Join us for a discussion of “Sons of the Harpy” with three fans with different perspectives: Laura Fletcher, a casual fan of the television and book series; Corrin Bennett-Kill, a dedicated fan of the book and TV series (she has read all the books four times!); and Cheryl Collins, who does not read.
Please join the discussion in comments!
Cheryl Collins
We start under Winterfell with that statue of Ned’s sister Lyanna and are reminded of the story linking her, Ned, and Robert.
To me that statue looked just like the one of the Mother in the House of Black and White.
Laura Fletcher
I was wondering if we’re meant to see a resemblance with Sansa — it would make sense as it’s her aunt, and she was a legendary beauty. And like Sansa, it seems, Lyanna had some interesting engagement/marriage problems!
Corrin Bennett-Kill
Lyanna was also a betrothed young woman with an uncertain future.
The popular theory is that Rhaegar kidnapped and raped Lyanna, and that a) led to her death and b) led to the war that dethroned the Targaryen dynasty.
It was Lyanna and Rhaegar that pushed Robert Baratheon to make war in the first place, as Lyanna was Robert’s betrothed.
Cheryl
OK, I’m trying to piece this together now …
Laura
This part of Westerosi history is super confusing to me, and I’ve read the dang books!
Corrin
This exposition about Rhaegar’s character, though, lends some doubt as to whether was indeed kidnapping and rape, or love. Petyr’s side-eye at Sansa makes me think he believes it may have been love.
Rhaegar was already married to Elia of Dorne.
Cheryl
Petyr gave her a series of looks like “yeah, I won’t tell you the real story yet … keep thinking what you want, sister …”
I thought Rhaegar was the insane one. Ugh!
Laura
See, confusion! Rhaegar was the son of the Mad King and next in line to be a Targaryen king.
Corrin
Rhaegar was killed at the Trident during the war that dethroned the Targaryens. (The Trident is a river.)
Laura
Robert killed Rhaegar, though that may be different in the book and show.
Cheryl
So the upshot is, Petyr is leaving.
Laura
Petyr is heading back to King’s Landing (where I don’t think he knows his brothel has been sacked?!), and Sansa is being left to her Littlefinger-taught wiles.
Cheryl
So Sansa will have to live in the viper’s nest … again. Seems like a replay of her time as Joffrey’s betrothed.
Corrin
This time at least she is better equipped.
Laura
Indeed. She’s done this thing before, a few different ways (as Joffrey’s betrothed, Tyrion’s wife), and hopefully this time she goes in with eyes wide open.
Cheryl
She also know the tunnels and hiding places …
Laura
By the way, I was hoping she’d find some signs of her little brothers in the catacombs. Not sure why I’m so keen to know where the littlest Starks are, but I blame new motherhood for my worries.
Corrin
I did think it was interesting that Littlefinger said Ramsay was already in love with her and she just needed to use her feminine wiles on him. Given what we already know about Ramsay I’d say that was … unlikely … in the extreme.
Cheryl
Sansa is now on her home turf, as it were, with potential accomplices everywhere.
Corrin
Absolutely, Cheryl. The North bloody well remembers.
Laura
It seems odd for Littlefinger to misread Ramsay so terribly. I wonder if he is just trying not to scare Sansa.
Corrin
We know Ramsay’s character, but he’s something of a mystery to most of Westeros.
Cheryl
If I were her, I’d be freaked, with those flayed bodies hanging in abundance.
So after the scene with Sansa and Petyr, it was cut to Jaime and Bronn at sea and a green isle appears: Tarth. This reinforced my guess of last week that Jaime would somehow cross paths with Brienne while he was on his journey.
Corrin
I adore Bronn. But Jaime’s apparently sincere anger at Tyrion was surprising to me. I didn’t expect him to be that upset that Tyrion killed Tywin given that he was willing to set Tyrion free.
Cheryl
Everything he told Bronn in that scene beforehand was a lie: that he was the uncle of Myrcella (not the father), that Varys had set Tyrion free (not him) … and then he says he would kill Tyrion? To me it seemed it was all BS. And Bronn knows it.
Laura
I’m sort of confused by Jaime’s emotions and motivations regarding Tyrion, in general. I think this is one of those areas where the show didn’t quite make up its mind and now it’s muddy. Tywin was an arse to everyone, including Jaime. Maybe the Tyrion-hate was all a show.
