We knew they would pull out all the stops — and they did. But at the heart of this epic battle episode was the conflict of love versus duty. One relationship comes to an end, and another is truly born.
Find a space amid the piles of lifeless corpses, pull up a chair, and enjoy a discussion of “Watchers on the Wall” with three fans with very different perspectives: Laura Fletcher, a casual fan of the television and book series; Corrin Bennett-Kill, a hardcore fan of the book and TV series (she has read all the books four times!); and Cheryl Collins, a TV show watcher who has never read the book series.
Please join the discussion in comments!
Laura Fletcher
Sometimes we start by discussing the title. Welp, you can’t get much more literal than “The Watchers on the Wall,” eh?
Cheryl Collins
The title reminds us of their vows, which they had to keep reminding themselves and each other of. I thought this was a tense and effective episode.
Corrin Bennett-Kill
Indeed, Laura. We got a whole lotta Wall this episode. I, for one, was ready for it. I was beginning to tire of the Paul Revere-esque “The wildlings are coming! The wildlings are coming!” that had been happening most of the season.
Laura
It really is Revere-esque, down to the horn-blowing code.
Corrin
Two if by land, three if by Mammoth!
Laura
And Cheryl, I suppose we should give a bit more credit to the title’s specific mention of the vows. Goodness knows masculinity was front and center this episode.
Corrin
I think vows and the role they played in this episode are central.
Cheryl
By the way, was anyone else reminded of Lord of the Rings with the mammoths, giants, and encroaching army?
Laura
Almost a little bit “The Two Towers.”
Cheryl
Maybe we should go back to the beginning, when Jon and Sam are atop the Wall and speaking of love.
Corrin
It does begin with an attempt to describe what the breaking of those vows means by Jon, and Sam’s very scholarly position on what the vows specifically prohibit. But the entirety of the episode was fraught with the consequences of broken vows: Ygritte’s anger and betrayal, the information Jon was able to provide about the upcoming attacks as a wildling turncoat, Sam’s willingness to put Gilly conditionally above his vows, and even the power of vows to stiffen the spine in the face of a terrible duty.
Cheryl
Jon tried to explain what love feels like, and he describes it by saying that for a while, you feel that there is more than just you as a single person. So the tension then becomes, what is greater: your duty to that love, or your love and duty to the larger community?
Corrin
Well, Cheryl, as Maester Aemon said in his delightful cameo, “Love is the death of duty.”
Cheryl
Sam and Jon are able to put duty above love (and fear).
Laura
I was also thinking of the interesting turn we get in Ser Alliser Thorne, who suddenly becomes almost likeable (almost) by focusing on his duty and — temporarily, he points out — putting aside grudges.
Corrin
(As likeable as anyone who calls everyone a “twat” can be.) And giving Jon a valuable lesson in leadership.
Cheryl
Thorne was fascinating to me, that he could admit he was wrong to Jon, really inspire his men in battle, and lunge bravely in the front of the swordplay.
Laura
Good thing since Thorne is one of the only other competent swordfighters at the Wall.
Cheryl
And even as he was dragged away, he screams, “Protect the fucking gate!”
Laura
Also, props to Grenn for tricking cowardly, useless Janos Slynt into abandoning his post atop the Wall. Thank goodness Jon caught on to what Grenn was trying to do!
Corrin
It’s always a happy moment when a sneaky, conniving coward shows his true colors.
Cheryl
And alas, poor Pyp. He was unabashed in his fear, but he tried. I was reminded that he was one of Jon’s friends who did not volunteer for the sortie at Craster’s — he knew who he was.
Turning to Sam, when we first met him in Season 1, he was defined as a shameful coward, but he has now shown that he is much more.
Laura
sniff And then Sam ends up being a mentor for cowardly Pyp. Yet, even when Pyp dies in his arms, Sam continues on. Both he and Jon are surviving against pretty ridiculous odds, but hey, we deserve some of that for the good guys in this show! Usually it’s only the jackasses who make it out alive.
Cheryl
You two knew the outcome of the episode. Did you feel the tension that I did?
