The second episode of the eighth season continues, on the one hand, the linking of arcs to situations from the beginning of the series as well as to relevant subplots, in which the authors let further characters arrive in Winterfell or let actions take place between those who are already there. In this sequence, several conflicts of previous strands of action are resolved to be able to reposition figures. To be able to continue the principle of ensemble dramaturgy with a central character, central elements of the central conflict are remembered in this series, realigned, and organised as tensions between the figures of this season.

On the other hand, this episode intensifies the tension in the sense of waiting for the central battle between the living, the human world, and the embodied death and its hosts. This is called as a theme in variants again and again – in the dialogue between Arya (Maisie Williams) and Gendry (Joe Dempsey) for example.

In their interaction the real battle, the challenge to face the angels of death, Satan’s hosts, is pointed out, but also the arc to the subplot and story of the character of Arya is created. Death can have a thousand faces and embody absolute evil as nobody (Arendt 2007, 101, Stutterheim 2017, 87/88). The adolescent Arya not only looked death in the face but also in his ‚workshop‘ (Season 5).

The theme of the confrontation with death and the possible total downfall and absolute oblivion appears again and again in this current episode. Here the central conflict of the Christian conception of the world is reflected as the elementary struggle between God and Satan, which determines this series in its moral code and the motivation of the characters. Good versus evil. To represent and stand up for the good ones, one must be morally good, get forgiven for one’s sins and free oneself or renounce them, put egoism and vanity at the back. For this fight, even the ‚For the Family‘, which otherwise determines the canon of behavioural norms, stands back. For the family would no longer exist after the victory of evil. (cf. Stutterheim 2017, 32-43)

As already emphasised in the last blog text, in these weekly comments I can only deal with selected situations, and only analyse them to a certain extent so as not to go beyond the scope. And, attention, unfortunately, from here it does not go without more detailed descriptions, spoiler warning for those who have not yet seen the episode.

First, however, embedding the scene between Arya and Gendry, Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) had to be repositioned in this episode because he is one of the central and dramaturgically relevant flexible characters (cf. Stutterheim 2017, 94). It was not only introduced as a second figure at the complementary level of Kings Landing, but also as relevant to the conflict at this level of action. Actions of this figure are part of the conflict between the Lannisters and Starks, but especially for the central conflict, the question of the right to the throne. The character of Jaime Lannister keeps alive the basic situation of the problems surrounding the Targaryen family. And so implicitly refers to the Grail legend in which the land is threatened until the king is healed or a healed king reigns over it. Jaime embodies this conflict, is a living memory of it because he prevented a mass murder by killing the last Targaryen king and could deceive the successor, who was a morally ill, sinful king. From this constellation, he can be managed as a variable character and not assigned to a family line. He is the protector of the rightful king, he fights for the living, as expressed explicitly in his dialogue, and in the sense of dramaturgy, he is a character who, in the tradition of tragedy, stands for the survival of the community.

The scenes around Jaime Lannister represent the day of the last court for Jaime. He must answer for his deeds, his sins are balanced against his good deeds. Since, as Jon (Kit Harrington) sums it up in one sentence, every man is needed, and especially Jaime, who for dramaturgical reasons cannot be removed from the narrative right now, this character has to face his sins and survive this judgment. As already mentioned above and explained in more detail in earlier texts (Stutterheim 2017), conservatively Christian world views and traditions are decisive for the leading strand and its development. First, it is the young women who sit in court over him, then he faces Bran (Isaak Hempstead Wright) and finally Brienne of Tarth (Gwendoline Christie). The character of Bran gives Jaime absolution because he acted for his family at that time, which is understandable in the context of the moral code that the roles of the series follow; and now it is ultimately about higher things than the earthly. A further moment of increasing the tension on the progress of the series is also interwoven here, in that the authors let Bran, the seer, ask: „How do you know there is an afterwards?“

With Brienne, Jaime is also brought into a balanced relationship, which is carried over several situations and results in Jaime knighting her.

