Wildcard:

Ladies and gentlemen, watchers and wargs, if we could all dry our eyes and bow our heads just for a moment now in honour of the great man Hodor.

Possibly the only true neutral in the entire show and his whole show and we’ve lost him. Even the Children of the Forest aren’t quite the live-off-the-land, no-politics hippies they might have been. I guess Jorah gets some credit for only wanting to serve but Hodor was a proper dude with zero agenda. And now he’s dead. But you know what? He died an absolute hero, playing a potentially crucial part in saving all humanity. Not bad for a giant simpleton, aye?

Also, as I’ve seen written elsewhere, this was the first big tragic death on the show that wasn’t spoilable by book readers. Meaning we all copped the shock pretty hard. You could sort of see it coming as all of Bran’s friends and allies sacrificed themselves for him, from Leaf to Hodor to the Three-Eyed Raven to even poor Summer. Yeah, another dead wolf, this show is going to have some serious questions to answer from the SPCA sometime soon… although the CGI team will thank them. That leaves Ghost and the missing Nymeria as the only ones left and more or less spoils my theory that the Starks with wolves are the Starks that will thrive… which is good news for Sansa.

If I could possibly get down all the thoughts that I had about the mythology in this episode and the entire series after this then I’ll be here ‘til next week or longer. I couldn’t type a fast as I think though, I just couldn’t keep up. Basically, this hour here was bombshell after bombshell. So we know now that the Children of the Forest created the White Walkers to protect themselves from mankind. That suggested some crazy dynamics here, which I’ve pondered ever since. It was supposed to be WW & CoF vs People. But Bran is a person and he’s on the Forest’s side and judging by all the happenings here the Walkers are most definitely not on the Children’s side any longer. And the (notoriously apolitical) Night's Watch figure in somewhere too.

But then there’s this other parallel going on that we witnessed some in Meereen with the new Red Priestess (well, not quite new but something like that), dropping secrets all over the place that shocked even Varys… although I’m not 100% that his secrets are watertight, like he’s told that story to Tyrion before and it isn’t like she actually said the words he heard in the fire. Still, there she is another fire priestess showing special powers in an episode where we also got some critical insight into the White Walkers. A Song of Fire and Ice, you see?

One of the wonderful things about Game of Thrones is that there is no good vs evil story, everyone just follows their own rules and ideas. But the Fire vs Ice thing has always been simmering beneath the surface. Dany and her dragons, Melisandre and her colleagues. The wintery north, the others beyond The Wall. What if… what if the White Walkers aren’t actually the enemy? They sure act like baddies but what do we know about these Forest kiddies and what do we know about their intentions with Bran? I guess what I’m saying is that in this world things are always more complicated than the traditional fantasy labels of good and evil.

By the way, this would pit Bran against Jon.

Why are they at war with the Children now, were they never controlled or was there some sort of betrayal in there? The Night’s King is a curious one because the legend in the books goes that he was a former Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch who fell in love with some woman with skin as white as ice and *poof* he’s a legendary White Walker. But again, another wonderful thing about this show is that it throws out false tales and red herrings to mess with its own myths. We’ve seen in the past the Others create more of themselves, the babies at Craster’s for example. They also resurrect the dead as Melisandre and co. do… granted with less favourable results.

Oh, and my man the Last Greenseer got whacked too, cut down in the prime of his… well, cut down anyway. That Raven, dude, he had some wisdom but I almost expected him and the Night’s King to share one of those ‘so, we meet again, young Skywalker’ moments before he was killed. The Night’s King is probably way older than the Three-Eyed Raven though so that wouldn’t make sense if they knew each other way back. 3ER, by the way, is strongly suggested to be a Targaryen bastard who rose pretty high in the legitimate ranks before being forced to take the black – he rode to The Wall with Maester Aemon, apparently. All those Night’s Watchers seem to be the ones with grand understandings of this stuff.

So the other week Bran reckoned that Ned could hear him through the green dream vision thing. This week he went on a solo mission and for some reason appeared at the present time around a beautiful tree formation which seems to be a CoF thing (there’s an HBO thing where the showrunners compare it to other ones we’ve seen built by White Walkers out of corpses from the early seasons, probably in mocking the Children).

