Game of Thrones (Season 6) Recap/SPOILER Review

This review contains MAJOR SPOILERS. For my spoiler free review of Game of Thrones click here.

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With the Season 6 finale airing just days ago and fans everywhere giddy with excitement for the next season of Thrones, including myself, I thought I’d take a look back at Season 6 in its entirety and do an episode by episode review. The end is certainly close, it’s likely there will be two more shortened seasons containing just 13 episodes in total, 7 in Season 7 and 6 in Season 8. Season 6 also marks the first departure from the books, as George R.R. Martin hasn't written them yet, but luckily I don’t care about the books at all, I haven’t read them, and I don’t intend to, we’re talking strictly about the show, the books don’t matter here! Right, let’s dive into this thing!

Episode 1: The Red Woman
Picking up right where Season 5 left off with the murder of Jon Snow, we’re thrown right back into the action! Castle Black is in panic, Jon’s body is discovered and there’s a divide in the ranks, with Davos, Edd, Melisandre, and a few other Jon loyalists locking themselves inside from Thorne and the rest of the Night’s Watch. Sansa and Reek, ah, go on then, let’s call him Theon again, Sansa and Theon are mid escape with Ramsay’s dogs trailing not far behind them then bang! They bump into Brienne of Tarth, who swiftly, although not swiftly enough to be honest, she should of squashed those guys like bugs, what was with the struggle she seemed to display, come on writer’s, this is Brienne of Tarth! But anyway, it was still great when she showed up, and because of that, Sansa’s able to have a much needed moment of self-confidence knighting her, or whatever it is she did. Jamie arrives back in Westeros from the dreadfully dull Dorne, and the death of his and Cersei’s daughter is immediately addressed, it was sad, and we actually felt some sympathy for Cersei, say what you will about her, but as Jamie puts it later in the Season, there’s nothing she wouldn't do to protect her children, and here was another one, dead. Margaery is still locked up by The High Sparrow, Arya is still getting abused by the Waif under the Faceless Man’s rule, Daenerys has been captured by the Dothraki, which I thought was clumsily handled, either she was lucky and came across the most subdue Dothraki warriors out there, or the writers are trivialising the brutality of these lot which was firmly established in Season 1, I just thought the little ‘humorous’ back and forth between them was a little out of place. Meanwhile, Tyrion and Varys stroll through the streets of Braavos without a care in the world, don’t get me wrong, I love these two, they share a fantastic chemistry and I love watching them converse, but aren't they worried they’ll be stabbed by the Sons of the Harpy? Oh, and the women of Dorne murder and overthrow the King there, I'm with everyone else on this one though, Dorne isn't interesting! It was a shocker to see the true form of Melisandre at the end, a very dark and almost disturbing moment, but with the season being over now, what did it really tell us, not much, in fact, nothing, other than she’s arguably even more mysterious now! Overall I thought this was a good introduction back into the series and it sets the tone for the rest of the season.

Episode 2: Home
Now, this was the episode everyone was happy with and a lot of people thought it should have been the opening episode instead, I agree! This was an action packed episode! It begins with a flashback, Brandon Stark, who was strangely completely absent from Season 5? Returns and he’s still inside the tree with the Three Eyed Raven having flashbacks of a simpler time in Winterfell, back when his family hadn't been mostly wiped out. I'm not a huge fan of the use of flashbacks in TV shows or films, it seems a little forced, like a get out of free card to progress a plot or explain information. Ramsay finally murders his overbearing father and feeds his step mother and new born baby step brother to his vicious dogs, they’re going to kill him off this season any way, why not remind everyone who Ramsay is! I really loved the bleak tension they created at Castle Black; they did a great job capturing that edge of the world feeling here, it’s very atmospheric. Davos and the crew are still barricaded inside, Melisandre seems to have turned into a stroppy teenager, a woman who has lost all confidence in her faith, which was interesting to see, and Thorne’s threats are getting harsher! Shit’s about to pop off then the Wildlings come crashing onto the scene, giant and all! The Night’s Watch pathetic attempt to fight back is short lived and the good guys take Castle Black back! There’s a great confrontation between Jamie Lannister and the High Sparrow, and a great scene with Jamie and Cersei, again, we feel for her and we’re rooting for them, against the High Sparrow at least. Tyrion sets the dragons free in a great scene, well, all of Tyrion’s scenes are fantastic by default; he’s the only character who speaks for us, the audience, and the only character that seems to react appropriately to all of this madness! This was a great episode overall, more and more into this season it’s evident that the writers are giving fans what they want, and although that can definitely be a bad thing, the idea of pandering to a whining audience, it’s what we want! Oh, and after a seemingly failed attempt by Melisandre to resurrect the late Jon Snow, it turns out it actually worked, but if you didn't see that coming, you were living under a rock! 

