“Game of Thrones” Season 7, Episode 4 Recap: When They Go Low, We Shoot Fire from the Sky

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At this point, we empathize with almost everybody left standing.Photograph by Macall B. Polay / HBO

If you thought that last night’s episode of “Game of Thrones” would be a quiet evening of dragonglass mining, Iron Bank account-settling, and Citadel-library intrigue, you, like Jaime Lannister, were in for a jolt. “The Spoils of War,” at a brisk fifty minutes, was a thrilling episode, and an emotionally satisfying one—and, in the end, the kind of experience that makes you want to pour yourself a soothing glass of rosé, with extra ice cubes. (Yes, ice cubes. You heard me.) We begin with the Lannister army, pleased with their new gold haul after taking Highgarden, and Bronn and Jaime chatting about money, moods, and plundering the harvests of reluctant farmers. (We’re hearing a lot about grain stores these days.) Jaime, as ever, has a look of noble forbearance on his face: he’s clearly still thinking of Lady Olenna’s end-of-life bon mots, and, perhaps, of the goddam pointlessness of it all.

“All your new riches weighing you down?” Bronn says.

“It all belongs to the Iron Bank,” Jaime says.

At King’s Landing, we see Cersei and the representative from the Iron Bank: this season’s featured bureaucrat, pleased about the money coming his way. A clever friend e-mailed me last week with an idea: What if the Iron Bank guy is Arya in disguise? Wouldn’t it be a hoot to see this humdrum bean-counter—staying in Cersei’s castle, discussing interest rates over Cersei’s floor map, collecting Cersei’s loot—unveil herself, and then blammo? That theory, sadly, was too hilarious for this world, but I’m holding out hope that the banker is secretly Jaqen H’ghar, having developed a spirit of whimsy, and wanting to surprise Arya with a graduation present.

Littlefinger, sitting by a fireplace with the new and inert Bran, is trying out his luscious-whispering skills on a different Stark kid. He hands Bran a terrifying dagger. “This is for you,” he whispers. This guy. “The last man who wielded it meant to cut your throat, but your mother fought him off.” What a thoughtful gift! Then he whispers about Bran’s mother getting killed with a similar dagger. Whose was this? Bran wants to know. “That very question was what started the War of the Five Kings,” Littlefinger whispers. What an adventure it’s been, he recalls—casting Bran from his home, driving him to the wilds behind the Wall, making him see things most men wouldn’t believe. To do all that, he goes on, in sympathetic tones, “only to find such chaos in the world—”

“Chaos is a ladder,” Bran says. Oh, man! Mirthless new Bran can zing! You recall, perhaps, that Littlefinger said this to Varys a few seasons ago, while gazing at the Iron Throne with lust in his heart. (He has counted the throne’s blades, he told Varys, nearly purring.) Littlefinger wants to use chaos to help him achieve success; Bran, all-seeing professional snoop, wants him to know he’s onto him. Bran can be fun, we are discovering, but he’s not the fun kind of fun. Meera comes in to end this awkwardness, and tells Bran she’s leaving town. He is impassive, after everything they’ve been through. She tears up. He’s not really Bran anymore, he says. “I remember what it felt like to be Brandon Stark. But I remember so much else now.”

“You died in that cave,” she says. Nuts. I liked Bran Stark, and the Three-Eyed Raven will take some warming up to.

Holy crow—Arya is at Winterfell! Now we’re talking. She approaches a couple of oafish young guards, and one of them tells her to fuck off. She talks her way in, and then, after taking in her familiar courtyard surroundings, quite movingly, she outwits the oafs and disappears. An amused and pleased Sansa finds her in the Hall of Dead Stark Statues. It’s a lovely scene, more subtle and emotionally satisfying than some other big scenes we’ve experienced lately. They hug.

“You need better guards,” Arya says to Sansa. They catch up—the travels, the horrors, Joffrey, the kill list. Sansa says that she hopes Jon comes back soon. “I remember how happy he was to see me,” she says. “When he sees you, his heart will probably stop.” It actually feels like a conversation such people might have, without a lot of plot rehashing but with a believable exchange of news and feeling. “Arya?” Sansa says. “Bran’s home, too.” She gives her a look that implies, but does not say, Look, Bran is wonderful, but . . . he has become a bit unnerving. This is underscored by a noise in the distance: Caw! Caw!

The Stark formerly known as Bran is sitting pensively in the godswood, brooding his face off. Let’s see if Arya cheers him up.

“I saw you at the crossroads,” he says to her.

“Bran has . . . visions,” Sansa says.

“I thought you’d go back to King’s Landing,” Bran says. “Cersei’s on her list of names.” The girls exchange a look that says, We’re all going to have to get used to having a brother who can see everything we’ve ever said or done. This will quickly give them something to bond over. Of course, if they gossip about him, Bran might “see” it. Eff. It’s a tricky world, this world.

Bran shows them the dagger: Valyrian steel. Sansa is suspicious; Arya is intrigued. So am I. She’ll know what the hell to do with it. Brienne of Tarth admires the sight of three Stark kids ambling along through a gentle snow, and Podrick, observing this, praises her and says that Catelyn Stark would be proud of the way Brienne succeeded in insuring their safety. Brienne, reluctantly, looks grateful. A note to the powers that be: I want Pod to find love. Is that too much to ask? I don’t think it is. Just cram it in somewhere in the final episodes. Up above, on the balcony, is Littlefinger, the unstoppable smirk machine. Caw! Caw!

In Dragonstone, some long-overdue sex talk: Missandei tells Dany that she wants Grey Worm to return. “What happened?” Dany asks.

“Many things,” Missandei says.

