TV Series Review: Game of Thrones S06E01 - The Red Woman *SPOILERS*

Genre Fantasy
Director Jeremy Podeswa
Producer David Benioff, D.B. Weiss
Actors Peter Dinklage, Lena Headey, Emilia Clarke
Where we got our copy M-Net Edge
Available on ShowMax
Air Date 2016-04-25
Episode Episode 1 - The Red Woman
Season Season 6

The Stubbs

Published May 4, 2016

Season openers for Game of Thrones are always a strange creature. The big questions from the previous season tend to get put to one side while we do a quick catch up on what’s going on with the massive cast. This one was no different, we got to visit the entire cast, with the strange exception of Bran and Little Finger, setting up what seems to be the tone for the rest of the season. Having read all the books this is the first season where I can say I for the most part don’t have a clear idea where the plot is going before hand. After the lack lusterness of the previous season which didn’t really do much for me, I was a bit more excited to be watching a show that could feel fresh again.

In the North

The episode opens, as had been expected at the Wall with Jon Snow still dead and busy bleeding out in the snow. Despite constant teasers leading up to this season we still don’t have a definitive answer of whether he will be making a comeback. The traitorous elements of the Night’s Watch seem pretty sure he’s dead and gone. Allister Thorne makes a convincing case as to why he shouldn’t be beheaded for his; pointing out that he was aware of his treason but that everything he did was to preserve the Nights Watch against Jons determination to help the Wildlings they had sworn to defend the South against. Truth be told this felt somewhat out of character for Thorne, for all his big words and challenges he hasn’t been portrayed as traitorous or an actual leader just someone play acting at being one. Nevertheless it does the job and turns the majority of a now very depleted Watch against those still loyal to Jon. Meanwhile Ser Davos and Dolorous Edd are busy trying to come up with a plan to not only come out of the situation alive but also wrest control back from Thorne. Once again the fatalistic nature of the Night’s Watch rears its head with Dolorous and the other Night’s Watch determined to repay Jon’s murder with their own lives, taking as many of their brothers with them. Thankfully Ser Davos isn’t quite as keen to die in the cold and reminds everyone that Jon has more allies than just those in the room. Dolorous buggers off to find the Wildlings south of the Wall, leaving Ser Davos essentially a neutral party in all of this, to stand guard over Jon’s body. Melisande briefly joins them, still reeling from the defeat of Stanis, and the sight of Jon’s body seems to finally break her faith in the Red God.

Staying in the North we find that Theon/Reek and Sansa survived their leap from Winterfell and are fleeing North to find Jon. Oh dear. Theon finally seems to have gotten more of his personality back and he actually does things! Despite his assurances that crossing a freezing river is the only way to throw off Ramsey’s hounds, both characters end up freezing seemingly for nothing, aside from the fact that both of their lives are just endless piles of bad things at this point. Theon once again takes the lead offering to lead the hunters off, which of course doesn’t work and it seems it’s back to Winterfell for them. That is till Brienne and Podrick appear. Fuck yeah Brienne! Small yeahs for Podrick, he actually can fight it seems, and kill! It’s up to Theon to save him though at the last minute. Finally Sansa realizes that she’s probably safer with someone that can stab people she doesn’t like and accepts Brienne into her service. What they plan to do when they find out that Jon is dead is beyond me though since that is more or less the last safe place for Sansa in the North.

All of this is proceeded by a brief scene with Roose and Ramsey Bolton discussing the defeat of Stanis. We’re once again shown that for all his overtures of giving a damn about Ramsey, Roose kinda does hate his son a bit and reminds him that he hasn’t done shit compared to him. He chides Ramsey regarding his treatment of both Theon and Sansa and how at the end of the day it did nothing but drive them away. Ramsey, as is typical with his father, retreats into his whiny persona and promises to bring both of them back; more for his own twisted revenge than because his father knows they need Sansa to keep the North loyal. Once again we’re also reminded that Ramsey is a heartless bastard, in many ways worse than Joffrey at this point, callously telling the maester to feed Myranda to the dogs since she’s good meat. At this point it seems be a bit pointless really, we know he’s terrible human, we’ve learnt that all too well last season. Urgh.

