WILDCARD:

Well, my bet for the first scene of season six was a bit or Bran, let everyone know that this season, things are gonna get freaky. Magic freaky. But before any of that… previously on Game of Thrones… here is a FULL THREE MINUTES AND FIFTY FOUR SECONDS OF RECAPS! Man, this show. They have us all by the balls and they know it. No other show in the world is going to piss around like that – I mean that doesn’t even count the notoriously loitering opening credits. In fact it was almost six minutes before the first bit of actual show and guess what? I was wrong about Bran. Instead it was a long, eerie shot of The Wall and Castle Black, zooming all the way in and onto the bleeding carcass of Jon Snow.

Very quickly it seems most of the Night’s Watch were cool with Snow being dead – or at least they weren’t willing to argue with them that did it. But a band of merry men did gather around the poor lad’s body, including an albino wolf, led by none other than that mutton-loving cynic Ser Davos Seaworthy. Quite a pickle that Onion Knight has found himself in, yet again. Basically, they have two choices now: hope Dolorous Edd can gather enough wildlings to rush the castle or get the Red Woman to do something special. Which she sort of does in the kicker at the end.

Have you seen The Shining? You know that scene at the bathtub of room 237? Yeah, it was like that, though admittedly not quite as scary. Oh that scene in The Shining, that tore me to shreds when I first saw that as a teenager, jeezus that is one damn fine horror flick. That thing happened because Jack Nicholson had gone crazy and there were maybe ghosts. This thing happened because that necklace that Melisandre wears is kinda sorta valuable. Lie, I’ve often thought that thing really brings out her eyes. Turns out it does the same for her hair, skin, lips, breasts… you get the idea. I don’t know if any of us will ever look at her in the same way again, which I suppose was the point.

I’m not banking on a Jon Snow resolution for at least another week. I still think they’ll bring him back, just not any time soon. It wouldn’t be Thrones if they didn’t keep us hanging for a while. But I wonder… is this the end of the Night’s Watch? How do they recover from this short of killing everyone else and repopulating it with wildlings? Alliser Thorne for damn sure ain’t about zombie killing.

Maybe this is a controversial thought after all this time waiting since season five finished… but that episode was a bit crap. It was all just shifting chess pieces, characters reacting to the end of last season. So there are two factions on The Wall? There already were, now the lines are drawn more clearly is all. We knew that Myrcella was dead and that Cersei and Jaime would come out raging for revenge, here we got to see that play out. Rather tragic but also rather pointless. I doubt anyone really expected Sansa and Theon to be recaptured – although for a while there I though Theon was a goner. That they’re now set up with Brienne and Podrick is a development at least, plus one of the two main points of action in this season opener. Hot DAMN Poddy, you’ve been practising with that sword, son!

The other action point was the Sand Snakes seizing power in a bloody coup. Keisha is a greedy bitch apparently. That was all well and good but did they really have to kill Quique Sanchez Flores? His job is already in trouble after three league wins in 17 at Watford, not to mention their FA Cup semi-final loss on the weekend. Really rough week for that bloke, gotta hope the club gives him another year though – just avoiding relegation should have been enough.

Quique Sanchez Flores during Watford's FA Cup semi-final loss

Quique Sanchez Flores after Watford's FA Cup semi-final loss

Okay, a confusing point about that thing. This is the establishing shot of the boat coming into harbour at King’s Landing with Jaime on board, Cersei waiting on shore about to get the (second) shock of her life.

Now here’s the establishing shot of the boat before the other two Sand Snakes kill Quique’s son – who is apparently too sensitive to rule and they show that by having him paint eyes on rocks. He was such an artistic boy, what a shame. Point being, they must be in King’s Landing. Might be a few adventures a foot.

Where the hell was Bran!? Dammit, I waited all this time and nothing. It’s even worse than when you finish one of his chapters in the last book and realise there are 250 pages ‘til you meet him again. Those flashbacks are gonna be superb when they eventually happen, just not yet because somebody rocked the chess board and we had to spend all episode putting the pieces back in place. Tyrion and Varys went for a stroll and Meereen is a mess. We already knew that. Daenerys finally played the Khal Drogo trump card and now she’s being escorted to widowsville. Another speed bump in her road to power? Just what we needed…

In other news, Arya is going through more trials and Margaery wants to see her brother. Does it count as a season premiere if nothing really happened?

People Who Didn’t Appear in S06E01:

Fat Sam & Gilly
Bran, Hodor, Meera & the Three Eyed Raven
Whoever Ian McShane is playing
Lady Olenna, Queen of Thorns*
Stannis, who is confirmed dead
Any wildlings or white walkers
Benjen Stark, yet again
Rickon, Shaggydog & Osha
Lady Stoneheart & Coldhands, yet again
Littlefinger
Lord Qyburn & his monster
Bronn
Any of the Iron Islands folk

*Thorns is almost anagram of Thrones, just saying

Hey, Khal Moro is played by Joe Naufahu, a kiwi lad who played All Blacks U19s and U21s before having a professional rugby career in Britain for a few years. He played Mils Muliaina in the Stephen Donald movie The Kick. So yeah, pretty cool.

Wisdom of the Dothraki

The others are:

Killing another Khal
Conquering a city and taking her people as slaves and taking her idols back to Vaes Dothrak
Breaking a wild horse, forcing it to submit to our will

Number five was unmentioned. You can always fill in the blanks on your own.

