Image taken from IMDb.
dir. by Alan Taylor
written by David Benioff & D.B. Weiss
This year, Game of Thrones has thrived on balancing its blockbuster impulses with the nuances of its character relationships. When that balance works, we get "The Spoils of War", where everything falls into place and even easy narrative tricks like big battles and small reunions can be emotionally evocative and deceptively deep. For the most part, it has worked very consistently, and while season 7 is still eager to please, it's been intelligent enough to elevate its pandering in ways which season 6 wasn't.
Unfortunately, "Beyond the Wall" neglects a lot of that intelligence in favour of brainless spectacle and contrived tension, caring more about action and epic sweep than the grit and intricacy which once defined this show's main appeal. The story has been gearing towards epic blockbuster fantasy for some time now, and it's still often good at delivering the bombast, even when it's illogical and predictable as it is here. But when even the recent years of the show have accomplished so much more than this, it's hard not to be disappointed.
For a good while, this episode consists exclusively of exposition and banter. In the North, we see interactions between characters who are only now meeting, but so many of these are meaningless. The Hound's interactions with both Gendry and Tormund are often humorous, but neither his insistence that Gendry stop "whinging" about the past nor Tormund singing the praises of Brienne of Tarth to him have any weight at all. They might as well be saying anything at all to one another, as these conversations serve little purpose other than to elicit some chuckles and establish minor bonds between characters. Nothing Gendry does is affected by the Hound's dismissal, and Brienne has nothing to do with the northern raid, so why do either of these topics matter?
A little more meaningful is Jon's attempt to return Longclaw to Jorah, as the sword was a possession of the latter's family previously, but while Jorah's rejection further indicates his distance from his family name, that's redundant information which adds little to the series. We also see Beric recounting his religious reason for marching north, and while it's basically claptrap, it at least clarifies the series' current fixation on the battle between life and death. Death was always the enemy: in early seasons, it was the most terrifying force in the show, something which could happen to anyone at any time, and now it's the literal opponent which the series is inexorably marching to battle with.
South of the wall, the dialogue reaches a low point. In Dragonstone, Danerys and Tyrion talk a lot about their opinions of other characters. Danerys likes that Tyrion is not a hero, Tyrion fears that Danerys is impulsive or too violent, and both make absolute sure that the audience hears them say this. We get a little more insight into Dany's single-minded obsession with the Iron Throne, but not much which other episodes haven't already made clear: she is not afraid to kill mercilessly to reclaim her birthright, and she won't stop until all seven kingdoms are under her rule. Also, Tyrion suggests that Jon might have a romantic interest in Dany, because god forbid this show doesn't try to pair up its most significant male and female character. This development, while perhaps building for a while, only makes the episode feel even more cynical and watered down.
And then, in Winterfell, there's the manufactured drama of Arya and Sansa's story, where it's revealed what the scroll Arya found in Littlefinger's room was: Sansa's early plea for the Starks to pledge fealty to Joffrey. Arya then repeats her suspicions that Sansa is eyeing the throne for herself, never once considering that she received this information a little too easily. Sansa states that Cersei coerced her into writing that, and for whatever reason, Arya rejects this. Apparently, she'd rather distrust her sister than believe that Cersei would be so manipulative. Perhaps being separated from Westeros for so long has distorted Arya's perspective, but it's hard to sympathize with her point of view when we've never been given reason to believe Sansa would willingly turn traitor.
In a later scene, Sansa discovers Arya's collection of faces, and is justifiably disturbed, questioning what they are and how Arya got them. Arya vaguely explains herself and unconvincingly threatens Sansa, all while spouting unspeakably wretched dialogue. In both of these scenes, Arya continues the episode's trend of telling the audience how she feels about other characters, in this case giving an analysis of Sansa so obviously off-base that it renders Arya entirely unsympathetic. Worse still, Arya is again given no justifiable reason to be hostile towards Sansa, aside from that written note which she really should have reacted more intelligently to. In the end, this subplot comes across as conflict for its own sake, only existing because the writers are too lazy to do something interesting with the Stark sisters cooperating.
And of course, for reasons which continue to escape me, Sansa confides in Littlefinger, asking for advice. She receives an invitation from Cersei to go to King's Landing, and at least she's smart enough not to indulge the Lannister queen, sending Brienne of Tarth instead. Brienne begs to stay behind and protect her, expressing distrust of Littlefinger, but Sansa insists she can protect herself, which is about the closest she's come lately to recognizing that Lord Baelish might not be the most trustworthy individual. Hopefully, she can be smarter than her sister and express a little caution, but the way she's acted so far doesn't give much hope of this happening.
Now that all the expository parts are out of the way, let's talk about the bear.
