The Prince of Winterfell

This week's episode of Game of Thrones was a bit more relaxed in pace than recent episodes; what we saw this week seemed to be setting things into position for a breakneck final two episodes of the season. Still, I found it a very entertaining hour with many great character moments.

The episode started with Yara (that's Asha to us book readers) showing up at Winterfell to trade barbs with Theon -- the equivalent of a fight with an unarmed man. It was an interesting scene in that once all the bluster was done and the spectators dismissed, Yara actually opened up with some genuine sympathy for her brother.

Beyond the Wall, Halfhand is trying to set Jon up to be a double agent among the Wildlings. Personally, I feel like Ygritte has been portrayed as far too clever to believe it, and the careful look she gave Jon as she gathered him up seemed to indicate she didn't quite trust it.

There was some fantastic verbal jousting this week between Tyrion and Bronn, and Tyrion and Varys. There was also a great exchange with Cersei, who believed she'd located Tyrion's beloved, though we the audience learned she'd been in error.

In a scene added from the book, we saw Robb and Talisa's relationship... advance considerably farther. With Robb not being a perspective character in the book, and his story told only through Catelyn's perspective, his relationship with Jeyne (is this meant to be the same character on the show?) was a relationship that was really hard to grasp in the book. Catelyn, of course, doesn't want this relationship to happen, and so is quite disdainful of it. We don't really get to see any of what draws Robb and Jeyne together. I'm not entirely sure I see the romantic allure of stories of severed limbs and near-drowning victims, but at least an effort is being made here to, ahem, flesh things out.

Jamie and Brienne are now on the way to King's Landing together, in a storyline not created, but rather moved forward from the third book, A Storm of Swords. I'm curious to see just how far the writers pursue this story this season. Or perhaps they'll invent a brief subplot for them to play in the next few episodes remaining this year, delaying the unfolding of the story as originally written for next year.

Arya found a clever way to use her final "death," arranging for her escape (along with her friends). This was all from the book, but very entertaining to watch, I thought. Her wry adopting of Jaqen's unusual speech pattern made her twisting the knife on him that much more enjoyable.

Uh... Dany made a probably unnecessary appearance. I hope that the depiction of the House of the Undying turns out pretty cool, because they certainly are building it up and drawing it out.

Lastly, the revelation that Bran and Rickon are still alive. I wonder if any show viewers who hadn't read the books really believed in their deaths last week, but in any case, I'm glad the show didn't try to drag this out for too long. Still, I think the whole ruse goes to show how stupid and short-sighted Theon is. He brought back the bodies of the farmer's kids, believing that he'd only be able to control the people by pretending the Stark boys were dead. He did not anticipate that it would just fan the flames of anger against him, nor did he apparently have a plan if the two were to show up alive later. Stupid, stupid Theon.

Next week, we get the episode that George R.R. Martin took time off to write himself, instead of actually writing the next book. It had better be good.