Game of Thrones for Noobs XXIII

The Story Thus Far
Daenerys and Tyrion hung around that kid-burning red witch while Jon Snow's underlings tried to muck up his vacation. Cersei hung around reminding people that villages burn and kids die with 'em. Uncle Greyjoy finally caught up with Theon and Sheon—with Theon displaying some Olympic-level cowardice and the assassin princesses of that Persia-like place getting straight slayed—and Snow's friend Pudgy Junior cut a bunch of Jorah's stony skin off while the show runners once again leaned into quick cuts from gross shit to food. Arya found her wolf…or did she!? Naw, she did, but that sucker went feral or something. Steel thyselves, dorki malorki—tis Game of Thrones for Noobs!

The Gist

Waves crash on the jagged rocks of some fucking place while a detachment of losers heads to shore. Oh wait, there's Dinklange—we're in Dragonville or whatever the hell this place is called. Dragonstone? Dragonglass? Dragon-opolis? Whatever. It's Jon Snow and he's in a scene with Tyrion! While the nerds across the globe shit themselves, Davos is like, "I'm here also." No one cares about him. Pleasantries are exchanged and weapons are handed over for safekeeping. Do you think Snow knows that red witch who brought him back to life is in the castle? Davos mustache glints in the seaside sun. Snow reveals that his pals think he's a dummy for going. "You might be," Tyrion says, "but let's kill my sister." WA-BOOSH! One of those dragons flies by all fast and loose and the other ones flit about in the sky. It's freaking everyone out big time. And the red witch watches from the cliffs with Varys (of the Westeros Pinfields). Varys points out that she's hiding from Snow and she's like, "Grow some hair before you talk shit!" and then she's all like, "I loved you on 120 Minutes!" She's planning on heading to Volantis, but she'll probably come back.

By the time they make it inside and hear about every fucking nickname anyone ever laid on Daenerys, Snow and Davos are beat, and Davos gives a concise "Snow's from the north" announcement. Daenerys doesn't waste a second before she's jibber-jabbering about ancient fucking oaths and knee-bendings and the like, but Snow's like, "Girl, I died, OK? Just relax." But then Danny asks for forgiveness for all the burning alive her family has done. It surprises pretty much everyone, but she still wants a knee-bending. What a stickler. Snow's halfway down, though, because he wants to feel Cersei's blood on his hands and because they need each other's help. Snow reminds the room that ice zombies will be a thing no matter what goes down with Cersei (while the rest of us wonder why they don't just send the fucking dragons in to melt all those jerks from the sky), but she responds with a history lesson about how much shit she's been through. To be fair, it's a lot, but Snow's life hasn't been much of a picnic, either. Davos gives a little history lesson of his own, and one thing's for sure—everyone is Westeros should throw themselves into the fucking sea, because it's the single most fucking depressing region of all time. Only Tyrion's beard makes life worth living. Varys announces Uncle Greyjoys slaughter-at-sea, and Snow takes off all whiny-like.

Speaking of Uncle Greyjoy, he's back at King's Landing with Sheon, the queen of—Dorn! It's called Dorn! The Persia-like place? God, that was driving me nuts. Anyway, he's got them all chained up and parades them through the streets to cheers and jeers from a crowdfull of people who like to throw cabbages at prisoners any chance they get. Sheon is pretty roughed up and seems down, but if I had to guess she'll be rippin' throats in no time (since things always change when it comes to this game; this…Game of Thrones). When Uncy Grey-Grey makes it to the throne room, Cersei is pretty into it. They make him the president of the navy and Cersei kind of leads him to believe they can bone down if they win the war. Dude's nuts, though, and Jamie ain't feeling it, especially when he describes a "finger-in-the-bum" situation.