Episode 3: Oathbreaker
Well, did anyone else find Jon Snow’s resurrection completely underwhelming? I think it’s a cop out in itself to even bring him back at all, but it just felt so disappointing, it’s like, okay, what have we learned from this resurrection? Not much, again, just that he was dead and now he’s back, but don’t get me wrong, it was good to have him back; it just felt unnecessary to kill him off in the first place. Arya is still being abused by The Waif, Tommen finally confronts the High Sparrow, but gets manipulated by his slimy words and they sit down and share a moment of ‘understanding’. Daenerys is still captured by the Dothraki, and her time with them definitely drags, Sam and Gilly return and it was a pleasure to see them again! There’s a fantastic scene with Tyrion attempting to awkwardly converse with Grey Worm and Missendei which was amusing, and Rickon Stark, the least interesting Stark child, ends up being handed to Ramsay, there’s more flashback visions with Brandon about stuff you have to have read the books to understand, and Jon has Thorne and his followers hung which was very satisfying, especially Thorne and that little shit Olly! It was a decent episode, fairly slow paced, and nothing particularly ground breaking happens. 

  Episode 4: The Book of the Stranger
Some great stuff happens in this episode, firstly, the Stark reunion, it was great to see Jon and Sansa reunited, especially after everything they’d both been through; it was a long time coming, finally, a Stark reunited with another Stark! They've had a tough time their family and this was warming to see! Tyrion is seemingly doing a great job using his morally questionable powers of persuasion to avoid mayhem in the city by bribing the Slavers, which Grey Worm and Missendei don’t handle well. Daenerys, still captive to the Dothraki, is waiting for her moment to strike, and when she does; it’s an undeniably empowering scene! She lets the Dothraki council know she’s not scared and refuses to do anything they say, and when they start getting angry and threatening to do things like take turns raping her she sets that hut on fire and locks them inside, and after a minute or so, when the hut is completely ablaze, she walks out, naked and unburned, and no, not CGI naked, Emilia Clarke believed in this scene enough to get her tits out, and it was worth it! All hail the queen. Meanwhile, the tension continues to rise in King’s Landing between the Lannisters and the High Sparrow, Tommen is slowly being controlled more and more by the High Sparrow, Margaery’s trying to find an angle out by playing dumb, and Cersei seeks allegiance with the Tyrells, there’s some great dialogue between Jon and Sansa, and the episode ends at Castle Black, with Jon receiving a letter from Ramsay. It was one of the most exciting moments in the season, we knew it was coming now, a great battle, and the atmosphere in this scene was just fantastic! It was great to see the return of Lord Baelish as well, I was wondering where he was creeping around! Also, I've completely forgotten to mention the rescue mission Ser Jorah and Daario have been on this whole time, well, there, it’s mentioned. This was a great episode!

