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It's graduation day at The Wall! Jon Snow is crestfallen to learn that he's only going to be a lowly steward (like Samwell), rather than a dashing ranger (like his uncle Benjen). Oh, and Benjen's horse comes back to the Wall without Benjen on top, so he's probably dead. When Jon and Samwell say their vows at a special spot north of the wall, Ghost (Jon's wolf) comes by with a hand in its mouth. So strange things are going on up there.
Ned has figured out Cersei's secret: all of her children are Jaime's, not Robert's. When he confronts her with this, she admits it, pointing out that the Targaryens spent hundreds of years marrying brother to sister to keep their bloodline pure. That explains Viserys, then. He tells her to get out of King's Landing, because he intends to tell Robert everything when he returns from hunting. But what he wasn't expecting was that Robert got himself mortally wounded by a boar, so the throne is going to pass to his heir. Which, in Robert's opinion, is Stannis Baratheon.
Littlefinger takes some time out from teaching prostitutes how to fake orgasms to give Ned some good advice about not rocking the boat when Cersei announces that Joffrey is the new king. Ned doesn't like taking advice, so he asks Littlefinger to let him borrow the City Watch to help out in the inevitable clash between Cersei's guard and his own soldiers. Littlefinger promises to do so, but then the Watch kills Ned's men and the episode ends with Littlefinger holding a knife to Ned's throat. Oops!
And out in Vaes Dothrak, Daenerys is having trouble convincing Khal Drogo that it would be a good idea to throw a few thousand Dothraki in a ship and go take the Iron Throne. He only likes to sit on horses and doesn't trust water. But then an assassination attempt is made on Daenerys's life! Jorah foils it and now Drogo is all set to go kill some jerks. He vows to give his son the Iron Throne, and he does a much more cinematic job of vowing than Jon and Sam did up at the wall. It's very impressive. Specifically, Daenerys is so impressed that I was surprised she didn't jump him right there.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!This is the episode that "aired" on the Internet a week before it was on HBO. Thanks a lot. Like this show doesn't have enough spoiler issues, right? Sheesh. Anyway, it's finally out there, so let's get to it. The credits have King's Landing, The Eyrie, Winterfell, The Wall, and Vaes Dothrak. It would be great if there was an episode that just had five completely different cities we'd never heard of. Out of nowhere, they just set an episode north of the Wall among whatever lives out there. Or maybe there's one of those stories where it's all about how the larger story affects some peasants we've never heard of. I guess I'm just resisting the steady, logical progression of the story. I'm used to things being more jumpy and broken up because regular shows don't have as much of a plan.
Somewhere with red tents. Jaime is reading Ned's pronouncement about how Tywin is branded an enemy of the crows. He muses about Ned's bad judgment as the man he's talking to, an older wiry gentleman, butchers a stag. Taste the symbolism! This is clearly Tywin, and he's the kind of person who butchers his own stags, if you know what I mean. He also thinks that Jaime showed some bad judgment of his own in attacking Ned, which matches my own perception of the guy. He tells Jaime that Lannisters don't act like fools, which I'm not totally on board with. Jaime says that he had to attack Ned because Ned's wife took his brother, so Tywin shifts gears and asks why Ned's still alive. For all the people on this show who try to act Machiavellian, Tywin's the only one who follows Machiavelli's actual suggestion of killing your enemies instead of leaving them alive to cause trouble. Jaime says that he couldn't kill Ned because one of his men stabbed him in the leg, so it wouldn't have been clean. Tywin doesn't care much about being clean (which is represented visually by Tywin being all covered in stag blood by this point) and suggests that Jaime cares too much about what people think about him. The guy with perfect hair and shiny armor? Heaven forfend! Tywin says, "The Lion doesn't concern himself with the opinions of the sheep." Then he assigns thirty thousand soldiers to Jaime and tells him to go march on Catelyn's girlhood home, because every day that Tyrion is a prisoner, the Lannisters lose respect. Jaime points out that worrying about respect is a little like caring what people think of you, because nothing shows good judgment like smarting off at Tywin Lannister. I really like how this guy's been on screen like three minutes and is clearly someone who gets things done. He's not all drunk and useless like Robert, nor is he tied down by rules and principles like Ned Stark. But he does have one principle, which is that he and all his children will be dead eventually. He wants to make sure that the family name endures and continues to mean something, which means that personal glory is secondary. By now, he has fully skinned the stag (symbolism!) and tells Jaime that he's blessed to belong to the most powerful family in the Kingdoms. And yet, Jaime's been a glorified bodyguard for two kings, which doesn't match Tywin's idea of what he should be doing. He would prefer that Jaime ensure the strength of the dynasty, rather than letting it collapse like the Targaryens. Man, I feel bad for the Targaryens. If you go back a few generations, this is probably not what they had in mind. Tywin delivers more motivation and goes back to his butchering.
