#tvrecaps

“I think everyone is getting along except one”  *Pans to Jordan staring at a cabinet eating avocado toast* ... Well who is it?! 

Group Date:

I always feel like the guys are way to excited for group dates. Those two words should never be together and it usually comes down to them measuring dicks either way. 

Becca brings all her girls out on the group date, including Tia, then invites Colton. This bitch just wants to dangle Colton in front of Tia like Aaron Fucking Samuels. 

The guys meet B at the spa, when she reveals that they wont be getting pampered they will be doing the pampering. Jordan looks like someone broke his hair straightener right in front of him.

Becca introduces the guys, gets to Colton and forgets Jason is even on the damn planet. Jason, you can shave your back now... bye Jason. 

Becca and Tia are fighting to see who can show more cleavage and Tia’s nipple is inches away. We do have to address that Colton is the one socks and sandals guy... there’s your trophy ladies. 

Jean Blanc: “We played as gentlemen and let’s all sit and talk with her.” *Becca walks in* Jean Blanc: “Hey girl, wanna come over here for a sec.” 

JEAN BLANC PLAYED YOU FUCKS! 

As B gets pulled aside from each of the guys, Jordan runs some quick numbers for us; 100% Bumble matches (4,000-4,000) - Those are all-star numbers bro! I would pay money to see his opening line. “Don’t be intimidated by my profile picture.” 

Jordan: “I know it’s hard that I am a model, I am not looking for someone pretty. Someone with a bright smile.” 

David: some dumb comment that wasn’t funny Triggered Jordan: “I’m a Wilhelmina Model (had to Google it), don’t be jealous of my three year deal with them. I am professionalism. I am attached to my face. My image is me.” As the Wilhelmina talent scouts begins to search their system to see if Jordan really has a contract...

Colton looks like he is in the clear, he gets the rose. Jason definitely regrets coaching him through all of that. 

One-On-One (Chris):

Chris and Becca may have traded jeans in the limo... The two pull up to Capitol Records. Guess who is waiting for them?! Richard Marx...... Yep no clue either. Didn’t look like Chris had any idea, cause he introduced himself like when the girl you’re on a date with runs into a guy she knows outside the restaurant. 

Richard tells Chris that he needs to write a love song for Becca... 

Chris: “This is tough for me, it all goes back to my upbringing and my relationship with my dad.” - Or maybe because you are writing a love song for someone you’ve met twice. 

If I stop talking about this date it is part because Trump and Kim interrupted it, but it’s also boring so I’m probably on Instagram. 

Quick update: Jordan still has his nails painted. 

Jordan: “I talk to God everyday, and God knows, you cross Jordan... You 86 them!” I believe that was Genesis 8:34. 

P.S. - Really not kidding I am done talking about this Chris date... I’m over it. 

Did the Bachelorette just become an episode of 48 Hours?! David left in a pool of blood and probably hairspray (looking at you Jordan). “He fell out of bed”. 

Group Date 2: 

The guys get to play some football! 

Becca: “Clay this is right up your alley” Clay: “Gee golly. Thank you for allowing me to come on this date” (Least manly voice possible)

But he is fucking people up as the G.I. Janes of the LFL (Legends Football League duh) scream in their face. 

What bet did Keyshawn Johnson lose to have to commentate this stupid date. He must have missed that note in his ESPN contract. 

Who the hell gave these nerds hockey masks!?

Lincoln: “The one thing we have that the white team doesn’t is heart” - The one thing that the white team doesn’t have is Lincoln and they are very happy about it. 

Clay down a touchdown with 1 min left

Until he becomes a bitch breaks his wrist. 

Becca is sending more people to the hospital than the Ebola outbreak. 

Evening rolls in and Garrett “teaches Becca how to tackle” essentially just politely asks her to grab his butt. 

Clay makes a grand entrance with his sympathy sling. “I told the doctors to wait for tomorrow, because I have a date.” In reality the ambulance dropped him off at a CVS and he bought a sling and some wrap. He gets the rose. 

BUT WAIT - Clay has a decision to make. Fight for the girl he tolerates or continue to play on an NFL practice squad. We have a real Sofie’s choice! He decides to break Becca’s heart/make her sending him home in two episodes easier and bows out. We will see him on a future season of Bach In Paradise. 

