Game of Thronesjust gave us everything we wanted.
We wanted a massive battle that’s unlike anything we’ve seen before, and we got it.
We wanted to see Dany’s three dragons fighting an enemy all at once.
Credit: Helen Sloan/HBO
We wanted Theon and Yara to meet Dany and form an alliance.
We wanted to see resurrected Jon Snow in action-hero mode.
We wanted Davos to get a clue about Shireen.
We wanted Jon and Ramsay to have an actual conversationand for them to fight one on one.
We wanted the Starks to reclaim their home.
And of course, yes, we wanted comeuppance for Ramsay and sweet revenge for Sansa.
Sure, there was tragedy in “Battle of the Bastards” tooRickon, Wun-Wun.
But can we be honest with ourselves?
On some level, we wanted that, as well.
What we don’t want is a huge climactic episode 9 battle without any loss.
That would not be war, and that would not beGame of Thrones.
Was this the show’s best episode?
It’s hard to immediately process that question.
It’s almost certainly the mostexcitinghour and had the most jaw-dropping battle sequence we’ve seen yet on TV.
But we start with…
Meereen:OhThrones, you’re soThrones!
We open with the sounds of war, setting a theme straight away.
In the pyramid, Dany is pissed.
Dany’s initial idea is to dragon-nuke the other Slavery’s Bay cities whose masters are attacking Meereen.
Tyrion points out her Mad King father once had a similar reaction to an invading army.
It’s admittedly a bit worrisome that a varation on “burn them all!”
is Dany’s first instinct.
He dares to push back on her, suggesting a different approach.
While he arguably mishandled running the city, he re-earns his status by giving strong advice.
They meet with the trio of masters.
They arrogantly order her to surrender.
“My reign has just begun,” she tells them.
Then it’s on: an extraordinary sequence where the dragons torch the attacking ships.
It’s almost like some dragonfire fantasy version of the Pearl Harbor attack.
Dany commanded “dracarys,” but she probably doesn’t have to say it aloud anymore.
We just get the feeling that she likes to say it.
We get that tingling surge of pleasure at seeingGoTcombine more characters together for the first time.
The Greyjoys make their pitch: They have 100 ships.
He remembers Theon acting like a tool back in season 1 and never forgets a joke about his height.
But that was before Theon lost his tooland his arrogance along with it.
Yara points out he’s proposing marriage, but she’s suggesting an alliance.
Theon nods in approval, though it’s Yara who hesitates.
That’s going to be a tough sell back home.
So what do we even call “Battle of the Bastards”?
Not TV, surely.Throneshas been riding well above what’s considered television for a while now.
There was, if anything, a devotion to hyper-clarity throughout.
Staging a clash of Ramsay vs. Jon in the first place is a genius move.
Both born to lords of great houses.
Low-born mothers (allegedly).
Saddled with the Northern bastard surname of “Snow.”
Jon Snow acquiring an army through his noble drive to protect others.
They’re both so similar, yet couldn’t be more different.
NEXT:The Glorious Bastards
There is a parlay.
Ramsay and Snow, together at last.
Sansa, too, who looks like she’s about to vomit just being near him.
The bastard of Bolton starts with sarcasm, thanking Jon for bringing his wife back.
Jon has a counter proposal: Let’s fight it out.
We lean forward:Fight!
Fight!He tries to play on Ramsay’s ego, baiting him.
He’s researched his opponent, and he’s got the numbers.
So we’re disappointed on one level, butThronesis going to give this fight to us later anyway.
Now this is a very interesting and non-Sansa-like comment.
She’s trying to get into Ramsay’s head, and using some sarcasm to do it.
It’s actually like something Ramsay would himself say.
There are multiple levels of strategy talk here, with each character focusing on a different element.
For Tormund, a battle is an act of aggression, not planning.
For Jon and Davos, the battle is about military tactics.
For Sansa, it’s about Ramsay’s psychology.
Jon and Davos plot a pincer movement.
“He’s going to play games with you,” Sansa warns.
“Whatever it is he wants you to do, don’t do it.”