Cersei meets Ned in the gardens of King's Landing and suggests that maybe it's time for him to go back to Winterfell, where he's less likely to get stabbed in the leg like that. I think she's right, but Ned has something else on his mind, because he's finally figured out what Jon Arryn was killed for. He knows that Cersei and Jaime are lovers. Cersei does not deny it, which I find kind of surprising. In fact, she says that the Targaryens wed brothers and sisters for three hundred years, although she doesn't add that that's a good way to end up with a dope like Viserys as the last scion of your once-mighty dynasty. It sounds to me like Khal Drogo is exactly the sort of person that bloodline needed. Cersei says that she shared a womb with Jaime, which gave them a special bond. Lots of twins share that bond, and most of them, as far as I know, don't end up having sex. Ned has connected all the dots: he's figured out that Bran must have seen them together, and also that all the Lannister children are Jaime's, not Robert's. That brings up an interesting angle to Tywin's worries about the family name. Even if Joffrey becomes king, he'll be Joffrey Baratheon. His blood is all Lannister, but for there to be a family called Lannister, Jaime and Tyrion need to be out there fathering some legitimate children.
Anyway, now that the whole story's out there, Cersei's perfectly happy to give more details, like how she "finishes Robert off in other ways" to prevent the chance of him accidentally impregnating her. She told Catelyn that she had a black-haired baby who died of some disease; I wonder if she was lying. Or if she killed the baby because it wasn't Jaime's. I guess we can decide for ourselves how evil Cersei's supposed to be. Although she does say she used to worship Robert. She was positively giddy in love. And then, on their wedding night, he whispered "Lyanna" in her ear, which I should remind you is the name of Lord Stark's dead sister. So that made Cersei hate Robert, and probably hate the Starks, too. Ned tells her to get out of town before Robert gets back from hunting. And to take her kids, too, because Ned doesn't want to be responsible for them getting killed when he tells Robert everything. Cersei says that Ned should have just become king himself. When he made Jaime give up the throne, it was right there for the taking. But he stepped back and let Robert be king instead, and we can all see how well that worked out. She adds, "When you play the Game of Thrones, you win. Or you die. There is no middle ground." She leaves the garden, and I have to wonder if Ned's going to take her seriously. Or does he think that all he has to do is tattle on her to Robert, and then everything will be all right somehow?
Hey, it's naked children! I wouldn't put it past this show to have a scene about naked tots, but they're just there so Littlefinger can look out his brothel's office window at them. At first I was thinking that it was a lousy place for an office, because these kids are running around being noisy, but then I decided that maybe Littlefinger just likes looking at naked children. Anyway, the scene shifts inside, where two women are having noisy sex while Littlefinger does paperwork. I guess maybe he just likes a loud workplace. Or perhaps not, because he tells the women to knock it off on the grounds that their fake orgasms are not convincing enough. Hey, one of them is Ros! This has to be rough for her, going from being the Number One Whore of Winterfell to getting remedial training in King's Landing. I mean, she was legendary up there. Both Theon Greyjoy and Jon Snow spoke very highly of her, and here Littlefinger is critiquing the details of her moans. He has Ros pretend to be the man and gives his employees some direction: "Well, go ahead! Slowly. You're not fooling them. They just paid you. They know what you are." Whore Lessons are surprisingly boring.
