But seriously though, where is Benjen Stark?
Brace yourselves. Spoilers are coming.
[dropcap size=small]A[/dropcap]fter a slow season, I thought episodes eight and nine were preparing us for another thrilling Game of Thrones finale. Maybe I expected too much, but I’m disappointed, and not by what happened to Jon (we’ll get to that).
Firstly, I’m disappointed by the episode title. If we’re not going to get Lady Stoneheart in an episode called ‘Mother’s Mercy’, we’re not going to get Lady Stoneheart. Only Cersei’s plot has anything to do with a mother’s mercy, and to name the finale such is a cruel and unnecessary tease.
In Winterfell, Theon’s redemption feels completely out of place. It wasn’t enough to watch Ramsay brutally rape Sansa, but it’s too much when a servant has an arrow pointed at her. Of all the times he could have killed Ramsay, he waits until he is gone to kill his lover and then flees, ensuring Ramsay lives to rule the North. He could have done some good if he was going to jump from a high tower and risk his life anyway.
The fact that Sansa needs saving is an insult to her season arc. We’ve been led to believe that Sansa has learned the game under Littlefinger’s guidance, but nothing we’ve seen from her has proven it. She and Theon helplessly jump from the tower, in an ending I didn’t want for either of these characters, and we cut to black.
There’s a lot of slamming to black in this episode. Dany and Drogon share a scene right out of How to Train Your Dragon, before she is surrounded by an army of Dothraki. Whether the Dothraki remain loyal to her, or if she can convince them to fight for her again, we won’t know until next season. What we do know is that she’s not heading to Westeros any time soon.
In Dorne, Jaime and Myrcella are just heading back to Westeros when Myrcella reveals that she knows Jaime is her father. Just as Jaime is ready to accept that he’s a dad now, she dies in his arms because Game of Thrones. Really, the biggest compliment I can give this arc is that eventually something happened. It looks like we may be in for a Lannister/Martell war after all, because although we never see Myrcella die, it’s safe to assume that she’s a goner.
The same goes for Stannis. I like that he lives long enough to allow Brienne the chance to avenge her King, but the show has been building up to the War of Winterfell for a whole season, and we only get to see the aftermath. What we do see is Stannis having the worst day ever. Shireen’s death leads half of his army to abandon him, his wife to hang herself, and Melisandre to the Wall. Stannis, honest until the end, stares Brienne in the face and tells her he is responsible for Renly’s death. He’s probably glad to die when he does.
And I bet a part of Cersei wishes she was dead right now. She is forced to make the most humiliating walk of shame, and although I usually enjoy the extended scenes in the show, this is time we could have spent in Winterfell, or on Lady Stoneheart (I’m not letting that go). Lena Headey deserves all the Emmys for her performance though. She seems to get closer to breaking down with every step she takes, and there aren’t many actors who could pull that off. Her face at the end, as she is carried off by zombie Mountain(!), proves that she is out for revenge against the High Sparrow, which sure, we all want to see, but it’s been another wasted storyline if Cersei has learned nothing from it.
Over in Braavos, Arya still has plenty to learn too. Her bloody assassination of Meryn Trant is everything we’ve been hoping to see from Arya, and even though it’s a little undermined by what comes next, I’m glad she gets to brutally kill that man. She’s later put right back in her place by Jaqen, who really turns out to be no one. Arya doesn’t know if what she’s seeing is real, and then losing her sight doesn’t help matters. Another cut to black, but at least we get a moral here: you don’t f*** with the Many-Faced God.
So let’s talk about Jon Snow. Firstly: called it! And second, I don’t think this is the last we’ll see of Jon. It’s too much of a coincidence that Melisandre arrives at the Wall the day of Jon’s murder, and we still don’t know who his mother is (even though we probably do) or where Uncle Benjen has got to. Appropriately, we know nothing about Jon Snow, plus the dude killed a White Walker. That’s a big deal. If we assume all the theories about Jon are true and he’s a reborn Targaryen legend, there’s no way Melisandre doesn’t bring him back. Not to mention the fact that Sam told Olly a couple of episodes ago: ‘He always comes back.’ He’s coming back alright, and he’s coming for you Olly.
In the moment, it’s still a gut-wrenching scene, which proves further that you should never try to do the right thing in this world. But unlike Catelyn (did I mention that Stoneheart wasn’t in this episode?), I think we’ll see Jon again.
At its best, ‘Mother’s Mercy’ is a mixed bag. At its worst, it’s a bit of a mess. After almost an entire season of build-up, I had hoped for some closure in the finale, but the episode asked more questions than it answered. One cliffhanger is great, two or three is acceptable, but when every other scene is a cliffhanger it softens the blow somewhat.
For every great Arya scene, there’s a rushed Winterfell sequence; for every time something happened in Dorne, we won’t find out what happened somewhere else for months; for every moving cast performance, there is the lack of Michelle Fairley. We’ll call it a mixed bag, but it’s a disappointing climax to a season that showed so much promise.
Game of Thrones will return for a sixth season in April 2016.
