Game of Thrones Season 8 Episode 5: Thoughts

[Contains Spoilers] 

The "Previously On" is full of foreshadowing and I hear a lot of warning bells going off in my head.

The episode begins with Varys writing letters to people - the important people in the realm, I'm sure. I saw words like "Rhaegar Targaryen", "hidden by Eddard Stark" and "the true heir to the Iron Throne". Not good news for Dany. He is interrupted by a knock on the door. He quickly hides what he's writing but it's obvious it's someone he knows because he just hides it, not destroys it and it's the same girl he was with down in the Winterfell crypts and she tells him that Dany isn't eating and he tells her, "we'll wait till supper". Varys is obviously onto something. He definitely looks to be conspiring to poison Dany because the little girl talks about the reward being great for the great risk. Varys seems like a strange person but we can see why he's a great spider because of the way he'e so warm with his little birds.

Then he goes out to receive Jon who arrives by a dingy and plays his hand once more by revealing he knows about Jon's parentage. But Jon being Jon refuses to take what's his and vows to be loyal to Dany.  I can understand Varys' concern but I can also see why Jon would want to stay blindly loyal to the queen who had abandoned her cause of reclaiming her right to rule just so that she could go help him defeat the army of the dead. I mean the guy is in love with her for what he has seen of her so far. 

Another man who is also very loyal to Dany is Tyrion. He witnesses all this and goes to Dany who is looking absolutely distraught. Her braids aren't in place, her hair is dull, her face is dull, her whole demeanor is dull. Tyrion betrays Varys by telling Dany that he, Varys, has betrayed her.  But Dany blames Jon for betraying her in the first place. She feels betrayed by everyone and that look of dull resolution on her face is frightening. Like she doesn't give a shit anymore. Not like she used to. 

Next we see Varys in his room (office?) doing more writing when he hears approaching footsteps. He quickly burns what he's writing, takes his rings off and waits. Grey Worm comes in with chains and some Unsullied at his back. They take him down to the beach where Tyrion, Dany and Jon are waiting. Tyrion tells Varys that it was him and Varys seems to understand. Varys says he hopes he deserves this (by this he means his execution to which he seems quite resigned). Varys says his goodbye to Tyrion and Dany formally sentences him to death. Right on cue, Drogon appears above her and she says, Dracarys to which he lurks near, bares his teeth, snarls and then does what he is bid. Show off.

Dany is wallowing in her misery along with Grey Worm while talking about Missandei and what she brought with her when they crossed the narrow sea. She gives Missandei's only belonging - her slave collar to Grey Worm who chucks it into the fire. Jon joins her in the room and Grey Worm leaves. Dany tells him Varys died because Sansa betrayed his trust. Dany, by now, has gone ape shit crazy. She looks miserable and sounds miserable too. Jon says again that he doesn't want the throne but she wants more than just his permission. She tries to know whether things are the same as they were before by kissing him but he breaks away from her embrace and she understands that things will never be the way she imagined.

In the Dragonstone throne room, Tyrion is trying to talk some sense into Dany by pleading for the lives of innocent people of King's Landing but she's gone beyond reason. She just wants to attack no matter the cost but she does agree on calling off the attack if they hear the bells ringing which means that they have surrendered (hence the title of the episode - "The Bells"). As Tyrion starts to leave the room, she informs him how they caught Jaime Lannister trying to get past the lines. She threatens him (with death, perhaps) if he ever fails him again.

Tyrion and Jon arrive at King's Landing where the northern army have camped. They plan to attack at daybreak. Tyrion tells Davos someone needs to be smuggled into the city (he obviously means Jaime). While Tyrion goes over to free Jaime, Arya and the Hound go past the northern army camp.  Tyrion enters the tent to meet Jaime and tells Jaime to go save Cersei (what!?) and escape to Pentos together (WHAT!?). Jaime seems skeptical of Cersei's intention to abdicate the throne (and he knows her better than anyone) but Tyrion seems to be sure she would do that for her child (oh you idiot). He instructs Jaime to give the orders to ring the bells before leaving. This seems like a fairly sound plan. You have to admire Tyrion's desire to put his skin on line for the sake of the lives of the innocent people of his city. Tyrion thanks Jaime for being the only one who cared about him (and oh this was such a beautiful and emotional scene and Peter Dinklage needs to win something for making this show so much better) before saying goodbye.