We cut to some horrible torture chamber where the Queen of Dorn (assuming she's a queen and doesn't have some other title…I sincerely have no idea) is chained to the wall while that dude The Mountin looms all big—his go-to move. Cersei reminds homegirl that her incest daughter was killed by the Dornish (is Dornish right?) and wants answers. None are given, so you can bet Cersei's gonna kill Queen What's-Her-Dick's daughter right in front of her. It's pretty fucked. Cruel. Cersei lays down the kiss of death by applying the same poison her daughter was killed with to her lips. The King's Landing contractor is there, too, and says something about how the poison could take hours or days; Cersei tells Queen What's-Her-Dick that she'll live the rest of her life near her daughter's corpse. Yikes.

Upstairs, Jamie takes off his golden prosthetic hand after a long day of not being able to do much with it because of the technological and mechanical shortcomings of the day. Cersei busts in to give him one of those "I just poisoned someone's daughter and now I'm down to clown" BJs. We don't see the actual boning (whew!), but Cersei's done hiding the incest and swings the bedroom door open in time for a servant to get the full idea of their sibling relationship. It's a great start to Cersei's day, which consists of a meeting with her banker. Snoozers.

Back in Dragonburg, Snow and Tyrion hang around on a grassy seaside cliff bitching about their failures. Snow has a good point, though: Why won't people listen to him about the ice zombies!? Tyrion says he doesn't not believe him, but they need to do one thing at a time. Tyrion goes to Daenerys to tell her about dragonglass. He's coming around to the idea of an ice zombie battle; Dragonglass will indeed be mined and used for swords. Daenerys even offers up her bros to help out.

Meanwhile, in the north, Sansa's been in charge for two fucking seconds and she's already hanging around with Baelish for whatever reason. A discussion about grain ensues. Ugh. I haven't been this bored since the time Clegane dug that grave. Baelish starts sucking up almost immediately, but Sansa is a little more hip to his crap by now. And then Bran shows up. Did Sansa think he was dead? I'm seriously asking. Anyway, she cries, but Bran, imbued with the timeless knowledge of the all-knowing Max von Tree-dow shows no emotion. They have a clandestine meeting in a snowy field outside town (since warm rooms and chairs are, like, sooooooo passé), and Oat-Bran describes his mind powers. It's difficult to explain, but he's basically like, "I see all!"

We finally catch up with Jorah who appears to have been cured of stone-itis by Pudgy Junior and his magic scalpel. Jorah is discharged —despite some pretty messed up bruising—and Jim Broadbent implies that he's pretty mad even though some pretty significant medical breakthroughs have been made. "I'ma visit my girl Daenerys," Jorah says. "Right on," Pudgy Junior replies, "that's cool." Hands are shaken, a milestone for Jorah who hasn't touched anyone for who knows how long. Jim Broadbent is indeed mad after all, or so it seems. He's actually pretty pleased with young Pudge and tells him he'll have a future as a surgeon or whatever. "You should be proud," Broadbent says. Indeed a red letter day for Jon Snow's one-time underling.

We rejoin Daenerys who wants to take her dragons out to sink Uncle Greyjoy's fleet, but nobody thinks it's a good plan. Instead they decide to maybe launch an attack on Fraggle Rock, even though it's supposed to be the hardest place to fight of all time. Turns out Tyrion built the sewers there, though, and he knows how to sneak a bunch of fools in to open the gates. So that's what they do. You know that throats get slashed and Daenerys' armies are gonna learn a little something about what's worth fighting for.

But wait—it's a distraction! Cersei's army is totally someplace else, and that someplace is…ummmm….I dunno. It's hard to tell. Olenna lives there. What's the name of this place? Aw, who cares. The music is dramatic, though, so it's probably a big deal. Jamie swoops in to Olenna's room to drink wine and be smarmy. She's got some good quips about how his crush on Cersei is gross to everyone, though, even though she knows it's time to die. "She's a disease!" she says. Snap! Still, Jamie allows the old bag to drink poison. Dignified, I guess. She still drops a few choice reminders of Joffrey's horrible death on her way out. Turns out Olenna was behind it—double-snap!

The Bottom Line
Oh, it's building. It's building so much! Everyone either got a resolution or a healthy step forward.

The Grade: B-
Where the eff was Arya!?

Santa Fe Reporter