Episode 5: The Door
Arya is still being abused at the House of Black and White, and this has been going on since Season 5 remember, I'm definitely not a fan of where they took this storyline with her and The Faceless Man, it turned out to be very tedious and I thought it dragged. Brandon is tripping his tits off with The Three Eyed Raven on flashbacks, and, bending time? That’s too far! But we get a little insight into the earlier life of Ned Stark and the Stark family which was interesting. There’s a great scene where Sansa confronts Lord Baelish and puts him in his place. Theon and Yara face conflict with their uncle who recently stepped onto the scene and murdered their father, and who’s now challenging Yara’s claim to the throne. Daenerys says a teary eyed goodbye to Ser Jorah, commanding him to cure himself, and then to return to her. There’s a very strange interaction between Tyrion, Varys and another version of Melisandre, the red witch of Braavos if you will, Varys seems to be very defensive; they’re both hiding something! Jon Snow sets off with Sansa and Davos to begin recruiting their army against Ramsay. Brandon, after accidently letting the White Walkers know his location while ‘Warging’, brings them to the Three Eyed Raven’s doorstep and all hell breaks loose! The children of the forest, whose appearance they altered for some reason, and altered for the worse, throw magical fireball grenades at the zombies, The Three Eyed Raven dies and Brandon, Hodor and Meera make a run for it in an exceptionally intense chase scene, and It all leads to that final moment where we find out that Hodor is called Hodor because Brandon travelled back in time through ‘warging' during their escape and somehow affected him, and as he’s holding the door Meera is screaming ‘hold the door’, the past version of Hodor gets zapped with this somehow and it breaks him, sending him mad, repeating ‘hold the door, hold the door’ until it’s carved down to Hodor because he’s trapped in that moment. Weeping twats everywhere went ape shit over this moment, and although I will admit, it does work in its emotional effect, I do have to say, it’s a fucking reach right? Oh yeah, and that guy playing Geoffrey at the pantomime, he got his cock out didn't he.

Episode 6: Blood of My Blood
This felt like another mid-plot sort of episode, beginning immediately with Brandon and Meera fleeing from the White Walkers and their army of the dead, which seems to have been reduced from the thousands we saw chasing them in the last episode, to about 10, which is convenient because that’s enough for Benjen Stark, Brandon’s uncle who randomly turns up to save them both with his magical fire ball on a chain, to slay by himself. Honestly, I don’t even remember this guy. Brandon’s still warging his tits off and we see visions of lots of things, including the Mad King, father of Daenerys, screaming, ‘’burn them all!’’. The Lannisters are crumbling, Tommen has been brainwashed by the High Sparrow, and Jamie’s rescue mission is rendered useless! Walder Frey is introduced back into the picture, which felt a little, hey! Remember this guy? The one who had Rob Stark and his family killed, well, here he is, he’s back, and he’s still very much talking about that moment. While ordering his sons to take back Riverrun, he reminds them, and more importantly us, who they are, and what they did, it’s almost like he was about to turn to the camera and say, hey, remember The Red Wedding, and wink! There is no other reason they would have brought back this character other than to die. It was great to meet Sam’s family, and the bond between Sam and Gilly is one of the most consistent and strongest relationships in the show so far! Sam’s family seem fairly decent, except his father of course, who’s a complete cunt! He has a prejudice against Wildlings, and given that Gilly is a Wildling, it creates an ugly tension forcing Sam to step up and leave with her, but not before he stole that sword! The pantomime continues in Arya’s storyline and it leads to her making a big choice and going against The Faceless Man’s wishes, sparing the woman’s life she’s been sent to take, leading to The Faceless Man putting a hit out on her, making The Waif very happy indeed! Daenerys gives another Braveheart speech at the end from atop her dragon and everyone cheers! She’s still with the Dothraki though, and this was yet again another ‘motivational’ moment, although we were very much already motivated this entire time!

