Game of Thrones Season 2 Episode 9 “Blackwater”
Director: Neil Marshall
Writer: George R. R. Martin
Story:
Tyrion and the Lannisters fight for their lives as Stannis’ fleet attacks Blackwater Bay. King’s Landing becomes the stage of the most decisive battle of the War of the Five Kings.
Review:
WOW! ‘Blackwater’ is an amazingly written and directed episode. When the writer for the episode is same person who wrote the book on which the series is based on, what else would one expect. This episode has the fewest cast members. Only 10-11 out of 25. It features only- Tyrion, Joffery, Cersei, Sansa, Shae, Bronn, The Hound, Tywin, Varys, Stannis and Davos.
The battle scene was just amazing. It reminded me of Lord of the Rings’ Battle at Helms Deep, but on a toned down level. Tyrion showed leadership skills and bravery. When he said ‘Rain fire on them’ I was hoping they’d play Adele’s ‘Set Fire to the Rain’, but that would have ruined the feel of the episode. Coming back to the point, Tyrion delivered an encouraging speech to the soldiers.He said that if he was half a man, what does that make you. That was one of the funniest lines in the movie. And after they started shouting ‘Halfman! Halfman!’.
The first 20-30 mins of the episode, there isn’t any battle, theres nervousness and tension in the air. But that builds up to a great battle which looks pretty real, though the ships and the harbor is clearly CGI, it looks pretty real. The battle was also as I had expected it to look like. There were soldiers hacking of the enemies, slicing the head off, doing a nice Kill Bill slicing of the brain and bodies being cut in half. A Song of Ice and Fire contains over-the-top violent scenes and the violent scenes in this episode did justice to it.
Just when you think that all is lost for Tyrion and the gang, a mysterious man on a white horse rides up and saves everyone. And Tyrion gets slashed on his face with a sword. Cersei, shows some actual affection for her son and tries to console him. She also gets drunk on wine. Her chat with Sansa is also one of the best parts of the episode.
The above picture is of Bronn shooting the arrow of fire to blast the ships. This scene reminds me of Hawkeye from The Avengers.
And in the end, Tywin comes in and proclaims that they have won. This was an awesome penultimate episode. The end credits had a nice song playing which is from the book. It’s called “The Rains of Castamere” which is in the book and talk about Tyrion’s victory. I just with the series was 12-13 episodes instead of 10. But I believe that their budget would not allow it. And with such elaborate sets and costumes and the battle scenes, their budget has to be very large to support it.
Final Verdict:
9/10
Galactica 
[…] TV Show Review: Game of Thrones S02E09. […]
This was one of the most focused episodes of the series so far, it was a nice change from the dancing around the series usually does between all the cast. It was nice that HBO actually had the battle in the show this time instead of warping magically to the end of it, but it was the perfect place to slow down and detail an event. Plus, what could be missing around Westeros . Since I work nights at Dish I never get to watch the episode when it first airs, but judging by my Facebook page, I know I was going to be in a great episode. I figure there is no reason to DVR it, HBO has it available right after it airs online, so I can watch the episode through Dish Online. This one I watched twice, and it was well deserving of the attention.
Great review here! I would also rate it as 9 out of 10, as the storyline is full of suspense and exciting to watch. Bronn really looks similar to Hawkeye in the scene!