As Sansa is sewing in her rooms at The Wall, she receives a note at the start of tonight’s GAME OF THRONES. She travels to Mole’s Town with Brienne to meet with Petyr at one of the old, run-down buildings. He looks pleased to see her and tells her that he came to help her, but she lays into him about Ramsay. She tells him she never wants to see him again. Before he leaves, he tells her that the Blackfish has retaken Riverrun and assembled what is left of the Tully army. He encourages her to seek them out.
At a meeting later, Jon, Tollet , Sansa, Brienne, Melisandre, Tormund and Davos talk about their strategy to take back Winterfell. Davos tells them they need more men. Davos is excited to hear about the Blackfish taking back Riverrun. Jon wants to know how she knew that, but she did not tell him about Petyr; she said Ramsay received a raven about it before she left. Sansa gives Jon a coat she made him, reminiscent of Ned Stark’s cloak, as the whole crew ride out of the gates of the Wall. By the way, Tormund is looking pretty goofy smiley at Brienne who shakes her head in disgust.
The House of Black and White
Arya spars with The Girl With No Name and Arya looks to be getting a tad better; that is until the Girl drops her stick and still defeats Arya, with her fists. The Girl tells Arya she’ll never been one of them. Jaqen takes her into the temple where all of the faces are located. He hands her a potion and tells her she’s been given a second chance. She attends a theater/stage for her target. The play is a parody of the King Robert, Joffrey rising, Ned Stark beheading, etc. history and Arya is none too pleased.
The Iron Islands
The King’s Moot takes place, but Yara is beaten out by Euron, who readily admits that he killed Balon, but no one seems to care that much. As Euron is being crowned, Yara, Theon and a lot of the men who are faithful to Yara steal the best ships from the harbor and sail off, with Euron promising to build a thousand ships and pursue them eventually.
Tyrion and Varys
Over in Meereen on GAME OF THRONES, we find Tyrion and Varys enlisting the help of Kinvara, the Red Priestess of the High Temple in Volantis. She promises to bring her most eloquent priests to help spread the word about Daenerys, as Daenerys is the one promised in the fire. Varys challenges her, mentioning that Melisandre saw Stannis in the flames as the chosen one. Kinvara is not daunted by Varys, bringing up his most painful past memories and telling him there is much still he does not know.
Bran
Walking with the three-eyed raven, Bran comes across children of the forest in a circle. They have a man tied to a tree and one inserts a sacred tree limb into the man’s chest. The man’s eyes take on the blue hue of the white walkers. Bran confronts one of the children of the forest and she tells him it was necessary to create white walkers because man was destroying the weir trees.
Later, Bran has a vision of winter and a lone weir tree. He turns around to see thousands of white walkers with weapons standing still. He walks among them and looks devastated. . He walks forward towards the Night’s King and the other three leaders who are all on horseback. The Night’s King slowly turns his head and looks right at Bran. The white walker army then swivel their heads and look at Bran, also. When he turns back around, the Night’s King is right in front of him and grabs Bran’s arm. Bran wakes up screaming and the three-eyed raven knows that the Night’s King touched him. The three-eyed raven tells Bran they all must leave because the Night’s King will now be coming for him.
As Meera is talking food with Hodor, she notices she can see her own breath. Bran’s eyes are white so he looks to be in a vision. Meera runs outside to where the children of the forest are standing. Beyond them, there are thousands of white walkers with the Night’s King standing out in front, staring at Meera. She runs in for Bran and violently shakes him, but he is in a vision with the three-eyed raven. They are back at Winterfell with a young Ned Stark and a young Hodor (Wylis).
The army of white walkers start advancing as the children of the forest throw magic stones towards them, to no avail. The entrance is surrounded by flames, but it is no problem for the Night’s King and the other three leaders. The rest of the white walkers run up towards the magic tree.
White walkers start falling inside as Hodor panics. Meera frantically tries to wake Bran, who eventually hears her screaming that we need Hodor now. In the vision, the three-eyed raven tells Bran to listen to his friend, as Bran stares at the young Wylis. In current tree-time, Hodor’s eyes flash white and then he is calm as he gets up to take Bran away on the stretcher. One of the leaders enters and Meera throws a spear, shattering the leader into tiny ice crystals. Summer, whom we haven’t seen in quite a long time, bares her teeth and jumps into the fray to battle white walkers…and yep, yet another direwolf bites the dust.
The three-eyed raven is left alone in the tree, in a vision, as the Night’s King slays him. Bran, Hodor, Meera and the children of the forest run through the tunnels. They go through a door and Meera yells at him to hold the door as she grabs the stretcher with Bran on it. In the vision, Wylis is now convulsing on the ground yelling “Hold the door,” which eventually turns to “Hodor” as white walkers in the current world are breaking through the door and clawing at his skin.
My Thoughts
Astounding and simply heart-wrenching. Kudos to the Reddit user who totally called it on the Hodor/Hold the Door scenario. Along with Bran, I had tears in my eyes watching the young Wylis. Poor Bran, all along it was he who turned that gentle giant into Hodor. I can’t even react to another direwolf death tonight. Why? That is all I ask, just why?
Spoilers ahead, but I read an article that Sansa (along with other members) played a game where they had to tell two truths and one lie about this season of GAME OF THRONES. Her three things were: Ramsay dies; Lady Stoneheart appears; Arya crosses three names off of her list.
Well, we all know Jon is going to kill Ramsay. Arya cannot kill Cersei, the Mountain and Walder Frey all this season, so that has to be the lie….which means when they get to Riverrun, I am betting we see Lady Stoneheart who will sympathize with Jon since she, too, has risen from the dead.
Don’t miss the next episode of GAME OF THRONES on May 29 at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on HBO and HBO Canada.