'Game Of Thrones' Season 6, Episode 8 Review: No One

Spoilers through season six of 'Game of Thrones' follow.

Sunday night's episode of Game of Thrones was an interesting one, perhaps more because of what it wasn't than because of what it was.

It wasn't the big showdown between Jon Snow and Ramsay Bolton---the "bastardbowl" as its called by fans. Nor was it the big showdown between Sandor "The Hound" Clegane and his brother, Gregor "The Mountain" Clegane---aka "Cleganebowl." So many bowls, and none of them yet.

Nor was it a moment of redemption for Jaime Lannister, whose moment of redemption is long coming, yet never arrives. Perhaps that arc has simply been erased. Perhaps Jaime is simply meant to love Cersei, and "kill every Tully" who stands in his way to reach her, miserable and cold though she may be.

We didn't even learn the details of the secret mission Varys embarked upon before the slave masters showed up on Meereen's doorstep; and when Daenerys returned to that failed city, she didn't speak a word. So many moments led to nothing tonight. Let's begin with the bloodiest. Let's begin with...

The Hound

Quite possibly the best scenes in "No One" involved Sandor Clegane. We first see him as a shadowy blur approaching a group of bandits. The four men are having a jolly old time when the Hound arrives. The first unfortunate rogue loses his head to Sandor's hand ax. The rest go down nearly as fast. The Hound tries to glean information off the last one, but the bandit simply swears at him.

"Those are your last words?" Sandor asks. (I paraphrase to take out the bad language. What can I say? This is a family friendly Game of Thrones review.) When the bandit responds with just another curse, Sandor tells him he doesn't even know how to die properly.

His quest for vengeance doesn't end there, and much to my surprise and delight the Hound eventually comes upon the Brotherhood without Banners, a group of freedom fighters we haven't seen since Sandor killed Beric Dondarrion in trial by combat, and the red priest, Thoros of Myr, resurrected him. (See my video post on why this is so important to Jon Snow's resurrection for context.)

This time around, the Brotherhood and Sandor are on the same side. They bicker over who gets to kill who, but in the end they sit down for a meal and some chit-chat about the future. (But not before they hang the villains who killed Sandor's friends. Sandor takes the yellow-cloaked man's boots.) Apparently Beric and Thoros intend to head north, where "cold winds" are blowing. Perhaps Thoros had a vision that showed him the White Walkers. Whatever their intel, they seek to recruit "good men" to their cause, which now includes the Hound.

He muses over the offer, but doesn't give a definitive answer. I want to make bets. I don't think he heads north with the Brotherhood. I think he heads south to find his brother. "Cleganebowl" may not happen the way we thought (read on to see why) but it still has to happen. Unless, of course, he runs into Brienne on the road, and they throw down. Then again, it's possible the two brothers never face one another, and the Hound goes north to help fight off the real enemy.

Speaking of big, fearsome warriors, let's take a moment to walk in the big, oversized boots of...

Brienne of Tarth

Brienne arrives at the siege of Riverrun much like we all expected her to. She confronts Jaime and tells him of her plan---to convince the Blackfish to go with her north, to help Sansa take Winterfell. Much like I predicted, the Blackfish doesn't bite. He cares less for Sansa and her home than he does for his own home.

This turns out to be a mistake. When Jaime sends Edmure to the castle to order the men to lay down their arms, he quickly obliges. Edmure was never particularly smart or brave. He would rather save his child (whom he has never met) and turn over his uncle and ancestral home than resist the Kingslayer and the Lannisters and Freys. The coward.

I am, at this moment, reminded of Edmure's failure in archery. Was this, in some way, his petty revenge against his uncle for unmanning him in long ago? Here's that scene:

In any case, the Blackfish goes down fighting and Brienne and Podrick escape. Jaime waves as he sees them rowing away down the river. He's given Brienne his sword. There's still some honor and some goodness in him, obviously, but I'm not sure when, if ever, Game of Thrones will allow it to really, truly emerge. At this point, Jaime is still obsessed over his sister.

I'm not a fan of any of this. I don't like how quickly they've killed off the Blackfish. I mean, here is a man who evaded capture at the Red Wedding, who rallied men to him and retook Riverrun. Then these men, for reasons the show does not explain, turn on him and accept Edmure as their rightful lord, despite knowing that he's under the Lannister's thumb. It's honestly preposterous. It's bad. It's one of the worst bits of writing and plotting this show has ever foisted on viewers. I don't buy the blind allegiance to Edmure. These are men who retook their castle under the Blackfish. He absolutely would have commanded more loyalty out of these men than the long-absent Edmure. It's all far too neat and tidy.

It deserves to be called out for what it is: Expediency at the expense of quality. For shame. The Blackfish's death is on the showrunners' hands even more than Jaime Lannister's.

In any case, we'll leave one Lannister for another and go pay a visit to...


The Queen Mother has a brief moment of victory followed by a crushing defeat and a mystery tonight.

The victory came when her cousin, Lancel, came to take her to the High Sparrow. She refuses to go with him, and so he tells her to stand down or their will be violence. "I choose violence," she says (and we've heard this before, in the many promos for the show, but now we see it play out.) Ser Gregor "The Zombie Mountain" Clegane takes the first faith militant that attacks him and rips his head off with his bare hands.

It's actually a very satisfying moment. The Mountain is a villain. Cersei is a villain. Qyburn, the ex-Maester is a villain. They're bad people. And yet, at the same time, it's quite lovely to see the Sparrows taken down a notch, to see them quake in fear. Their arrogance is palpable at this point. Their leader is very good at the game of thrones, and they ride his coattails with a cocky self-righteousness that just begs to be deflated.

