Curtain Call: Patrick Malahide

Farewell, Patrick Malahide. With remarkably little screen time you breathed life and humanity into grizzly Balon Greyjoy, who was, in many ways, the introduction to the ironborn worldview for Unsullied fans.

After only a handful of scenes scattered across several seasons, Balon has departed this worldly plane to join the Drowned God in his watery hall. Though I can’t honestly say that I’ll miss Balon, I will miss Malahide’s sullen yet nuanced performance as the ironborn patriarch.

We last saw Balon Greyjoy at the end of season 3 when he abandoned his son to torture and mutilation with a shrug, cementing his place in my heart as #1 Worst Dad in Westeros, which is no small feat considering his competition included a man who burned his daughter at the stake and another who gave his sons (who were also his grandsons) to the White Walkers.

Bringing the Lord Reaper curmudgeon to life without resorting to cartoonish antics couldn’t have been an easy task and Malahide rose to the occasion beautifully. From the icy greeting he offered Theon in “The Night Lands” to his argument with Euron on the bridge in “Home,” Balon embodied the harsh ironborn values that his son destroyed himself trying to live up to.

“’He’s like the landscape on which he lives,’” Malahide told IGN, quoting David Nutter. “That was incredibly helpful [advice] because the landscape is dour and stony like granite. His strength is in he is very, very unyielding. The idea of being loved, I don’t think that would occur to him. He wants respect.”

Indeed, in one of his last scenes, Balon threatened his daughter, Yara, with disinheritance for insubordination. Yet, there were still moments in which Malahide played Balon with a sense of heartbreak. The pained looked on his face when Theon accused him of giving him away in “What Is Dead May Never Die” and his angry, “I lost three sons” retort in “Home” when Yara reminded him of the cost of the Greyjoy rebellion imbued Balon with much-needed humanity.

We can see Malahide elsewhere this spring in the second season of Indian Summers in which he plays Lord Willington, “a very warm, complex character,” Malahide said in his interview with IGN, “which is really nice. A very sympathetic character, which is nice for a change. I usually play hard-nosed bastards.”

So, best of luck, Malahide. I’ll enjoy watching Balon’s family members squabble over the salt throne he left vacant and I look forward to watching you in new and varied roles in the future. In that respect, at least, what is dead never will die.

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