Except then he turns and sees that he is surrounded by what I initially, despite the ominous music, assumed was a large forest of trees.

Until the mist and the snow cleared and the camera shifted focus slightly and all of a sudden we were looking over Bran’s shoulder at the entire force of the icy undead.

The way it was filmed, from the ever-so-slightly unsteady camera to the minor discord in the score, it was straight out of The Shining or something. Really tense, really scary. The one thing about horror on TV is that the episodes aren’t long enough to build that truly frightening atmosphere, in the way that The Shining (or The Exorcist) for example does, but this was still pretty freaky Bowie. Instead of waking himself up immediately with the news of what he’s seen, Bran then MORONICALLY GOES WALKING THROUGH THE BLOODY ZOMBIES! WHAT ARE YOU DOING YOU IDIOT, YOU IMBECILE!? Clearly he didn’t learn his first season lesson about looking too long at things he wasn’t meant to see. And they saw him. Not only that but they touched him and his arm burnt and they now knew where he was. Reminded me of when Frodo wore the ring.

Meaning that maybe those dreams really can affect the past, present and future. Or at least the present, though we saw him alter the past as well. Bran was in Old Winterfell during the whole drama that followed (imagine the story Meera’s gonna have to tell when he wakes!), even if he did manage to calm Hodor. Somehow the lines got crossed between Bran sitting in Young Hodor’s time and warging into current Hodor (which was confusing because Bran was still there and Hodor was still himself – I think he just gave him a little pep talk or something) and yeah, that’s the origin of Hodor. He did appear to see Bran but Bran wasn’t born then so it couldn’t mean anything to him other than a weird stranger. However Bran doesn’t seem to have the same control as the 3ER did and that all happened after he left. I thought it was curious too that he tried to sneak one last lesson in as the castle was stormed, but it didn’t seem all that important. Northern lessons about winning fights and behaving. Although… Hodor was a kid with Ned’s generation so that was them there and so… the kid going to the Vale had to be Uncle Brandon. So the little kid he hugged was probably Uncle Benjen. Okay, gotcha, Thrones. I can take a hint.

“Remember that you are a Stark. Comport yourself with dignity at the Vale. And try to stay out of fights. But if you have to fight: win.”

Alrighty but there is one more Bran thing before we move on. Specifically… now what!? The Children of the Forest are gone, at least the ones we’ve met anyway. The books suggest that they chill all over the place so they maybe find some more somewhere. But, like, can Meera even drag that sled that far in the blizzard? Hodor held the bloody door, don’t you worry about that, but you’ve gotta imagine the zombies could still overtake them within, say, ten minutes max. Maybe they really are that dumb though? Or is Bran still ‘touched’? Or… Coldhands, finally? Yeah you fellow bookies know what I’m talking about.

Oh God and what if Hodor comes back as a zombie? I’ll tell ya right now I couldn’t take it. If it comes to that then just drive a dragonstone knife in my chest and paint my eyes blue. Although… I’m almost ashamed to admit this following such a tragic viewing but when they were all trying to escape and something had to give, I did sort of decide in my head that I’d rather keep Meera around than Hodor. Look, Hodor had a destiny and he met it. He died as we all should live… holding the door for a friend. It’s pure and beautiful.

Also, Meera killed a White Walker, which is cool. It looked like dragonglass that the Children used to create them so dragonglass seems to kill them too. Makes enough sense for me.

Aaaanyway.

This show bosses all measures of drama and as we saw this week it’s got a decent hold on horror too. But what it doesn’t always get the same credit for is the comedy that is produces. Honestly, there were two genuine moments of laugh out loud hilarity in this episode and, no, neither involved fart machines or genital warts. The first was from that comedic icon Brienne as she expressed her doubts about “that wildling fellow with the beard” and admitted that Jon was “a bit brooding… understandable considering”. Ah, and the second moment was also from our favourite comedienne, this time no clever word play but a brilliant piece of physical comedy, pairing with our new favourite bearded wildling.

Love is in the air… everywhere I look around…

Honestly, there are comedies that I love and still don’t laugh like I did at that.