If one image summarizes the tone of the second half of the episode, it's the presence of a White Walker bear. Aside from the glowing eyes and rotting flesh, and the implications of this animal being transformed into a zombie, there's nothing separating a White Walker bear - okay, let's be real here, a zombie bear - from a normal bear. A zombie human is a warped reflection of ourselves; a zombie bear is just another monster. It's also a little silly, and reflects the show's increasing obsession with showing off an increasingly freakish and impressive bestiary. Increasingly, the White Walkers resemble nothing so much as a generic evil army, and the fact that they are, you know, zombies barely even registers despite all the expensive CGI.
As much criticism as Jon's scheme has received, it had a lot of potential for good television. How would the raiding party acquire this Walker? Would they need to fight their way through a horde? Carefully isolate a single zombie? Grab one and run? As it turns out, the Walkers dissolve when the commander who turned them is slain, so all Jon and co. need to do is find a single party, kill the commander, and take the one Walker which is left alive. It's all very convenient, and more than anything, it appears this whole plan exists solely to get a major fight scene in before the finale.
What Game of Thrones gets right this week is the sense of spectacle. The bear attack is startling and horrific, and later, when the raiding party is beset by the entire White Walker army, the action is visceral and often exciting. Much of it is shot with shaky handheld camerawork, and several shots conspicuously hide the White Walkers' faces, but there's still plenty of thrills to come from this ragtag team fighting off an endless horde of opponents. The action choreography is fluid and inventive in ways the script isn't, and the presence of the Night King himself commanding this army, while blatant pandering, is undeniably a little exciting.
Early on, the action scene consists solely of the team running away from the White Walker army until all but Gendry are stranded in the middle of a frozen lake, surrounded by enemies and protected only by the ice being too thin for the Walkers to follow them over. Meanwhile, Gendry is running back to the Wall to send a raven to Danerys, and Jon's crew is depending on him to stay alive. Eventually, Gendry makes it, and despite Tyrion urging her to stay, Dany arrives with her dragons and burns down much of the White Walker army.
The thing is, even here the episode's logic falls apart. How did Gendry make it all the way to the Wall so quickly? And how long has passed since the raven was sent? At most, we see a day pass, as the episode cuts from the confrontation on the lake to Winterfell to Danerys and then back with only night scenes in Winterfell to suggest the passage of time. Still, once Dany arrives, we get to see dragons burning up White Walkers, and the biggest shock of the episode comes when the Night King successfully throws a spear at one of the dragons, Viserion, and takes it down.
Now, there's only so much impact this can have, because the dragons aren't really characters and they're a lot harder to care about than the humans on the ground. At the end, there's some pathos to be found in Dany mourning Viserion, and that scene of mourning is very well acted, but it also serves as a reminder that the show's original draw - that any character could die - is no longer accurate. Out of the main seven characters to head north of the Wall, only Thoros dies. He's injured in the bear attack and succumbs to his wounds out on the lake.
Anyone else who dies is of no consequence whatsoever, and as much as the battle tries to create a sense of danger to match its spectacle, it fails, because it keeps throwing in scenes in which Jon Snow ought to have died but then showing him having barely made it out of danger. At one point, Jon is submerged in freezing water, buried under a pile of aggressive White Walkers. But later, we see him emerge safe and sound, with no indication of how he survived both the freezing water and the White Walkers piled on top of him. At this point, it's clear that Jon Snow will never die, so there can never be any weight to the fight scenes.
Even Viserion's death, despite the pathos of Dany's response to it, serves an ulterior purpose. The stinger of "Beyond the Wall" shows the White Walkers pulling the dragon up from the lake, followed by the Night King turning it into one of them. In other words, the closest thing to a significant death we get in this entire extended 70-minute episode happened only so we can get another spectacular monster for later. As with the Night King's appearance and Dany's raid on the White Walkers, this is an undeniably thrilling sight, but also like those decisions, it's pandering, a cheap "cool" image which only serves to cheapen what genuine emotions the show is able to elicit.
Oh, and Jon finally pledges allegiance to Dany, for some reason. And, in a blatant in-joke which is still no less pandering than anything else in this episode, Jon actually uses the nickname "Dany," which Dany then requests he not use again. Hooray for boring romantic subplots, I guess?
Despite all its pretenses to dignity and high class, Game of Thrones is now driven less by artistic impulse than by the demands of blockbuster filmmaking and the urge to pander to its fanbase. Every time it gives in to those demands, it feels just a bit more generic, just a bit less distinctive, and just a bit less intelligent. The show fills a different niche from when it started, and there's certainly merit in that - as vapid and weightless as that final battle is, there's not much else on television which can match it in scale. But "Beyond the Wall" is a demonstration of all of the show's worst impulses, and even its impressive spectacle can't outweigh the feeling of disappointment which comes with that.
6/10
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