In an episode entitled “Oathbreaker,” one might have expected more open breaking of oaths. But other than Jon Snow’s all to obviously coming choice to walk out of the Night’s Watch and finally live a life where he can crack some jokes, get a new costume and try out his new, shorter hairstyle, nothing this week was quite that in your face. Instead our sliver of ongoing storylines presented this week (there were at least as many characters left off screen as there were on) focused on those who were faced with certain expectations of what they would do, and either chose to fulfill those expectations, or looked for a different path.
The High Sparrow: It’s not what I want. It’s what the gods want. They make their will known to us, and it’s up to us to accept or reject it.
The High Sparrow may have told Tommen in an effort to manipulate the young king to his council that it’s not human who expect these things, but the Gods who do, but the truth is far more complex. After all, with perhaps the exception of R’hollr, we have no proof of what these gods want–only the human interpretation of those expectations, and those expectations therefore become the fabric that holds society together. In the Vaes Dothrak, society expects a woman who once married Khals to give up their hopes and dreams and take an early retirement plan away from the world, essentially insisting that when her husband dies, her life is over. Dany has defied that expectation–until now. (The look on her face when told she would be judges on her actions suggests she has no plans to acquiesce to such a life any time soon either.) In King’s Landing it is expected that Cersei, who has become Queen Mother, and therefore any direct say in the affairs of government, will quietly sit in her chambers and allow the wiser heads to clean up the mess she made while she was running things. Clearly, this week she and Jaime show no sign of accepting that world–even as the Small Council openly refuses to work with them. Up North, the Umbers may refuse to conform to their new Warden in Winterfell demand that they kneel, but they also expect to be paid handsomely for their delivery of an unexpected plot twist–Rickon Stark, who just replaced Sansa both as Key to the north and Ramsay’s latest plaything. While at the Wall, Jon Snow defied the expectation of societies everywhere, that those who die stay dead.
It was the complaint heard all day up at the Wall–this shouldn’t be. Jon Snow said it himself after coming back. Alliser Thorne echo’d it in the final scene when we returned for a second engagement. The dead stay dead, damn it. We burn their bodies. They don’t come back. This isn’t right. Jon Snow, for the record, seems to agree. What happened to him wasn’t right. Melisandre and Davos broke all the social mores to do what they did. But as Davos points out, in yet another fantastic pep talk, “You were dead and now you’re not. That’s completely f****** mad, seems to me. I can only imagine what it means to you.” But that doesn’t mean it’s something to be thrown away. Jon Snow has been given the ultimate second chance here–a new life, literally. To hell with society’s expectations. (By the way, after all these amazing pep talks, I’ve decided Davos needs to be given his own daytime show on Westerosi TV where he brings on troubled people and gives them therapy, a la Dr. Phil. Call it “Fook It, With Davos Seaworth.”)
Tyrion: “A wise man once said a true history of the world is a history of great conversations in elegant rooms.”
Even the minor scenes this week dealt with people fighting expectations. Missandei and Greyworm have been trained by their society not to express opinions, or play games from the cradle, running up against Tyrion’s expectations that those who he is working with–even those who are not really his equals–with acquiesce to his demands to drink with him and play whatever games he thinks up. Varys expects that his oh so reasonable sounding threats will get a more rational person to talk. (Between his oh so calm demeanor threatening the life of a child in order to get his mother to talk, and the first sight of his “Little Bird” network, who he bribed with sweets, we were reminded this week that in his own way, Varys is no better than Littlefinger. The cause he’s working for is just different.) Gilly expected Sam to keep his promise to take her to Oldtown, while he expects her to obey his will, because he means well by it. (Proof, perhaps that Sam is more of his father’s son than he realizes.) Either way, I think we can all be pretty confident that Sam attempting to take his wildling lover home to Horn Hill–and then leave her there to cope–is the worst idea we’ve heard all year.
As for the long awaited Tower of Joy–which for many books readers ended rudely with a Starkus Interruptus–the discovery of one defying expectations was on the other foot. Bran wasn’t the one faced with expectations for him to either follow or rebel against. Instead he was the one holding the expectations. That his father was an honorable man, even in battle, that he killed Ser Arthur Dayne, as the cleaned up version of this messy story goes. But to his horror, Bran learns something else–his father in not the hero his childhood self always believed. The stories he was told were only true from a certain point of view. And that discovery was hard enough for him to take–to the point where he cried out for his father, who, at this age and moment in life would not have recognized him. As frustrating as it was for us, the Three Eyed Ravemn was right–this was enough for today. Bran was not ready to handle the truth of what was inside that tower. Not yet. First he has to let go of those expectations of what his father’s life was (honorable always,) and his own (that he will be forced to spend his life becoming one with a tree.)
Jon Snow: “Hold off on burning my body for now.”
But if Bran was letting go of expectations, everyone else around us coming up against them, and Jon was defying them for the first time with his declaration that “my watch is ended,” their sister was, for the first time, rising to them. Arya has spent her life rebelling against society’s expectations. From the first moment we met her in the pilot, she was ignoring her sewing and girly skills for the chance to fight with her brothers. Over the course of five seasons, Arya has lied, begged, borrowed and stolen to stay alive in an increasingly traumatic and hostile situation. Now, for the first time, she has found a place that will accept her. But in order for her to join, she must be broken, like a wild horse. She must let go of who she was, and follow the House of Black and White’s expectation of her in order to survive here. In what was one of the highlights of the evening in a very strong episode, we watched Arya’s fight training with the Waif build her up, even as her talk therapy sessions with the same broke down all the lies she’s been telling about her life all these years. For the first time, she admits the emotional truths of her life—as confusing as it may be in places–and by doing so she accepts what the, gods, the world, or at least those who keep her here, want of her. By the end, there’s no question if she is still holding on to that “funny little list” that Arya Stark once recited like a zen koan to keep herself alive. Such a funny little list. And so short. A girl knows these things are bygone playthings to be discarded. If she didn’t know, the water from the Pool of Death that the Faceless Men give to those who seek it would have killed her. Instead, it restores her vision. A Girl is Ready to be No One. At least one person this week has accepted her fate completely.
Via http://winteriscoming.net/2016/05/09/game-of-thrones-oathbreaker-thematic-analysis/
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