3.9 "The Rains of Castamere" - SPOILERS

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Game_of_Thrones_episodes

In the North
North of the Wall, Sam (John Bradley) and Gilly (Hannah Murray) continue their march south. Sam tells Gilly he plans for them to cross the Wall using the entrance at the Nightfort, an abandoned castle along the Wall.

South of the Wall, Bran (Isaac Hempstead-Wright) and his group take shelter in an old abandoned tower. Nearby, Jon (Kit Harington) and the wildling party raid an elderly horse breeder’s home, taking his horses and gold while the old man flees. While in the tower, Bran and Jojen Reed (Thomas Brodie Sangster) discuss how they plan to cross the Wall, before Meera (Ellie Kendrick) spots the old horse breeder riding nearby. After the old man is captured by the wildlings, Hodor (Kristian Nairn)—spooked by the thunder—begins yelling, which threatens to give away their location to the wildlings. Bran uses his warg abilities to enter Hodor’s mind and cause him to pass out.

Outside, Tormund (Kristofer Hivju) moves to kill the old man, but Orell (Mackenzie Crook) tells him to have Jon do it instead, to prove his loyalty. Jon is ultimately unable to kill the innocent man, and Ygritte (Rose Leslie) kills him with an arrow. Tormund orders his men to kill Jon and Ygritte, and soon after Jon battles with Orell. Bran and Jojen enter the minds of Summer and Shaggydog, the two Stark boys’ direwolves, and aid Jon and Ygritte. Jon kills Orell while the wolves hold off the other wildlings, and Jon is able to steal a horse and escape, seemingly leaving Ygritte and heading back to the Wall. At night, Bran asks Osha (Natalia Tena) to take Rickon (Art Parkinson) to Last Hearth, the home of the Umber family, and they depart shortly after.

Across the Narrow Sea
Planning their invasion of Yunkai, Daario (Ed Skrein) tells Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) and her knights about a hidden entrance to the city, which they may use to execute a sneak attack. Ser Jorah (Iain Glen) is suspicious of the plan, suspecting Daario to turn traitor, but comes around when Daenerys seeks Grey Worm’s (Jacob Anderson) opinion of Daario and his plan. He simply says, “I trust him.” leading Daenerys to approve of the plan. When night falls, Daario, Jorah, and Grey Worm arrive at the gate. Daario enters ahead of them, posing as a still loyal Second Son commander. Shortly after being let inside the city, he signals Jorah and Grey Worm to follow him. Once inside the city, they are ambushed by a group of Yunkai’s slave soldiers, and though largely outnumbered, manage to kill them. After fighting a second wave of soldiers, the group returns to Daenerys, and tell her the attack on Yunkai was successful, and she is now in control of the city.

At the Twins
At camp, Catelyn (Michelle Fairley) counsels her son, King-in-the-North Robb (Richard Madden) about his planned alliance with Walder Frey (David Bradley) and his assault on Casterly Rock, the homeland of the Lannister family. The Stark host soon arrive at the Twins, castle homeland of the Freys, where they are given bread and salt, a symbol of the “guest right”: a guarantee of safety when under another lord’s roof. Robb makes an apology to both Walder Frey and his daughters, which is accepted by a sarcastic Walder, who later insists on inspecting Talisa (Oona Chaplin), the woman Robb broke his vow for. Nearby, Arya, (Maisie Williams) though still a captive of Sandor ‘The Hound’ Clegane (Rory McCann), journeys to the Twins to reunite with her mother and brother. When they come upon a trader and his cart, Clegane knocks him out and moves to kill him, but Arya manages to dissuade him, and he instead steals the cart of food.

At night, Walder walks his daughter, Roslin (Alexandra Dowling), down the aisle to her future husband, Edmure Tully (Tobias Menzies), who is pleasantly surprised by her beauty. They are shortly thereafter married, and the celebration begins. At the feast, Walder calls for the bedding ceremony to begin, and Roslin is carried off by her relatives, followed closely by Edmure, who is collected by the Frey women. After they leave, Lothar Frey (Tom Brooke) closes the banquet hall doors, and a musician begins playing “The Rains of Castamere”. Using the food cart as their reason for being at the Twins, the Hound and Arya arrive at the wedding shortly after the bedding has begun, and are turned away at the gates. When the Hound moves to turn the cart around, he notices Arya has fled. Walder rises to make a toast to Robb, and signals his men to attack. Lothar Frey draws a knife and stabs the pregnant Talisa in the stomach repeatedly, killing her. Before he can react, Robb is shot by the musicians with crossbows several times and falls to the ground. Arya, having snuck past the gate guards, witnesses Frey men kill Stark soldiers and Grey Wind, Robb’s wolf. She is saved by the Hound who carries her out of the castle. Catelyn, having been wounded by a crossbow bolt, takes Walder’s wife at knifepoint, demanding that Robb be allowed to leave. Walder refuses her offer, and Roose Bolton (Michael McElhatton) stabs Robb in the heart saying, “The Lannisters send their regards.” Catelyn kills Walder’s wife before her own throat is slit.

Discuss.

Well, this was the key point in the story that the showrunners wanted to get to when they started the show and I thought they did it perfectly. I thought I was prepared for it and I was so wrong… I’ll miss Robb Stark. He was one of my favorites ever since the show started to flesh him out some more. I’m looking forward to next week and seeing how they decided to end the season.

