Season 8-Episode 04

Episode 71: The Last of the Starks

“I would murder every woman and child for her. She’s hateful, and so am I”

Major Plot Points: Daenerys heads south.  Jon gossips with his sisters.  Euron hides in plain sight.  Cersei looks down on her enemies.

Observations from a Book Reader:

1. Jon calling the fallen soldiers “the shield that guards the realms of men” is of course a direct callback to the oath every member of the Night’s Watch takes.  In fact, if you pretend Jon is giving this speech at a Castle Black funeral, it still really works.  He basically just recycles a eulogy he probably heard a million times before.
2. Stannis is still technically the Lord of Storm’s End.  But Aegon (the potentially fake Aegon from Essos) and the Golden Company now hold it. 
3. There are many theories about what Bran will do once he is the Three Eyed Raven.  Will he use his new powers to manipulate the politics of Westeros? I am certain he will have a larger part to play than just revealing Jon’s true parentage.
4. Sansa and the Hound have an even weirder past together.  When he approached her to leave King’s Landing with him, he drunkenly kissed her.
5. The Prince of Dorne is still Doran Martell.  If he died, it would go to his daughter Arianne.  Since she is out of the show, I have no idea at all who this new prince could be.  Possibly someone from another house, like the Daynes. 
6. Bronn is correct about the origin of great houses.  The Lannisters became a major house because their ancestor, Lann the Clever, stole Casterly Rock from the Casterlys.
7. Ballista crossbows exist, but they wouldn’t work against a dragon.

Other Points to Notice

1. We see Daenerys whisper something into Jorah’s ear.  According to Ian Glenn, it was a very personal message from Emilia Clarke that he says was extremely touching.
2. Tyrion and Davos have a interesting conversation about the Lord of Light.  They both acknowledge that he does probably exist, but they have the same questions we do.  Is he still around? Was his only role in this story to defeat the White Walkers?
3. Tyrion comes off slightly cruel in his drinking game with Brienne.  More in line with book Tyrion, in the show he is usually not as much of a dick.
4. Daenerys begins feeling increasingly isolated.  She sees everyone celebrate Jon riding a dragon and defeating the White Walkers, both things she also did.   It makes sense why she grows increasingly hostile as the episode progresses, the goals she has worked her entire life for are being thrown away to someone else just because he’s a dude. 
5. Kinda weird that the writers decided to make Sansa happy about her experiences.  It almost makes it seem like they were trying to justify the whole “rape” plotline, and it understandably irked some people the wrong way.
6. You can see the desperation in Dany when she begs Jon to keep his lineage a secret.  She is entirely correct, even if Jon claims he does not want the throne, his family and the North would never let him abdicate.  Even honorable Ned Stark understood this, and never told his wife about it.  Also Sansa tells Tyrion immediately.
7. I wish there was a scene between Arya and Sansa after Jon reveals his secret to them.  I’d like to see their reactions, plus Arya goes from saying how much her family means to her, to leaving Winterfell immediately.  It was really sudden to me.
8. The scene with Bronn is hard to believe.  I can stomach him sneaking into Winterfell I guess, but what was the purpose of this conversation? He just takes their word that he will get Highgarden? This seems to me like a plot-line created just to get Bronn in one last scene with the Lannister boys. 
9. Sansa knew exactly what she was doing by telling Tyrion about Jon.  She is planting the seed to sow discord in Dany’s court, a very Littlefinger move.
10. It’s very possible this episode shows us certain characters for the last time, like Gendry, Sam and Gilly.  Tormund however could be back, and he left it open that one day Jon may return to the true North.
11. It is unlikely Euron was able to hide an entire fleet and catch Rhaegal unaware.  I get why he would be waiting in the waters near Dragonstone, but the show could have done a more realistic job of depicting his fleet being hidden from an airborne Daenerys. 
12. For all his talk about “helping the realm” Varys really flip flops his allegiances constantly, which ultimately hurts the realm.  Daenerys is rightfully upset at losing her 2 closest friends, her 2 dragons, and her potential happiness with Jon.  Any normal person would be angry at this point, and Varys just blames it on her being mad.  I could be wrong here, and we will see soon, but Dany hasn’t as of yet done anything to justify Varys leaving.
13. Jaime and Brienne getting together is something that was years in the making.  They both clearly had feelings for each other, and it was nice to see them come to terms with it.  But then we see Jaime leave her, to go back to Cersei.  When I first watched, I thought he was leaving to go kill Cersei, but now I believe he is going back because he feels that he does not deserve the new life and redemption he found in Brienne.  In the end, his story will be about how close he actually came to becoming a better person, but failed just when he got there.  This story would have been a lot better if it were spread out over the course of a season, and not over 20 minutes, but here we are.   RIP Jaime.
14. Did anyone really think Tyrion would convince Cersei to stand down?  Also I wish that Dany’s armies were not so close to the ballista, because it would be in character for Cersei to have her men shoot at them.

 Stray Observations:

1. The title confuses me a bit.  The Starks didn’t lose anyone this episode.
2. Theon finally got that Stark swag he always wanted.
3. The Hound was able to *sniff* out Gendry’s intentions with Arya very quickly
4. Arya shot Gendry down harder than Euron shot Rhaegal down.  I saw that on twitter unfortunately its not an original. 
5. Sansa could have been a bit kinder to Daenerys in the council room. She really hates her.
6. At least we got Arya and the Hound together one more time.
7. Glad they brought Ghost back for an unceremonious goodbye.  I mean how much more money would it cost for Jon to go pet him. God damn it.
8. Poor Brienne.
9. Qyburn walking out from King’s Landing reminds me of the Mouth of Sauron emerging from the Black Gates in Return of the King to negotiate with Aragorn. 
10. Missandei’s last words are up there with my favorite from the show. She basically tell Dany to kill all her enemies.

RIP: Rhaegal, and Missandei of Narth.