Airdate:  6/26/16 ; Season 6, Episode 10

Game of Thrones finales like to make grand exits, and last night’s episode was no exception.  We saw some major power shifts, establishing the next generation of leaders in the world of GOT…and a huge revelation was finally made.   And did I mention all the killing? Copious characters – including lots of main players –bit the dust last night.  Can somebody please do a roll call?  With a supersized finale, they packed a lot of action into last night’s episode, so let’s get to it and find out if your favorites survived “The Winds of Winter”.

 Get Me To The Sept On Time

 It’s judgment day in King’s Landing as the trial for Ser Loras Tyrell and  Cersei Lannister is upon us.  We have a really cool sequence showing all the main players getting ready for the trial.  Cersei is rocking a black dress with some serious hardware to get that full Rhythm Nation vibe going.  King Tommen and Queen Margaery’s servants dress them in their individual chambers, and when his crown is placed on Tommen’s head, he couldn’t look more lost. High Sparrow pulls on his special occasion burlap sack - you know, the one that he cleans once a month.  Grand Maester Pycelle drapes some chains around his robe and a self-satisfied grin passes over his face.  Hm…could Pycelle be looking forward to Cersei’s comeuppance? As Pycelle leaves his room, a little girl calls him over and whispers something to him.

Crowds file into the sept and the High Sparrow takes his seat at the seven-pointed star along with his six fellow judges.  Queen Margaery and her father, Mace Tyrell, watch as Ser Loras is brought to the floor, sporting a brand new haircut.  Loras decides to take all the fun out of the trial by simply confessing to all his crimes. Presumably, to avoid any truly horrendous punishment, Loras commits to becoming a servant of the Faith of the Seven. This means he has to renounce his family name, his lordship, his inheritance and best of all, it means he gets one of those awesome star tattoos carved into his forehead!  Woot, silver linings all around!  The only downside is that whoever is giving the tat does NOT have a steady hand.  Also, they just let Loras’ blood drip down his face and nobody has the decency to give him a rag afterwards.  Filthy animals.

With Loras’ extremely short trial complete, it’s now Cersei’s turn to be tried by the Seven, but she’s nowhere to be found at the sept.  Instead, we see both Tommen and Cersei still at the Red Keep – though, in separate rooms.  Cersei is leisurely pouring a glass of wine as though she’s about to settle in and watch her stories for the rest of the day.  Meanwhile, Tommen has finally mustered up the motivation to get his butt to the sept, but when he tries to leave his room the Frankenmountain bars the way.

Back at the sept, Queen Magaery’s spidey sense is tingling and she tells the High Sparrow that something is very wrong, seeing how both King Tommen and Cersei are absent.   High Sparrow sends his lackeys to go fetch Cersei.

 As Lancel Lannister and his Faith Militant buddies step outside, they notice a little boy acting rather suspicious and running down the steps into a doorway nearby.  Lancel decides to follow the kid down a dark corridor, when the child jumps out from the shadows and stabs him.  As Lancel lays injured on the floor, he notices the corridor is lined with barrels upon barrels that have glowing green liquid oozing from them.  It’s wildfire, and it’s everywhere.  Further down the corridor are a few candles standing in a puddle of wildfire and they’ve almost melted down completely.  

 At the same time, at the Red Keep, Pycelle has followed the little girl down to Qyburn’s creepy office/reanimation studio under the impression that King Tommen wants to meet him there.  When Pycelle sees Qyburn, he is annoyed and turns to leave, but a group of Qyburn’s little street urchins appear with knives in their hands. Children of the Corn, much?  Is there anything more terrifying than little children with weapons?  Yes, there is…namely, when those little children attack mercilessly. Pycelle is gruesomely stabbed to death by Qyburns “little birds”.  

 Margaery has raised her personal threat level to red and she’s not going to stick around at the sept. She grabs her brother and father and tries to convince the High Sparrow to evacuate everybody. A panic spreads through the sept, but the Faith Militant don’t allow Margaery and her family to leave.

Lancel, meanwhile, is desperately crawling toward the burning candles set in the wildfire to attempt to put them out, but he’s too late.  The sept and everything nearby explodes in a neon green inferno, instantly killing everybody.  Cersei watches the explosion from her room, sipping her wine and smiling like a sociopath.

 Revenge is a Dish Best Served With Wine

 Tommen hears the explosion and runs to his window.  As he sees the massive smoke cloud emanating from the sept, he is dumbfounded and simply looks on speechless and impotent.  So really, it’s just business as usual for Tommen.  Ugh, where is he gonna find a new puppet master on such short notice?