Not sure I was a huge fan of the one on display wherever the hell Arya is these days though. Yes, Braavos, I do remember. Remind me not to go buying a season ticket to the theatre there. It was fun, don’t get me wrong, and cleverly written with all the rhymes but there is only so much buffoonery an audience member can take, just ask Arya who was obviously sent there to be tested on her motives. She’s pulled through once more but… nobody really expects her to stay long term, right? Even Jaqen seems to realise this.

Those actors are a randy bunch though aren’t they? They’re all sharing their diseases and getting slammed on the rum backstage… it’s almost like the show had a point to make. Or two points, maybe, since they snuck in a close up penis (uncircumcised) for no real reason other than comedy. It was kinda funny though. However I reckon it was harsh to single out the Sansa character as the worst actor of that bunch. I didn’t see Daniel Day Lewis there as Ned Stark or Laurence Olivier as Tyrion. Although… that might have been Meryl Streep playing Cersei, couldn’t really tell.

Other things that happened: Euron won the Kingsmoot and not Yara and Theon are exiled… but exiled with some quality ships. Euron reckons he can marry Daenerys by offering a large fleet of boats and I reckon he’s got significantly more chance of ending up getting pried by a toothpick from a dragon’s teeth. Good luck with that one, champion.

Also, Jorah told Dany about the greyscale and she ordered him to find a cure in a teary moment. It was lovely but then it was also a little odd because isn’t there a theory that dragon fire cures greyscale? A shame that Stannis sacrificed his own daughter at the stake, aye, seeing as she’s the only known person to survive that affliction. Not really sure what the narrative reason of that is either, is he gonna stumble into a friend/foe or is this just to get him out of the way for a while, like Shrek and Fiona sending Donkey after the blue flower with red thorns (is Jorah colour blind too?).

And most important of the other stuff, Sansa is now officially playing the game. There was even a moment where it looked like she was over-ranking Jon by using her Stark name, which is what I want, actually. My call the other week was that her destiny was to unite the Starks and the North as Queen of Winterfell, pretty sure that’s her calling and she’s rising to it now – even telling Littlefinger to bugger off (not that he went quietly). There were some squirmy moments watching her confront him, addressing that, umm, yeah stuff with Ramsay. She should have had him killed but then a guy like Littlefinger doesn’t die so easily. He’s like Gollum, he’ll have a massive role to play yet.

Why not tell Jon about Littlefinger though? Probably the same reason Jon doesn’t seem to talk about being reborn: it’s all a little embarrassing and they’ve moved on to stronger positions now. Even Davos, that perennial pessimist, sees a chance to win this war.

Hey, this was an episode with no Dorne, no King’s Landing, and no Ramsay. And it was one of the best they’ve done. I mean, the Hodor thing was always going to cement this as a cornerstone hour in the show but that other stuff helped because there really wasn’t a dull moment. They even made the Kingsmoot fun, although frustrating. But if we watched TV to only experience happiness and joy then we damn sure wouldn’t be watching this thing.

Diggity Doc:

You'd be right for thinking that a whole lot happened in 'The Door' as we zoomed around a few storylines and enjoyed some hefty developments that push Game Of Thrones in a very funky direction. I had previously looked down on mystical developments in shows that just didn't really need it and I was a weary traveler when it became clear that GoT would be all about exploding fire bombs and time-travel.

A whole episode dedicated to the Children of the Forest, or the Three Eyed Raven, would have been cool but it's equally as cool to get little bits of history drip-fed amongst the fast-moving beast. I have a feeling that this poor bloke trapped by the CoF, who is then flipped into a White Walker, may be a cheeky sign of what's to come for a few of our human homies. The White Walkers have shown that they do enjoy making human babies become what I assume are White Walkers.

I am however happy, I'm content and I'm enjoying the ride. It's a bit more chaotic than a ride and is more similar to trying to decipher the time-warp-warging that took place as Bran took his powers to greater heights. Honestly, during that whole part of the episode, from Bran getting touched to some chubby kid becoming Hooolddadoooor, I contemplated if this was sustainable. 