Episode 7: The Broken Man
This was the first episode to start with a scene before the opening credits, and oh look! The Hound’s back and he’s found himself a peaceful group headed by the man himself, Ian McShane, Al Swearengen! Who forms a connection with The Hound and gives him some kind words, he’s taken the path of pacifism, and by the end of the episode he’s dead, along with all of his followers, which was a damn shame! But it did lead to The Hound grabbing an axe and storming off to find the culprits of this slaughter at the end of the episode. There’s confirmation that Margaery isn't brainwashed, she’s just trying to play the High Sparrow, Yara and Theon share a wonderful scene where she tells him he either needs to fix up, or just go and kill himself now, because she needs him strong. Jon and Sansa are recruiting for their army with not much luck, but they do meet the child Queen Lady Mormont, who’s quickly become a fan favourite, and for good reason, she’s awesome! After a long scene between Davos, Jon, Sansa and Lady Mormont, she agrees to back them, but it turns out she only has 62 soldiers to give them. Cersei got owned by Olenna with the fantastic line, ‘’I wonder if you’re the worst person I've ever met’’, Tormund shows Jon some love, Sansa’s been showing signs of hope this whole season, and it continues here, about time guys, she’s been useless for five fucking seasons, at last she’s stepping up! Jaime arrives at Riverrun with the plans to take the Castle back, but Brynden Tully has other plans! I don’t remember who Brynden is, or why he matters. Arya gets stabbed in the stomach multiple times by The Waif, narrowly escaping death, but let’s be honest here, getting stabbed like that, she would without a shadow of a doubt be dead, she’s not though, and the episode ends with her running off through the busy streets. 

Episode 8: No One
The storyline with Arya and the Faceless Man finally comes to an end here, and oh boy, was it a storyline that dragged, a man doesn't care about this storyline any more, and to see it end was nice, but at the same time confirms that it was ultimately leading to this disappointing conclusion, Arya delivers The Waif’s head to The Faceless Man after an intensely action packed chase scene with her, ending in a face-off between the two in a dark alley. Arya tells The Faceless Man that she’s in fact not ‘no one’, she’s Arya Stark of Winterfell and that’s where she’s going, and he pretty much says fair enough and lets her go? Jaime Lannister grows tired of Riverrun and shares a great speech with Edmure Tully, telling him he loves Cersei and he’s willing to kill every Tully alive to be able to return to her if that’s what it takes, which was pretty intense! Cersei unleashes The Mountain on a few of The High Sparrow’s religious maniacs, and he literally pulls a head from its shoulders, which was nice to see. Tyrion continues to share moments of awkwardness with Grey Worm and Missendei, who slowly seem to be opening up to him, he asks them to drink, they connect, and then suddenly the Masters begin to attack the city from Slavers Bay, Tyrions diplomacy hadn't worked and things were getting tense in the city. It’s worth mentioning as well that before this attack, Varys leaves the city, which was a very suspiciously timed departure. I'm not sure if I trust him any more, it’s a shame because I like him! Bryden Tully shares more screen time as we all struggle to remember who he is, and Jaime convinces Edmure to give up Riverrun. The Hound hacks a few people to death and then meets up with the Brotherhood without Banners, again, I can’t remember them, but they've caught the remaining slaughterers from last week and The Hound bargains himself the pleasure to hang two of the three. Oh, and Daenerys finally returns to Braavos amidst the siege, we won’t get anything more of that until the next episode. 