Corrin
There’s a connection between Brienne and Jaime. She forced him into using his conscience and to be a better man. I don’t think it’s a romantic connection, but it’s a deep one nonetheless.
Laura
Brienne essentially serves as Jaime’s conscience/good angel on his shoulder, where Cersei is the devil on the other shoulder, heh.
Cheryl
I agree about Brienne and Jaime. He looks at that isle as if he is recognizing an old friend— a jogged memory of who is he at his best.
Corrin
And maybe is trying to be again …
Cheryl
But soon those two have to kills four guys on horseback (plus a horse).
Laura
Jaime gets his first real taste of combat, post-amputation.
Corrin
I kept yelling “HIT HIM WITH THE HAND!”
Cheryl
I LOVED that shot when he realized a new use for his fake hand. But he’s also using his hand as an excuse to get out of unpleasant tasks and pissing Bronn off.
Also, because the scene of Petyr and Sansa immediately cut to the one of Jaime and Bronn, I think the show is hinting at a broader connection among all of these folks.
And now that I think of it … children with unknown/fake parentage.
Jaime is still denying that he is the father of Myrcella, although it is common knowledge; as Loras says in the show teaser, in King’s Landing “everyone knows everything about everyone.”
Laura
And we got another important scene regarding Cersei and Jaime’s kids: when Tommen tried to go visit the High Sparrow and a fight nearly broke out, some anonymous sparrow-follower (or two) shouted “bastard” and a few other choice epithets.
Corrin
We got “bastard” and “abomination.” Tommen is confronted with accusations about his parentage.
Laura
He looked upset and clueless, but it goes back to Loras saying that everyone knows everything. Especially about the powerful in Westeros. Due to his age and general affability, Tommen hasn’t really had to confront these “rumors” before.
Cheryl
And do we think he has ever heard these accusations?
Corrin
Maybe, but he’s pretty naive. Remember, he is written as a child, a small child at that (7 or 8). They aged him up in the show and made him able to consummate his marriage. In the books, the marriage is unconsummated and Cersei has Margaery arrested for not being a virgin.
Laura
Yeah, Margaery is saddled with a third husband who can’t or won’t seal the deal, in the books.
Cheryl
It was extremely stupid of Cersei to go after Loras and undercut Tommem’s authority this way. She is flailing.
Corrin
I read all this as Cersei trying to strip away Margaery’s underpinnings. Her grandmother left as we found out last week. Her father has been sent to Braavos. Her brother is now imprisoned.
Cheryl
Then it’s off to the Small Council that, as Pycelle says, is getting smaller by the day.
I wondered about Pycelle’s comment that the small council is getting ever smaller, and then Cersei replies “not small enough.” She has pushed Pycelle too far, I think, and he will hit her when she can. Stupid, stupid Cersei.
Corrin
Dumb move is DUMB. But then again, Lena Headley has given Cersei MUCH more depth and heart than the books ever did. In the books Cersei is foolish and kind of dumb, although with a base cleverness.
Margaery is left with a naive king and a mother-in-law more firmly in control of the small council. No matter that she has potentially destabilized the entire city by unleashing the Faith Militant on them.
Cheryl
There were many shots of Qyburn keeping his mouth shut as Lord Tyrell just blathered on — but knowing full well what Cersei was doing by sending Tyrell away with that murderous Meryn Trant. Lord Tyrell is doomed, but he was too much a fool to see it.
Laura
Pycelle is smart enough to know when he can and should find new alliances. There’s no way he’s sticking with Cersei much longer.
And the Faith Militant are, well, quite militant.
Cheryl
Hard not to think of the Sparrows as the dark side of the religions that are central in GoT … meaning, this is what happens when what seem pure intentions are given actual power.
Corrin
They are fanatics and the High Sparrow, regardless of what direction his fanaticism lies, is also a fanatic.
Laura
The High Sparrow certainly has more to him than meets the eye. And Cersei knows it.
Corrin
I don’t think she does. She thinks she has a good bead on him and will find out otherwise to her dismay.
Cheryl
It seems to me Cersei is playing with fire and she will get immolated.
She thinks she can control the High Sparrow. Good luck with that.
Laura
He’s both too smart and too fanatical to want to help her out, I think.
Cheryl
OK, what about Jon and Melisandre. I was really surprised he let himself be, um, tempted by her.
Laura
She is a redhead. (She’s no Ygritte, but still … I think it’s been established by the show that Melisandre is nigh on irresistible.)
