Game of Thrones: Season 5, Episode 6: Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken
This was an intense episode, like crazy intense. Just google the name of this episode and look at the comments sections everywhere. You’ll see tons and tons of controversy about what happened to Sansa Stark. The social response to her wedding night is very interesting. There is a massive uproar about whether it was narratively necessary or if it was just for shock value. It was pretty terrible to see her go through that and having Theon/Reek there was just salt in a pretty horrendous wound.
I don’t usually look at the opinions of others before I do reviews, but this was kind of overwhelming. It may have taken more effort to avoid trying to see anything. With all of the vile acts and tragedy that has happened on this series, I’m actually pretty surprised to see that this episode is getting more blowback than the Red Wedding. Someone stabbed a pregnant woman right in her unborn baby multiple times on that one before leaving her to bleed out.
It was a very shocking scene (which happened in a much worse way to a different character in the books), but I for one do feel as though it happened for a reason. This show is pretty much known for its setups and we’ve been shown evidence of that more than once so far. For examples, look at Stannis’ story about greyscale and how that paid off in the very next episode or Margaery walking in on Loras and his boy toy Olyvar, which paid off in this episode. Even the fighting pits they’ve been talking about in Daenerys’ storyline came into play.
Everything has significance, which is pretty much how the source material is. Let’s just give them a little more time here to try to make that scene’s relevance known. Maybe its purpose is to strengthen Sansa or Theon, or both in a single stroke (no tasteless pun intended). It might even be just to build Ramsay up to be an even worse villain than Joffrey before him. Especially since this is his first really terrible act toward an innocent person. Theon kind of deserved a lot of (definitely not all) of what he got.
Speaking of Margaery, she is definitely getting her a** kicked by Cersei at this point, in their little game of manipulations. Cersei’s punishments of her have been extremely harsh, all her daughter-in-law did was try to get her son to send her back to Casterly Rock and she’s all trying to get them all slaughtered and imprisoned. She even sent Margaery’s father sent away to Braavos to probably be executed by the Iron Bank. Even the mighty and fearless Olenna Redwyne was powerless agains Cerise’s devious machinations. House Tyrell may be screwed, unless the Queen on Thorns has more cards to play. I’m sure she does, House Tyrell is pretty much holding the Lannister/Baratheon family together as it is.
Luckily, Littlefinger is there to play Cersei even more than she’s playing the Tyrells. How is he getting places so quickly? I think he might have a secret plane or something, because no one is traveling nearly as fast as him. It’s crazy because I’m starting to think he may be my favorite character, because he really doesn’t lose. Of course he’s sneaky and extremely manipulative, but you kind of have to be to keep from dying in that world. He even kept the Sparrows off his back with a few words. Those guys definitely need to be stopped. Now he’s going to start a war and come out on top no matter what the result of it might be, but as I stated earlier, the Tyrells might keep any of that from happening at all. I’m sure he’ll overcome that as well if he needs to.
Arya is another favorite of mind. She is the one character that is constantly progressing and changing in every episode. Now she understands the Game of Faces and is much farther along the road of becoming who she wants to be, which is not quite “No One.” She is learning the ways of the Many-Faced God and let’s not even mention that library of faces. While one of the creepiest things I’ve ever seen, that was pretty awesome. I wonder how she will feel when it comes time to remove her own face.
Tyrion and Jorah seem pretty screwed, hopefully the Imp’s manipulations can get them out of their current predicament. His “guess again” comment was pretty bada** as well, not to mention hilarious. I especially cherished him delivering the news about Jorah’s father to him. I was waiting for that conversation since the two of them got together and it seems appropriate now that Jorah is pondering his own mortality after so much fear of losing his former worth. Anyone else notice the use of more recognizable actors this season (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje and Jonathan Pryce)? Also, where the hell is Varys? Is he going to meet them in Mereen or did he stay in Volantis?
Lastly we have the Jaime and Bronn bromance. They finally found Myrcella and it did not go well at all. Born punched out a prince of Dorn and the pair fought the Sand Snakes to a stand still. There was a “hey look at this” shot of Bronn getting cut by one of their blades and if they are anything like their father, that means Bronn has been poisoned in a most horrendous way. I like him, but it seems like this may be the end of one of the best supporting characters on the show. As in all things on this show, we’ll just have to wait and see what happens. The next four episodes are going to be pretty epic, there’s more than enough tension for the show to release now.
Jonathan Thomas Jones is a speculative fiction author and founder of geekhavenreviews.com. He has been passionate about all things geek for his entire life. See more about him at jonathanthomasjones.com and follow him on twitter @jtgloryjones.