“What have I been doing all my life, playing with broomsticks?”
Sansa also warns him that if they lose, Ramsay is not going to take her alive.
Jon promises to protect her.
“No one can protect me,” she says.
“No one can protect anyone.”
Jon has a separate sidebar with Melisandre.
He wants her to promise she won’t bring him back again.
I buy that his mental state is such that he’s in post-resurrection depressive funk.
Speaking of that, Davos goes for a predawn walk and finds the remains Shrieen’s execution pyre.
He discovers the wooden stag he carved for her shortly before she died.
That little scene between Davos and Shrieen from season 5 now serves a new purpose.
NEXT:Battle Royale
The morning of the battle.
Ramsay has flayed and crucified some people just for scary decoration.
He then produces his trump card: Rickon Stark.
Fans have been assuming Rickon is doomed.
Ramsay tells the terrified kid that he wants to play a game.
He asks Rickon to run as fast as he can toward his brother.
He takes his chances and bolts.
What follows is agonizingly suspenseful and beautifully shot.
Ramsay leisurely begins firing off arrows.
We think he’s trying to kill Rickon.
And Jon does exactly what he must.
It’s their natures.
Jon almost reaches Rickon in time.
Then Ramsay’s archers take aim at Jon Snow.
We get a staggering shot of Jon facing down a calvary charge.
Jon is ready to accept his death.
His army is not.
They charge, falling for Ramsay’s trap.
And the battle begins.
What we get next is a series of epic (dammit…) battle moments.
What Jon sees here is an eclipsing darknessjust like the nothingness he saw when he died.
He realizes he doesn’t want to go back to that.
Jon finds the will to live and fights his way out into the light.
He was resurrected in epsiode 2, and now born again in episode 9.
But that’s squinting pretty hard to find a complaint in this hour.
At the start of the season, nobody had predicted this collective.
Two years ago it would have been inconceivable.
They’re like The Avengers of the North.
Wun Wun is their Hulk.
NEXT:Release the Hounds
Winterfell:Ramsay flees to the castle.
He thinks he’s safe.
He can wait it out, he figures.
But his castle wasn’t built to withstand a giant.
Wun Wun just dismantles his drawbridge like it’s a lemoncake.
Only the wilding have giants and a giant is what it took to win.
Wun-wun takes arrow after arrow.
The only consolation is that Wun Wun is his final victim.
We feel the impact of every arrow and flinch.
Nothing is going Ramsay’s way today.
Jon beats the hell out of him.
At a certain point Ramsay just relaxes and lets it happen.
His changing expression almost looks like some kind special effect, but it’s not.
This is cathartic for us.
But before Jon gets too carried away, he sees Sansa and remembers.
He doesn’t say “he’s all yours,” but he doesn’t have to.
Later, Ramsay is tied to a chair in his cell.
And there is Sansa.
Fans on Twitter are having a full revenge-gasm meltdown.
“Hello Sansa,” he says, channeling Dr. Lecter.
Ramsay isn’t even worried here.
He’s so arrogant that he thinks this will turn out fine.
It’s like he’s the hero of his world and everybody else isn’t even a real person.
“All memory of you will disappear,” she promises.
Enter Ramsay’s hungry, hungry hounds.
He’s very much mistaken.Nom-nom-nom.
Revenge is a dish best served while screaming his bastard head off.
Sansa starts to turn away, then takes a creepy peek.
Then, walking away for good, Sansa gives a cold smirk.
I might be out of superlatives to describe this episode.
IMDb already has it rated a 10 out of 10.
I can see whyThronesis betting heavily on this episode in the Emmys.
We have so much more exclusive BOB coverage: Read our exitinterview with Ramsay Bolton actor Iwan Rheon here.
Separately, Sapochnik also weighed in onstaging Ramsay’s final scenes.
Also: Sophie Turnerreacts to her final Ramsay scene.
We’ll also have a trivia question tonight (courtesy of the HBO Store).
Tonight’s prize is a sigil pint glass.
Has he ever had any lines?
And, if so, what was the last line that he spoke on the series?