Littlefinger encourages them to "ease into it." He gives directions along the lines of "You're winning him over in spite of himself." and "He knows he's better than other men." Ros invites Littlefinger to enjoy them, and he claims to be saving himself for someone who is not beautiful, but who has impeccable bloodlines. He says that he was her little confidant, her plaything. Ros flips the other girl over so they can simulate doggystyle, which is how everyone in Game of Thrones likes to do it. Littlefinger never mentions specific names, but he launches into the story of how he loved Catelyn, but she loved Ned's brother. So he challenged Ned's brother to a duel, which he lost, but Catelyn wouldn't let Ned's brother kill him. Then Ned's brother "got himself killed before the wedding" and she married Ned. So from all this, Littlefinger learned that he'll never win by fighting. I really can't emphasize enough how distracting it is that he's delivering this monologue while two naked ladies are theatrically pleasuring each other. "I'm not going to fight them. I'm going to fuck them." It's not clear to me whether he knows Ros is all up in the Stark family's doings, or if she knows he's talking about Catelyn. Either way, his story's over and he tells the ladies to wash up because they're working tonight.
That crazy lady is apparently going to be an ongoing character, because she's carrying straw into Winterfell. Theon Greyjoy comes in to simultaneously sexually harass her and tell her that where he comes from, she'd be stakes out on the beach to drown slowly. And when she asks where he's from, he's shocked that she's never heard of the Iron Islands. And then he gets snotty about her telling him he's never heard of where she comes from, because she doesn't call him "my Lord." He tells her with pride that his father is Balon Greyjoy, Lord of the Iron Islands, and she points out that apparently Theon isn't a lord, then. She also calls him a Southerner, since everything south of the Wall is about the same to her. He calls her an impudent little wench, and I think he's just cranky because Ros left. Maester Luwin enters to remind Theon that Crazy Lady is a guest. Theon says that he thought she was a prisoner, but Luwin archly points out that Theon, of all people, should be aware that the two can overlap sometimes. Theon, realizing that he's been outflanked, enacts a strategic withdrawal from the conversation. Crazy Lady tells Luwin that she's used to men that could chew Theon up. She's only in Winterfell because she was trying to get as far south as possible before the Long Night started, with its scary things that hunt in the night. Luwin says those things have been gone for thousands of years, but she says they were only sleeping. Is this going to be a situation like Tywin Lannister where they get talked up a lot before they show up on screen? I'll put up with that one or two times, but eventually I'm going to get tired of this nonsense. Bring on the monsters already!
Speaking of the Wall, Sam and Jon Snow are up on top of it, talking about how they'll miss girls. Well, Sam is talking about that. Snow is too busy paying attention to the wasteland between the Wall and that forest to the north. And his vigilance is rewarded when he sees a rider coming toward the Wall! Sam rushes off to a horn, where he takes time to read the instructions. You know the sort of thing, "one long blast for a rider, three short blasts for an incursion of mole people, Flight of the Valkyries for helicopters," and so on. He takes so long that before he gets around to blowing the horn, Jon has noticed that it's really just a horse without a rider. Sam and Snow run to the elevator, which is still being operated by a single guy pushing a stick in a circle. I still think they should get themselves a donkey or something. As they ride down, the horse pounds through the tunnel under the Wall. I'm surprised they keep the outer door open like that. It seems counterproductive. When they get down to ground level, Jon is able to identify the horse: it's Uncle Benjen's.
Ned is out for a stroll in King's Landing, probably looking for some other huge political mistake he can make, when he's stopped by Renly Baratheon, who says, "Ned! It's Robert. We were hunting..." Uh oh!
