Pete, Shana and Matt recap Game of Thrones Season 4 Episode 3, “Breaker of Chains.”
[audio:http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/archive.org/download/oti-recap-game-of-thrones-s04e03/oti-recap-game-of-thrones-s04e03.mp3]→ Download The Game of Thrones Season 4, Episode 3 Recap
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What did you think of this episode? Sound off in the comments below.
One thing I noticed was how the episode was bookended with with characters being liberated (or soon to be liberated) from bondage. Like you all mentioned in the podcast, the slaves in Meereen may have a “choice,” but they will still end up being a part of Dany’s war machine one way or the other. Similarly, Sansa may now be free of Kingslanding and no longer a hostage of the Lanisters, but now she’s stuck on a boat as Littlefinger’s hostage.
At the midpoint of the episode, Tyrion is in literal chains and no clear way out. So perhaps his liberation will be the same. He will get released from prison, but only to be under direct control of someone else. Or perhaps it will be another case of two to set the pattern and a third to break it.
For anyone curious about “The Virgin Spring,” the Ingmar Bergman movie I talk about on this recap, learn more here: http://youtu.be/h82_I4kH6H8
If the scene with Jaime and Circe was originally shot as a rape scene that turned into a sex scene, I think that would have been much worse than the scene that actually aired. As someone who hasn’t read the books, I thought ithe scene was fine. it was a really unambiguous instance of forcible rape of a woman practically on top of her dead child’s body. It was the sort of abject-human-suffering-porn that Game of Thrones is built around. If they had tried to morph it into something sexy halfway through, it would have been gratuitous T&A proceeding as if consent were irrelevant, sending the message that if she started enjoying herself it doesn’t really matter that she said no when they started. As it was, I didn’t feel like it was condoning or eroticizing rape. It was offering it up in the same spirit as Sansa being taken to see Ned’s severed head, or Theon getting castrated. It was lurid, but didn’t feel like it was intended to appeal primarily to sexual appetites.
Great point.
I kind of feel the scene worked. I guess that puts me into the uncomfortable position of defending it now. Here we go.
I found it interesting (from a story perspective, let me stress) because Circe was reaching the peak of detestitude (?), she was one of the few that were happy when Dinklage (audience favorite) was being humiliated at the wedding, she was perhaps the only one who seemed upset at Joffery’s death (audience pariah), and, directly before the event in question, she begged Jamie to kill Dinklage (did I mention audience favorite?). When she was raped I couldn’t help but feel sympathy for her, even though the show was telling me to hate her up to that point.
In the same way, Jamie had been slowly, steadily climbing up from where he started at incestuous (attempted) child murderer. His act against Circe reminded me of why I should hate him. Not only is he forcing himself on his sister (a few steps worse than where he started) but he’s also doing it within arm’s reach of his own dead son (which, if not worse than throwing a kid out a window, is still pretty morally disgusting).
If there were a line graph of how the audience was supposed to feel about these two characters, they would reverse directions and intersect with this scene (like a Jesus fish).
If it’s not obvious, I haven’t read the books, so I don’t know if those new trajectories hold for long, but I didn’t feel it was so out of place. Gross and cringe-worthy, sure, but it was just another unexpected character reversal in a series known for just that.
Good point. Based on episode 4 [SPOILER ALERT!!!]…
[SPOILER ALERT!!!]…they don’t seem to be taking the rape scene as a chance to hit reset on the likeability or ethical standing of the characters. Circe went straight back to her “kill every reasonably nice character to avenge my horrible little son” thing, and Jamie is being heroic and self-sacrificing. I guess if the scene served any purpose at all, it was to remind the audience that there aren’t really any good characters in the show. The likeable ones do horrible things, or things that have horrible results for other likeable characters, and most of the recurring heels have back stories or redeeming virtues that make to hard to hate them completely.
Yeah, after watching episode 4, I agree with you. It looks like I gave the writers too much credit.
With the danger of continuing the over credit heaping, maybe they did that to reinforce the moral grays of the world and its characters. Maybe? Hopefully?
Either way, it’s pretty hard to root for his redemption now.
I think it makes sense as a reminder that Westeros is a land without moral absolutes. Even if it was totally gratuitous, I stand by my view that it was depicted as gratuitous violence, rather than gratuitous sex, and therefore not really a problem.