Sorry this week’s ‘Winners and Losers’ Game of Thrones recap for ‘The Dance of Dragons’ is a little late, but I think I’m still punch-drunk from last week’s HEATER episode of ‘Hardhome’. I think going in to this week we were all a little skeptical that the show would be able to match last week’s episode in both intensity and excitement, and while it might have fell short of the epic battle from ‘Hardhome’ this week’s episode was certainly no slouch. ‘The Dance of Dragons’ produced deaths from a handful of significant characters, and it also set up next week’s season finale of ‘Mother’s Mercy’ fantastically. So before I ramble too much on my part let’s get into this week’s Game of Thrones recap for Season 5, Episode 9’s ‘The Dance of Dragons’.
Game of Thrones Recap: The Dance of Dragons (Episode 509)
LOSER: Stannis Baratheon and the entire Baratheon blood line
In the middle of the night 20 men raided Stannis Baratheon’s camp and set the entire thing on fire, decimating his troops and food stuffs. Stannis was at his lowest moment, facing the ruin of his army as he’s marching on Winterfell to overthrow Ramsay Bolton as Warden of the North. His back’s against the wall, so what does he do? HE SETS HIS BABY GIRL ON FIRE IN FRONT OF HIS TROOPS?!?!
The Lady Melisandre recently suggested that Stannis burn his daughter, as the sacrifice of King’s Blood holds enough powerful magic to make just about anything happen. At the time Stannis was all ‘not my baby girl! Are you insane? Get out of my sight before I set your ass on fire!’ Then this week he experiences a few setbacks and somehow thinks it’s a good idea to sacrifice his ONLY CHILD. And not only did he burn his daughter on the stake, he did so with all of his men watching. So now if the magic doesn’t work they all watched a tiny girl burned at the stake by the orders of her father. Who is going to want to fight for that man?
As this plot line has completely jumped ship from the books and my speculation as a book reader is of no use, here’s where I see this heading in the coming episodes… Whether it happens in the finale or to kick off next season, Stannis is in ruin. His men will soon turn against him after this magic fails. He’s going to die at the hands of soldiers pissed off to be in the North. Hell, he might even lose in battle to Ramsay Bolton and have his skin flayed off and strung up on a pole for all the world to see. After burning his own daughter alive I see no way anything good happens to this man in the coming days. The show’s writers and creator seem to reward ruthlessness over lawfulness, but this is just despicable. Stannis’ hunger for power has gone too far, and his days are numbered. Hopefully his wife stabs him for killing their daughter. That’s something I would pay the writers to see. I’m deeply, deeply disturbed by sitting through the screams of that poor child who was murdered by her parents.
I say DEATH TO STANNIS!
LOSER: Jon Snow
So he escaped the Night’s King and his rage-filled army of zombie white walkers AND He saved hundreds (thousands?) of lives in the process and managed to bring them all south of The Wall. So, why’s he a loser? Because it’s obvious he’s going to get them all killed, as Ser Alliser Thorne stated. Just because the Wildlings were in danger of being killed by the White Walkers and Jon saved them it doesn’t mean that thousands of years of blood between the Wildlings and the Night’s Watch disappears. The blood feud between the Night’s Watch and the Wildlings runs so deep I wouldn’t be able to do it justice if I were to write 10,000 words. Jon Snow consistently puts his brothers in black in harm’s way to save these Wildlings. Just because Jon Snow has a big heart for every man it doesn’t mean that his brother’s do, nor that the Wildlings actually give two shits about his life.
They’ve focused WAY TOO MUCH on that young child in the Night’s Watch for him not to be the one to launch the siege on Jon Snow. He trusts his Lord Commander beyond belief, we’ve seen that time and again, but we’ve also seen him come to Jon man-to-man to tell him how these are the same Wildlings that raped and murdered his family.
Jon don’t care. Jon’s gonna do what Jon’s gonna do. ‘Fuck your dead relatives, there are living enemies who mean more to me than your dead dad.’
If Jon Snow was smart he’d keep Ghost with him at all times, because nobody’s going to get at him while his direwolf is around….But rest assured, someone’s coming at the Lord Commander sooner or later because there’s too many pissed off people on both sides of Jon’s life. As he’s one of my favorite characters I can only pray that he weasels his way out of whatever’s coming.
WINNER: Jamie Lannister
I’m going to call him a winner here, even though I have my suspicions that something devious is afoot. But Jamie Lannister sailed into Dorne to retrieve his niece and he’s leaving with his niece, the Prince of Dorne, Trystane Martell, and his (now) trusty sidekick Bronn’s life intact. All things considered Jamie really couldn’t have made out any sweeter. Sure it sucked getting locked up briefly and dealing with the politics of Dorne, but he got what he came for.
Do I think that there’s something sinister behind Crown Prince Doran Martell sending Prince Trystane along to sit on the King’s Small Council? Hell yes. There’s 10000% something tricky going on there, but I can’t really come up with any ideas. One boy won’t be able to make an impact on the King’s Small Council, not in the way someone like Littlefinger or Varys would have.
But Jamie, as of now, is returning to King’s Landing with his daughter-niece, her betrothed, and everything else that was already in place before. Seems like a win-win to me. The whole ‘dragging Bronn out to get bitch-slapped as an eye-for-an-eye punishment’ was nothing more than amusing. I don’t really make anything of the other Sand Snakes involvement at this point. Though the back and forth between Bronn and the ladies in the jail cell may have been some foreshadowing, I guess we’ll see next week or next season. Yes, the Sand Snakes are pissed off. But if Prince Doran wants to kill these crazy women then it looks like he’s the sort of man who will actually do this.