Elsewhere at the Red Keep, Cersei has septa Unella tied to a table and Cersei is pretty much waterboarding Unella with wine.  She prompts Unella to “confess” that she enjoyed tormenting Cersei when Cersei was in Faith Militant custody.  Cersei goes on to gloat, and gloat, and gloat about how friggin’ much she loves doing all the horrible things she does, because it feels so darned good.  She tells Unella she won’t be killing her anytime soon.  Then she calls the Frankenmountain into the room to do god-knows-what awful things to Unella.  Cersei saunters away as Unella screams hysterically.  

 Tommen is still looking out at the smoky ruins of the sept in the distance.   He removes his crown and steps away from the window.  Then, suddenly he comes back and without hesitation, Tommen steps up on the window ledge and plunges to his death.  Meme generators everywhere go wild.  Poor Tommen, he wasn’t cut out for this kind of responsibility.  Yes, he was useless and cowardly, but he was also just a sensitive, impressionable kid.

 Qyburn shows Cersei her son’s dead body and asks about funeral arrangements, seeing how the sept is no longer a burial option.  Cersei tells him that Tommen should be with his grandfather and siblings.  She instructs Qyburn to burn Tommen’s body and bury the ashes among the rubble at the sept.  Her gloatiness from earlier has disappeared entirely.

 Tailcoat Ridin’

 Miles and miles away at The Twins, Walder Frey hosts a feast to celebrate the recovery of Riverrun. Jaime Lannister looks positively unimpressed to be there.  Walder takes a seat next to Jaime and tells him he’s thrown Edmure Tully back into the dungeon.  As Walder goes off on a self-congratulatory tirade, Jaime throws some serious shade and calls him out.  “Yeah, dude, nobody respects you.  You always need the Lannisters to bail you out since you have zero fighting smarts. So stop being all braggy.”  Way to sour the mood, Jaime, but it did shut Walder up pretty nicely.

We finally get an update on Sam and Gilly, who have arrived at the Citadel in Oldtown.  They enter the Maester Registration Building where they are greeted by the Dwight Shrute of clerical workers.  Sam informs the humorless man that Lord Commander Jon Snow has sent him here to become a maester.  Turns out the citadel needs to update their records, because they don’t show a Lord Commander Snow in charge, so the man needs to check out Sam’s story. Bureaucracy, man!  In the meantime, Sam is allowed to check out the awesome library while Gilly and Little Sam have to wait outside like a bunch of plebians.  Citadel = definitely not progressive.  

Caught Red (Priestess) Handed

 At Winterfell, Jon is chatting with Melisandre when Davos storms in and accuses her of stone-cold murder for burning Shireen at the stake.  Jon asks Melisandre if this is true, and she admits to it.  She tries to deflect the blame along the “Well…ya know, her dad and mom were okay with it, too.” But that’s really not much of a winning argument.  Sorry, girl, just because other crazies support your crazy idea, that doesn’t make it okay.  Jon spares Melisandre’s life, but he banishes her to the South and warns her that if she ever returns to Northern Westeros, she’ll be executed.  He tells her she must leave immediately.  Davos throws in that he’ll kill her himself if he ever sees her in the North again.  Jeez, you sacrifice one kid at the stake and everybody seems to forget how you can bring people back from the dead.  Real nice.    

 Jon and Sansa watch from the battlements as a sullen Melisandre trots off into the snow on her horse.  Jon thanks Sansa for calling in the cavalry to help them all defeat Ramsay, and Sansa apologizes for not having told Jon about Littlefinger.  She does warn him never to trust Littlefinger, to which Jon replies that it’s time for the two siblings to trust each other. “Agreed.  Oh, and guess what?  We got a letter from the Citadel.  They did their Groundhog Day ritual and determined that winter is HERE!  Finally. It’s official.  Dad was right.”

My Enemy’s Enemy Is My Friend

 Next we have a mercifully brief scene with Ellaria Sand and her daughters in Dorne, who are meeting with a visitor.  Lady Olenna Tyrell, the Queen of Thornes herself, has arrived to dish out sass to the Sand Snakes and to form an alliance with Ellaria in order to get revenge against Cersei Lannister.  Out from the shadows steps Varys, and it’s clear that he has come to broker and alliance on behalf of Queen Dany.  Wow, dragons, Sand Snakes and the army of House Tyrell united are gonna be one formidable foe for the Lannisters!  

