Game of Thrones “Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken” Review

*Spoilers below*

‘Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken’ was an episode that was used as a vehicle to move the many story arcs along, ending on a brutal, psychological attack on a girl that has already seen so much pain and suffering, pushing the limits of Game of Thrones even more than it has done before. Tonight, many of the stories began to show signs of reaching a conclusion and giving us some insight on how this current season may end for many of its characters. We got to see Cersei up to her old tricks, Jaime and Bronn in a spot of bother, Tyrion and Jorah captured by a band of unknown slavers and Arya uncovering more of the Faceless Men’s secrets. Unfortunately, it was the final scenes of the episode that stuck with me and fundamentally overshadowed everything that had happened up until that point—poor, poor Sansa.

In King’s Landing, Cersei may very well have sentenced Ser Loras and Margaery Tyrell to death. Cersei has always been a malicious and deceitful woman but tonight she really pushed the boat out and made me despise her even more. Lena Headey plays this role to perfection and it is detrimental for a character to be despised; it makes you feel so much distain for a character and draws you in even more, giving you more of an interest in the show. With Joffrey, I absolutely hated him, yet I couldn’t stop watching him. Now that he’s left this mortal coil, Cersei has filled his place with ease. Of all the players in the game of thrones, she is the one pulling the strings. In recent weeks, we have seen Margaery try to take her on and in some parts succeeding, but tonight it was the Queen mother that well and truly left Margaery in the dirt. Even with the return of Margaery’s grandmother, Lady Olenna (portrayed to perfection by Diana Rigg), Cersei had already twisted matters and got the results she wanted. The High Sparrow held a holy inquest to try and uncover Ser Loras’ lie and all seemed to be going relatively well until the final moments when his former squire and lover (or former lover after this) told the council everything and informed the room that Margaery caught them in bed together. Margaery had just told the High Sparrow that she knew nothing of it so with finding out that she was lying before the Gods, there will now be a trial to find them both guilty; one of homosexuality and one of perjury. It is clear that King’s Landing needs to be liberated; the sparrows now have a fearsome hold on the people and Tommen is a weak and pathetic king who will never be able to change a thing as long as his mother is alive. As much as I despise her, Cersei is a fantastic character and without her, there wouldn’t be a need to keep an eye on King’s Landing. With no Tyrion, Jaime, Oberyn or Joffrey, the capital of Westeros has become a very dull place. Once a city that harboured some of the greatest storylines to date now feels like a shadow of its former self and I can’t see it giving us much more this season.

Whilst on the subject of King’s Landing and Cersei, we did get to see Lord Baelish return. As much of an enigma that this guy is, we find out a little more of his plan. He meets with Cersei to discuss the fate of Winterfell and to inform her that Sansa is very much alive there, awaiting the marriage of herself to Ramsay Bolton. After some excellent back and forth between the two and some underhanded retorts, Baelish reveals why he has asked to speak with her—Baelish wants to be Warden of the North! I still have no idea what is really going on inside his head and after thinking I had almost figured him out, he tells Cersei that he wants to lead an army to the gates of Winterfell and wipe out the survivors of whoever is left after Stannis and Roose come to blows. Baelish is a swine—one that doesn’t seem to care who’s toes he steps on, but for all his treachery, Peter is one smart man who knows exactly what he wants, even if we don’t have a clue.

After her absence in last week’s episode, Arya is back and still cleaning bodies and scrubbing floors. When Jaqen approaches her in the night and wakes her up, he asks Arya to tell him who she is. With every slither of information, Jaqen whips her and shouts ‘lie.’ Regardless, she refuses to relinquish her heritage and with every mention of Stark, she gets whipped every time. A little later on, a man brings his daughter to the temple and tells Arya that she is dying and he cannot watch her suffer like this. Arya begins to lie (yes, lie!) to her, telling her a tale about being her age once and being brought here by her father to be healed by the special water. She picks up a bowlful and lets the girl take a sip of it. The next thing we see is the girl lying lifeless on the same table that has seen many other dead people occupy.  At the start of the episode, Arya tried to sneak behind the door that stands at the head of the table but the girl who is also staying there slams it shut. Now, Jaqen allows Arya to walk beyond the door and discover the secrets of the Faceless Men. What we get to see is a majestic hall filled with large columns, all filled with the faces of the dead bodies that they have been cleaning and preparing for something that wasn’t clear to her, until now. It seems as though Jaqen sees potential in Arya—more so than before, even though she has been a little apprehensive about her new home.  It is amazing to see how much Arya has grown and the reveal in tonight’s episode shows a certain future for her—one that involves Jaqen training her to become a Faceless Man, despite having his reservations in the past. Arya proved she can let go—lie to achieve results and fulfil the needs of those she serves but there is still a part of me that hopes the Stark in her remains in the end.