It also seems interesting to me how the constellation of Sansa-Daenerys is further developed in this episode. As a reminder, the most urgent wish of both women since the beginning of the series has been to be Queen in Kingslanding. The figure of Sansa (Sophie Turner) as the king’s wife, the character of Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) as the one who is convinced that she is entitled on her own right to the throne on inheritance law grounds. This is implicitly conceived as a conflict between the morally good Stark family in the north, living in harmony with nature, and the immoral and therefore insane Targeryen family from the south. The latter provoked their own downfall because they got involved with the ‚heraldic animal of the devil‘, the lindworm, i.e. the dragon. In the course of the plot, sufficient situations were built in which the figure of Daenerys was inscribed with irrational to excessively cruel decisions in her actions, which kept awake and confirmed this stigma of the family of the South and intellect and the associated impression of overestimating one’s own self. To prepare for this situation, Winterfell Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) and Jaime talk about Daenerys and Cersei (Lena Headley) in the inner courtyard, an analogy is also made here and above all the third woman, whose aim in life is also the throne, is remembered.

As so often in the course of the series, Daenerys is advised by one of her male advisors to do something relevant to the achievement of her goal, but which would never have occurred to the character herself. (Almost all positive decisions made by this character in the course of the action have been initiated, advised, or prepared by male companions.) „All my life I have known one goal: The Iron Throne.“ And it is very likely that for dramatic reasons they deliberately leave their brother unmentioned, whose aspirations determined the first years of their lives.

The moment the conversation revolves around their love for Jon, they get closer to each other, to the point that Daenerys lays her hand on Sansa’s, which, however, also expresses an embodiment of hierarchy. But the figure of Sansa does not allow herself to be captured by the gesture and brings the conversation back to the central conflict, the balance of power between the throne in the South/Kingslanding and The North/Winterfell.

Before Daenerys can respond, there is a reinforcement for the Sansas cause and its emotional power: Theon (Alfie Allen) arrives. Since the beginning of the series, these two figures have been dramaturgically linked to each other, as have those of Arya and Jon or Arya and Gendry.

Central to the further course of the explicit action is the scene of planning the impending confrontation in the middle of the running time of the episode. Since a time frame can now be given by the arrived fighters, one must make preparations for the forthcoming all-decisive fight. This makes it possible to unite all prominent figures in one room and to move Jon back into the centre of the action. He, as the Parzival of the narrative, is the one who can heal the country, end the threat. A fight for that is inevitable. That this must be wisely prepared since victory cannot be achieved by force alone, is evident on the explicit level of narrative, and implicitly a clash of the spiritual divine with the representation of absolute evil, Satan, is equally inevitable. Here we are also working on the figure gang, which has already been led over the whole season. Through Bran’s encounter with the Night King and the resulting physical networking of both characters, Bran can serve as a lure. Of course, the figure of Theon is the most suitable to be placed at his side. Explicitly for the reason that the character himself expresses: He conquered Winterfell when the child was Bran Burgherr, so now he has to defend her next to him. Implicitly, Theon is also the most suitable figure to stand by Bran’s side, as he also suffered a non-healing physical wound from the hand of one of the characters representing evil in the human world. Like Bran, Theon has been transformed into a different character through the encounter with the evil, according to the standards that apply to the cosmos of the series, a better character.

Arya and Gendry have been emotionally connected since episode 10 of the first season. The fact that the two become a couple in this episode is explicitly logical concerning the situation in this previous plot. This is already apparent in the events evolving in episode 8.1 and the scene at the beginning of this second episode. Implicitly this is also logical because in their relationship an arc is drawn to the friendship between the characters Robert Baratheon (Mark Addy) and Ned Stark (Sean Bean). Arya and Gendry take this relationship to a new level. So there is still another, an alternative future royal couple for the build-up of tension: Gendry and Arya.

As an echo to the scene in 8.1, in which Sam (John Bradley) in the crypt tells Jon of his true origin, at the end of the second episode of this season it is again the situation in the crypt, in which Jon now opens Daenerys that he is her nephew. This circumstance not only excludes a love relationship, the reason why the Daenerys figure was able to develop a gentle and peaceful side, as she expressed earlier in the conversation with Sansa. Moreover, if Jon is now Aegon Targeryen, he is the rightful male heir of the family throne and stands before her in the line of aspirants. This calls into question the entire previous striving and doing of the figure, as well as its position. This situation enables a further change in the action, with which a new conflict is built into another internal action in a specific constellation of characters. An excellent cliff hanger.