In Meereen, Daenerys Targaryen and Dreamboat Daario are discussing Dany’s next steps.  Her ships are being readied for her mission to invade Westeros, and Daario is excited to be a part of it when Dany has to have the awkward breakup talk with him.  She instructs him to stay in Meereen and keep things running smoothly.  She’s even rebranded Slaver’s Bay to be called Dragon’s Bay.  Sweet! Daario is super bummed that he is being dumped and confesses his love to her. Dany reasons that she’ll need to form alliances in Westeros and will likely marry somebody to clinch a deal. Having a boyfriend in tow isn’t going to help her cause.   Also, she’s actually not all that into Daario, despite all his dreaminess.  

After Dany gets her pesky break-up business out of the way, she shares a warm moment with Tyrion Lannister who fails miserably at cheering her up, but gets her pumped for her conquest of Westeros.  He tells Dany how much he believes in her and then she goes and gives him the feels by naming him Hand of the Queen.  She even had an official pin made up for him.  These two are a great team!  I love it. 

The Remains of the Frey 

Back at The Twins, the Lannister army has left and Walder Frey is back to his usual crankiness. He’s sitting alone in the dining hall and a pretty servant brings him his food.   He assumes she’s one of the servants from the Lannister army and grumbles that his sons are late for dinner.  The servant tells him they are already here. Walder is understandably confused and she tells him again, but this time she points at his meat pie on his plate. Gag! The sons have been baked into the pie?  Suddenly the servant pulls her face off and it’s Arya Stark!  OMG, jaw drops on the floor!  Arya gets Frey in a headlock tells him who she is.   She cheerily informs him the last thing he’ll see before he dies is a Stark smiling down at him and then she slashes his throat, just like the Freys killed her brother Robb and mother Catelyn.  Ah, karma is sweet.  Not to get too nerdy here, but I’m a little unclear as to how Arya just has a face available to be wearing.  Unless Jaqen gifted her with a face, I don’t really understand how she can simply run around and change faces if she isn’t checking one out of the face library.  I mean, a lot of work goes into harvesting faces. We know this.  Anyhoo, that’s a question for another day.

The North Remembers

 Sansa is hanging out at the Godswood at Winterfell and Littlefinger approaches.  He tells her he’s sent word out to the North of the victory against the Boltons and that the Kights of the Vale are pledged to her. He suggests that Sansa should seriously consider claiming Winterfell for herself rather that letting her bastard bro Jon Snow lay claim as the heir.  She’s asks him what he wants.  It’s simple: To sit on the Iron Throne with Sansa at his side.  Just as Litterfinger is getting extra smarmy and leans in for a kiss, Sansa pushes him away, tells him it’s a pretty picture and leaves. 

Speaking of Godswood trees, Benjen Stark has accompanied Bran Stark and Meera Reed to the Godswood just north of the Wall – it’s the same tree where Jon took his Night’s Watch oath back in season 1.  Benjen tells them he can’t go beyond the wall because it’s imbued with magic that won’t allow him past.  Interesting, so I guess that’s why the Whitewalkers can’t just mosey South of the wall.  I wonder what the limits are of that magic.

Bran decides to tap into the Godswood for another warg session.  Meera asks him if he’s ready.  “Duh, I’m the Three-Eyed Raven now, I’d better be ready.  What’s the worst thing that could happe—uh, nevermind. Lemme just do this.”  In his warging vision, Bran goes back to where we last saw a younger Ned Stark at the Tower of Joy.  This time, Bran follows his father up the stairs.  Ned finds his sister Lyanna laying in bed, her torso covered in blood.  She tells Ned she’s going to die and she whispers something into his ear.  We can faintly hear her say “If Robert finds out, he’ll kill him, you know he will.  You have to protect him.  Promise me, Ned.”  We hear a baby cry and a woman in the room lays a sweet little bundled baby into Ned’s arms.  The child opens his eyes…and the scene changes to a close up on present day Jon Snow’s face.  

And there we have it. The L+R=J theory has been confirmed. I’ve kinda assumed this was the case for a while now, but it’s nice for them to finally give a definite answer as to the question of who Jon Snow’s parents really are.  Jon Snow is actually Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen’s son and Ned lied to him his whole life to keep him safe. Awwww, lies for protection. The sweetest kind of lies!