In the next scene, we see a massive bell and in the background - ranks upon ranks of the Iron fleet waiting to shoot Drogon out of the sky.  We see that the day is overcast which means that they can't really see the dragon coming from a long way off. Euron swaggers to the place where they are readying a Scorpion. We also see the whole walls of King's Landing lined with a lot of Scorpions and one has to wonder, does Dany have a backup plan? People are clambering about trying to get to safety but where DOES one hide when it's a dragon  - a flying beast that breathes fire is what is you're trying to be safe from. Soldiers are getting into place, door and windows are being shut, Lannister soldiers are trying to help people. We see Arya and the Hound walking down the streets of King's Landing where everything is absolute chaos. Jaime Lannister makes it inside King's Landing just in time and the Golden Company gets outside the gates. And truth be told, these people don't even look all that intimidating. Harry Strickland on his glorious horse looks over to the allied forces at the gates of King's Landing.

Over to the lines of allied forces, we see a handful of northmen, Dothraki and the Unsullied, and more are pouring in. Over a hill, Tyrion reminds Jon about the bells. At the Red Keep, Cersei stands on the balcony and watches people flowing inside the palace walls. Arya and the Hound make it inside just in time when they close the gate shut but Jaime Lannister doesn't get so lucky. And it was then that things started to look very bleak. Tyrion was going to fail again and it left a bad taste in my mouth. Jaime decides to take another route and despite not being a fan of him any longer, I root for his success, not for Cersei but for Tyrion.

Down in the Blackwater Bay, everything seems quiet. The day is beautiful and the gulls are screeching like any normal day. A breeze starts rolling and it's a cue for the viewers to know that the (mad) queen has arrived. And Euron feels it too. Everyone had been speculating what Dany would be up to. Dragon armor? More Dragons? Turns out, her strategy was to just come in very fast at them and from the direction they weren't expecting. The moment she blew the first ship, I knew there was no stopping her. We were in for a visual spectacle. She ends up blowing not just the Iron Fleet, but more and more Scorpion in the city. The soldiers manning the walls didn't even stand a chance.

Outside the city gates, all the soldiers are waiting patiently when they start to hear the ground rumbling. And in a pure show of spectacle, the gate and the walls come crashing at the Golden Company from the inside, and this band of mercenaries are burnt to crisp to the ground. Harry Strickland gets blown off his horse and has to run away from the incoming onslaught of the ululating Dothraki screamers. He doesn't get very far because he gets speared by Grey Worm. The allied forces breach the city and the carnage begins. Dany continues on with her demolition of the remaining Scorpions. While Dany is destroying man, machine alike, Cersei is watching from her balcony in Red Keep still hoping for a "one good shot". Qyburn informs her that all of the Scorpions have been destroyed. She insists on Euron being the savior again, which Qyburn promptly dismisses. He informs her that the gates have been breached to which she replies with her faith in the Lannister men.

The scenes down in the city speaks otherwise. The northmen march down the streets of King's Landing where they face a very scared Lannister army.  Tyrion watches the bell while Jaime is making his way to somewhere (I'm hoping - one of the bells, but I know, he's heading to Cersei). Dany is wrecking havoc in the minds of the people of King's Landing with her flying around in Drogon. She goes and perches over a wall and everyone waits. Heartbeats. Heartbeats all over the world. Drogon is at it with his roar and I was crossing my finger because I was scared that he was going to be killed while he was being distracted.

The attacking forces seem to be overwhelming for the defending army so they give up their arm and people start screaming for the queen to surrender and ring the bells. Even though Dany can't see Cersei and Cersei can't see Dany, Cersei can see the dragon and Dany can see the Red Keep, so it's like a face off which neither is willing to give up. I understand that Cersei is feeling utter defeat in her heart but her face shows defiance still, but I can't read what Dany's face is trying to portray. It's like she's willing Cersei to give her the reason to burn it all. All the pent up anger and hurt and feelings of betrayal and abandonment is welling up and it's quite amazing to see Emilia Clark absolutely nail it. 

