F**k Yeah Game of Thrones Recaps! Episode Five: Kissed by Fire!

We’ve only just hit the halfway point and already Game of Thrones season three is packing plenty of punches. And those epic punches are covered in fire! And laced with nipples! I just got punched square in the face by episode five, Kissed by Fire, and I may not have read those big fancy books, but boy do I have an awful lot of knee-jerk, immature, and ill-educated things to say about it!

Let’s recap the crap out of Game of Thrones! If your Throner Boner remains strong then join me... after the jump!

Speaking of fire, now this is how you open an episode! One-eyed Beric of the Brotherhood Without Banners make good on his promise to give scarred, shark-toothed villain, The Hound, a trial-by-combat in the secret bat cave. And then Beric’s goddamn sword is on fire! The Hound hates fire! It’s his Kryptonite! But Beric keeps swinging that flaming sword at him as lil’ androgynous Arya Stark eggs him on! Now it should be known that Beric worships the Lord of Light and he figures that if he wins then the Hound is guilty in the eyes of God, but if he loses then the Hound is free to bugger off. It’s looking like fire is going to win but then the Hound pulls out some mad skills and embeds his weapon in Beric, killing him. Wild-haired Banner-Bro, Thoros, quickly takes to his side and starts chanting some religious mumbo jumbo to resurrect him. Beric is inexplicably back from the dead but the Lord of Light has spoken. Much to Arya’s chagrin, The Hound gets to skulk off back into the woods to... I don’t know... dig for truffles?

Arya’s glumness continues when later on Robert Baratheon’s bastard, Gendry, reveals that he’s going to stay on with the Banner Bros to do their smithing. They’ll be the closest that the bastard has ever had to family, so Arya sheds a couple of tears. But chin up, lil guy, (girl?) because Thoras reveals that they plan on selling her back to her brother Robb in the Riverlands. He also reveals that Beric has died and been brought back at least five other times, once before at the grimy hand of The Hound. I think he must be an immortal-flaming-sword-highlander-ninja. I’ve read about those.

Seeing as how we just mentioned Robb, let’s skip ahead and get him out of the way. Actually, full credit to the usually yawn-inducing Robb this week because he stepped up and was legitimately badass. This was the first time I truly accepted him as hardened, take-no-shit, no-holds-barred, talk-to-the-hand leader. Beardy old jerkface Karstark’s thirst for vengeance against the Lannisters leads him to break into the dungeon and murder the two young Lannister nephews who were being held hostage. Robb is mighty pissed at this senseless act of treason and although his mother, Catelyn, and wife Talisa attempt to warn him that the loyalty of Karstark’s men are essential to their war efforts, Robb’s all, “No. No, fuck that shit” and he lops off Karstark’s head with his own sword. And then kicks it down a rabbit hole. And then a rabbit comes out wearing Karstark’s head over his own head. And everyone laughs. OK, I spiced up that last bit. Oh! But Blackfish did punch Karstark in the face beforehand. Blackfish is rad.

Later on, Robb is stewing over his medieval tabletop strategy wargames while good wife Talisa tries to help him finding a new strategy seeing as how Karstark’s men predictably split. An anachronistic lightbulb bursts over Robb’s head when he realises that he might not be able to take the fight to King’s Landing, but he can take away their home at Casterly Rock. Everyone high-fives for at least five minutes. You da man now, Robb Dawg!

But what of the other Stark brother-who-is-not-really-a-real-brother, that bastard Jon Snow who is now literally dicking around in the wastes beyond the wall. The wildling army guys, particularly Gareth from The Office, are questioning Jon on the movements of the Night’s Watch, doubting that he has actually turned against them, i.e. suggesting that he is infact 2 legit 2 quit. Jon’s like, “Say that again and I’ll kill you!” and the red beard guy is like, “Nuh uh. I’ll kill YOU, you bastard!”, and Jon is like, “Nuh uh!” And then wildling woman Ygritte playfully steals his sword and he has to chase her.

Now Ygritte has had a lady boner for Jon Snow since season two (my girlfriend has had one since season one) so he follows her into a cave where there is a totally sweet hot tub. Wait... they’ve been freezing and miserable in the snow for years but... they had a hot tub? Inconceivable. Now there was zero nudity last week so it was a pretty safe bet that one of the main characters was getting naked this week. Turns out a lot of them did! But it’s Jon and Ygritte who kick things off as she slips into her birthday suit and Jon takes a sip from the furry cup. After they’ve banged (Jon, that cave hot tub will strip her of her natural lubrication. Just saying. You weren’t to know) Ygritte makes him uncomfortable with tales of past conquests. They should have called this episode The Snow Plow.

