By Bethany Atkins

Posted on March 10, 2015 in Television with tags Game of Thrones

Game of Thrones will soon return to our screens! However, since Season 4 ended all the way back in June 2014, you may be wondering what in the Seven Kingdoms actually happened last year. Fear not, we’re here to help. Here’s a short recap of where we left our favourite (and least favourite) characters at the end of Season Four…  

Inhale…

Warning: spoilers are coming

Here’s our Game of Thrones Season Four recap:

On the Wall

We last saw Jon Snow stride across the border of the wall to ‘negotiate’ (read: assassinate) Mance Rader, leader of the Wildings. Mance wants Snow to open the gate so the Wildings can escape the White Walkers.

But negotiations are cut short when the cavalry arrives, lead by Stannis Baratheon and his trusty helper Davos. The emminently untrustworthy Melisandre has also come along for the ride, and she’s giving John Snow the eye – we don’t think she’s after his direwolf.

Finally for Jon Snuur, we see him give Ygritte a proper funeral, in the ‘real north’. Don’t expect to see him smile anytime soon in Season Five.

 

Across the Narrow Sea

At the end of Season Four Daenerys Targaryen (alternate names thus far: Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, the First of Her Name, the Unburnt, Queen of Meeran, Queen of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, Breaker of Chains and Mother of Dragons – I did tell you to inhale) had to make a heart-breaking decision. After one of her dragons barbecued a poor peasant child, she tearfully imprisons the reaming two dragons in the catacombs.

 

That’s two out of three locked away safely – what harm can one dragon do?

Oh, and in between the dragon drama, Daenerys has also got to continue her crusade to abolish slavery and free the people of the world. Then at some point she’ll ride her dragon into King’s Landing (we hope).

Beyond the Wall

Bran (hair longer and voice broken) has finally – and I mean finally, they’ve gone on about it since Season One – reached the three eyed raven. This is after losing Meera’s brother Jojen to a skeleton army that literally crawled out of the ground, escaping only because of the powers of a girl from The Children of the Forest – a race on the verge of extinction.

 

They are finally introduced to the optically well-endowed raven who is not actually a raven, but rather an old man whose body is fused to the roots of a weirwood tree. As ancient people in fantasy are wont to do, he gives some cryptic predictions about the future, telling Bran that he will never walk again, but he will fly. Does this mean Bran will ride a dragon!? We live in hope.

In King’s Landing

Following Joffrey’s magnificent death, King’s Landing is in turmoil, ridden with betrayal, incest and revenge. No change there, then.

After the gruesome battle between The Mountain and Prince Oberyn Martell, the victor has fallen ill. It turns out that Oberyn’s sword was coated with venom that has taken its toll on the Hound’s notorious brother. Qyburn, an ex-maester turned necromancer, believes that he can be saved, but that the procedure may change him.

Elsewhere, the gruesome twosome decided to tell their(!) father about their affair, after Cersei refused to marry Loras Tyrell at the command of Tywin. She tells her father that her sons’ real biological father is in fact, Jaime. Of course, he already knew that. We knew from the first ever episode. They celebrate this declaration through… well it is Game of Thrones, I needn’t state the obvious.

What about Tyrion? I can hear your trepidation as you struggle to remember what happened to our favourite character in the final moments of the Season. In a nutshell: he discovers his ex-lover Shae in his father’s bed chambers, kills her, finds Tywin sat on the toilet and fires a crossbow into his chest.

Varys smuggles Tyrion out of the castle in a box, and sets him on board a ship to the Free Cities. We all knew that George wouldn’t have the heart to kill him off so soon! Not entirely sure about Varys though, but who is?

 

In the Vale

Poor Sansa Stark has had a pretty bad time of it. In Season Four she escaped King’s Landing only to be taken to stay with her somewhat deranged Aunt Lysa by her creepy (yet, also quite charming) family friend Petyr Baelish. She then gets caught in a rather soapy love triangle between her Aunt and Petyr which comes to a head when Petyr pushes Lysa out of the Moon Door. When questioned, Sansa proves that her time at King’s Landing was well spent and lies like a pro, and then emerges with a fabulous and notably darker look. Sansa is dead, long live Dark Sansa!

Somewhere in the countryside

In the Season finale, all our dreams came true and Arya and Brienne bonded over sword fighting. Unfortunately, our dreams of a Arya/Brienne buddy comedy were cut short, when the Hound interrupts for some bludgeoning. After an epic battle between the Hound and Brienne, where no rules applied (I’m talking about punches to the groin, head-butting, stones smashed on the scalp and a very long fall down the cliff, for the Hound), Brienne emerges victorious, but has lost sight of Arya, the reason for all of this fighting in the first place.

 

Arya, after hiding from the action, finds the Hound in a pitiful state begging for death. She decides to steal his purse instead. She trades an iron coin that was given to her by Jaqen H’ager in Season Two to board a ship on its way to Braavos. Our hopes and dreams go with her.

 

Exhale.

Now tell us what we missed and what things you are looking forward to in the comments!