Tyrion and Jorah had an intimate conversation about their fathers and after Tyrion revealed that he killed his own, he revealed that the former Lord Commander of the Knight’s Watch, Jeor Mormont had died beyond the wall. It was a nice reminder of how huge this world is and that Jeor was indeed Jorah’s father. As brave-faced as he tried to remain, it was clear that Jorah was upset of the revelation. Whilst continuing on their journey to Meereen, they are attacked and captured by a band of unknown slavers, led by the Former Mr. Eko from ABC’s ground-breaking show, Lost. It seemed as though Tyrion was a dead man until he gave the leader of the slavers a remarkable offer. Keep him alive and they can sell his dwarf c**k to a c**k merchant! Yes, seriously, they exist and I’m sure you’re better off for knowing it. Once again, Tyrion’s wit and intellect has kept him alive, but for how long and how will these new characters play into Tyrion and Jorah’s story. This was an excellent scene and a genuinely exciting one. I was pretty sure that Tyrion wouldn’t be killed but that knife got pretty close to his throat and one thing we’ve learnt since watching this amazing show is that nobody is safe.

In what was the weakest part of tonight’s episode, we got to see more of the Sand Snakes (yawn) and Dorne. Myrcella was engaging in a little teenage kissing with her soon-to-be husband when the cavalry showed up—enter Bronn and Jaime. I was expecting a more emotional reunion between father and daughter (or uncle and niece if you are Myrcella) but there was nothing. Jaime Lannister has feared for his daughter and after travelling many miles to reach her, their encounter was lacklustre and void of emotion. It was cut short by those damn Sand Snakes though, so I’m not going to be too hard on them. These assassins/warriors/meddlers have shown very little appeal and when they interrupt this little meeting, we are forced to watch a dire sword fight between them all. Thankfully, Areo Hotah, Doran Martell’s lead guard breaks up the scuffle with that huge bloody axe, the same axe he assures Doran that he can still use well. Thankfully, the scene ends and we get to move on. I sincerely hope that we don’t see Bronn meet his maker in Dorne. It would be incredibly poor to see him die at the hands of the Sand Snakes; one of my few wishes for the series is that both Jaime and Bronn make it out alive, with or without Myrcella because—well—she is pretty dull, isn’t she?

And so, we move on to ‘that’ scene, but first let us start a little before, where the jealous Myranda bathes Sansa in her abode, once more trying to frighten and scare Miss Stark. She tells stories of all the women before Sansa to fall for Ramsay and how he got bored of everyone. Myranda reminisces of one such girl who was eaten by dogs after he grew tired of her. Sansa finally bites back with a proud, strong statement that shuts the annoying girl up. “I am Sansa Stark of Winterfell. This is my home and you can’t frighten me!”  Once again, Sansa has been left alone to fend for herself, but no matter how frightened she may actually be, it doesn’t show—not in front of Myranda at least. In the next scene, Theon (I will not call him Reek!) asks Sansa to take his arm as she is led to the altar for her marriage to Ramsay. She refuses which according to Theon will result in him being beaten but she doesn’t appear to care; understandably so—she still believes he killed her brothers. As we approach a dreary and colourless wedding location, Ramsay, Roose and the rest of House Bolton are in attendance, awaiting the pairing of Sansa and her psychotic, soon-to-be husband. After she reluctantly accepts his hand in marriage, the two return home with Reek and one of the most shocking moments to date ensues. It is destined to cause outrage because of its sensitive nature but there was more at the heart of the scene that made it more upsetting for me. As Ramsay stands before Sansa, he asks her why she is still a virgin. From this moment we know that something bad is going to happen; when it comes to sex, Ramsay can’t see the line between love, passion, hate and torture—it is all one and the same. When he notices that Theon tries to leave, Ramsay barks at him to stay and begrudgingly, he does. Ramsay commands Sansa to take her clothes off and when she takes a little longer than he likes, the wedding dress is ripped off her back and she is thrown on to the bed. As Ramsay begins to rape her in a truly uncomfortable scene, through her horrified and teary eyes, she sees a distraught Theon stood in the corner, weeping and completely frozen by what is unfolding in front of him. I’ve not seen something so far that has made me squirm in such a way; there have been many times before that had been hard to watch but they’ve been more of the bloody, violent nature. This was psychological, visceral and mentally scarring. I don’t condemn the writers for having this scene in—as I have never read the books, I don’t know how much of an affect this has in them or even whether it is featured but I have faith in this show and in these writers and showrunners. My one hope for Sansa is that it makes her stronger and in the end, she finds revenge and strength through the darkness. Sansa has been through so much more than any other character and it is getting to a point where I can’t keep watching her suffer. She needs to be saved and I hope that Jon Snow comes to the rescue. I half expected Theon to finally snap and kill Ramsay in the most amazing way, but I expect that grisly fate to be save for a finale—sooner rather than later.

Tonight’s episode wasn’t the best, nor was it the worst but for the most parts, we saw the story start to feel like it was going somewhere and I expect that over the next few episodes the finale will be set up superbly. There were some good moments but most were dwarfed by the final scene. I expect the next episode to feature heavily on Winterfell and the impending attack by Stannis and his men, with the aftermath of Sansa’s rape being at the forefront. Where the hell were you, Brienne? Where were you?