Right, before I get into anything Game of Thrones related, Ed Sheeran was in a scene with Arya Stark as a Kings Landing Soldier that sings. OK? Has that satisfied everyone’s need to talk about it? Good. Here’s everything that happened in the hotly anticipated opening episode of Season 7.
As is the trend of Game of Thrones, the opening episode of the Season has always been a way of recapping where the characters are after the events of the last episode, who the prominent figures of the episodes to come will be, and what will be the overarching story of this overall Season?
So, from here on there will be spoilers for Episode 1 (Dragonstone) of Game of Thrones. You have been warned!!
Dragonstone opened in maniacal fashion with Walder Frey addressing his entire family at a feast to celebrate their victory over the Starks. The intriguing part of this whole ordeal was that Arya Stark murdered Walder Frey in one of the last scenes of Season 6. So, I wonder who was masquerading as Walder Frey in front of the whole male contingent of the Frey family? Arya obviously! Her brilliant plan to execute the Frey’s for their involvement in the Red Wedding made her path to retribution a lot more interesting.
Once the opening credits drew to a close, Bran and Meera arrived at The Wall almost immediately after Bran’s latest vision showed the Night King leading his undead army closer and closer to the waiting men women and children due south.
Jon and Sansa began to plot their defense against this growing force of White Walkers by uniting the heads of each family loyal to the Stark family, and maybe some of those that fought against them too? In a bit of a twist, both Jon and Sansa have a bit of a falling out about the actions required for the traitors to their Name. In the end, it’s Jon’s stoic nature that overcomes the situation, but not for a brief comment from Sansa regarding his need to listen to her more than Ned and Rob and had in the past.
Cersei Lannister looks to have begun her reign as Queen of the Seven Kingdoms the same way she’s spent every day so far, with a firm grip and iron will. Her plan to usurp the uprising growing on all sides seems a fleeting one at first, however, an encounter with the newly crowned “king” of the Iron Isles promises a terrifying alliance for all that stand against them.
Sam, seemingly stuck in a rut with the Maesters, takes it upon himself to steal books from the restricted section of books to discover anything he can about the oncoming wave of Zombie soldiers. His discovery – a mountain of Dragonglass buried beneath the new home of Daenerys Targaryen and former residence of Stannis Baratheon, Dragonstone.
Finally, we find The Hound alongside the gang of Lord of Light worshippers he attached himself to. This interaction, although brief in terms of the overall episode I believe will have the most resonance throughout the rest of the Season. The way in which The Hound seems to immediately sway towards understanding the Lord of Light’s methods by looking into the Fire will surely mean we will discover events occurring throughout Westeros before, during or even after they have happened.
As opening episodes go, Dragonstone is probably better than most, it didn’t feel like just a recap of the last Season’s events, instead, we learned more about what is yet to come than that of what we think we already know. As negative as this may sound, let’s hope this is the worst episode of the Season by a country mile.