And finally, after what feels like an eternity, the bells start ringing. Jon sighs a breath of relief, Tyrion seems relieved too but he hears Drogon screeching and he looks at Dany who does the fucking unthinkable. She takes off and starts burning shit up. Alright, my first reaction was - what the fuck, Dany. But having watched it multiple times, I have surmised a defence for Dany's action. First of all, she grew up only wanting to return to Westeros and be reunited with her family built home - the Red Keep. She got married to a Khal and got her taste of being a Khaleesi which meant ruling (to some degree). After her brother's death, she became the rightful ruler to the Iron Throne. She struggled after Drogo's death but eventually she got to a ruling position with the grace of her full grown dragons and an army of Unsullied and the Dothraki fighting for her cause. She got good at ruling (after failing a few times) but she started to feel entitled to being the rightful ruler. She went to Westeros, met Jon for whose battle she lost one of her dragons, her most trusted adviser, half of her army and yet felt no warmth from the people. People may say they were right to not trust her now that she went berserk but she went berserk exactly because she didn't feel loved or trusted whose very own arse she saved by putting her own arse on line. She then finds out her right to rule isn't even legitimate because her elder brother had a secret son whose claim is stronger (on the basis on the fact that he has a penis) and that son is her lover who refuses to keep quiet about it and the secret goes out in the open. She goes to take King's Landing but loses another one of her dragons and her best friend in the process. She lets that anger fuel her drive to defeat the army but she then starts to wonder whether her victory is going to matter at all in the grand scheme of things. She's going to take the country, again by putting her arse on line, risking the life of her last dragon and for whom? One of her advisers clearly has already betrayed him by spreading the fact of her weaker claim to the throne, another one of her advisers has also potentially betrayed him by scheming to protect her enemy (but she doesn't know that it's to save thousands of innocent lives), and these innocent lives that she came to save only feared her. And the last nail to the coffin was perhaps Jon's withdrawal from her. Yes, he doesn't want the throne and all but what's he to her if he won't have her at all. He's disgusted by their relationship when in her eyes, incest is okay. It shouldn't have mattered to him as well with him being a Targaryen too. She felt no love in this place. She only lost too much, and in that moment, she lost herself. Yep, she thought all this in 20 seconds. And hats off to Emilia Clark's acting. She absolutely nailed the boiled anger that she finally decided to be free of by bending her knees to her temptation to "make it personal".

Tyrion watches in horror as Dany takes off on her dragon towards the Red Keep and I thought, "She's heading towards the Red Keep to have Cersei's head" but nope, she starts frying the fleeing people of the city. We see Drogon's shadow over the city just like in Bran's vision. She flies for good 38 seconds before she starts the annihilation of the city which makes being on the outskirts of the city seem pretty safe. The two armies that were waiting at standstill realise what's happening and we see Grey Worm's resolve to follow his queen to the dark side starting to build on his face. He lowers his spear in preparation and kills the first soldier that turns around. War resumes. Jon is very confused. He tries to stop his men but to no avail. He has to start butchering a few men himself in defence. Grey Worm goes on a killing spree like many had guessed.

It's all chaos. Tyrion can't believe what he's witnessing. Davos is trying to save the people from harm's way. The allied forces go on a rampage that spares no one - soldiers, men, women, children, everyone fall prey to the war. Jon is walking around totally disconcerted. He sees the roles being reversed - the Lannister army trying to save the people, ushering them to safety while his men raping and pillaging. He kills a Lannister soldier who comes running his way only halfheartedly.  He manages to save a woman from his one of his own men. Up in the air, Cersei watches as Dany starts burning the Red Keep too. Down below, Jaime makes it to the bottom where he encounters Euron and the two fight. Euron mortally wounds Jaime but Jaime leaves Euron to die after stabbing him. Not interesting. Cersei, after finally accepting her defeat is persuaded to leave the Red Keep to go to Maegor's Holdfast. Down in the city, caches of wildfire that were hidden either from the time of the Mad King or by Cersei herself start blowing up but surrounded by dragon fire, they seem pretty insignificant. The Hound and Arya make it to the map room where he manages to convince her to abandon her vengeance by choosing life. This scene is beautiful because both of the characters have been through so much transformation, a huge chunk of which together. She was his pupil; while he taught her many things, she also managed to become one of the only two people around whom he could smile. This brute of a character cared for her too much to not let her follow him to certain death so he made him see what revenge could do to a person, and she cares enough to do what he tells her.  She thanks him and leaves. 