Way down South

Cersei had a bunch of character growth last season, well it seemed that way time will tell if she’s actually as broken as she makes out to be. I really think she has been and the return of Jamie and Marsella are one of the few things keeping her together. Since this is Game of Thrones though nothing good can happen very often, so the sight of her daughter returning in a funeral barge is just another kick in the teeth for her. (Bronn seems to have ducked out early, probably because he’s not an idiot) She, like Melisande, is at her lowest point and generally that doesn’t mean good things are going to happen to those around her. Jamie on the other hand seems to be taking this all far better than the rest of his family, and is the driving force in what likely to a trail of bloody revenge for everything that has happened to the Lannisters recently.

I had totally forgotten, Margaery had been arrested the High Sparrow last season, I don’t know why she’s a compelling character but that was mostly having her Grandmother to play against something she was lacking in season 5. It also didn’t help that I didn’t really enjoy the Faith story arc that much, it was more or less as per the book and didn’t do much for me then either. So it was a good refresher to find her being spoken down to by Septa Ullen. She’s “saved” by the High Sparrow, for a given value of saved. It’s clear that He’s still playing the good cop to the Septa Ullen’s bad cop. Personally I can’t wait for him to get his comeuppance this season, for all his talk of leadership and faith I doubt he fully understands how to play the Game of Thrones, since he’s give both the Lannister’s and the Tyrell’s reason to put him in his place.

Ah Dorne, the worst part of season 5. After we were promised so much and the Sand Snakes hyped up so much, all we got out of them was one of the worst fight scenes in the history of the show and underused characters. As if to say sorry for everything we get to watch the Sand Snakes and Ellaria Sand viciously over throw the weak men of House Martell. I was disappointed to see Doran Martell thrown away so soon though. The entire coup was quick and bloody, none of the wasting time like the fight with Bronn and Jamie last season. Whether this actually manages to bear any fruit remains to be seen, despite Ellaria claiming otherwise, Dorne isn’t in any position to actually wage a war against House Lannister though with the seven kingdoms in the state of chaos that it is they may just have a chance to finally pay them back for the humiliations they’ve visited upon them.

Across the Narrow Sea

Varys and Tyrion have taken it upon themselves to take a tour of a Meereen to see what they actually need to do to put it back together. The city seems to be totally abandoned, it’s rather errie actually. Tyrion it seems is going to keep providing the comic relief this season when his terrible Valeryian scares a women into thinking he wants to buy and eat her baby. I could actually just watch an entire show of Varys and Tyrion being best friends and poking fun at each other. Even if we don’t get to stay in Meereen for very long, we learn quite a bit though. Varys hasn’t wasted any times sending out his little birds; it seems his reach is far greater than he ever let on while on the Small Council. The priests of the Red God have taken up preaching directly to the people of Meereen and seem to be trying to incite another revolt against The Masters in Daenerys’s name. A name which isn’t as popular as it once was. I was really glad to see Daenerys’s choice finally having actual negative consequences; it’s a pity she’s not there to actually deal with them.

Speaking of Daeny, Daario and Jorah manage to luck out and find a the ring she dropped during her capture by the Dothraki. They briefly discuss why they like her, something we’ve already established and honestly felt like padding this late into the show. They ride off after the Dothraki horde and we jump to Daeny bound and marching along with the horde. She’s guarded by a pair of smart ass Dothraki who thinking she can’t understand describe what they plan on doing with her if they get permission from their Khal. Daeny isn’t too pleased by this but she seems to just accept it for the time being despite a bit of eye rolling and disgust on her face. That’s because she was holding in her “I’M DAENERYS STORMBORN I’m so great you totally need to listen to me speech till she meets Khal Moro. For some reason the writers decided to ease us into this scene with a bit of Dothraki comedy, it’s amusing but honestly felt way out of tone with the show. As expected the Khal is pretty unimpressed by Daeny till she mentions Khal Drogo at which point he lets her know that he’s actually got to take her to Vaes Dothrak since she’s a widow. I’ll be blunt and say I don’t like Daenerys at all, in the books or the show. She’s a special snowflake and manages to avoid the horrid fates that characters that do far less reasonable things seem to meet. So seeing her actually deal with people that don’t automatically kowtow to her was fantastic, even if the rest of the scene was average at best.

