Search This Blog

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Game of Thrones Season 2 Episode 4 - "Garden of Bones"


If you plan to watch this episode, do not read the following article until you have watched it. Ok realistically I can’t stop you, but there are SPOILERS below. You have been warned.

Alright what the fuck was that at the end there? First of all how did Melisandre manage to become 9 months pregnant in maybe 1 month (there’s no way 9 months passed, because winter would have come and gone)? Some crazy voodoo witch shit going on over there. More important, what did she give birth to? I knew the show was a fantasy with the dragons and such, but this spirit or whatever it was just brought this fantasy to a whole new level. I can’t imagine what was going through Ser Davos’ mind as he was watching her give birth. It was probably something like.. “ooo Melisandre is getting naked, wait she’s pregnant? Is that even possible? Ok typical preggo screaming… this light is getting brighter and moving toward her, WTFFFFF is that shadow spirit thing?”. Also how did her stomach get so large if she was carrying a shadow? Alright enough about that, but I can’t wait for the next episode to explain wtf was going on there. At least Stannis has a son (I guess) now. Speaking of Stannis, I found it interesting how him and Renly have some serious hatred toward each other. It looks like both of them will be fighting each other as well as fighting against Joffrey.

Joffrey reminded us all (most) why we hate him in this episode during two instances. He almost stripped Sansa naked and was about to beat her in front of a crowd for Robb’s latest victory, but fortunately for her Tyrion saved the day (by the way Sansa is acting very robotic these days, but what choice does she really have). Joffrey also made a whore basically beat the crap out of another while he was watching with joy, which is pretty sickening. I guess violence and torture is his way of getting turned on.

Tyrion stole the show for the second straight episode by “lecturing” Joffrey and exposing another one of Cersei’s secrets through their cousin, Lancel. Apparently Cersei has been using Lancel as her sex buddy (I mean she does have to get some right?) for some time now. So Cersei enjoys intercourse with her brother and cousin…hmm. Joffrey prefers violence over sex and Cersei enjoys incest, this family seems pretty normal. Anyways, Tyrion tells Lancel that he will not expose this information if Lancel reports to him whenever Cersei does something significant. This is a great tool for Tyrion, since now he has some control over the council, has control over Lancel, and has eliminate the snitch Pycelle. I’m pretty sure Tyrion is in everyone’s top 5, probably top 3 favourite characters of the show and he just keeps getting more and more interesting.

Guess who made an appearance this episode? Daenerys! Yes her crew has finally made some progress (I don’t really know where they’re heading, but I’m not sure she does either) and arrive at the city of Qarth. After the 13 leaders of Qarth initially deny Daenerys and her crew, one of the 13 counters this and allows he to enter. The doors open and we see this beautiful city. I’m excited to see what the whole city looks like and how the story with Daenerys progresses. They’re really milking it for now, but hopefully the pace increases a bit.

As for the rest of the Game of Thrones world, Robb wins another battle and finds a women that he falls for (he definitely looked like he was in love), while Lady Stark gets a visit from Little Finger asking to trade Jaime for Sanse and Aria, and bringing her Ned’s remains. Tywin Lannister becomes an unlikely hero in this episode, saving Gentry and Aria from death. Aria is now serving him as his cup bearer. Hold on a second, a Stark is serving a Lannister now? (I don’t count Sansa, because she has to marry Joffrey). This is somewhat strange and maybe, just maybe Aria might harm (or try killing) Tywin, since she is very ambitious. At least for now Aria is safe.

The story of the Throne progresses with arguments and battles just waiting to start, while many questions still remain unanswered. Who will end up at the Throne? What has Melisandre produced? Will Aria stay alive or be used as a bargaining tool to get Jaime back? When is winter coming? Hopefully these get resolved by the end of this season, otherwise I might give in and read all the books.

Feel free to leave any comments and I will address them in the review for next episode.

8.9/10

3 comments:

  1. Apparently the whole deal with not showing the dragons is because the CGI is expensive, I wonder if the Quarth exchange happened like that in the books

    ReplyDelete
  2. I don't understand why they show the birth of a shadow in this episode. In the books there is no explanation of the shadows origin (beside the things we have "seen" in the tent where Mirri Maz Duur used bloodmagic from Asshai to get Khal Drogo back to "life") and Davos definitely was not engaged... Even when the shadow performs its task people were only guessing that Stannis or Melisandre are participating in this.

    *spoiler* Maybe they will skip Stannis Baratheon's siege of Storm's End and the role of it's castellan Cortnay Penrose and Melisandre's second shadow in it, then it makes sense to use the birth scene right now...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Firstly, thank you for your comment and thank you even more for warning about potential spoilers, much appreciated. To provide a thought to your observation: Obviously reading and watching are two very different things. The advantage the show has, is that it can "improve" (I have not read all of the books yet, so I can't comment too much here) some aspects that the books missed. In this case, providing an explanation satisfies those who were wondering where the shadow came from, while not confusing audiences who have not yet read the books.

      Delete