Those Dothraki… not particularly nice fellas. Dany had to listen to some pretty objectifying stuff as they assumed she didn’t understand them and while there was some embarrassment later on it’s not like they let her go after that, they just stopped joking about raping her. Once again with a Daenerys storyline: haven’t we done all this before?

Right, back now to the old lady in the flames. Umm, clearly it was presented to be this big shocker but it wasn’t. Why am I meant to be surprised about a magic lady having magic powers? She’s like 200 years old and when she isn’t wearing her necklace she shows her age, so we’re led to believe. I dunno, I think taking the choker necklace off was symbolic but the transformation was more about her crisis of faith. What she saw in the flames is failing. Presumably she’ll get a good night’s sleep and wake up fresh and reinvigorated, clip on the necklace and get back to business – I don’t think she’ll be the one to revive Jon, at least not next episode, but she might be the only one left who can save The Wall. It’s either her or Edd. Come on Edd, you can do this!

DIGGITY DOC:

Look at us, we've got ourselves all whipped into a GoT frenzy over summer/the last 6-8 months and were rewarded for our excitement with the everlasting image of a naked elderly lady. That doesn't sound too appealing, nor was it too appealing and it provided me with a bit of an insight into the next 80 minutes of my Monday night as I went from the image of Melisandre's reality to the Warriors getting smoked by Melbourne Storm in the NRL. After looking forward to April 25 for so long, after enjoying a great day remembering the Anzacs and all of that, my Monday night finished with a naked elderly lady reflecting and the Warriors reflecting on a piss-poor job ... and me reflecting on my lack of sanity.

Melisandre's final scene, for all its mental torture, was actually pretty damn interesting. If you'd been living under a rock, or watching GoT from under a rock, you may not have noticed the dragons, Arya's creepy death-cult, Bran's mystical journey and the presence of Valyrian steel - GoT is far more than a medieval power struggle. As Melisandre stood there, looking at her reflection, taking off her necklace, we were given an insight into how the struggles of life at the wall could play out.

That was the only really super interesting aspect of 'The Red Woman', which might have been a let down for some, let's not forget though that this was a season premiere. The problem with all those trailers and snippets that we get drip-fed ahead of the season is that they present us with all this action in a short little video that leaves us expecting all that action from the season premiere alone.

The beauty of GoT lies in how it follows the different characters - their twists and turns - seamlessly and a rather uneventful season premiere did that nicely. We got fed updates on all the key characters from the end of season 5, without much insight into how their storylines would play out which obviously keeps us wanting more.

We caught up with Arya, she's still blind. She is however learning tricks of the trade, whatever trade she's in, and you've got to imagine that learning how to slice and dice whilst blind can only be a positive.

Dorne? Yawn. Unless the Sand Snake shawties rise up and go on a rampage outside of Dorne, that'd be sweet.

If you didn't have any Lannister stocks, I'd be buying them quickly as I can see Cersei, Jaime and Tyrion all enjoying some success (as I look into flames). We knew from the trailers that Jamie and Cersei are out for revenge so there was nothing new to their narrative, I'd like to give Jamie a heads up about prophecies and all of that. Like dude, I like you now, so how about you just pay the freaky shit that GoT is now built on some respect ... you do have a freak-a-zoid protecting your sister/lover.

As for Tyrion, well I'm all in on him being a Targaryen and him being the man for the job in Meereen. Peep the similarities between Tyrion and Daenerys as they both have an appreciation for the poor/slaves, which we saw when Tyrion offered to eat a poor lady's baby (/give her money). Daenerys has a similar heart, she wants the best for the oppressed but is she as smart as Tyrion? Obviously not, Tyrion's the smartest dude on the show, so I'm eager to see how Tyrion's Meereen power-play pans out.

The best part of this episode was Sansa and Theon being saved by Brienne and Poddo. I've got high hopes for Sansa and I got down on my knee as she swore-in Brienne as her guidance counsellor ... I had to make up for Theon and Pod's lack of ruthlessness. Sansa now has a little army at her disposal, well at least for her protection at the moment.

I'm still unsure if crossing a river throws dogs off your scent, it seems plausible but we still almost saw Sansa and Theon become Ramsay Bolton's latest pieces of meat.

Buzzy 420 Thought From 'The Red Woman' - Imagine being in that snow-filled forest, watching on as Brienne took an oath to protect Sansa. If I were Pod for example, I would have found that to be a pretty surreal moment; all that snow, the scenery, the joy of shanking a few soldiers/the good vibes of saving Sansa and Theon.

Ep #1 Power Rankings:

Davos – Yes, the Onion Knight is in control! Owned every scene he was in with his detached wisdom and wistful pragmatism.
Brienne – You have my sword, and my axe, and my quixotic honour.
Theon – The redemption tour is underway, was it just me or did he and Sansa have a moment there?
Varys – The sparrows are in place…
Ellaria Sand – Maybe there’s hope for the Sand Snakes yet.
Bran – Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
Daenerys – She’s still the Mother of Dragons, so yeah.
Podrick – That bumbling idiot that squired for Tyrion back when suddenly has some skills.
Sansa – What’s this? Something went right for Sansa Stark? About time.
Melisandre – Look, full credit for the Shining moment. Minus points for the crisis of faith.