Robert's in bed. This show has a lot of bed-acting, doesn't it? That's a good way to lure the good actors. "You'll get to shout a lot and twenty percent of your scenes will be in bed. And if you don't want to commit for the whole series, we have characters who die unexpectedly partway through!" Surrounding Robert are members of his family and council. He tells Joffrey he should have spent more time with him, showing him how to be a man. Then Ned comes in and Robert tells Joffrey to shove off. So he doesn't seem to have been all that sincere in that, since he's throwing the kid out of the room before he accidentally has a father-son moment with him. He tells Ned that he had too much wine and missed his thrust, so he got gored by a boar. Ned looks at Robert's grievous side wound (which, if I remember my high school English classes, automatically makes Robert a Christ figure) and Robert says it stinks like death. But Robert is proud that he managed to kill the giant pig with his knife, so he has a plan for a feast in his own honor. Everyone is to eat the boar that killed him, which is weird. And having established that, he tells Cersei, Selmy, Pycelle, and anyone else I didn't notice to get out so he can talk to Ned privately.
Now that he's alone with Ned, Robert is ready to dictate his will. He skips all of the titles that are supposed to go after his and Ned's names, telling Ned to go ahead and add them in. He names Ned "Lord Regent," who is to rule "until my son Joffrey comes of age." Ned, taking dictation in an absolutely beautiful calligraphic hand, writes "until my rightful heir" instead. He hands the scroll to Robert, who signs it. Robert tells Ned to give it to the Council after he's dead, so that people will say that Robert did one thing right. Ned will hate ruling, he says, but he'll do it better than Robert. And he admits that Ned was right about Daenerys and was the only one to give him the right advice. He asks Ned to stop the assassination and to help his son. Ned briefly considers telling him everything (I'm guessing about that; really all he did was pause for a second) and goes with, "I'll do everything I can to honor your memory." Instead of noticing how vague and evasive that is, Robert comments that his memory will be "King Robert Baratheon. Murdered by a pig." He would like to die now.
Ned leaves Robert and tells Pycelle to bring the milk of the poppy. They just keep opium lying around in case Robert wants some? It's good to be the king! Selmy tells Ned that Robert was reeling around from all the wine he drank. Varys asks who exactly gave him this wine, and of course it was his faithful squire, Lancel Lannister, handing Robert his own personal wine skin. Oh, I forgot about him when I was listing ways that the Lannister name could be kept alive. I guess he could father some children, too. There are bound to be more male Lannisters around than just Tywin, Jaime, and Tyrion. Varys claims that he hopes Lancel ("the poor lad") doesn't blame himself for the king getting so very drunk. Ned changes the subject and says that the Daenerys assassination is off, so the plans have to be cancelled. Varys says that it's too late, and she's probably dead already. I still don't have any handle on how quickly things move on this show. Did Ros get from Winterfell to King's Landing in a day, or has the time between last episode and this one been longer than I thought? Or should I stop worrying about the details like that? I guess that's also a possibility.
Khal Drogo and Daenerys... Drogo? Can I just call them "The Drogo Family" from now on? I mean, I'm obviously going to. I was just wondering if that was appropriate. I guess "Drogo" is his given name, really. Oh, well. Mr. Drogo tells Mrs. Drogo-nee-Targaryen that the Stallion who Mounts the World will have no need for iron chairs. And also that horses don't cross the poison water, so this seems like it's his way of saying, "Woman! I'm not going to take my army of horsemen across the sea to go seize your homeland for you, so quit asking!" Dany talks about "the dirts" where she was born, and he corrects her to "the lands." I will be very disappointed if, by the end of this series, people haven't put together a fairly complete dictionary of the Dothraki language. She tells him that the Iron Throne isn't just a chair, but since the Dothraki don't seem to have a word for "large, uncomfortable thing a king sits on," she has to say, "Throne." Drogo says that the only large, uncomfortable thing a Khal needs to sit on is a horse. Zing!
