Game Of Thrones Recap: S6E5 ‘The Door’

Braavos: Arya

I’m getting tired of these Waif-beats-Arya-and-gets-interrupted-by-Jaqen scenes, no matter how cool Arya looks trying. Her mentor gives her and us a Faceless Man history lesson: the first were Valyrian slaves, delivering the “gift” of the Many-Faced God to slaves and masters alike until there were no more masters and the Doom came. The survivors founded the House of Black and White and around it sprouted Braavos.

Jaqen assigns Arya an assassination. “You’ve been given a second chance,” he reminds her. “There will not be third.” Why don’t we ask wise Prince Doran Martell about second chances . . . oh right. Arya’s mission takes her to a play reenacting Season 1 of the show as a comedy with Joffrey as a sweet daddy’s boy, Cersei as a grieving widow, and her father Ned as a bumbling buffoon. Richard E. Grant is the theater troupe’s leader who plays Robert Baratheon and Essie Davis (The Babadook) is Lady Crane, the Cersei impersonator and Arya’s target.

Arya is clearly unsuited for the Faceless Men; even Jaqen seems to agree when she won’t stop questioning things. She is clearly going to blow this second chance, so I’m kinda just ticking down the hours until she’s badass enough to go on a killing spree across Westeros.