If there was a story arc I wouldn’t have guessed the show would use it would be Arya going blind, the chapters are all from her POV and I didn’t think sounds and inner monologue over blackness would really make for compelling TV. How wrong I was! As is the theme this episode she’s broken and at her lowest. Ignored by the people of Braavos and only totally out of her element begging she is in a sad state. To make matters worse The Waif shows up, whether it’s Jaqen or not we’re never going to be sure, and proceeds to taunt and thoroughly kick her around while encouraging her to staff fight her. After seeing Maise Williams in Doctor Who I was really looking forward to seeing her in GoT again, more so since her story arc was one of the few that was totally disconnected from the main plot lines of the books and she’s an amazing Ayra Stark.

Wow the North Again!

Yeah we’re back North again, Thorne is busy trying to negotiate with the Watch and Ser Davos promising them they won’t be horribly murdered. We all know that’s a lie though, as does everyone else locked up with Jon’s body. Ser Davos decides to play for time and kindly tells them to fuck off basically because he has to give it a talk over with everyone. Throne doesn’t immediately decide to break into the room and kill them, probably because he’s not a total idiot. Davos meanwhile seems to have warmed up to the idea of Melisandre actually helping them out. I guess he must truly be desperate. Melisandre is too busy dealing with her crisis of faith, and stares into a mirror as she undresses. Since it wouldn’t be Game of Thrones without some huge reveal we find out that she’s not actually as youthful as she appears; she’s basically ancient or at least her body is. The books had strongly implied that her magic wasn’t for free and that there was a cost but what it was was never made clear, it would seem that her youth is the price she pays for her faith in the Red God.

To sum it all up

This episode got me excited for the series again. Departing from the book last season felt weird and strange, I struggled to want to watch. Without any previous knowledge this time around though the departures seem to be more natural and fit into the show much better. Hopefully they can keep it going for 9 more episodes, though if rumors are true this may be our second to last season of the show. In all fairness I don’t blame them, it’s not something I think they could keep running for much longer and being able to do away with the contrivances of the novels means no more weak plot points or fan expectations.

Season openers for Game of Thrones are always a strange creature. The big questions from the previous season tend to get put to one side while we do a quick catch up on what's going on with the massive cast. This one was no different, we got to visit the entire cast, with the strange exception of Bran and Little Finger, setting up what seems to be the tone for the rest of the season. Having read all the books this is the first season where I can say I for the most part don't have a clear idea where the plot is going before hand. After the lack lusterness of the previous season which didn't really do much for me, I was a bit more excited to be watching a show that could feel fresh again. In the North The episode opens, as had been expected at the Wall with Jon Snow still dead and busy bleeding out in the snow. Despite constant teasers leading up to this season we still don't have a definitive answer of whether he will be making a comeback. The traitorous elements of the Night's Watch seem pretty sure he's dead and gone. Allister Thorne makes a convincing case as to why he shouldn't be beheaded for his; pointing out that he was aware of his treason but that everything he did was to preserve the Nights Watch against Jons determination to help the Wildlings they had sworn to defend the South against. Truth be told this felt somewhat out of character for Thorne, for all his big words and challenges he hasn't been portrayed as traitorous or an actual leader just someone play acting at being one. Nevertheless it does the job and turns the majority of a now very depleted Watch against those still loyal to Jon. Meanwhile Ser Davos and Dolorous Edd are busy trying to come up with a plan to not only come out of the situation alive but also wrest control back from Thorne. Once again the fatalistic nature of the Night's Watch rears its head with Dolorous and the other Night's Watch determined to repay Jon's murder with their own lives, taking as many of their brothers with them. Thankfully Ser Davos isn't quite as keen to die in the cold and reminds everyone that Jon has more allies than just those in the room. Dolorous buggers off to find the Wildlings south of the Wall, leaving Ser Davos essentially a neutral party in all of this, to stand guard over Jon's body. Melisande briefly joins them, still reeling from the defeat of Stanis, and the sight of Jon's body seems to finally break her faith in the Red God. Staying in the North we find that Theon/Reek and Sansa survived their leap from Winterfell and are fleeing North to find Jon. Oh dear. Theon finally seems to have gotten more of his personality back and he actually does things! Despite his assurances that crossing a freezing river is the only…

TV Series Review: Game of Thrones S06E01 – The Red Woman *SPOILERS*

2016-05-04

The Stubbs

Final Word

Percent - 9.2

92 9.2

A solid first episode that sets up with could be one of the best seasons we've had so far.

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The Ubergeek made up of parts from lesser geeks in a lab somewhere. He also likes RPGS and useless facts.