Walking through some kind of market, Jorah tells Dany that she should have patience. I agree, because she's only been married a couple of days, which is kind of early to start making your husband mount a massive invasion. I think it's interesting that Jorah is calling Dany "Khaleesi," although I guess that's just as likely to be him showing proper respect as it is him sincerely thinking of her as his queen. Back in that last scene, the subtitles made it clear that "Khal" and "Khaleesi" do translate to "King" and "Queen." Jorah tells Dany that Aegon Targaryen didn't take the Seven Kingdoms because he had "the right" or anything; he did it because he had the power to do it. And on a completely unrelated note, Jorah doesn't believe in dragons, even if people are pretty sure they existed hundreds of years ago. Having established that, Jorah goes off to pick up some intercontinental mail. He tells Daenerys to enjoy the market while he's gone. As soon as he's alone, he's accosted by a small boy who says that the Spider sends his greetings and congratulations. I wonder if the kid knows that "the spider" refers to Varys, because I think it would be more fun if he thought he was carrying messages for an actual spider. Don't look at me like that! Everyone in Westeros thinks there are ghosts north of the Wall, and they're mostly adults. A kid in Vaes Dothrak could easily believe that there's some kind of spider that spends its time sending messages of greetings and congratulations. And also, at least in this case, a royal pardon for Jorah Mormont! The accompanying note says, "You can go home now."
Daenerys strolls through the market with her retinue. She's being regaled by the usual shouting you get in a place like this. I consider myself something of an expert, since I've shopped at seedy markets in Tijuana and Kuala Lumpur. So my advice to Dany would be to strike a bargain before paying full price, make sure the Genuine Rolexes are actually running, and go easy on the bootleg DVDs. Oh, and maybe a joke about not drinking the water. Okay, that takes care of that topic. Moving on! Dany's attention is grabbed by a small, bearded man shouting about how he's selling pear brandy and something called "sweet reds." I was hoping that "red" was just what they call apples here, the way we call oranges "oranges." But it appears to just be red wine. Phooey. He offers the khaleesi a free taste, but he's just using "khaleesi" in the general "person who might be willing to pay some money" sense. As soon as Daenerys speaks, he gasps that she's from Westeros. One of the handmaidens says that Dany is both a Targaryen and the wife of Khal Drogo, so she's got royalty coming and going. Oh, now the wine merchant is much more excited, and somehow even more obsequious. He has a special cask of wine that he keeps in reserve for passing queens. He begs her to drink from it, and one of her more well-muscled attendants steps forward to take it. The wine merchant tells Dany that there are many in Westeros that pray for her return. Just then, Jorah returns and tells the merchant to open the cask so everybody can get a drink. The merchant is shifty and evasive, claiming that this is a wine you want to let breathe. Dany tells him to open it, and I like the way she's backing Jorah up like that. Of course, by this point, the merchant might as well be holding up a sign saying, "I AM CLEARLY GUILTY OF SOMETHING," but still, I always like to see characters trust each other. The merchant pours out a glass for Jorah, who smells it. The merchant praises the fruits involved while Jorah keeps pretending he's just about to drink it. Then Jorah quits screwing around and hands the glass to the merchant. He stammers about how he, a mere wine merchant, isn't worthy of the special Princess Wine, but Dany tells him, "You will drink." He raises it to his mouth, nods to Jorah, then drops it and runs off. The chase is on! He gets pretty far, but Dany's muscly retainer throws something at him (looks like a boomerang to me, but that doesn't seem likely). He gets grabbed and Jorah hustles Dany off. So was the pardon a reward for setting Daenerys up for assassination? Because it looks like Jorah has decided to stick with the Dothraki instead of going back to Westeros.