Episode 9: Battle of the Bastards
This was an incredible episode! Two culmination moments, the end of the Masters in Braavos, and the end to Ramsay Bolton! The episode begins with Daenerys and Tyrion discussing the future of their city, they meet with three of the Masters, and in the best use of the dragons so far, Daenerys climbs on one and rides out to the invading ships followed by the other two and they proceed to burn shit down! There’s then a great moment where Grey Worm tells the Masters that one of them must die, and slices the throats of the two that give the other one up, it was awesome! Meanwhile, back in Westeros, there’s a frosty pre-battle meeting on horseback between Jon, Sansa, Davos and Ramsay were they exchange some hostile words, Jon offers Ramsay a one on one, which he refuses, saying why would he risk it when he will ultimately win the battle as he has more men, Sansa tells him, ‘’you’re going to die tomorrow, Lord Bolton, sleep well’’ and rides off. The battle commences, and oh man, this was a battle! Ramsey brings Rickon out, and in an Apocalypto-esque manner makes him run while firing arrows at him, and Rickon, failing to swerve and instead running in a straight line, obviously dies, Jon gets angry and rides at Ramsay, with everyone following close behind. This battle was like a mix between the opening scene to Saving Private Ryan and Braveheart, it felt very up close and personal, and very heavy, it was pretty spectacular, probably the best TV battle of all time! It’s definitely a reach to say that Jon wouldn't have died the moment he was sandwiched between thousands of horses riding full force at each other, but it was still awesome! Then the battle starts to go badly, Jon is forced to climb his way out of hundreds of bodies that continue to pile up, and things aren't looking good for Tormund in a duel with one of Ramsay’s lieutenants, Ramsay’s army have them surrounded! It’s okay though because Sansa turns up with Lord Baelish and the Knight’s Vale, and they save the day, crushing Ramsey’s army, leading him to flee back to Winterfell with Jon, Tormund and the giant in hot pursuit. The giant bangs the gate open and Jon proceeds to smash Ramsey’s face into the ground, letting him live however, long enough for a final scene with Sansa where she sets his own dogs on him and they eat him alive, a fitting end for Ramsay when compared to Geoffrey’s more abrupt death in Season 4. There’s a great meeting of minds between Theon, Yara, Tyrion and Daenerys, I loved the chemistry between Yara and Daenerys especially! This is an alliance I'm definitely interested in. An all-round fantastic episode, this is what we had been waiting for!

Episode 10: The Winds of Winter
Onto the finale, and what an explosive finale it was! I absolutely loved the opening montage of Cersei’s master plan! It was beautifully executed and Ramin Djawadi’s composition for it was incredible, simple, but hauntingly effective! After two seasons of The High Sparrow and his religious takeover of King’s Landing, Cersei was striking back. The long talked about trial was taking place, Margaery was there, and so was her brother, but Cersei wasn't and everyone was waiting for her. Margaery begins to panic, shouting at The High Sparrow to forget God for a moment and think! Maester Pycell is stabbed to death in his room by Qyburn’s band of orphaned children, who also lead Lancel Lannister into a dark tunnel under the court where the trial is taking place and stab him, just enough it seems for him to crawl to where Cersei’s wildfire bomb is set, so that he can realize what’s about to happen, and then get blown away before he can do anything about it. I would have liked to see Lancel suffer a lot more, this was too quick a death for this cunt! The bomb blows the court up and puts a hole in King’s Landing, taking the lives of The High Sparrow, most of his followers, Margaery’s father, her brother, and most upsetting of all, Margaery herself! It was a shock, all of these characters gone in the blink of an eye, with Cersei watching the explosion from a safe distance, smiling at her success. Then, arguably even more shocking, Tommen jumps out of the window and commits suicide. It was a hell of a fucking finale to the season, and a very satisfying one at that! It’s nice to know Septa Unella is forever being raped and tortured by The Mountain as well, Cersei promises it will be a long time before she actually dies, she deserves it! ‘Shame, shame’ Cersei chants mockingly, very pleased with herself. Meanwhile in Winterfell, did anyone else find the scene where Davos confronts Melisandre on the burning of Shireen Baratheon a little too late? It felt like, if Davos hadn’t randomly discovered that little toy horse he would have probably forgotten all about it, and then Jon Snow immediately getting angry too, he wasn't even there! Come on! I'm sure everyone in the Game of Thrones world has murdered a child at some point, what’s the big deal? It just felt a little forced in. The scenes between Tyrion and Daenerys continue to be fantastic; Tyrion offers her some harsh but useful advice, ‘are you scared? Good! Only mad men like your father weren't scared’ and she officially names him hand of the Queen. Walder Frey’s in this episode, and why else would he be here other than to die, and he surely does, Arya feeds him his two sons baked into a pie and then slits his throat, it was a great moment and we learn that she’s somehow still able to change her face without The Faceless Man’s help, I'm not sure how, but watching her exact bloody revenge and cross another name off her list was very satisfying. Lord Baelish finally lets slip his mysterious desires which was a bit disappointing, so, he wants to sit on The Iron Throne with Sansa at his side, all that mystery built over 60 hours for that conclusion, again, it just felt forced in there, why would he suddenly feel compelled to let his true motives be known? Through more of Brandon’s convenient visions while he’s ‘warging’ we discover that Jon isn't the son of Ned Stark, but the son of Lyanna Stark and, recently confirmed on HBO’s website, Rhaegar Targaryen, so despite Lady Mormont’s powerful proclamation that Ned Starks blood runs through Jon’s veins being inaccurate, it turns out he is actually the true air to the throne, which is big news! The King of the North scene was fantastic, reminding us all of Robb Stark’s glory days and how far we’d come, it was emotional. The episode ends with a very animated Cersei finally sitting on the throne, she looked like Angelina Jolie from that awful movie Maleficent, it wasn't subtle in any way, but I can’t deny its effectiveness, this was a dark moment, Jaime looked horrified! This is where Cersei was headed from the beginning, and after everything she’d suffered, which she did deserve really, she’s finally snapped, the prophecy was true, all of her children were dead, and despite the pain she would usually feel, when the news of Tommen’s death got to her she almost seemed to just shrug it off, she’s beyond pain at this point! I absolutely loved this episode, it was about 15 minutes longer than usual, and almost everyone was packed into it, a lot of doors were closed, and the push towards the end is evidently close with all the key players getting closer to their destinies and their roles in the wars to come, and side characters being killed off in hoards. This episode is one of my favourites and I can’t wait for the next season!