 On to the next scene. Jon Snow is hosting NorthCon at his house or something, because we’ve got all the Wildlings and a bunch of Northern Houses gathered together in one of the big halls at Winterfell.  At first some of the Northerners are pissed that Wildlings are on their turf, but Jon tells them they need to look at the bigger picture now that winter has come and the boogeyman is beyond the wall.  Lyanna Mormont gives a rousing speech, calling out the houses that didn’t support Jon when he needed them to defeat the Boltons. She pledges her support to Jon as the King of the North.  The other houses quickly fall in line, give a heartfelt “Sorry, I bailed on you earlier. Can we still be friends if I call you my king?” and soon the whole room is amped and having a big Jon Snow lovefest. Sansa sits next to Jon and is genuinely enjoying the acceptance and support for her brother (though, technically he’s her cousin) until she sees Littlefinger being pouty and shady in the corner.  She knows she’s gotta keep an eye on that one.

Yaaaaassss, Queen!

 In the outskirts of King’s Landing, Jaime Lannister and his army are returning home, but the huge billowing smoke that is still coming from the sept immediately has him worried.  As Jaime makes his way into the Red Keep, he is just in time for the coronation ceremony of…Queen Cersei!  That’s right, I’m not totally sure how the succession rules work, but I guess since all the Baratheons (including presumed Baratheons) are dead, and since Cersei used to be the Queen, she gets to be the Queen now? Or is it just that whoever has the biggest hidden stash of wildfire gets to rule?  Regardless, Cersei is the Queen Bee once again, but considering the price she paid for it, she looks unsurprisingly unhappy.  Jaime looks on from the wings realizing all three of their children are now dead.  

Across the Narrow Sea, the other Queen has set sail with her massive fleet.  Dany’s ships are pimped out with Targaryen sigil sails and golden dragon heads on the bow We see the Greyjoy siblings, and Dany’s whole Scooby Gang, including Varys, on deck with Dany.  Her three dragons soar through the sky and we get a sweeping view of the enormity of Daenerys Targaryen’s army.  The Mother of Dragons is ready to take Westeros by storm.  I pity the fool that tries to stop them.

And thus ends the season. Such a lot of great things happened in this episode.  The previous week was truly the apex of all the action, but last night still gave us a good dose of spectacle.  I was pretty shocked that they did away with pretty much all of House Tyrell and the Faith Militant in one big swoop.   And then Tommen bit the dust as well, making Cersei’s witch prophecy come true. Wild.  But I suppose, in a way, that we needed a big change.  Wildfire will definitely do that for you.  At this point, it looks like Cersei will become a bit of a Mad Queen. The only thing she has left in her life is Jaime, but what else do they have going for them?  They won’t have any successors to the throne.   I doubt Cersei will take a husband.  Jaime doesn’t want to have a family with anybody else.  The Lannister name will die out, unless Tyrion ends up having a kid.  Things be cray!  But they probably won’t need to worry about long-term plans, because Dany will be knocking down their gates soon enough to disrupt the order of things.

I love that Arya is going on her private little vendetta streak.  Cersei and the Mountain are still on her list, so I wonder if she’ll get to them before Dany has a chance to obliterate the Lannisters.  Or will the Hound finish off his bro?

Airdate:  6/19/16 ; Season 6, Episode 9

 Last night, viewers across the nation witnessed a historic battle of epic proportions…but enough about the NBA Finals and the Cleveland Cavaliers big W, we’re here to talk Game of Thrones!  The penultimate episode of the season brought us two visually stunning battles and we finally got to see a few baddies get their just desserts.  Victory comes at a price, however, and even the winning side doesn’t come away unscathed.  Strap on your emotional armor as we charge head first into “Battle of the Bastards”:

Trial By Fire

 The siege on Meereen is in full swing and Tyrion Lannister nervously explains to the recently returned Danerys Targaryen how things got to this point.  While Dany gives her best look of a quietly seething mother who caught her kid throwing a kegger at the house while she was away, Tyrion does some fast talking.  He lays out that the masters of Slaver’s Bay are threatened by the idea of Meereen thriving as a free city, because it will throw their entire economy and way of life out of whack if other cities rise up against slavery once they see the success Meereen is enjoying.  Dany puts on her game face and goes “Ok, let’s do dis.”  To which Tyrion is all “Yeah…ok…um…what exactly are we doing?” When Dany reveals her plans to mercilessly make her enemies pay for what they’ve done by laying their cities to waste, Tyrion reminds her that she may wanna lay off the Mad King motto of “Kill them all”, and go for a more diplomatic approach instead.