Laura
Interesting you bring that up, Cheryl. Although most of the action was based on the story from the books, I didn’t know exactly where it was going. Enough had changed that I wasn’t sure of the outcome or who would survive.
Corrin
Only in the sense of not being certain what was going to be revealed this episode. I enjoyed the episode, but looking back on it, I think that there were better ways to have captured the mounting crisis at the Wall.
What I really missed and what I think would have made the episode MUCH more dynamic than it was, was inclusion of the wildling leadership in the storyline. A) Ciarán Hinds as Mance Rayder … where were you? B) The wildlings were just too faceless and monstrous (thanks, bloody Thenns). There is a lot to sympathize with in their cause. They are fleeing for their lives and they know it. Hell, Jon knows it. Even a glimpse of the wildling horde as something other than a faceless mass of monsters would have provided some much-needed emotional dynamics.
One thing the books gave us was some real knowledge of the wildlings as people. This was just good guys and bad guys. None of the complexity that GoT usually excels at.
Cheryl
Interesting Corrin, because I still have not really appreciated that part of the storyline: the wildings are being pushed south.
Laura
Agreed, Corrin, especially on the Thenns (rewritten for the show to be cannibals).
Cheryl
What we saw of them was the view from above: the wildings were largely just dots moving across the frozen expanse below. Perhaps next week we will see the view from below the Wall a bit.
Laura
As usual, the show relied on Ygritte far too much to humanize the wildlings, and she ends up looking like an outlier as opposed to a representative.
Corrin
A lot of the complaints I saw about this episode was that it was all spent at the Wall. I thought the battle for the Wall deserved its own episode, more so even that did the battle of the Blackwater back in Season 2. But the reason that I think it deserved its own episode is the Wall is the heart of the conflict behind everything else. It’s the root of the real danger to Westeros. And instead of taking the opportunity to really play up that danger, the writers and directors showed an enjoyable but pretty traditional battle.
Laura
Yes. We barely got a mention of the White Walkers, beyond remembering Sam’s lucky slaying and Jon telling Sam to be sure to burn the dead. I suppose I should’ve been wowed by the giant fire that Mance lit, but mostly — as you said earlier, Corrin — I wanted MANCE!
Corrin
There was a lot to like, but it felt like a missed opportunity.
Laura
I saw some complaints that this episode had less of the unexpected character development we got from Blackwater (which of course everyone compares this to), but on that front I actually think the episode did well. On the pacing part and on the big-picture issues of who the wildlings are and what comes next, it failed, or at least fell short.
Cheryl
This episode was about Sam and Gilly and their new commitment, Sam proving himself as a Night’s Watchman, and Jon proving himself as leader. And how people’s characters come to the fore in battle.
Laura
I like that we saw both Sam and Jon as young adults at times (discussing sex, or trying to anyway) and then as grown men, mostly by necessity (Sam’s crossbow to the big Thenn, Jon’s leadership atop the Wall).
We saw the same for their compatriots, including those poor doomed six at the inner gate facing the giant. That was the most emotionally charged moment of the episode, for me.
Cheryl
To me the talk was less about sex and more about merging with another — and that conflict with one’s larger duties that love brings.
Jon and Sam discuss love, because Sam says, he may never know it, but it turns out they all do have a kind of love for each other, not a romantic love, but something else.
Corrin
Brotherly love.
Laura
Those vows really do join them as brothers, in a way they didn’t really know before being thrust into battle.
Corrin
Interestingly, I think we saw that although love is the death of duty, duty isn’t necessarily the death of love. Sam doesn’t love Gilly less for having to stand with his brothers. Jon’s separation and betrayal of Ygritte didn’t end his love for her.
The most heartbreaking moment for me was the nod from the little boy who shot Ygritte. Duty killing love. And I just contradicted myself entirely.
Laura
Olly! Poor thing. So proud of himself for protecting Jon.
Cheryl
The irony of the most inexperienced archer shooting Ygritte through the heart, it seems. Would she have shot Jon? We’ll never know, but he seems happy to see her.
Ygritte’s love had turned her into an obsessive killer, robotically taking out all she could.