Could I, or other average jokers really contemplate all of that being crammed into such mayhem? Of course we can, somehow GoT makes it work and while I can't add much to the musings of my comrade the Wildcard, I can highlight that we got dealt some pretty intense history lessons and these history lessons came during an action-packed sequences. 

Everything is about the future, all the characters are only really concerned with their next move. Take Sansa and Jon for example as they are contemplating how they will go about reclaiming Winterfell. Or take Tyrion, he's made a low key crucial move and brought in the services of Melissandre's fire-homie Kinvara to help him control Meereen ... and I think these fire ladies may have some link to dragons, maybe, well fire at least.

Point being, that we often get caught up in what is happening next but amongst this we are taught more about the history, the foundation to what we are currently seeing. This is obviously because it's highly important, I just love how the history is blended in with the desire to move forward, given what we've seen with Bran, you could also argue that history and the future are deeply connected. 

I've taken a liking to Sansa, maybe out of pity as she lacks the magical ability of her siblings and possibly her half-sibling. In 'The Door' Sansa generally handled her business, stepping up to boss Jon around and generally act like the Queen of the North, plus she told Littlefinger what's up. It was awfully creepy however when Littlefinger his smug little shot at Jonny boy as he walked past Sansa and I don't really view Littlefinger as someone I'd want to piss off.

Littlefinger isn't brutal like Ramsay, there's just a very creepy vibe to him and we could see Littlefinger now take the Bolton side in this upcoming war. Which will hopefully mean that he gets shanked by Jon.

We know Jon and Sansa ... well Sansa runs the show but it's good to see a leadership group formed up in the North. It's not often we see this team unity in GoT but Jon is all ears to any advice from Sansa or the rest of the gang and so is Sansa which differs greatly to how other rulers rule in GoT.

The prospect of Dany going to Westeros at some stage in the near future too a leap forward, even if Euron seems like a prick. Euron has what Dany wants, well Theon and Yara have the fleet at the minute which makes things a wee bit tricky. If we are to roll down the path of Euron bringing Dany to Westeros, that wouldn't be great news for Theon and Yara who have quickly become a pretty damn cool team. I did expect Theon to let out a 'Reeeeeek' during his speech though.

Peep Theon x Yara and Jon x Sansa. Both are teams of siblings and both are led by the sister, with Jon and Theon obviously playing crucial roles themselves. The foundations have been laid for conflict involving these teams with Jon x Sansa set to go to war over Winterfell while Theon x Yara must fight of Euron (who talks a big game). 

Don't sleep on how these two teams and their storylines are connected to the fire and ice stuff as well. Jon x Sansa are in the North where it's really cold and rumour has it Jon could be the son of this guy and that girl, so they are linked to both sides of the mystical stuff. Theon x Yara have the whole water god thing going on but could have a link to Dany at some point as well. I'm super interested to see how these two different situations pan out, not only in the coming episodes but also long-term ... should they be alive. 

Do yourself a favour and Google 'four horsemen of the apocalypse game of thrones' and let the internet take you on a journey of impending doom.

S06E05 Character Rankings

1. Hodor – When it all seemed lost, he rose to meet his destiny. And by God did he hold that door. Rest easy now, sweet prince.
2. The Night’s King – Yeah, this bugger’s pretty frightening. So cold he can walk through fire and see through dreams.
3. Sansa Stark – Future Queen of the North, just you wait.
4. Meera Reed – It’s you and Bran now, girl. Don’t screw this up.
5. Euron Greyjoy – As much of a complete arse as he is… if you can survive an Iron Islands crowning then you basically deserve to be king. They bloody drowned him!
6. Tyrion Lannister – So full of good ideas, though the new Red Priestess is one that might explode in his face. He’ll be happy to know that on Braavos the actor that plays him is nailing the actress that plays Cersei too.
7. Arya Stark – A servant does not ask questions.
8. Brienne of Tarth – Not too happy about leaving Sansa’s side but just wait until she and Tormund get a little time alone, woof woof (he doesn’t exactly look like Renly, does he?).
9. Three Eyed Raven – You know what would’ve been a good idea? Telling Bran exactly why he wasn’t meant to go dream surfing on his own.
10. Bran Stark – D’oh!