 On the top of the Great Pyramid, Dany and the Scooby Gang have called for a parlay to discuss the terms of surrender with the three slave masters who are leading the siege on her city. The slave masters are super cocky and disrespectful, assuming Dany is ready to give up.   Their behavior is not unlike the nasty khals that Dany recently torched in Vaes Dothrak, so it comes as no surprise when Daenerys tells them it’s their surrender she’s here to discuss.  “Soooo…Imma break this down for you…oh hey, there’s my dragon!” Drogon, now bigger than we’ve ever seen, comes swooping up to the pyramid.  He does a showy “Look, ma, I’m a Harpy Statue!” as he briefly perches on the top of the pyramid before allowing his Mama D to hop on his back for a fun ride down to the harbor where all the slavers ships are hurling fire balls at the city.  

The visual effects are off the hook and as Drogon drifts through the sky, we see his little dragon brothers emerging from their dungeon to join him and Dany for a right schooling of the masters.  All three dragons go on a ship burning rampage, picking off the slavers’ fleet one by one.  

 As Daenerys leads her dragons in an airstrike, her Dothraki horde and Dreamboat Daario handle the invaders on the ground.  They chop off a head or two of the Sons of the Harpy mobs that are brutally killing citizens in the streets.  Gnarly stuff.

 Meanwhile, Tyrion takes over negotiations at the top of the pyramid and tells the slave masters they are to return to their cities and tell everybody what happens when they try to mess with the Mother of Dragons.  Also, as punishment, one of them is going to die and they need to decide amongst themselves who that will be.  Two of the slavers immediately throw one guy under the bus, and as a result, Grey Worm kills the two back-stabbing jerks and lets the other man live to tell the tale. Classic King Solomon stuff!  

 With the loose ends in Meereen neatly tied up, and Dany firmly in control of her city, we move on to the second part of the night.  Bastard showdown!

The Final Countdown

 In preparation for the big battle of House Stark versus House Bolton, Jon Snow and Sansa Stark and their entourage have a pre-fight meet and greet with Vile Ramsay Bolton to make sure they all have the right time for the battle tomorrow.  There’s nothing more awkward than showing up late to a rumble.  

Jon suggests that rather than risking all their men’s lives, they should simply settle things the old-fashioned way, one on one.  Nice try, but Ramsay is vile, not stupid.  He knows Jon is the better swordsman, plus his men outnumber Jon’s around three to one, so he sticks with the obvious choice: They’ll battle for Winterfell tomorrow.  Ramsay throws some verbal barbs and mentions that he hasn’t fed his dogs in a week so they’ll be happy to eat what’s left of Jon’s men.  He menacingly adds that he can’t wait to have Sansa back, whose stone-faced reply is, “You’re going to die tomorrow, Ramsay.  Sleep well.”

 It’s time to talk battle strategy!  Jon has gathered Davos, Tormund, and Sansa in his tent for a war council sesh before the big day tomorrow.  Once Davos and Tormund leave, Sansa tells Jon how much he is underestimating Ramsay and how reckless it is to engage in battle knowing they’re badly outnumbered. When Jon counters that they can’t simply let Ramsay hold on to their little brother, Sansa says what we all pretty much have been thinking:  Ramsay will never let Rickon live.  There’s not a thing they can do to save him.  It’s grim, but it’s the truth.  If anybody knows about Ramsay’s love for games, it’s Sansa.  She’s learned the hard way that Ramsay is always a step ahead and she warns Jon that they will fall into whatever trap he has laid.  If Jon loses, Sansa says she won’t let Ramsay take her alive.  When Jon promises Sansa he’ll protect her, she retorts the saddest, truest thing we’ve learned watching GOT:  “You can’t protect me. Nobody can protect anyone.”  Damn.  

 Outside the tent, Davos and Tormund exchange battle prep rituals.  Surprising to nobody, Tormund likes to get drunk on goat pee or something equally gag-inducing to help him sleep the night before a big fight.  Davos, on the other hand, doesn’t like to sleep at all, so he goes for a stroll.  He comes across some piles of burnt wood and something in the ashes catches his eye: It’s the little stag statuette he made and gifted to Stannis’ daughter Shireen.  It takes a few seconds for him to put two and two together, and the look on his face is heartbreaking.  Melisandre’s dark secret is out, and I have a feeling there’s a reckoning coming for her.