A Few Final Thoughts Overall   
So, to conclude, although at times it was fucking achingly slow paced, (that could have been because I was watching each episode as it came out though which I don’t like to do, but because millions of arseholes have caught onto this one, it’s best to avoid spoilers and just watch them right away!) I really enjoyed it, lots of major things happened and the stage has been set for the final two seasons, it’s going to be epic! I'm going to leave you with a few of my thoughts overall, after having just finished this season. First of all, a lot of complaints come in the form of the book readers saying that travel times weren't respected, it wasn't taking people long enough to reach their destination, which I can understand if you read the books, but I don’t, so it didn't bother me at all, the only time it even bothered me slightly was when Varys, after being in Dorne, suddenly warped back to Meereen in the space of seconds, that definitely stood out. The Arya Stark storyline at The House of Black and White went on way too fucking long with hardly anything happening there outside being brutalized by The Waif. The fantasy elements came to the front-line this season with an over-abundance of dragons, White Walkers, a resurrection, more witchy stuff and even time travel, which makes sense given the end is nigh, but I definitely appreciated the subtlety it had in the show before this. They’re being forced to bring back old characters to kill because all the characters left are fan favourites and play, I'm assuming, major roles in the wars to come, so, Walder Frey, Blackfish, The Hound, Benjen Stark, the Brotherhood without Banners etc, are all nothing more than cannon fodder. The flashback scenes felt a little forced to me, and the show as a whole seems to be a lot more animated than it used to, there’s definitely been a change in style, I think it happened somewhere between season 4 and 5. I love the show, don’t get me wrong, but it isn't a series without flaws, and watching this extremely slow paced tale unravel can be painful, waiting a week between each offering of an hour! I'm looking forward to watching the entire series straight through when it’s finally wrapped up and we know where all the pieces are going to fall. I can’t wait to see what happens! Until then, thank you for reading all of this, I hope I didn't ramble too much, and I’ll see you for Season 7!

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