It's Graduation Day on The Wall! But since everyone in this world is drinking and whoring it up all the time, it's not clear what they do on Graduation Day. I might be thinking of Prom Night. Okay, scratch that whole line of thought. I'll bring it up again when Sansa has a subplot about picking out a prom dress or something. The various Wall recruits are informed that they used to be thieves and rapists (which the show calls "rapers" in an attempt to seem somehow fantasy-based), and some of them had proud families and blah blah blah. The point is that they're now all one family. Jon Snow is looking forward to being a ranger, because it's what he's always wanted. But now he just wants to find his uncle, which suggests that he's not listening to the part of the speech about them all setting aside their old families. Not that I can blame him. Sam says he's going to be a steward, not a ranger. Snow says there's no honor in being a steward, and Sam agrees. "But there's food," he adds, and that seems like a relevant thing to consider. Benjen was a ranger, and he probably got lots of honor. And now he's almost certainly dead. The speech continues, telling the recruits that the men of the Night's Watch live for the realm, not the king. And not glory, either. Everyone is told to think carefully before reciting the vow, because the penalty for desertion is death. Remember Twitchy, from the first episode? A deserter. A dead deserter. So there you go! The recruits can take their vows here in the courtyard, but anyone who keeps the Old Gods can feel free to go to a Godswood just north of the Wall. Jon will be doing that, and so, to everyone's surprise, will Sam. Sam's family has never followed the Old Gods, but he figures that his life hasn't worked out so great so far, so maybe a change of religion is in order. It's worth a try, I guess.
It's time for everyone at the Wall to be assigned a job, which I guess they'll do for the rest of their lives. There are three choices: builders, rangers, and stewards. There might be other choices in the grand history of the Wall, but I'm only going off what they say here, you understand. If "guy who pushes the thing that moves the elevator" is a specific job, nobody got assigned to it this year. Sam, as predicted, is now a steward. But anyone who was making a bundle by betting on the assignments is immediately ruined, because Jon Snow, Mr. Swordplay, is not a ranger. He, too, is a steward! And he's clearly crushed, because he thought he was bound for Greater Things. Ser Allister smirks at him. I think. He's always smirking, so I guess it's possible he was just looking in Jon's direction. With all the jobs handed out, people gather in their groups. Builders over there, rangers over there. Stewards just kind of congregate in the middle, apparently. An old, blind geezer speaks to the stewards and gives them their personal assignments. Sam will be helping him in the rookery. And one guy gets assigned to help "One-Eyed Joe," which I think sounds kind of fun. Don't you want to hang out with One-Eyed Joe? Jon learns that Lord-Commander Mormont has requested him for his personal Steward. He asks if that will involve feeding him breakfast and changing his sheets. It will! He's now completely petulant and asks if he has been taken for a nursemaid, and Blindy cuts him down to size: "We took you for a man of the Night's Watch. But perhaps we were wrong in that." Snow shoves past Sam and stomps off.
Sam catches up with Jon around the corner. Jon says that this is just Ser Allister's revenge, and it's not fair. Pip joins them and says that nothing's fair. By way of example, he's here because an elderly lord molested him. Sam points out that his original story was that he stole a wheel of cheese for his starving sister, but apparently Pip thinks "cheese-stealer" sounds cooler than "guy whose junk got grabbed by someone." I'm not sure this is entirely relevant. Sam finally explains to Jon that as the personal steward of the Lord Commander, Jon will be attending meetings and squiring for him in battle. Jon still doesn't get it, so Sam makes it explicit: "He asked for you himself. He wants to groom you for command." Snow appears not to have considered that, and says, "I just. I always wanted to be a ranger." Sam shrugs, "I always wanted to be a wizard." There's laughter all around, and Jon is staying after all. If this were a sitcom from the 1980s, this is where we'd freezeframe and start running the closing credits.
However, there are many important ways in which this is not a Facts of Life or Family Ties-style show. So we have to keep going. In Kings Landing, Renly Baratheon asks Ned for a moment alone. He warns Ned that even if Robert named him Protector of the Realm (which she did), Cersei won't care. He wants Ned to hang loose for an hour, during which Renly plans to kidnap Joffrey so he can be king himself. Ned says that even without Joffrey, Stannis is higher in the chain of succession than Renly. Renly doesn't care about the line of succession, because he wants to follow the precedent set by everybody jumping on the Mad King. Ned thinks that Stannis is more kingly, because he's a giant burly soldier, which is what Ned respects. Renly says that being a good soldier doesn't mean you'll be a good king, as evidenced by how lousy Robert's been at it. Ned says, "I will not dishonor Robert's last hours by shedding blood in his halls. And dragging children from their beds." So that's a "No" to the kidnap-Joffrey plan, then. But as soon as he's alone, Ned drafts a letter which he hands to a large gentleman. He tells him to take that letter directly to Stannis Baratheon. No one else. So I guess that's who he means by Robert's "rightful heir." Ned sure spends a lot of time thinking about "what the rules say is correct" when he should be thinking about "what's a good idea." I'm just saying, if he intends to bring Stannis in as New King, he should probably be laying some groundwork first.
Littlefinger enters Ned's office and calls him "My Lord Protector." Ned has had it with the whole concept of politics and secrecy and just straight-up tells Littlefinger that all of Cersei's children are Jaime's bastards and not trueborn sons of the king. Which means that Stannis Baratheon is the rightful heir. For some reason, I thought the armorer's apprentice would get the job, but I guess Ned maintains a clear difference between legitimate sons and bastards. Littlefinger thinks this the Stannis plan is dumb and instead recommends that Ned just let Joffrey take the throne. Then he can be Lord Protector for years and years! If he'd stop being all hung up about who's supposed to be king, he could just be the power behind the throne. Of course, he'd have to make Catelyn release Tyrion and wed Sansa to Joffrey, but that's just common sense. And then, says Littlefinger, they can just wait until Joffrey comes of age before they need to do something like swap Renly in. Ned notices that somewhere along the line, this became a plan where both of them are ruling the country together. Also, this is clearly treason, no matter who you think should be king. Littlefinger says it's only treason if they lose. Ned also objects to the idea of making peace with his enemies, but Littlefinger accurately answers, "We only make peace with our enemies, my lord. That's why it's called making peace." It's true; you're very rarely called upon to make peace with your allies. Anyway, Ned's rejected all of Littlefinger's suggestions, but he wanted to talk to him about something else. He's planning on denouncing Cersei in the middle of court (because that's the worst possible place to do it, I'm assuming), but she's going to have more soldiers there than he is. So he'd like Littlefinger to let him use the Goldcloaks of the City Watch to bolster his personal guard. Littlefinger mocks him a bit for not just saying something like "I want a bunch of extra soldiers on my side for when I try to stage a coup." He then gets somewhat philosophical: "When the queen proclaims one king and the Hand proclaims another, whose peace do the Goldcloaks protect?" Answer: "The man who pays them."
Snow, Sam, and a few others are coming out of the tunnel under the Wall. As soon as the door is high enough, Snow's wolf runs out into the past-the-wall area and proceeds (I assume) to romp around adorably. Ghost is a cute doggie. Excuse me; a cute dire-doggie. They go to a tree with a big wooden face on it and Jon and Sam kneel down and recite their vow. They will be wearing no crowns and winning no glory. Then there's a string of things that begins with "I am the sword in the darkness," but it somehow doesn't end with "I...am Darkwing Duck!" Finally, they are told that they knelt as boys but can rise as men of the Night's Watch. Sam has a little trouble standing up, because it's important to keep reminding us that he's fat. Sam and Jon embrace. Then Ghost comes back, and he's got something in his mouth. It's a human hand. Good doggie!
Back to Daenerys and the Dothraki. The wine merchant is chained up to a pillar and she asks Jorah what's likely to happen to him. To the guy who tried to kill Khal Drogo's lady? Nothing good, I'm guessing. According to Jorah, he'll be chained behind the horses and have to run to keep up. Until he falls, at which point he'll just be dragged for miles. Dany was hoping King Robert would leave her alone with Viserys dead (although you'll note that she was already working on Drogo to go seize the throne, so it's not like she was planning on staying in exile), but Jorah assures her that Robert's spies will always follow her. I'm pretty sure that Jorah is one of those spies. He's one of Varys's spies, anyway, which is basically the same thing. And Robert, he says, will always want her dead. I guess he's technically wrong about that, but I feel like if Robert makes a miracle recovery, he'll also have a sudden change of heart about leaving her alive. Torchbearers come in, followed by Drogo, who is positively radiating anger. I'm starting to think this guy is going to make a terrific Conan the Barbarian. He makes sure Dany is okay, then tells Jorah that in return for his help, he can choose any horse he wishes. These guys and their horses. And then he goes into an awesome vow, during which he stomps around and flexes his muscles and it's all Daenerys can do to not jump him right there: "And to my son, the stallion who will mount the world, I will also pledge a gift. I will give him the iron chair that his mother's father sat upon. I will give him Seven Kingdoms. I, Drogo, will do this. I will take my Khalasar west." And so on, with the wooden horses and black salt water. He'll be killing the men in iron suits, raping the women, taking the children as slaves, and bringing their broken gods back to Vaes Dothrak. It, in short, is totally on.
The Dothraki ride out under that horse arch. The wine merchant is chained behind Dany's horse. And he's naked. Not "artfully concealed genitalia" naked; "flopping around in the breeze" naked. It's not only ladies that get nekkid on this show. He's also stumbling a bit already, so that's about it for him.
Lord Stark is summoned to make an appearance before Cersei and King Joffrey. King Joffrey? Even without all of Ned's plans, I don't like the sound of that. Kid's a snot. Littlefinger tells him, "All is accomplished. The City Watch is yours." Varys says that Renly has left the city with Ser Loras Tyrell (the Knight of the Flowers), and they were last seen galloping south in some haste. I guess he could be either fleeing the city (not a bad plan) or rounding up some troops so he can make a move.
King (ugh) Joffrey sits upon the Iron Throne and tells his council he would like to be crowned within a fortnight. And today, he'll be accepting oaths of loyalty from his loyal councillors. That's a good move, which makes me suspect that it's Cersei's idea. Make people pick a side right away, in front of everybody. Ned hands a scroll to Ser Barristan. Selmy notes that it has King Robert's unbroken seal. He begins to read: "Lord Eddard Stark is herein named Protector of the Realm, to rule as Regent until the heir come of age." Cersei asks to see the scroll, and Selmy obligingly hands it over. She looks down at Nedand says, "Is this meant to be your shield, Lord Stark? A piece of paper." She tears it in half. Huh. I guess Ned's assumption was that everybody was as into honor and duty as he was. Once you've got something signed by the (dead) king, everything's gravy, right? Cersei doesn't care that the scroll contained the words of the king, because they have a new king. She recommends to Ned that he bend the knee and swear loyalty to the throne. That's a good suggestion. I'm with Cersei here. Ned says, "Your son has no claim to the throne." Well, it's on now, I guess. Cersei tells Selmy to take Ned. Selmy steps forward with the rest of the king's guards. Ned's personal guards also draw swords. So does the Hound. Joffrey shrieks, "Kill him! Kill all of them! I command it!" Yeah! That's how to behave as a king: just start demanding executions left and right. I'm sorry I didn't see it before, but Joffrey's got the right idea of how to be royalty. Gigantic weddings and plenty of executions! Ned, confident that he's got a trump card, tells the leader of the Goldcloaks, "Commander. Take the Queen and her children into custody." The men of the watch draw their weapons. "I want no bloodshed. Tell your men to lay down their words. No one needs to die." Then the men of the watch stab Ned's men to death. Littlefinger comes up behind Ned and puts a dagger to his throat. And we end on Littlefinger's awesome line, ""I did warn you not to trust me." Ned, you're terrible at politics.
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