History Recap / GameOfThronesS8E1Winterfell

** Queen Cersei tries to keep Euron at arms length, but realises she has to throw him a bone to keep him loyal. Even after sex though she still maintains a cold demonour.

** Queen Cersei tries to keep Euron at arms length, but realises she has to throw him a bone to keep him loyal. Even post-coitus however she's carefully keeping her feelings guarded.

* DarknessEqualsDeath: To others ''really'' don't want to follow Beric into the dark interior of a castle that's been overrun by wights, but of course they do anyway.

* MortonsFork: Bronn is given a doozy of one by Qyburn - either he can refuse Cersei's order and be killed for defying her, go to Winterfell to assassinate Tyrion and Jaime and probably get murdered by their allies (especially as Tyrion is Daenerys' Hand), or TakeAThirdOption, pretend to go along with the assassination by accepting the gold, riding North and then join forces with Tyrion and Jaime instead. Time will tell which he chooses.

* InterruptedIntimacy: Bronn is in the middle of a foursome with three prostitutes when he's interrupted by Qyburn walking in.

** ''Arya'' defending Sansa's attitude to Jon, when last season she was worried that Sansa was undermining Jon's authority, shows that she also doesn't trust Dany and that she trusts their sister.

* DroppingTheBombshell: Sam and Daenerys are having a lighthearted conversation about the former saving Sir Jorah's life. Dany can barely contain her laughter when Sam asks for a royal pardon for stealing some books from the Citadel -- oh, and also for stealing the Tarly family sword from his father.

* ShipTease: Between Gendry and Arya in the forge. He [[{{Adorkable}} stammers]] as he compliments her on [[SheIsAllGrownUp how good she looks]]. Then [[CallBack he calls her "M'lady" again]], which causes her to [[WhenSheSmiles smile and giggle]]. Finally, after requesting him to make her a knife, she gives him a ''flirty smirk'' as she leaves.

However, that night, events take a downward turn for both Jon and Daenerys. When Jon goes to see Sansa in her study, she tells him that Lord Glover has decided to hunker down at Deepwood Motte rather than join them at Winterfell because of Jon's decision to bend the knee to a southern ruler. Jon is frustrated but Sansa points out it's a feeling of anger shared by many of the Northern nobles, including herself. Jon points out that [[WeAREStrugglingTogether they need allies and they have no chance of defeating the undead without Daenerys]] ("Do you think we can beat the Army of the Dead without her? I fought them, Sansa. Twice.") and their squabbling over who holds what title will be irrelevant if the undead aren't defeated. Sansa and Jon seem to reach a brief stalemate but Jon tells Sansa that Daenerys is not like her father, she's a good queen. Sansa wonders if there's a more personal aspect in her brother's decision to bend the knee, ''"Did you bend the knee to save the North, or because you love her?"'' Jon can't answer.

At the castle forges, Arya finds Gendry arming men, including Sandor, with dragonglass weapons for the battle to come. After a fond reunion for the two, Arya requests that Gendry fashion an unspecified weapon she has in mind to fight with. In the castle library, Samwell is met by Daenerys and Jorah, who wants to introduce his queen to the man who saved his life in defiance of the rest of the Citadel; Sam's idea of a reward for such a service is simply a royal pardon for the books he "borrowed" from the Citadel's libraries. Unfortunately, the jovial mood turns sour when he says he also needs a pardon for stealing his family's Valyrian steel sword, at which point to their horror, Jorah and Daenerys realise Sam is the son and brother of Randyll and Dickon Tarly respectively, executed on her orders for refusing to bend the knee to her. Devastated, Sam holds back tears and excuses himself, fleeing outside. He then finds Bran in the courtyard. Sam asks what he's doing there and Bran replies, "Waiting for an old friend." Bran urges Sam to tell Jon the truth that he needs to know and Sam must be the one to tell him, for Jon trusts Sam more than anyone.

In the Winterfell crypts, Jon is delighted to see his old friend again, but dismayed when he learns what the woman he loves has done to the family of his best friend. When Sam asks Jon if he'd do the same, Jon admits he has executed men who have disobeyed him. Sam responds that Jon has also spared men when they've refused to kneel. Jon points out he wasn't a king then but Sam tells Jon, "But you were. You've always been." He proceeds to drop one hell of a bombshell on Jon; while Eddard Stark loved and raised Jon like a son, he was Jon's uncle, not his biological father -- Jon's mother is Lyanna Stark and his father was Rhaegar Targaryen. Ned lied to everyone -- his nephew, his wife, his children, all of Westeros -- keeping the secret of Jon's true parentage to the grave to protect Jon from Robert Baratheon's wrath. Sam reveals that his friend is in truth Aegon Targaryen, the trueborn son of Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen... and as such, possesses a better claim to the Iron Throne than that of Daenerys. Jon is stunned and horrified as everything he thought to be true comes crashing down around him, but Sam insists his friend has what it takes to be a good king. "You gave up your crown to save your people," Sam remarks. "Would she do the same?"

Leading them into the bowels of the castle, Edd shows Tormund and Beric a horrific message from the Night King; the corpse of Ned Umber, nailed to a wail in the center of a spiral pattern formed from severed human limbs. When Tormund points out the Army of the Dead is now between them and Winterfell, Edd remarks their best bet is to ride double on the horses he brought from Castle Black and hope they can get ahead of the undead. Their conversation is interrupted by Ned reanimating as a wight, letting loose a bloodcurdling screech; Beric sets the child wight ablaze with his flaming sword and all three watch in horror as the boy and the macabre tableau he is part of ignites, a grim warning of the fate that awaits them all if they don't win the Great War.

