Game of Thrones Season 3: Episode 8 recap

 Spoilers ahead!

Episode eight proved to be the wittiest episode this season not least due to the absence of Theon's never-ending torture story. But to ensure that people still sat watching with their legs crossed, they had Melisandre put leeches on Gendry's erect member. Lately, this show has really had it in for penises.

Arya and the Hound don't take too long to make up and start getting along. After deciding against trying to mash in the Hound's already mashy face, they saddle up and Arya grabs a hold of his barrel of a body as they ride toward the Twins and the wedding the whole countryside is talking about. And just in case simply doing the right thing isn't enough to win over Arya and the audience, the Hound gets a great new catch-cry: 'Fuck Joffrey. Fuck the Queen.' Word.

After being tasked to find out just who the Yunkai's 'powerful friends' are, Ser Jorah undertakes a stealth mission to track rumour through the streets, source information on the who, the why and the wh- no, wait, there they are, hanging out in Yunkai city's backyard.

It's the Second Sons, racing their horses fast, slapping the asses of their very clean prostitutes and throwing their weight around as much as possible.

Surely a conjunction of action from the books, the reveal that these guys are hanging around on retainer hits a weird note. Why didn't the envoy just say, 'We've got a horde of mercenaries hanging out round back. They're five minutes walk away. Ten, max. You're bound to run into them.'

Mero, leader of the Second Sons, makes a quick bid for being the most douchey character since Joffrey, but also the most broadly sketched. He basically spends his entire screen time spewing every objectionable thing you've overheard in a bar. Characterisation shorthand, I suppose. And it works, because when his head rolls out onto Daenerys' carpet, all I could think was 'that's what you get for sniffing crotches, man'.

Daenerys also gets what looks to be her new crush, the diamond eyed Daario Naharas, 'the man who always has a choice'. And that choice seems to be between appearing smug or appearing self-satisfied. He's good at both.

What the dragons were doing during all this business?

Melissandre introduces Gendry to Stannis, who had little regard for the bastard, but also sees no need in torturing the boy. Melissandre says that the situation requires the tact of taking a lamb to slaughter. She's done it plenty of times, and they've never seen the knife. So when she ties up Gendry and tosses leeches onto him, I wondered in what why this counts as not seeing the knife? But then that got me thinking- is Stannis going to end up the lamb in this scenario?

Tyrion tries his best to forge some kind of understanding with Sansa in the lead up to their nuptials, and thankfully he finally says the magic words 'I will never hurt you', which finally lets Sansa relax her eternally tensed shoulders.

Margeary tries on a bit of her charm on Cersei, looping her arm in arm and calling her 'sister' (I love the way Cersei tries to pull herself away at first, but, like a Chinese finger trap, Margary's embrace just seems to tighten). It was a pretty stupid thing to do if you've ever met Cersei, but it goes even worse than I expected when Cersei threatens to have Margeary strangled in her sleep for the insult. She's pretty stubborn, ol' Cersei, but it smells a little like burning bridges to be threatening the soon-to-be wife of your son, the King, whose respect for you has waned enormously of late.

Joffrey gets plenty of moments to retain the title of most horrible character by trotting out the indignities one after the other: walking Sansa down the aisle, snatching away Tyrion's footstool at the altar, threatening midnight rape on the wedding night and attempting to cajole the crowd into stripping Sansa and carrying her to her chambers. You win, Joffrey, Mero's got nothing on you.

Olenna proves herself to be the person you most want to sit next to at a wedding, with her hilarious riffing on the inevitable incestuous links soon to be bonded through this spate of marriages.

Tyrion, a mess of drunken forlornness, threatens Joffrey in a moment of impatience, but thanks to Tywin's diplomacy and Tyrion's ability of poke fun at himself, the moment is soon diffused. Even the Lord of Tits and Wine has play by the rules sometimes.

Of course, he then has convince Sansa that's he's a decent fellow at heart and has no interest in sharing her bed 'until she wants him to'. When she asks what happens if she never wants him to, he settles into the couch for the night. Shae barges in in the morning and pulls the pillow from below his head, but gives him a conciliatory glance when she notices the clean bed sheets. It's the subtleties of romance that elude so many people.

When things return to Sam and Gilly and their trip back to the wall, I really wondered why on earth Sam is even trying to light the fire when we all know Gilly's the one who knows about this shit? I thought they were in this together. There's no 'I' in frozen, Gilly. Finally, when she's convinced Sam's not purposely trying to make her feel stupid, she volunteers to light the fire. In like, 5 seconds.

The ravens announce the arrival of a white walker, come to stach away the newborn boy, providing us with a big finish that pays off the dramatic value of that old dagger Sam found in episode six. After having his sword disintegrated by the icey touch of the walker, Sam stabs the zombie in the back with the dagger, the only thing he still has on him. So powerful is this weapon that the zombie collapses and explodes. Amazing weapon! So amazing, it seems, that it's not really worth picking back up.

So here we are, on the precipice of episode nine, traditionally the climax of the season, before episode ten gives us denouement action and sets up the storylines for season four. There's a break next week for the US Memorial Day weekend (viewing figures dipped for the corresponding episode last year, so they're giving it a miss this time) so we will have to wait in anticipation of the resolutions episode nine may give us:

Will Arya get back to her family?
How many teeth will Edmure's bethrothed actually have?
Does Theon find out who's torturing him?
Will the Yunkai be defeated easily?
How will Casterley Rock be taken?
and will anyone ever care about what Loras' father once told him?