The night is finally here and the card is stacked. In the main event, two bastards will battle it out for the title of Warden of the North in one of the most anticipated bouts of the year. While, in the co-main, The Mother of Dragons faces off against the Masters of Slavers Bay in a firefight that is likely to be a barn burner. Who will emerge victorious? How many of your loved ones will die? How much more can my heart take? LETS GET READY TO RUUUUUUMBLE!
Where does one even begin with the phenomenal ‘Battle of the Bastards’? Despite the episode only covering two locations there’s a glut of talking points. While the peak of this great mountain of corpses is certainly the titular battle, the siege in Mereen was almost as thrilling, and has it occurred in any other episode it would have been a highlight.
As Daenerys draws closer to her goal of sitting upon the Iron Throne, as so does she grow ever more like the last Targaryen to do so. Atop the massive Drogon and accompanied by her other sons she razes the Masters’ fleets, boiling those on board alive. If not for Tyrion she just as quickly would have reduced the other cities of slavers bay to ash, with little regard to the innocents and slaves which she had been so desperate to liberate seasons earlier. Hey, nobody’s perfect.
I maintain Daenerys was at her most interesting in the first season where her arc entailed growing from meek princess in her brother’s master plan to strong-willed and compassionate Khaleesi. She’s occasionally dipped her toes in the pool of cruelty since, flirting with the idea of developing, but has mostly been preoccupied with the whole slave business. Finally letting her dragons loose is her coming to terms with the legacies left to her of conquest by her dynasty and ruthlessness bequeathed by her father. I’m hopeful this inferno is a defining moment in her journey as she sets her gaze west and leaves this entire Essos debacle behind.
In her negotiations with the Greyjoys she’s appropriately regal and brandishes her authority with aplomb. She also probably wants a bit of hanky panky with Yara. Boring old Daario who hasn’t done a single important thing since ever, beginning to bore you? Yeah me too. Having another pair of characters to bounce against Mereen’s cast is also refreshing because Tyrion and the Sober Slaves was getting stale.
The remainder of the episode is centred in The North and the impending pitched battle that will be waged Jon Snow and Ramsay Bolton. With Miguel Sapochnik returning to the series on the strength of last season’s Hardhome we were well aware that the production was in skilled hands, but the he soars above lofty expectations with phenomenal results.
The battle itself ranks with some of the best I’ve seen on television or film. The shot of Jon facing down the charging cavalry and the following sequence where he navigates the chaos of plummeting arrows and galloping horses is a masterwork of choreography. The abhorrent violence and indiscriminate killing of war on full effect as we stumble through the battlefield with Jon in what reminds me of the war sequences of Saving Private Ryan.
Though even more impressive than the action is the ever creeping sense of claustrophobia and desperation as the battle continuously tips in Bolton favour. As the bodies mound up, the Bolton shield wall surround the Stark forces and men begin to panic. In their attempts to claw their way over the corpse wall, Jon is trampled beneath the route and begins to suffocate under the stampede. This is the perfect culmination of the battle, the series and a morbidly beautiful moment. The hopelessness of the hero Jon Snow screaming and gasping as his own men stomp him into the muck trying to escape their own slaughter. When the retreat slows as the men are barricaded Jon pushes himself back up and emerges, squashed into a mob of bloody and terrified men and gulping air.
There’s a lot I can say about this sequence and why I adore it so much. The mayhem of when Jon is being crushed and the top down zoom out when Jon is reborn from the horde is beautiful. He’s just another face in a throng of frightened and dying men. There’s nothing special about him at this moment. He barely survived the ignoble fate of being smashed beneath his own men’s feet. It’s an incredible shot and is Game of Thrones at its finest. Yes Jon survived, but how close he came to drowning in muck and blood and to emerge broken and beaten, just another man to die at war. It’s bloody magnificent.
And of course the outcome of the battle was extremely satisfying. Having Jon deliver a monstrous beating to Ramsay feels a long time coming. Sansa’s vindictive turn in setting Ramsay’s own hounds upon him was equally rewarding. In fact I loved the conversation between Jon and Sansa earlier in the episode and how cold she has become in contrast to her half-brother. She correctly assessed that there was no way for them to rescue Rickon, and was fine with writing him off as a necessary casualty. Her suffering has callused her to the world and it’s a great place to take the character.
Speaking of Rickon, did anyone actually care that he died? He was as much a prop as that direwolf head that Umber was throwing around earlier. Surely the writers were aware that we’d have no emotional investment in a character that had 0 lines this season, and they didn’t linger on his death. Hell Wun-Wun was a better character than Rickon. Though I wasn’t found that Ramsay struck the killing blow against the giant, another prodding reminder from the writers that we’re supposed to hate Ramsay and felt overly scripted. Would have been more appropriate if he’d merely succumbed to wounds sustained during the storming of Winterfell.
As for the other members of the Stark squad, Tormund had plenty to do during the battle and got his own confrontation with Umber which played well in the battle with a gruesome ending. Davos discovering that Mel burned Shireen is a great development, if a little coincidental, but I’m looking forward to the conflict that arises. Also credit to Liam Cunningham for that sorrowful glare he threw at Melisandre.
My largest “complaint” (if you could call it so) is the arrival of Littlefinger to salvage the battle. Why didn’t Sansa tell Jon they might be coming? Also it’s a fairly simplistic and straight forward resolution to the battle. “Reinforcements arrive”. I had been hoping that Umber would turn on Ramsay or had been playing him the entire time, adding an extra layer of complexity to proceedings. Sadly it was not to be.
Other nitpicks? Why couldn’t they have given Wun-Wun a tree to use as a club? That would have been very helpful, did no one think of that? and most importantly WHERE WAS GHOST?! Did they spend their entire CGI budget on the dragons and had none left for the direwolf? We couldn’t even get a little bit of Ghost action?
And thus concludes the Battle of the Bastards. A fantastic hour of television if there ever was one. From start to end, exhilarating, thrilling, suspenseful and satisfying. I’ll miss Iwan Rheon as Ramsay. He played him fantastically, even if the script wasn’t always up to par he always provided the perfect performance for the derange Bastard of Bolton. He was a cruel psychopath and when the writers gave him the opportunity he showed depth in his relationship with his Father or his twisted fascination with Reek. Even if Ramsay did begin to wear thin this season through insecure writing, he still played the role perfectly.
Sadly we’ve only one episode left of Thrones. What might happen is anyone’s guess, but you can bet I’ll be here again next week to talk through my opinions and what occurred. Maybe you’ll join me one last time for the season finale.
