Winter is Here: Game of Thrones final season, episode 3 recap and thoughts

Illustration by Jake Barnard

Episode 3: The Long Night
Warning: spoilers ahead

Wow. Just wow.

I’m sure that’s what all of you were thinking after the end of that episode on Sunday as well. For all of our speculating and theorizing, I don’t think anyone really expected that outcome for the defeat of the White Walkers and the army of the dead.

Can we just talk about how insane that battle sequence was? I honestly want to know how anyone would have made it out of there alive. When the Dothraki charged in the beginning and their fiery swords slowly burnt out one by one, I honestly lost it.

Let’s not count our blessings yet though—we’re sure to lose more of our favorite characters to Cersei in the next few episodes.

You would think that after defeating the army of the dead, Cersei Lannister would be a cakewalk, but remember that she has 30,000 members of the Golden Company on her side, and the North has… what, 10 people left? Not to mention the dragons might be out of commision after that battle, but we’ll know for sure in the next episode.

There’s been speculation that Melisandre’s prophecy about Arya (brown eyes, blue eyes, green eyes) may also mean that she will be the one to take Cersei’s life, but I seriously doubt this—Arya had her big kill, and I’m not even sure if she’ll live until the end of the show--she fulfilled her purpose, just like Beric fulfilled his purpose by keeping her alive.

No, I’m a firm backer of the Valonqar prophecy, and think that Jaime will be the one to take his sister down.

But where was fearless leader Jon the whole time?

According to this Buzzfeed article, we shouldn’t be giving Jon grief for riding a dragon the entire episode and screaming at Viserion. Apparently, he may have paved the way for Arya to get to the Night King.

The theory states that Jon was screaming the word “go” to both distract the wight dragon and give Arya a signal. Maybe Jon wasn’t useless after all?

Speaking of useless: how the hell did Sam make it out of there alive? Every time they showed him on screen I thought this is it; this is how he goes, but no. He managed to pull through, meaning he also has a greater purpose--a few of my friends think he’s going to survive and be revealed as the narrator of the entire story.

As for NOT useless: Lyanna, Jorah, Edd, Theon, Jaime and Brienne.

Lyanna showed everyone up by killing the wight giant. RIP to a real one. Jorah died a hero’s death while defending Daenerys (who was useless). But goodbye to the Mormont line--there go the last two of the direct bloodline.

I saw Edd’s death coming from a mile away after he saved Sam, but he took out a ton of wights before he was killed. Also, RIP to a real one.

Theon died with forgiveness and the knowledge that he was a god man. I don’t care how you felt about Theon’s storyline but his redemption arc was perfect and I’m heartbroken about him, even though it was obvious he had to die for the Starks to complete the arc.

Okay, honestly, every single time Jaime and Brienne showed up on screen I was certain Brienne was going to die. I really thought more people were going to be killed I guess. Is that a bad thing? But she made it, so maybe the writers will finally let her and Jaime have a little peace before the next storm begins, but we’ll see.

Now, I wanted to do a segment on who I expect to live and die in the coming episodes, but after Arya’s twist ending, I absolutely can’t trust my own judgement anymore. I will say I’m a firm believer that Jaime and Cersei will both be done for, but Tyrion will live. They need at least one surviving Lannister, right?

Anyway, since the semester is ending this will be my last commentary on the season. Feel free to shoot me an email at cadex025@d.umn.edu to tell me your fan theories and expectations for the final episodes!

Enjoy the rest of the show and have a great summer everyone. Valar Morghulis.