Totally blown away by this episode. Murdering 2 1/2 main characters just like that? Wow. I did not see that coming dude. Perfect reveal as Catelyn puts it all together. I have two questions:

  1. I was under the impression that this was all Frey’s doing, but word on the street was that it was the Lannisters. What did Frey have to gain by killing Robb? What good did it do him?

  2. Why the frak did Jon Snow leave Ygritte? That was as bad as Sam leaving the dragon glass dagger. Stupid.

Da Fuck did I just see? Kinda hard to talk about the rest of the episode with that at the end. I liked the Daenerys storyline this week.

Just came across this. Perfect:

from http://www.cinemablend.com/television/Game-Thrones-Watch-Season-3-Episode-9-Rains-Castamere-56308.html

“And that action, is the hot hot heat between newcomer Daario Naharis and the Khalessi. But come on, they can’t be together. Daenerys Naharis. Terrible name.”

I’ve been waiting on this episode for a while. The reactions I’ve read so far pretty much line up with what I was expecting. The episode was very well done

This was the episode that all of us book readers anticipated and dreaded in equal measure. I can only imagine what it felt like for viewers who weren’t prepared for the Red Wedding, who had no idea and no warning was was about to happen. My own RW experience culminated in throwing my book across the room and refusing to pick it up for about 3 months. But at least with the books it’s only as bad as your imagination makes it (which to be honest was bad enough) but watching brought it to a whole new visceral and unrelenting level. I love this show but I will never watch that scene again.

This episode for me is the reason why Game of Thrones is at once the best and the hardest show to watch on television. The Starks are butchered at the hands of the Lannisters, the Freys, and the Boltons. We can call them monsters for what they did - and yes the act is monstrous and unforgivable - and on the other hand it probably saved thousands of lives of a protracted war along the North and in Casterly Rock. Tough choices. I hate them and yet I understand the Lannister motivation. I hate him and yet understand Tywin’s reasoning.

In Westeros, winning the battle does not win the war. Robb lost his battles and his life for the same reason his father lost his head: he believed that the rules of honor would protect him. He believed that everyone would play by the same rules. He was too much his father’s son.

The most heartbreaking part of the episode for me was watching the Stark family almost reunite. Bran, Rickon, and Jon; Catelyn, Robb, and Arya. so close and yet once again splintered even farther apart by the end.

All I want now is to curl up in a ball and watch happy kitten videos on the internet.

Valar Morghulis. No one is safe.

this was just shown in the UK. In reading terms I have finished book 5 so no major shocks for me, even so, it’s still quite a visceral scene. I thought they made a change though, if memory serves, in the books, the wife is not definitively killed (Robb’s wife, that is). Overall a good ep, although again, in the book when Tarly used the arrow to kill the white walker, the blade dissolved, he didn’t just leave it there, plus our tv show Sam seems braver, again going form memory, but in the book the walker sort of stumbles on to the dagger when attacking him, Tarly certainly doesn’t run at him with the dagger, I accept the changes for dramatic licence though.
Alan

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

  1. He’s a vindictive prick, and in his mind Robb screwed him over. Plus, the Lannisters shit gold. Also, since the wedding happened, he pretty much has the Lord of Riverrun under his control.

  2. Don’t remember this from the books. Haven’t read them in a while, but the Riverlands plot is hard to forget.

He knocked Ygritte over so that she wouldn’t shoot another wildling and could stay with them while he bailed

As some of you know I discovered a few people here at work are really into GoT. Instead of gathering by the watercooler I setup a recurring weekly meeting so we can all sit down in a conference room for half an hour, hash out the details, ask questions and then go on with the day. One person in our group has read all the books, reads all the blogs and is our subject matter expert. He has really helped me understand who is related to who, what families are related to others and understand some of the mechanics, geography and other nuances of the show.

That all being said he confirmed your memory. In fact in the books Robb doesn’t even bring the wife into the castle because it would be an insult to Frey. I can argue for this logic and think they brought the wife in to simplify the story, no need to cut away and show her being murdered in the camp. It also raises the drama of it all happening at once after she and Robb are shown to be so close and reconciled with his Mother.

Frak.

In the books Robb’s wife isn’t murdered and she may or may not have a king in the north in the oven Duder

If they did this in the books, I’m guessing it won’t be a factor in the books. Granted, the way Margery goes through husbands, she could wind up married to the kind once he’s born. Not her fault, just sayin’…

Book spoiler
[spoiler]Yeah, she’s kind of the Sam Carter of Game of Thrones, isn’t she? :stuck_out_tongue: [/spoiler]

you know I asked amanda that very question…

That’s pretty awesome. Sometimes I can’t keep track of all the families still, and I read the books. :smiley:

Yeah, Robb/Talisa is portrayed quite differently than in the books, for a multitude of reasons, I think. Partly to pad out Robb as a character in some ways (I found him to be a more “important” character on the show than in the books, in that sense Cat in the show had less weight than in the books, where she was the PoV character when they go to Cat/Robb side of things in the story), but probably also because events got shifted around on the show and thus Robb’s motivation behind marrying a non Frey became very muddled back in season 2 (as did Cat’s motivation behind freeing Jaime). It sort of became necessary to give more weight to the romance of Robb/Talisa to justify Robb’s decision, or make it more understandable. And giving them scenes at the wedding talking about Ned and the baby and being truly in love adds to the punch of the slaugther that came right after.