This replacement does not come as a surprise, as it has already been prepared for a long time. Dramaturgically, this can first be deduced from the sequence and form of the introduction of the figures. The figure of the Daenerys has taken over the claim to the throne from her brother and now – in the sense of how the series is arranged – gives it back to her next male relative in a dramaturgically logical manner shortly before the end of the plot. And, in the course of the plot, it was not for nothing that Jon was familiarised in time with the dragons, which he can now take over from Daenerys, and with them determine the final battle. The figure of the Daenerys seems to me to be a transitional figure who enriches the plot between the two male heirs to the throne and gives it a necessary facet, but possibly according to the dramaturgical balance, has to give up her claim to the throne at the end to the central male figure. We’ll see, but there’s a lot to be said for it. Because with the parents, Lyanna Stark (Aisling Franciosi) and Rhaegar Targaryen (Wilf Scolding), the conflict between the south and the north would be solved, and the country could be healed, if the figure Jon/Aegon would become the new king.

I’m curious to see what happens next. The Night King was already ready in the last shot to advance the plot in the next episode.

Kerstin Stutterheim

Bibliography

Arendt, Hannah. 2007. Über das Böse. Eine Vorlesung zu Fragen der Ethik [Some Questions of Moral Philosophy]. Ungekürzte Taschenbuchausg. ed, Serie Piper. München: Piper.

Klotz, Volker. 1980. Geschlossene und offene Form im Drama (1969). 13 ed, Literatur als Kunst. München: C. Hanser.

Stutterheim, Kerstin. 2015. Handbuch angewandter Dramaturgie. Vom Geheimnis des filmischen Erzählens, Babelsberger Schriften zu Mediendramaturgie und Ästhetik /. Frankfurt am Main u.a.: Peter Lang Verlag.

Stutterheim, Kerstin. 2017. Game of Thrones sehen – Dramaturgie einer TV Serie. Paderborn Fink Verlag / Brill

The art of the episode – beginning of the fifth act.

The eighth and final season of Game of Thrones has begun. As a reminder: Dramaturgically speaking, this series is rather a long epic feature film and follows the corresponding rules. This structural structure is complemented by a historical drama in the tradition of Shakespeare. Therefore, Game of Thrones doesn’t follow the rules of a series in which each episode must have a dramatic climax on the vertical narrative level. With this series of weekly comments on this series I complete the book „Game of Thrones sehen“, published in 2017.

With this eighth season the fifth act begins. Accordingly, the art of the first episode of this last season is not only to recall important aspects of the previous action after the long production and waiting period, but also to organize the necessary explicit action for the decisive fifth act. References to previous events must be included, especially to those of the first act, in this case the first and second season, which corresponds to the dramaturgical requirements of a last act of a feature film.

This referential level is already established in the first scene when we observe a boy (Felix Jamieson) walking through the crowd to climb a tree to better observe the approaching troops. This scene reflects on the one hand the scene from the first season, in which Bran spotted the approaching caravan of King Robert from the lookout at Winterfell Castle. The boy’s about the same age as Bran was in the first season. Part of the caravan now riding in are Jon Snow (Kit Harington) and at his side Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke), but also some of the central figures from the different action levels of the previous seasons.

Shortly thereafter, a boy of similar age – Lord Umber (Harry Grasby) – appears during the assembly in the Throne Room, which deals with the preparations for the presumably decisive Battle of Winterfell and the Seven Kingdoms. Also in this situation events of past seasons are called and at the same time the meaning of the forthcoming battle is underlined. Lord Umber, calls for more horses and wagons to secure his family’s contribution to the battle. Sansa (Sophie Turner) responds to this demand, underlining her position as Lady von Winterfell. At the same time a logical and probable situation has been created in which the character Jon once again combines a past decision with the expected dramatic climax and thus creates an elegant dramaturgical arc. In the final scene, the figure of the young Lord Umber is used again to recall one of the very first scenes in the series – the gruesome arrangement on the clearing and Umber recalls the image of the girl nailed to the tree.