Laura
And there’s another example of the forced-end-to-childhood thing. All of a sudden, not only are these young men (including Olly) forced to battle for their lives, they’re reckoning with huge issues of duty and vows and loyalty and, most importantly, fear.
Cheryl: Jon was happy, I think! I mean, he smiled. He never, ever smiles, the dour thing.
Cheryl
One odd thing for me to insert: Sam lectures Pyp on how his fear evaporated at the moment he met the White Walker. He was trying to protect Gilly and the baby, and he lost his sense of who he was in time and space. That made me think of a lecture by Joseph Campbell, in which he referred to this as something like “single-focused attention” (someone correct me!): the moment you lose sense of consequences and you are simply focusing on one thing, which merges you with All, as in meditation. And to me that’s what this episode was about: becoming part of something larger in which you lose yourself. How this band of hoodlums, as Slynt says, can fight effectively together.
Sam has no fear because he is focused on the tasks at hand, whether going to the top of the Wall, fetching Ghost, aiding Pyp — he was doing what needed to be done. He reminds Olly to simply focus on his single task: the elevator (oh, and killing if he can).
(I could not help but think Martin must have heard that same bit of Campbell that I did.)
Corrin
That’s a terrific point, Cheryl! I think that ties beautifully back to the importance of the vows the Night’s Watch takes. In a moment every brother who has stood before a heart tree or in the sept to say those vows begins to see what they actually mean. The focus on celibacy is the product of peacetime.
Laura
For a battle episode, this was pretty dang psychological.
Corrin
The role of the Watch as the Watcher on the Wall, those who guard the realms of men, suddenly battling giants put that into an entirely different context.
Cheryl
They finally lived those vows. And what are they protecting … lands ravaged by war, pillaged by marauders and thieves, fields lying fallow?
Laura
Maybe this is an even bigger condemnation of Janos Slynt: he refused to watch, literally. He denied giants exist even as they literally knocked at his gate.
Cowards aren’t all bad, I think, since it can be seen as natural (especially for the younger, inexperienced lads). But refusal to do the root task of your vow, i.e., watch? That’s bad shit.
Cheryl
Yes, Laura, even Gilly proved braver than Slynt, who is prepared to uses all she has at hand — a hunk of frozen meat — to fight with.
Corrin
Janos Slynt seemed to represent the entirety of the South. How they have ignored the requests for help from the Wall and dismissed the concerns as “snarks and grumpkins.”
Cheryl
Denial! Trying to enforce his worldview on a very different reality.
Corrin
They would rather hide in their denial than face hard truths.
Cheryl
Did you notice that amazing, really very well choreographed tracking shot that sweeps the inside of the castle below as Jon joins the battle: we see Jon thrusting himself into battle, Tormund gleefully throwing himself at the carnage, and Ygritte obsessively unleashing arrow after arrow.
Laura
Now THAT is some camera work! Such a sharp contrast with last week’s bizarre shots during the trial by combat.
Corrin
Visually, this episode was GoT at its best.
The giants were awesome! Loved the shot of the bow shot from the giant. The power behind it. Especially in comparison to the puny human effort.
My one complaint about the visual effects of this episode was, does it have to be so damned dark? It was hard to follow the action and I was watching on a big flat screen in the dark.
Cheryl
So many of the night scenes are just too dark to appreciate all that choreographed action.
So what about that extremely odd story by Tormund, who claims to have had sex with a bear?
Corrin
It’s part of Tormund’s schtick. Tormund Giantsbane who once had his way with a bear.
Cheryl
And then at the end, after he is captured, Tormund resembled nothing more than a baited bear, growling, full of arrows, snarling and lunging.
And no breasts or asses this time. Come to think of it, this was a resolutely anti-sexual episode. Just show heads decapitated or hammers pounded into skulls: that will keep the male adolescent mind happy (HBO seems to think).
Laura
I like the idea of seeing this episode as anti-sexual. What really makes a man isn’t what’s between his legs, or who (or what) he screws — it’s his actions.
Which may or may not make both Gilly and Ygritte men, but we’ll leave that for another day.
