town with a Deus ex Machina from not only a different show, but a different television network entirely! Every single character on "Buffy" could have fled town and Angel would still have saved the day with his magical blingblang. It wouldn't even have cost his show anything; he'd have come right back anyway, like Spike. So the purpose of anybody besides Angel even being on the show during S7 was for Xander to get maimed, Anya to get killed, Giles to get boring, Willow to lower her standards, Andrew to mention Trogdor, Faith to steal Andrew's hot pocket, Wood to steal Faith's hot pocket, Spike to be Fonzie, Nathan Fillion to get a paycheck, and Buffy to keep us from demanding another season. Yeah, add in the handful of scenes that I actually liked and 45 minutes sounds about right.

The Unsullied would also fall under what you've described. In order to make them fearless against death, their programming attempted to beat and cut most of the life out of them. ETA: I think the Iron Bank of Braavos might have have similar connotations to "iron price," or "Iron Islands." Iron=Slaughter.

And of course there's different types of intelligence. Ned had atrocious social intelligence, which resulted in a sort of highly impractical honesty that was probably one of the main reasons a loose cannon like Robert liked him so much. However, he was able to figure out Mendelian genetics on his own, and only needed the book of records in order to see whether or not the data matched his hypothesis. So he was capable of rational thought in some cases, but whenever honor was involved, honor always went before reason. Catelyn's mental weakness wasn't so much an obsession with her own honor as it was an unrealistic expectation of everybody else's. "Sure, if we send the Kingslayer back, I'm sure the Lannisters will free my daughters." "Oh, I know, Walder Frey acts like a supervillain, but he wouldn't really betray us." "The guy goes through wives like Kleenex, and if he spares Robb he's going to hang for treason, but I'll bet this hostage trick'll stop him..." But, like Ned, outside of her particular area of mental weakness, she seemed functional enough. Robb, despite his age, was a brilliant military leader who managed to be a pain in Tywin's ass. His first biig mistake was trusting Theon, which, considering that they'd grown up as friends and that Robb had never actually met Balon, was understandable. His second was breaking an alliance over Talisa. But, having seen Talisa naked, I can't blame him too much for that one either. The mistakes that killed him were that one and trusting Catelyn's assessment of Frey, which was also understandable since of course you're going to trust the person who knows him best. So Robb's cognitive failings were less egregious than those of his parents, even if no less fatal. Jon started out with a lot of Ned Stark in him. Since he wasn't distracted by dating or by meeting all the other nobles at family functions, he was left to spend all day dreaming of and practicing for his future as a heroic swordsman. He was good at the physical part, but mentally? Head in the clouds. I mean, he's the one who got Arya made fun of for naming her sword! But he seems to adapt to reality better than Ned did. The wildlings, at this point, will kill him as readily as Joffrey did if they get the chance, but Ned's neck wound up on the block through his own terrible decision. At least Jon's reason for pissing them off was acting as a spy in order to keep civilization from being overthrown by giants, cannibals, and/or zombies. Sansa's intelligence... well, I hear she's good at sewing. At least compared to Arya, who hates sewing. I think the main reason Littlefinger killed Don Toes right in front of Sansa was that it was the only way the writers could think of for her to eventually figure out that the nice man with all that candy in his raincoat might be up to something suspicious.

I like Arya. Of course. Everybody does. It took me most of Season 1 to forgive Sansa for siding with Joffrey, but eventually she'd been through the wringer enough that I became sympathetic to her plight. However, I still think she's the stupidest member of the immediate Stark family. And that's including the three who literally died of stupidity. Bran deserves better stuff to do. I like the actor, and I actually think that the writers have a good handle on the character's personality. My problem is that they never give him anything to do. I don't mean riding a unicycle and slam-dunking whatever the local equivalent of a basketball is. I mean conversations. Human interactions. Practically all we ever see him do is dream about a stupid bird, wake up, talk about dreaming about a stupid bird, and then cut to the next scene. Supernatural doesn't have to be boring, but for some reason in Bran's case it usually is. And Rickon just sucks. So far the only things Rickon has done are 1. Make the cast larger and more confusing during the early episodes. Like we didn't have enough trouble telling Robb, Jon, and Theon apart. 2. Leave a nice trail of walnuts that led to Theon having the idea of killing those other two kids, and 3. Give Osha even more reason not to get dragged into any of Bran's madcap north of the wall hijinks. Which means, that, without Rickon, Osha might well have gotten dragged along with Hodor, the Guru twins, and the Little Lord, complaining all the way but at least adding some entertainment value. Now, since she's busy playing Fran Drescher to the Littler, More Useless Lord, poor Bran looks like he's going to be stuck up there having the absolute dullest conversations on the show. "I dreamt of a crow." "The crow is important." "Hodor." "You should eat something." "Yes, I made lemming stew. Off screen." "Hodor." "See if you can put your mind into that tree." "OK, I'll just roll my eyes back for the rest of the scene..." "Oh, for love of fucking Hodor!" It's hard to believe that his scenes have actually gotten less interesting while on the run for his life, but for the most part I think they have. His supernatural powers have the potential for interesting uses, sure, but if we can't step up the pace on their development, can we at least have something in his scenes besides them? Everyone else's group is allowed to banter a little. It's called dialogue. It's the difference between a character who's interesting in theory and a character who's interesting in actuality.

Why doesn't Salladhor Saan buy corn on the cob?

I often wonder how well the story would play for younger first-time viewers. At the time, the cold war was recent enough that the Vorlon-Shadow conflict had very strong political parallels, in addition to its religious ones. I'd seen the "both angels and demons are scary on Judgement Day" schtick done before. Black Sabbath's "Electric Funeral" is a great example. And there's been lots of hackneyed "Satan manipulates us into fighting a war" stories. In both types of story, though, the normal world and the supernatural world were seperate things. Once you make the traditional assumptions about sufficiently advanced technologies interacting with lesser ones, though, the division is no longer so clear, and Straczynski was the first writer who I saw really nail what that meant. As someone who grew up during a time when the world's playgrounds were dominated by two giants, the theme resonated powerfully for me. But, while I'm not necessarily saying it's aged horribly, I think enough has changed that it just wouldn't feel as amazingly spot-on today as it did then. That happens with everything, I suppose, but it's sadder in the case of something that was that brilliant.

I see the same discrepancy, but what does it mean? Are his claims of having a code exaggerated? Did he simply feel stupid admitting to Arya that he got all his money taken away, so he tried to put a more "honorable" spin on it, at least until he just didn't give a damn any more? Or does it mean that his code is degenerating?

This guy has other GoT songs that are perhaps more professional, as in: much longer, somewhat more serious, and considerably less batshit insane than this one sometimes gets in its quest for the perfect rhyme. However, this one is very short, very funny, and has grown on me quite a bit since I first saw it.

I've seen mediocre episodes before, and Tom usually isn't very funny anyway. Hopefully next week when they get back to the core character's it'll be better. If not, I'll forget it exists in about a month. Nothing else in that Monday night block still interests me much.

I like your spoiler trick. I'm using it too. Why doesn't George R.R. Martin use Twitter?

Oh, I almost forgot. Two, count 'em, two, Monty Python references this week. We started out with Davos being corrected on his pronunciation of "kaniggets..." and finished up with a scene in which the heroic side is taunted at the gates while obnoxious foreigners snicker at them over the wall. I admit, the second one could have been a coincidence, if it was out there all by itself. But after that first joke, no way. These writers have seen "Holy Grail."

Was that slave they did the final closeup on supposed to be Barrack Obama? Yeesh. As if conservative old noblemen didn't hate her enough already...