Cheryl
And what about Melisandre’s closing comment as she leaves: “you know nothing Jon Snow”? Wow.
There was that most obvious link between Melisandre and Jon: Fire and Ice.
Corrin
That scene between Stannis and Shireen was dynamite! The look in that little girl’s eyes was amazing!
Laura
And Stannis’s eventual hug made me like him. Damn you, show!
Corrin
We FINALLY got to see a different side of Stannis.
Cheryl
Stannis still could not hug his daughter or smile, but we saw that he loved her. She so craved it.
Shireen asks Stannis: “Are you ashamed of me?”
Maybe that was another theme: children — and acts — of which the characters are ashamed. And all the children who feel shame (as Jon does). Jaime is a shame machine.
Tyrion embraces his flaws, but no one else does. They all try to pretend they’re not there. Loras was shame-less.
Corrin
Well, Shireen’s mother sure is a harpy.
Cheryl
And in Meereen … Barristan is apparently dead, which will make Jorah’s arrival more fortuitous to Dany.
Corrin
I was YELLING at the TV during the fight with the Sons of the Harpy! “NO! NOT SER BARRISTAN!” If he ends up actually being dead, I’m gonna be pissed.
Cheryl
Live by the sword, die by the sword.
I assume that’s why there was that conversation between Bronn and Jaime beforehand about how one wished to die, as a setup to Barristan’s apparent death.
Corrin
I think it was just to set up the return of Jorah frankly. He’s going to try to get back to Dany rather than accept exile.
Cheryl
Tyrion and Jorah have more in common in terms of outlook than it may seem.
Laura
The title of the episode is “Sons of the Harpy.” Obviously we have the huge violent scene in Meereen. But then we have all the other Sons of the Harpy…
Corrin
It seemed more like “sons.” Or at least children. Oberyn’s children. Cersei’s children.
Laura
Which “harpy” was Jon’s mother?
Cheryl
Or “children of religion”; that is, the devotees who turn violent: Sparrows in King’s Landing, Sons of the Harpy in Meereen.
Laura
Yes, and the Sand Snakes… Even to some extent Shireen since she was asking if she was (essentially) a real daughter to her father.
Corrin
Or you could read Grey Worm and his fellow eunuchs as Dany’s sons, and she as the new harpy.
Laura
And Dany is the second coming, too — at least according to some, as we heard last episode.
Corrin
The destructive Faith Militant could be Cersei’s children in that they were unleashed by her, as the actual Sons of the Harpy in Meereen are Dany’s responsibility, the fruit of decisions.
We keep seeing Dany’s compatriots taken from her by her own hand. Jorah she sends away. The kid she had executed. Now potentially Grey Worm and Barry the Bold.
Her inability to see her way to rule this city like it needs to be ruled is paying her dividends in the worst possible way.
Cheryl
Two boat journeys: Jaime’s and Tyrion’s.
Corrin
Part of it is a nod to Tyrion’s boat journey in the books, I think. Something is going to happen along the way. Watching Tyrion annoy Jorah into un-gagging him was fun, and Jorah carefully setting the tiller and then slugging Tyrion in the face was pretty lol worthy.
Laura:
Let’s talk about the Sand Snakes!
Cheryl
As a non-reader, I was not sure what to make of their intro.
Corrin
I’m glad they scaled the number down. That would have been confusing if all seven had been cast.
Corrin
Well, Dorne’s roll in the future is still kind of murky.
Laura
In short: only one of the three daughters is Ellaria’s.
Cheryl
I take it they are Oberyn’s daughters bent on revenge. Maybe they’ll grow on me.
Laura
And although I didn’t realize it until looking it up online, the show still says there are more Sand Snakes but only these three were extensively trained in combat or something. So Oberyn has eight bastard daughters (he never married).
Corrin
Yeah. He got around. They are blindly stubborn. And apparently follow in the Dornish tradition of liking to fight.
Laura
Nymeria is one of them, and that was the name of Arya’s direwolf! And both were presumably named after a fabled character from Westerosi history.
Nymeria is ‘the warrior-queen who led the Rhoynar refugees to Dorne a thousand years ago,” says The Game of Thrones wiki.
Corrin
I have a feeling that most of this season will be like setting the chessboard for next season. Knives are being sharpened. Skills are being learned. Connections made. That’s what book five felt like. Like GRRM needed to get a bunch of characters placed before the final push.
Cheryl
I feel we have been doing that forever.
Please join the conversation in comments … but no spoilers, please!!