Did this battle scene leave you satisfied? Or do you need another brothel scene? Please share your thoughts with us in comments … but please, no spoilers!
This is the best season yet. A whole battle episode, serving as a break from the rest of the story, is also a very welcome reminder that this is a book. Like Malcolm Lowry would say, if the battle scene seemed long to you, it’s because you’ve become interested in the other stories, and that’s a good thing.
The Starks are gaining strenght: we have Sansa at work, having blossomed this season; Arya has learned a lot from the Hound (and might still be reunited either with her sister or with those face-changing fellows); Jon has become a man; and Bran is in full posession of his powers. So that’s real development.
Dany is pretty much set for the season as she has taken the smart decision to learn to rule before attacking Westeros, but made the terrible mistake of letting go of a great advisor in Ser Friendzoned. So that’s that for her. The North is a mess that almost deserves to be taken over by the Wildlings. So that leaves us with just one more thing to solve….what’s to become of Tyrion?
I’m guessing the last episode will give us some resolution on what’s to happen to Tyrion, and this battle episode was just a break from that particular story line, which seems so central to the whole season. I don’t expect that to be an accident, they have to be giving emphasis to Tyrion’s character for something!
You are right, Fernando, the Starks do seem to be having a bit of a comeback — at the end of last season we of course had the Red Wedding and the death of Robb and his direwolf, with the head of the animal stuck on Robb’s body; this time round we have Jon taking command and his pet is making dinner of his adversaries. I’m kind of wondering about Rikon, who has disappeared; I’m hoping we might check in with him in the season ender (and he’ll look five years older).
Speaking as a book-reader (but remaining spoiler-free), there are a lot of story lines coming to a head right now. I’m almost sure the show can’t tackle all of them next week, even with the extra 10 minutes they’ve allotted to the finale episode. I agree that the remaining Starks are ascending again. Perhaps that’s why the opening credits left in the burning Winterfell all this season and last. Now I want to check if it has shown up before every episode…I think it has! That alone has to tell us that the Starks and the North aren’t subplots. They’re central.
Related: Intriguing point about Rickon, Cheryl! I do hope we catch up with him soon, if only to see what he knows and how he and Osha are hiding.
I was pleased that they used proper commands for the archers; Nock – Draw – Loose. I have a vague recollection of Dany, when bombarding the slavers with the barrels full of slave collars, using the command “Fire” (which you wouldn’t, pre-gunpowder). Maybe it’s some dragonmother thing.
I, too, enjoyed seeing the giant shooting enormous arrows, and the watchers firing back with a ballista. It made me think of the Troll watchman Detritus in Discworld, who uses a siege ballista as a handheld weapon.
A quick aside: “Twat” isn’t that offensive in British English. Even the conservative Prime Minister Cameron recently said ” too many twits might make a twat”. It has sort of lost the genital meaning, and now mainly means “clumsy idiot”. Cf. “twatted” = extremely drunk. Or “twat him” = hit him really hard.
My inner armchair strategist sneered with contempt as I saw the pitiful ramparts where Pyp (R.I.P) and Sam were stationed at the start of the battle. Why would you have firing positions large enough for a guy called “Giantsbane” to climb through? How about some masonry, spikes and narrow slits? That looked more like a romantic mock tudor balcony than anything else.
Did Sam just invent condoms? And sexual loopholes? He is really the GRRM Mary-Stu. Look, fat bearded celibate cowards CAN be heroes and get the ladies! Rejoice!
It would have been hilarious if there had been an uncomfortably long post-battle sauna scene, where the surviving Crows sponge the blood and grime off of each other, in slow motion, set to some Luther Vandross. For the ladies.
You won’t believe me, Karl, but I had the same thought about the bath! I thought that would be the inevitable result in GoT world. My image does not have Luther Vandross, but that detail is, um, interesting. And who says its only for the ladies?? Maybe for next year’s pre-season Vanity Fair cover, all the featured actors will be lolling in a steam bath. With Gilly applying various salves, and Maester Aemon applying … wait a minute, check that.
Yes, it does seem that Sam is a lover not a fighter.