Game of Thrones recap: Season five, episode three

SPOILER ALERT. Weddings are usually happy occasions, but this young woman’s big day will be more of a nightmare. So why is she going through with it?

“No Podrick, I will not go to your school formal with you.”

THIS story is dark and full of spoilers. Read no further if you want to avoid juicy details from episode three.

A beheading, a kidnapping, a terrible wedding arrangement and a cheeky homage to the Mother of Dragons. All that and more in this week’s Game of Thrones recap.

Episode one recap

Episode two recap

Once again, we begin at the House of Black and White, where Arya is being trained as a maid. Huh. So much for her plan to become a master assassin. In all fairness, she’s really killing it with that broom.

Across the room, actual faceless assassin Jaqen H’ghar is apparently murdering a decrepit old man with a cup of water, providing further confirmation that his job isn’t nearly as cool as we’ve been led to believe.

When Arya dares to complain about being used as a sentient broomstick, Jaqen accuses her of being self-absorbed. Normally that would seem a bit rich, coming from a fellow who refers to himself in the third person, but he’s making a fair point. If Arya is to become a faceless man, as she wishes, she must cease to be a girl with a face. She must sweep away her old identity. Poetic, right?

“A man does not do the sweeping. A woman does that. Welcome to the Middle Ages.”

It’s third time lucky (in several senses of the word) in King’s Landing, where Margaery Middleton has finally managed to consummate a marriage. Unlike his brother, who choked under pressure, Tommen rose to the challenge. Now he’s keen to meet it head-on again and again and again.

“It all happened so fast!” he exclaims, prompting many knowing glances between female viewers.

The new Queen is already using her considerable lady charms to manipulate Tommen’s well-meaning but desperately horny heart, driving a wedge between the King and his mother. When this becomes apparent to Cersei, she goes to confront Margaery, but is silenced by a ruthless smackdown.

“I wish we had some wine for you,” Margaery says. “It’s a bit early in the day for us.”

Oooooh. Right in the alcoholism. This woman’s ruthless.

That horrible moment when you realise you’re the third wheel.

In the north, Sansa has cottoned on to Littlefinger’s latest plot. He wants her to marry renowned psycho Ramsay Bolton, on the vague premise that it will allow her to avenge her dead family. Littlefinger is sketchy on the details of this wonderful, noble, selfless plan which, needless to say, won’t benefit him in any way.

Meanwhile, at Winterfell, Roose Bolton is trying to teach his son that skinning people alive isn’t always the smartest form of diplomacy. Ramsay isn’t buying it — he lives to flay. Definitely husband material.

“Ramsay? No way. He’s spent too much time touching Theon’s naughty bits.”

Brienne and Podrick are pursuing Sansa, and seem to be running out of time to catch up, but they still clear room in the schedule for one of their habitual campfire bonding sessions. Today, Brienne wants to tell him about the saddest school formal ever. I honestly never thought I’d hear of anything more distressing than the woefully undercooked steak at my formal, but there you go.

In short, a bunch of “little s**ts” tricked Brienne into thinking they liked her, before she realised they were laughing behind her back. Then Renly “Prince Charming” Baratheon shut them up. She’s loved him ever since.

Of course, Renly was murdered back in season two by Stannis, otherwise known as the guy who finally took sibling rivalry too far. The look on Brienne’s face when she spits out Stannis’s name is strikingly reminiscent of that time she slowly shoved her sword up a soldier’s backside. So if I were him, I’d be investing in a very strong butt-plate.

“No Podrick, I will not go to your school formal with you.”

At Castle Black, Jon is easing into his new role as Lord Commander with baby steps. His first such step is to tell Stannis, the self-proclaimed king with a huge army at his command, to get lost. Apparently, that army is eating too much of the crap the Night’s Watch calls food.

Stannis takes this affront rather well, as he’s planning to march on Winterfell within a fortnight anyway. But his adviser, the onion man of many layers, thinks Jon should be marching with them.

“The shield that guards the realms of men. That’s what you swore to be. Now I’m not a learned man, but the best way to help the most people might not be to sit in a frozen castle at the edge of the world,” Davos says, expertly twisting the semantics of Jon’s vows. In another life, he might have been a lawyer instead of an illiterate, digitally challenged onion smuggler. Alas, we shall never know.

“What can I say? I have a big appetite.”

Jon’s influence is also being felt in Braavos, where Arya has decided to quite literally throw away her old identity by casting her belongings into the sea. There’s just one thing she can’t part with: Needle, the sword Jon gave her. Arya hides the blade under some rocks, where I’m sure her new assassin/professional stalker buddies will never find it.

To celebrate her fresh, nonextistent persona, Arya joins forces with a fellow apprentice to give a half-naked dead guy a sponge bath. Not quite sure what to make of that.

“Oh, Needle. We had a bloody good time together. Emphasis on the bloody.”

Back across the Narrow Sea, Sansa arrives in Winterfell, and everyone present does a lovely job of pretending the Boltons didn’t butcher half her family. Ramsay even displays something resembling manners.

“I’ll never hurt her, you have my word,” he tells Littlefinger. I never thought I’d say this, but this new, nice Ramsay is even more unsettling than the old one.

“Nice to flay y ... meet. Nice to meet you, m’lady.”

A little further north, Jon is presiding over lunch, or dinner, or breakfast — it’s hard to tell, because the lighting is always the same at Castle Black. He’s lapping up the power in his new role, partly by ordering people around, but mainly by cracking jokes about gingers. Ygritte would not be happy.

Eventually, he gets around to giving Lord Janos “Potato Head” Slynt a nasty new assignment. “You can stick your order up your bastard a**,” he replies. Not a good idea.

Jon orders his men to drag Lord Potato Head outside for a good, old-fashioned beheading. When the deed is done, he looks up to see Stannis give an approving nod. There’s a weird master-padawan relationship forming here.

Soooooooo, Stannis has aged a bit.

In King’s Landing, the High Septon is enjoying a kinky role-play session in Littlefinger’s brothel, as one does, when he’s interrupted by a bunch of “Sparrows” — fanatical cultists with a penchant for punishing sinners. In this case, they force his Holiness to march through the city’s streets stark naked. To be frank, that’s a harsher punishment for the people watching than for the Septon himself.

That incident eventually leads Cersei to meet the Sparrows’ leader, the High Sparrow, a refreshingly humble man with no shoes, no ego and practically no hair. Think of him as Balding British Jesus. Cersei, pretending to be pious, moves to forge an alliance of sorts with the High Sparrow. What could possibly go wrong?

“Jesus was better looking, I’ll give you that.”

Finally, to Volantis, where Tyrion has escaped the comfort and safety of his horse-drawn carriage to take a gander at the local sights. And by sights, I mean brothels.

He finds an establishment with a good-humoured bouncer and settles in for a drink. Tyrion seems to be avoiding notice without any trouble, because everyone else is distracted by the sight of a prostitute in a Daenerys costume. I’m not saying she’s Khal-easy or anything, but Daario would definitely approve of her attire. One man, however, does not.

That’s just cheeky.

Ser Friendzone, known as Jorah Mormont in a former life, is sitting in a dark corner with the sort of hangover that only seems to afflict the lovelorn.

It’s OK though. He’s just hatched a plan to win back Daenerys’ affection. When Tyrion strolls outside to relieve himself, Ser Friendzone sneaks up behind him, ties him up and carries him away. He’s going to deliver one of the Lannisters to his Queen.

Who knew Jorah was so into bondage?

We’ll be back with another recap next week. In the meantime, tell us what you thought of episode three in the comments section below, or on Twitter: @SamClench