 Speaking of the Red Priestess, Jon Snow pops into Melisandre’s tent to tell her that if he dies in battle, he doesn’t want her to bring him back.  And can she please dress him in his nice black outfit for the funeral? Melisandre tells him she’ll have to at least try.  When Jon orders her not to resurrect him, she tells him she doesn’t answer to Jon, but rather, the Lord of Light.  A big change here with Melisandre is that she’s stopped drawing definite conclusions about the things around her.  She doesn’t necessarily even think Jon is the chosen one, or that there is a grand plan for him.  For all she knows, Jon may be just a tiny piece in the puzzle.

Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves

 Back in Meereen, Yara and Theon Greyjoy have come to Daenerys' throne room to propose an alliance. The Greyjoy siblings will give Dany their 100 ships in exchange for Dany’s endorsement of Yara as the true ruler of the Iron Islands.  When Daenerys wonders why she shouldn’t just wait for their Uncle Euron’s offer of more ships, Yara tells her it comes with a marriage proposal, and after Euron gets what he wants, he’ll kill Dany.  Oh. Ok.  Well, that’s something to consider.  Dany agrees to an alliance, but in return, Yara must support Dany's claim as the true leader of the Seven Kingdoms, Yara can’t make any power grabs beyond the Iron Islands and, oh yeah…no more raping, pillaging, or otherwise wreaking havoc on any of the mainlanders.  “But…but..that’s what we DOOOOO!” Yara protests.  –“Not anymore, chica.  Queen rules.” –“Ok fine, maybe we can find a new pastime to bring the Iron Islanders together.  Like pushing each other off bridges and fake-drowning each other.  Oh wait.  We already do that.  Ugh, new hobbies are so hard.” –“Gurl, haven’t you heard of Pinterest?  Get on it.  Now let’s figure out a secret handshake to make this agreement legit.”

 Okay, enough of Meereen already!  Dany’s got things handled, people.  It’s time for a Snow storm!

 Inglorious Bastard

 In the battlefield outskirts of Winterfell, teams Stark and Bolton are lined up and ready for some action. The distance between both sides is about the length of a few football fields.  Ramsay has even been so kind as to decorate the field with flayed burning bodies! #RamsaySoMarthaStewart.  Note to Team Stark:  Budget for some kick-ass pyrotechnics to really shine at your next battle.  

 Before the fight can commence, Vile Ramsay plays a mind game to really eff with Jon’s head.  Ramsay trots out to the head of his army with Rickon tied up and walking behind him.  As he pulls out a knife, Jon – who seemingly has laser eagle eye vision – tenses up. But it was a big fake-out!  Ramsay just uses the knife to cut Rickon’s ties and tells him he’s free to run to his bro.  Oh. Whew.  Well, my goodness, that’s rather pleasant of you!  But then Ramsay starts to shoot arrows at Rickon’s back. He misses each time, probably on purpose, as Rickon literally runs for his life and Jon spurs his horse forward to help save his little brother.  Just as Jon is mere feet away to pull Rickon up to safety, Ramsay’s arrow hits its target and poor, young Rickon is dead.  NOT ANOTHER STARK!!!!

Jon is sent into a fury, and also…he has fallen right into Ramsay’s trap, because he’s halfway down the battlefield, all alone, and Ramsay commands his men to charge.  Davos yells to the fighters to get to Jon, STAT.   As the Bolton men bound down the field on horseback, swords and lances ready, Jon looks around and realizes he is truly effed. He pulls his sword, Longclaw, from the hilt and braces himself, ready to go down fighting.  As the sea of Bolton’s fighters reach Jon, his backup posse arrives in the nick of time and there is a ginourmous clash of men and horses with carnage everywhere.  Jon takes a moment to look around in utter surprise, then lunges right into battle. The ensuing fight scene is an intense, gory, free-for-all. It’s beautifully shot and executed, but also extremely violent.  I think I saw intestines.  Multiple times.  