It doesn't work out well for Cersei in the long-term, however. Later she finds herself in the throne room where her son, the malleable Tommen, does more damage to her than Joffrey ever managed. Under the direction of his new master, the High Sparrow, he abolishes trial by combat. So much for Cersei's one last chance. So much for Loras Tyrell's chances also.

So much for Cleganebowl. Maybe.

Crestfallen, Cersei and Qyburn talk in whispers.

"Your grace," says Qyburn. "That old rumor that you told me about. My little birds investigated."

"And?" asks Cersei. "Is it just a rumor or something more?"

"More," says the maester. "Much more."

This is, I suspect, all about the wildfire. Is Cersei getting ready to burn King's Landing to the ground? Or perhaps just the High Sparrow? We shall see.

For now, let's pay a visit to another strong female character...


I'm a little disappointed that some of the fan theories didn't come true tonight. I mean, I'm glad that Arya didn't join the Faceless Men, and proclaimed herself as Arya Stark and not "no girl" (as I predicted in my 10 predictions post) but I'm not as happy about how last week and this week resolved things.

My favorite fan theory was the "Fight Club" one, in which the waif and Arya were one and the same person---two warring sides. In this theory, the waif was nothing more than a part of Arya's mind that wanted to erase her, to fully become "not a girl." If this had played out the way the theory suspected it would, Arya would be killed by the waif, who would then return to Jaqen H'ghar and tell him that Arya was dead. Then we would see her remove her face and Arya would be underneath, fully transformed into an assassin of the many-faced god.

Instead, it turns out that last week's carefree Arya was just acting totally out of character, and that multiple deep stab wounds to her stomach were nothing more than "a flesh wound." Mere scratches. Several stabs to the gut would remove a hardened warrior from battle for a good long time, but Arya manages to be up and running almost instantly, thanks to some tender love and care at the hands of Lady Crane.

Of course, Lady Crane is killed in the process, horrifically by the waif. It's kind of a waste of that entire storyline, to be honest. Then Arya is chased through the streets of Braavos by the waif, only to get to where she hid Needle. She faces her adversary, slices the candle in half, dousing the flame, and then...

We don't even get to see the fight. She just wins (apparently, though since we don't see the fight and these assassins disguise themselves as others it's possible the waif won and killed Arya) and we don't get to enjoy the moment.

I'm sort of baffled by how much of a letdown Arya's story turned out to be, even if I'm glad she's heading back to Westeros at last. What was the point of her being in Braavos to begin with, though? I don't see it.

We won't tarry here long either. Instead let's move on to the most entertaining dwarf in the world...


I really enjoyed Tyrion's drinking scene with Missandei and Grey Worm. He got them to drink! He got them to tell jokes! These are, quite possibly, Tyrion's greatest victories of the season.

After all, even though he's gotten a bunch of Lord of Light fanatics to come talk up Dany, his truce with the slave masters has resulted in nothing but a massive naval invasion.

The slave masters of the various neighboring slaver cities arrive in full force and attack Meereen. Just at that moment, Dany and Drogon also arrive and...say nothing.

Truly, this was the weirdest moment of the episode. Dany arrives as the enemy attacks and...nothing happens. She doesn't even speak.

Okay then, we won't bother with Meereen. Bad guys are attacking. Dany and her retinue probably shouldn't still be in Meereen to begin with. I have a hard time caring.

Let's wrap things up.

A few final thoughts.

  • No Lady Stoneheart tonight. Probably no Lady Stoneheart ever, then. If she was going to be reintroduced it would likely have been by now. I suppose that Beric Dondarrion could still recruit the Hound and take them back to the grim Lady. I just doubt it.
  • Killing off the Blackfish was lame. I expected better. I said it once before but it bears repeating.
  • It looks like next week will be "bastardbowl" as Jon Snow and his army attack Ramsay Bolton and his army. I hope the conflict isn't immediately resolved. I don't want Ramsay to win both because he's a bad guy and because it would be terrible storytelling, but I do want to see this conflict played out over more than one episode. Sometimes this show moves too fast.
  • I still see Edmure Tully as Captain Jack Randall. Sorry, I can't help it. Also, to hell with Edmure. He may as well be Randall for all I care, the coward.
  • There's been talk of a Game of Thrones spinoff show. Can it be a Bronn and Podrick adventure? The Adventures of Bronn and Podrick Payne sounds amazing to me.
  • I made another video in my Game of Thrones series this week. This time it's "The Five Biggest Problems With Season Six." Watch it below and let me know what you think:


Not the greatest episode of the season, but I still didn't want it to end. Sometimes I realize that even an episode I have lots of complaints about manages to be some of the best television out there. Game of Thrones isn't always on the money, but even an off night can be surprisingly good.

I love the fact that Arya's story can finally move on. I love that we saw the Brotherhood again, and I love how awesome the Hound has become. I can't wait for the assault on Winterfell next week, even though it feels premature. Shouldn't the Starks spend a few more weeks gathering troops? Will Littlefinger show up to help, Lannister-style, at the last moment?

All told, this was the eighth episode of the season and it showed. The big battle is slotted for episode 9. Some terrible, huge reveal is slotted for episode 10---likely having to do with Bran and the White Walkers. I'm excited for the final two episodes, even though I really don't want the season to end, and another year to pass before we get to watch Game of Thrones again.

What did you think?

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