Back at '''Winterfell''', a lone rider enters the castle's courtyard and removes his hood, revealing himself to be Jaime Lannister, having come to make good his pledge to fight against the Army of the Dead. Taking in a place he hasn't seen in years, Jaime is mortified to find himself met by the last person he wants to see... Bran.

* SpitTake: Bronn chokes on his wine when Qyburn casually remarks one of his female companions will be dead of an STD within the year.

-->'''Tyrion''': [[{{Understatement I know our peoples haven't been friends in the past}}]]... but we ''must'' fight together now, or die.

-->'''Tyrion''': [[Understatement I know our peoples haven't been friends in the past]]... but we ''must'' fight together now, or die.

* AnAexToGrind: Sandor has Gendry forge him a dragonglass axe, with Gendry even noting that it was rather difficult to forge something so big out of the material.

** Additionally the designs on the astrolabe depicting events from pre-series history have been replaced with depictions of the [[Recap/GameOfThronesS7E7TheDragonAndTheWolf Night King and Viserion breaking through the wall]], [[Recap/GameOfThronesS3E9TheRainsOfCastamere The Red Wedding]], [[Recap/GameOfThronesS1E9Baelor Ned Stark's beheading]] and [[Recap/GameOfThronesS1E10FireAndBlood the birth of Danaerys' dragons]].

* WhamLine: ''"[[TheDreaded The Night King]] [[ZombieDragon has your dragon]]. [[ReforgedIntoAMinion He's one of them now]]"''.

* ActuallyPrettyFunny: Varys says that neither Dany nor Jon are likely to listen to lonely old men because the young keep them at a distance to avoid unpleasant truths. Tyrion takes offense to 'old men' and says he's not old -- well, not as old as Davos. The Onion Knight can't help but smirk at this.
** Incidentally, Peter Dinklage is actually the oldest of the three Lannister sibling actors, despite playing the youngest.

* ArmorPiercingQuestion: Two towards Jon, and he can't answer either of them:
--> '''Sansa Stark:''' Did you bend the knee to save the North, or because you love her?\\

-->'''Qyburn''': What will she do for the man who rids her of her treasonous brothers?

* LadyDrunk: Cersei seeks refuge in a goblet of wine after having to sleep with Euron; since she avoided alcohol last season due to her pregnancy, it's a mark of how much her situation is really getting to her; it also sheds some doubts as to whether she's pregnant or not.

* VillainHasAPoint: Qyburn is correct when he reminds Bronn it was Jaime and not Cersei who screwed up the arrangement Bronn had to marry Lollys Stokeworth.
** Euron also has a fair point that he's done more than enough by now to prove his loyalty to Cersei.

* ShipperOnDeck: Davos, who teased Jon about his attraction to Dany, decides to go a step further and proposes to Varys and Tyrion (his counterparts in Dany's camp) a marriage proposal between Jon and Dany, seeing a way to unite both houses and heal tensions.

* CainAndAbel: Cersei sends Qyburn to hire Bronn to assassinate both her brothers for treason, though [[{{Hypocrite}} she was the one who put them in that position herself by turning coat in the first place]].

** Daenerys' revelation of her execution of Randyl and Dickon brings to mind her all-too-familiar tendency as a JudgeJuryAndExecutioner, as shown previously with her treatment of the Slavers of Astapor, and how poorly she measures the consequences of her brash actions. In that instance, she unwittingly made the people she swore to protect vulnerable (the slaves), and in this instance, she unwittingly alienates a man that she doesn't know is aware that her claim to the Iron Throne is inferior than Jon Snow's.

** Daenerys' revelation of her execution of Randyl and Dickon brings to mind her all-too-familiar tendency as a judge, jury and executioner, as shown previously with her treatment of the Slavers of Astapor, and how poorly she measures the consequences of her brash actions. In that instance, she unwittingly made the people she swore to protect vulnerable (the slaves), and in this instance, she unwittingly alienates a man that she doesn't know is aware that her claim to the Iron Throne is inferior than Jon Snow's.

* RealLifeWritesThePlot: Cersei sends Bronn away from King's Landing to assassinate her brothers (and gets Qyburn to give him the specifics rather than doing it herself) so that Lena Headey and Jerome Flynn, as per usual, [[HostilityOnTheSet don't have to share any scenes.]]

* FromBadToWorse: After finding Ned Umber's corpse nailed to the wall of his castle as a message from the White Walkers, Tormund notes that this means the Night King's army is now between them and Winterfell. Edd suggests they can ride double on the horses he brought from Castle Black to try and get ahead of the undead, to which Tormund replies that between the cold and carrying two riders, they'll be lucky if their horses last that long.

** Once again, Lord Glover [[FairWeatherFriend abandons House Stark in its hour of need]] and holes up in his castle to wait out the crisis. Much to Jon and Sansa's frustration.
* HollywoodTactics: Last Hearth should have been the very first castle to have been demanned, as it's the northernmost keep in the North. Predictably, and having lagged in bringing their people to Winterfell, House Umber and the castle's occupants are the first to fall to the White Walkers.

* LadyDrunk: Cersei seeks refuge in a goblet of wine after having to sleep with Euron; since she avoided alcohol last season due to her pregnancy, it's a mark of how much her situation is really getting to her.