 Ramsay’s army soon gets the upper hand as they form a horseshoe shape around Jon and his fighters, and then use shields and extra long lances to close in on Team Stark in a kind of human trash-compactor kind of move.  Ewww, they are literally gonna just squeeze everybody together and skewer them like shish kabobs!  The only way out for Team Stark is behind them, where dead bodies have piled up. Then Ramsay calls out for the final nail in the coffin:  Lord Karstark’s men come around the back to kill anybody who tries to leave.  Jon loses his footing and starts to get trampled like a Justin Bieber concert gone terribly wrong.  Though…is there any such thing as a Bieber concert gone right? Ugh, the whole thing was shot so well and disorienting that I felt like I was right there with Jon.  But, ya know, without the pain and the loss of air, while I sipped a brisk iced tea from the comfort of my couch.  Seriously, though, the struggle was real!   

Miraculously, Jon manages to pull himself off the ground and up to the surface, where we get a spectacular birds-eye view of Team Stark as they are just being squished like a pack of sardines.  Jon shares a few “This is the end” glances with Davos and Tormund across the way.

 All seems lost and I’m literally shouting “WHERE ARE THE KNIGHTS OF THE VALE ALREADY?!” when…the Knights of the Vale arrive.  YES!!!! Looks like that letter Sansa wrote last week was indeed a begrudging acceptance of help from Littlefinger.  Like beautiful angels in armor, the knights sweep in and start to obliterate Ramsay’s forces.  Sansa and Littlefinger watch from a distance on horseback, and Sansa’s smile says it all “Check mate, Ramsay.”  

Like the little coward he is, Vile Ramsay abandons his men on the battlefield and retreats to Winterfell. Jon Snow, Tormund, and Wun Wun the Giant  are in hot pursuit.  It only takes a few pounds on the gate for Wun Wun to break it down and Jon and more of his men storm into the Winterfell courtyard.  Poor Wun Wun takes so many arrows to the body that he looks like a giant pin-cushion.  Ramsay lands a final arrow into his eye and the giant drops dead.  NOT THE GIANT!!!  Right about now is where Vile Ramsay decides maybe he DOES want to engage in a little man-to-man fighting.  He aims a few arrows at Jon, who stops them all with a shield whilst storming straight at Ramsay until he knocks him down and beats his face to a pulp.   Jon finally stops the beating when he looks up and sees Sansa standing nearby.

With the Bolton banners removed, and the  House Stark direwolf banners proudly hanging from the walls of Winterfell, Melisandre looks around and seems to have a little “Ok, so my vision was right, I just got some details wrong” moment.  Across the courtyard, Davos is giving her serious side-eye.

 Sansa asks Jon where he is keeping Ramsay locked up.  I’m not sure if she has Ramsay moved here, or if this is where Jon originally put him, but next we see Ramsay tied up on a chair in the kennel where he keeps his beloved hunting hounds.  Sansa throws some mad shade at Ramsay and tells him how every trace of his existence and family will soon be gone.  The doors to the dogs’ cages are unlocked and the hungry animals come out.  Ramsay insists his dogs are loyal and would never harm him.  Sansa points out that they were loyal until he starved them for a week.  One of the hounds approaches Ramsay and starts to eat bits of his battered face.  Ew, vomit much?  Thankfully, we’re spared too many visuals, but Sansa watches as Ramsay is eaten alive. For a moment she turns away, but then turns back to get one last good look before she walks off with a slight satisfied smile on her face.  Karma’s a biatch, and Ramsay finally got what was coming to him.  Woo-hoo!  Roll credits.

 Wow, that was quite an episode!  Going into last night’s episode, I assumed it would be one mega show only about Jon Snow vs. Ramsay Bolton – like what they did in Season 4 at Castle Black.  I’ve very happy that we got some closure to the Meereen storyline.  And most of all, I’m so glad that the Starks finally got a victory and have their home back. We’ve needed something good for House Stark for so long, and to finally see Ramsay get his due was the cherry on top.

Lots of new questions have arisen in this episode.  What will happen now that Littlefinger is back in Sansa’s life?  I feel like Sansa is getting as good as, if not better than, Littlefinger when it comes to strategic manipulation to get what she wants. Is Davos going to kill Melisandre for what she did to Shireen, or can he look past it, considering she saved Jon Snow? How is Euron going to handle a rejection from Queen Dany once he finally gets his ships built?  What is going on with Bran?  Will we get any more warging visions before the season is over?  And last, but not least, will we be getting more hilarious Brienne and Tormund moments when Brienne returns from her failed Riverrun errand?  Do we still care about what’s happening in King’s Landing?  I don’t know.

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPzCOxrosrA)