By Montykins
Welcome back to Game of Thrones! I don't know if you remember, but this show has a lot going on. Let's get to it in the short form, and I'll be back later in the week with all the details. All of them.
Up in the north, Samwell Tarly (you might remember him as "the fat one") got scared by spooky zombies, so he forgot to loose the ravens. And that was literally his only job, so Lord Commander Mormont is not at all happy with his performance. And even farther north, Jon Snow finally meets Mance Rayder, the King Beyond the Wall. Just in case you were worried that we didn't have enough kings on this show. Jon joins up with the wildlings, possibly so that he can make friends with Ygritte the Sexy Wildling Lady.
In King's Landing, Tyrion is recovering very well from being almost killed in the Battle of Blackwater. He's already up on his feet and being sarcastic at everyone he can find. He starts with Cersei, who parries his sarcasm with some gloating about how Tyrion isn't the Hand anymore. Then he works on Bronn, who has become Ser Bronn of the Black Water, not that any of the real knights will give him the time of day. Finally, he tries out his gift for verbal irony on Tywin, father of the Lannisters. This doesn't go so well as Tywin flat-out tells Tyrion he doesn't think he's a real Lannister, and no matter what the tradition is, Tyrion is never going to inherit Casterly Rock.
Meanwhile, Margaery Tyrell is making herself beloved by the people of King's Landing. It turns out all you have to do is give a few toys to orphans and the people will love you! This is a message that's completely lost on Joffrey, but Cersei seems like she's pretty tired of Margaery's faux-ingenuous style already. I bet she misses Sansa's genuine naïveté now.
Oh! And remember Blackwater? That big battle with the green fire? Ser Davos somehow survived it, and he's lucky enough to be picked up by his old pirate buddy Salladhor Saan. So he gets taken all the way back to Dragonstone, where he tells Stannis Baratheon that Melisandre is obviously evil. Just because she's been burning people alive! And he does this while Melisandre is in the room, so obviously he gets thrown in the dungeon. Good work, Davos.
And out west, Daenerys's dragons are getting pretty big. She's also got a ship, although it's crewed by Dothraki, who turn out to be comically bad at operating watercraft. The cutaway shot makes them look like basically the Keystone Kops of the sea. But they get Daenerys to a city where she has the exciting opportunity to purchase an army of brainwashed murdering castrati from some people that despise her. Before she has to decide, Barristan Selmy appears out of nowhere and foils an assassination attempt on her. He's here because Joffrey fired him from his kingsguard, so he wants to guard Daenerys instead. Maybe he should start by teaching her to keep a low profile, because it can't be a good sign that he found her so easily.
Get the scoop on Season 3 from author George R.R. Martin and the actresses who play Daenerys, Catelyn and Sansa Stark from our friends at Wetpaint.