Okay... Stannis. Still sulking about his defeat (although has he ever smiled?) the-man-who-would-be-king, Stannis, having been fobbed off by his redheaded sorceress mistress, Melisandre, plods back to his frightening wife. Seriously, this woman is trying to outdo Lady Arryn in the creepy stakes. She has at least three of her miscarried babies floating in jars in her room! Stannis confesses his infidelity but she not only already knew, but she’s thrilled as she sees it as a blessing from the Lord of Light. She’s stoked that Melisandre gave him a son, conveniently neglecting the fact that it was a Shadow Man Baby.

Defeated again, Stannis skulks off to see his young daughter who is apparently part lizard. No wonder this guy is always miserable! She shows him a toy ship that shamed sea captain, Davos, gifted her and Stannis moans that Davos is a traitor rotting in the dungeon. The little lizard girl later sneaks down to question Davos and although he confesses to standing against her father, she’s all, “Hey we cool, Davos”. She slips him a book but poor old Davos can’t actually read. So she’s like, “No problem, I may be part lizard but I can teach you how to read!” and they get stuck into the first couple of pages of Hop on Pop.

Now, after all that expensive dragon craziness last week, I didn’t expect to cut back to Daenerys so soon, but she’s still riding along with her freshly liberated slave army. She asks them to pick their own commander and they bring forward a strapping young dude who identifies himself as Grey Worm. Apparently the slaves were all given names to remind them that they are vermin. This totally rubs Daenerys the wrong way so she’s all, “From now on you pick your own names. Pick a name that gives you pride!” Great! So now she’s going to have an army full of guys calling themselves Big Dick and Long Dong.

Daenerys’ faithful knight, Ser Jorah speaks to ex King’s Guard commander Ser Barristan. Barristan starts planning out Daenerys’ public relations strategy suggesting that it won’t look good for the shunned Ser Jorah to be by her side when they take over. Ser Jorah is like, “Whoa whoa, dude, you just got here, who the hell do you think you are? I take my orders from the Queen!” Looks like a cockfight is about to happen there!

So Jaime Lannister is finally handed (hurr!) over to Lord Bolton at Harrenhal and, thank god, Bolton shows some humanity by scolding Locke, removing the decomposing hand from Jaime’s neck, assuring him that his sister still lives, and seeing that his wounds are tended to. He also unties mighty mountain woman Brienne and places her under his protection. Jaime goes to the medieval doctor who does all sorts of gross and painful things to cleanse the infection from his stump.

Soon afterwards, Brienne is naked and soaking in a giant hot tub (tonight’s theme?) and a battered Jaime strips off, waves his butt at the camera for a bit, and then gets in with her, much to her shock. He assures her he’s not interested but does show a spark of interest when she stands up naked to threaten him when he questions her oath. Jaime tells her the true tale about how he broke his oath and went on to slay the mad king who was threatening to burn everyone. It’s a great performance but I have to admit that I was mightily distracted throughout. Not by nude Brienne, but by Jaime’s bandaged stump emerging from the water. I swear it looked like he was talking to a sock puppet the entire time. I hope to god someone Photoshops googly eyes on that thing!

And finally to King’s Landing. Demon/monkey/imp Tyrion, now Master of Coin, discusses the exorbitant royal wedding budget with super sharp, take-no-bullshit grandmother-of-the-bride-to-be Olenna Tyrell. She outwits even Tyrion, throwing around a billion well-placed verbal barbs, reminding him of the Tyrell's contributions to the war and  schooling him that a royal wedding is the kind of distraction the people need so that they keep from finding a violent distraction for themselves. Tyrion reluctantly concedes, but Olenna agrees to pick up half of the bill.

Little Finger meanwhile entraps dashing knight Ser Loras Tyrell by sending a young man to tempt him. After the two of them have sex, the man reports back to Little Finger revealing that Loras intends to marry Sansa Stark. Little Finger had been planning on skipping the capital with her smuggled on his boat, so he is naturally pissed, a suspicion that is further confirmed when she tells him that she wishes to stay a little longer. When this all get back to the terrifying Big Daddy Lannister, Tywin, he is mighty pissed and summons children Tyrion and Cersei to discuss the plot. If Sansa is the "key to the north" then he doesn't want to lose her so he comes up with an unexpected plan. Tyrion will marry Sansa Stark. Tyrion is horrified while Cersei gloats. Then Tywin insists that Cersei will marry Loras and start popping out more babies in order to secure that family as well. Now it is Cersei who is horrified as the credits roll.

HOLY SHIT! Can Tywin do that?! I wanted to see an extended scene where he then walked around King's Landing ordering EVERYONE to get married. "You there! Marry a goat! You there, boy! Marry a watermelon! Guards! Each of you marry a hay bale!" THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT!

What would you like to marry? Tell me in the comments below!