“Many things?” Dany says, with a tone, reminding us that she, too, once had appealing erotic story lines. (Perhaps Daario can be recruited to work in the dragonglass mine.) Oh, look! There’s Jon Snow, wanting to lead her into a cave. He’s done some of his best work in caves. By torchlight, deep within, he shows Dany some etchings. She’s wide-eyed, as ever. “They were here together, the Children”—of the Forest—“and the First Men,” he says. He takes her arm quietly. “They fought together against a common enemy, despite their differences, despite their suspicions, together,” he whispers. Wait a minute, she’s thinking. Did you just draw these?

“I will fight for you. I will fight for the North,” she tells him. He looks aroused. “When you bend the knee,” she says. Oh, for crying out loud. When they emerge from the cave, after more confrontational whispering, Tyrion gives her the good but terrible news about Casterly Rock. Dany, fuming, has had it with this b.s.—she wants to go kill the Lannisters herself, with dragons. She asks Jon Snow what he thinks. He reasonably reminds her when they go low, we go high: a “Yes we can,” “Inspire, don’t terrify” sort of approach. Some of us may have felt sad during this exchange.

At Winterfell, Arya and Brienne pay each other some respect, with sparring and weapons admiration. Sansa momentarily stops talking to Littlefinger about grain reserves to admire them. Arya bests Brienne. “Who taught you how to do that?” Brienne says.

“No one,” Arya says. Oysters, clams, and cockles!

In Dragonstone, now it’s time for guy sex talk: Davos Seaworth wants to know what Jon Snow thinks of Dany, in the hubba-hubba sense. No time for that, Jon mutters. There’s only one cave woman for him. A ship approaches. Hey, it’s Theon! (The winds sure are fair in Westeros these days.) How will they react to each other? You might recall that many seasons ago, Theon and Jon Snow both lived at Winterfell, Theon as a ward of Ned Stark; later, Theon captured Winterfell and murdered people there; then he spent interminable seasons getting tortured by Ramsay Bolton and becoming Reek, after which he eventually saved Sansa from Ramsay. Remember when they jumped off that wall together, and we thought they’d break their legs? Well, much of that history is conveyed here, on the beach, via glowering.

“Sansa—is she all right?” Theon says.

Jon clutches him by the lapel. “What you did for her is the only reason I’m not killing you,” he says. Theon tells Jon that Euron took his fleet and his sister, and he wants Dany’s help. Well, Jon says, Dany’s not home. Where did she go? Theon asks. Uh-oh.

Jaime, with troops in the field, trots up to a young guy we’re finally beginning to recognize, Dickon Tarly, and once again calls him Rickon. Bronn laughs, because he knows, as we do, that Dickon is quickly becoming this show’s Landry of “Friday Night Lights,” forever destined to be called Lance. And, indeed, here come the explosions in the sky. “Spears and shields!” Jaime yells, galloping around. “Spears and shields!” But spears and shields can’t quite defend against lizard-breath hellfire. On foot, here come the Dothraki, whooping, with horrifying curved knives; and, from the air, our fed-up Mother of Dragons, on dragonback, leaning in, yelling, “Dracarys!” In a mesmerizing, horrible scene, we see the dragon-based warfare we’ve been anticipating all these years: a mighty blast of dragonfire burns up a bunch of Lannister soldiers, shrieking, staggering, turning to ash. It reminds us of real-world unfair combat, in a provocatively uncomfortable way. Jaime looks on in horror. So does Rickon. (Dickon.) Meanwhile, there’s a more conventional battle going on: you know, stabbing, stamping, bows and arrows, grunting. The Dothraki are surfing on horseback somehow, like a bunch of showoffs.

Jaime says, “Archers, hold the line!” and gets his men to shoot their dinky arrows at the dragon. The dragon incinerates men, carriages, horses. Dickon saves Jaime from an imminent Dothraki scything; Jaime grants a respectful nod. Maybe he will remember his name. The mayhem that continues, dirty and fiery, has closed-captioning like (shouts), (horse bellowing), (men screaming), (dragon roaring), (Dothraki shrieking). Things are getting desperate; it’s definitely time to fire up Qyburn’s custom-made dragon-shooter. Bronn unearths it from its carriage and points toward the smoky sky. Suddenly, somehow, Tyrion is watching all of this from atop a hill. Where the hell did he come from? Did Dany drop him off so he could primly observe? (Horse screaming.) Dany comes flapping straight at Jaime; Bronn has got her dragon in the crosshairs of the Qyburn machine. Dany yells “Dracarys” again, but Bronn shoots the dragon, and hits it. Oof.

It’s a funny thing, this show. At this point, we empathize with almost everybody left standing. I don’t want to see this dragon incinerate the Lannister army—or, at least, Jaime, Bronn, and Dickon—and I don’t want to see Bronn kill the dragon or the maddening faerie-like queen atop its back. Our loyalties are complicated. So are Tyrion’s. “Flee, you idiot,” he says, watching Jaime, his brother, his supposed enemy, who once saved him. Jaime takes off on his horse, galloping with his spear out. “You fucking idiot,” Tyrion whispers, sounding like a true sibling. Jaime charges toward the dragon, the dragon gets a good blast going, and, just in the nick of time—how on earth does he do this?— Bronn gallops up and knocks Jaime into a conveniently placed body of water. Phew. But! Jaime, weighed down by his armor and his gold hand (Qyburn must be really marvelling at his handiwork in all this), is sinking. Not weighed down by his riches, exactly, but close enough. I suspect he won’t sink for long—he’s too central, and too handsome, to just drift away—but he’s sunk for tonight. Fade to black.