The art of the dramatic design of the fifth, final act consists, on the one hand, in leading the action to its dramatic and tense climax and its dissolution, for which references and arcs or spies, depending on which of these concepts seems more understandable to whom. What is meant is that situations, places, events from the exposition are revisited and recalled in the development of the last act, and an echo is playfully received or answered. This is particularly true of the central conflict, which in this case is a multi-layered one: who owns the throne, who is the rightful king of the seven kingdoms, which is a more abstract conflict at the ‚collective level‘.
The other, more emotional question associated with the main character is who Jon’s mother was. This, however, is logically linked into the first mentioned, central level and gives this abstract collective level the concrete, exemplary individual fate. Now we viewers have known the answer to the personal question for some time. Here, a gimmick known from Hitchcock’s films of the ’self-effect‘ is used, which creates tension because we know more than the figure it concerns. The tension is to observe the character Jon, who knows or suspects nothing of his origin, but for whom this knowledge would influence the decisions he has to make.
In this episode, Jon Snow finally learns of his special origins and the completely different situation in which this character finds himself. He is, this is summarized by Sam Tarly (John Bradley) once again Aegon Targaryen, the son of Lyanna Stark (Aisling Franciosi) and Rhaegar Targaryen (Wilf Scolding), and thus the rightful heir of the throne – in the logic of the rules that are set for this kingdom. Of course this scene takes place in the crypt in Winterfell, between the graves of Lyanna and Ned Stark. Here, too, the arc is closed that began with the conversation between Ned Stark (Sean Bean) and King Robert (Mark Addy) just there in the first season. The overall conflict was already embedded in this dialogue.

With this scene between Sam and Jon/Aegon, a change in the quality of the plot has been achieved, a reorientation that gives the plot a twist that makes a reorientation of the plot necessary for a nude change possible.

The organization of the nude changes in this series also includes letting Cersei Lannister (Lena Hadley) start a new intrigue.  The immanent conflict between Winterfell and Kings Landing, the south and the north, connects the two regions. This is relevant for the tension building of each series and serves as an additional explicit narrative level that enriches the overall plot.  The figure of Cersei is designed in such a way that she still hopes to guarantee herself total power and the throne over the Seven Kingdoms. Implicitly, this constellation also tells of the conflict between an egomaniacal and dictatorial character and a social character that is intent on the welfare of the community. Dramaturgically speaking, each of the intrigues that Cersei leads gives a season a substantial dramatic arc, with the help of which each season can be brought to a certain conclusion without having to adapt the overall plot too much to nude progressions or to a series dramaturgy. In order to also draw a line to the first season on this level of the narrative, Cersei’s lover Euron Greyjoy (Pilou Asbæk) is designed to reflect the behaviour of Joffrey (Jack Gleeson) from the first season. In this series, the principle of evil is passed on from one human character to the next as in a relay race. When Euron Greyjoy, like Joffrey, now acts in close proximity to Cersei, evil has returned to her side.

A further task for the design of the fifth act is to conclude secondary actions.

Right at the beginning of the episode, a scene is set in which Arya and Jon see each other again as an echo of the situation in which Jon hands over her ‚Needle‘, in which Jon’s relationship to Daenerys is also addressed. This constellation is very probably still relevant for the further course. Because in the way characters are organized here, Daenerys has replaced Arya at Jon’s side for some time. Since the character of the Daenerys was threaded into the plot via her brother, it is quite possible that she will be unthreaded from the plot before her next male relative. This character has been able to make enough enemies in the course of the plot to make such a procedure probable. However, this is only a dramaturgical option, not a prediction.
Gendry (Joe Dempsey), the young blacksmith who is also the only surviving heir to King Robert’s throne, now forges weapons out of Dragon glass. The Hound and Arya face each other as well as Jamie and Bran. There are still conflicts to be resolved between these characters.