Cersei is leaving the Red Keep with Qyburn, the Mountain and her Queensguard when the ceiling comes falling over them. The mountain saves Cersei and Qyburn by putting his body over them. Many do not survive. Whatever manage to make it alive are killed by the Hound. The Mountain makes a move toward the Hound when Cersei commands him to stay by her side, a command he completely ignores. Qyburn tries to make him but that only gets him bashed to the rock and killed. Cersei, seeing that she has no use here, quietly slinks off by herself. CleganeBowl is on! Drogon, overhead is the embodiment of death but the two brothers have only eyes upon themselves. Quite obviously Clegane is a better fighter than Gregor is but Gregor is stronger, inhumanly so. Clegane manages to put a sword through Gregor multiple times but the latter being undead refuses to die. The rubble keep falling over them while Gregor throws Clegane around like a rag doll. At a point Clegane starts laughing because no matter how many times he tries, his big brother won't die. Gregor shoves Clegane to a wall and starts choking him; Clegane takes out a dagger and starts stabbing Gregor everywhere but doesn't get a reaction. It was sadly funny when Clegane screams - "fucking die!" and starts cackling like a maniac (while being chocked) but it stops being funny when Gregor moves his thumbs towards Clegane's eyes and my heart stopped. This wasn't the end I had in my wildest imagination for the Hound. Every single Game of Throne fan in the entire fucking world wanted the Hound to have his closure. Dany went mad - I didn't bat an eye. If the Hound was to die without killing the Mountain, I'd have rioted. Fortunately, before Gregor manages to gouge Clegane's eyes, the latter stabs the former in the eye and he lets go. Clegane sees Gregor fumble back but the latter recovers quickly enough to start to take the dagger out of his eye. Clegane then pushes both of them off the castle and the two brothers fall down to the inferno. What a scene. The Hound's hatred for his brother proved to be bigger than his fear of fire and his end felt almost poetic.

Cersei is scared. She gets to the map room where Jaime finds her. And you've got to give it to Lena Heady's acting. Hated as she is as a character, her feeling of absolute terror is very apparent in her face and you've got to feel sorry for her. Her relief at finding him and his relief at finding her and my (little pocket of) happiness for them confused me. I was supposed to hate them but I was glad they got reunited at the final hours of their lives. They make it down to the dragon skulls room but find the exit being covered with rubble. Cersei starts freaking out and laments about not wanting to die, not wanting their baby to die. In their final moments, Jaime has the presence of mind to try and soothe Cersei by telling her, "Nothing else matters, only us." They embrace and the building comes caving on them. So Jaime dies in the arms of the woman he loves (which sadly isn't Brienne) but Cersei's valonqar prophecy doesn't get fulfilled.

We see Arya running among the people of King's Landing fleeing the devastation. People are hurt - charred, amputated, dead; buildings are still falling on them; people are rampaging over other people. Survival seems impossible. We start seeing scenes where it seems like Arya couldn't make it - she gets stormed upon by hordes of running people, gets blown off by an explosion (she was shown to be covered in ashes with blood running down her face, lying motionless on the ground after the explosion), she wakes up fazed only to have a tower fall over her (and we distinctly hear her gasp). She tries to save few people but almost dies in the process. The three scenes with the Clegane brothers, the Lannister siblings and Arya were shown inter-changingly but I separated them for clarity. Jon and his army fall back somewhere in the middle of these scenes. 

Arya wakes up to an ashen city on the side of a blood-run wall and finds the city in ruins. There's fire, burnt-to-crisp bodies, ash is falling over the city like snow. She suddenly finds a white horse on which she rides out of the devastation. The scene is spectacular, the music is beautiful but I didn't think it meant anything.

Next episode: King's Landing is ashes and Daenarys Targaryen is the Queen of ashes. It's the final episode of the season and the final episode of the entire series. There are so many unresolved plot-holes, so many unanswered questions, so many loose ends. 80 minutes to accomplish all this, 80 minutes to satisfy 20 million viewers, 80 minutes to give a fitting end to an epic journey. It is definitely going to be bittersweet.