Game Of Thrones: Season 5, episode 2 – The House Of White And Black recap

If you haven't already ploughed up to episode four with the rest of those pirates on the internet (argh), you might like to know that Game Of Thrones, season 5, episode 2, is okay-ish.

Sadly we don't see much of Tyrion, who is STILL stuck in a box - one with wheels this time - while trundling off to meet Daenerys Targaryen. However, he does get one of the best lines in the episode, when discussing the price Cersei has put on his head, he tells Lord Varys that “she ought to offer her c***. Best part of her for the best part of me”.

Ayra spends most of the episode trying to make her way into the The House Of Black And White to find the faceless assassin, Jaqen H'ghar, who we haven’t seen since season two.

Remember? This guy. The face-changey man.

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The show continues its tradition of pairing up unlikely characters with Brienne Of Tarth and Podrick Payne hot on the heels of Sansa. After being snubbed by Ayra at the end of Season 4, she’s trying to live up her promise to Catelyn Stark that she’d protect her daughters, as everyone with the surname Stark essentially has “stab me lots” written on their foreheads in wonderful olde-worlde calligraphy. Littlefinger rightly points out that everyone Brienne decides to protect ends up well-dead. Nevertheless, it’s still mega-frustrating when Sansa tells her to do one. WE JUST WANT THE STARKS BACK TOGETHER DAMMIT. Horse chasing and stabbery ensue and Pod and Brienne set off to follow Littlefinger and Sansa.

There’s more fallout from The Mountain and the Viper - the big head-squishing bit from the penultimate episode of season 4 - and Cersei has been sent a necklace which she gifted to her daughter, Marcella, except it’s hanging out of a viper’s mouth. This it figurative in case you didn’t guess. The Martells are obsessed with snakes and it means they want her dead. So Jamie is dispatched to rescue her from Dorne and enlists Tyrion’s old chum, Bronn - see there’s another one of those unlikely double acts we mentioned - who’s now being bored to tears by his new wife-to-be.

We do see a glimpse of Cersei’s daughter, Marcella, and she’s been drastically aged up (read recast) since the last time we saw her in season 2. Luckily they’ve done the same with King Tommen, but only to the age of 17. So we’ll probably have some awkward bonking scenes between him and Margaery Tyrell (played by 33-year-old Natalie Dorner) to look forward to. Prince Obery’s wife is furious and wants to kill Marcella and wage war on the Lannister’s for having The Mountain kill The Viper. But King Doran Martell wants to keep the peace, and it looks like he will, for now.

It turns out all that being a hero and generally saving the day that Jon Snow does hasn’t gone unnoticed. Stannis - Robert Baratheon’s brother who reckons he should be king - offers Jon Snow the chance to become Jon Stark and Lord of Winterfell. Why? Well, everyone respects Jon and he could probably convince all the men still loyal to Ned Stark to follow the new king. But Jon Snow wants to say “no”, because he’s an IDIOT. He wants to stay on the big icy wall, with all his grumpy crow mates and wait for ice zombies to come and kill everyone. Great plan Jon, deny yourself everything you ever wanted, EVER. Genius. There is some good news for Jonno, though. His good ol’ buddy Samwell Tarly puts him forward to be Lord Of The Knightswatch - to lead all those men on the icy wall - and unsurprisingly he wins.

Finally, Daenerys is having a bit of a mare in her newly occupied city, Volantis. Those pesky Sons Of The Harpy who keep going around killing her men have gone and killed one of her men. They’re being paid by the old slave masters, who want slavery to come back. However, Daenerys’ advisor Mossador thinks she should kill them to show strength, she turns him down and he kills them anyway. So how does Daenerys respond? How does anyone respond to anything in Game Of Thrones? Even if they were just making a big speech about not killing people. Yep, they kill them. This leaves Daenerys pelted with rocks and serenaded with weird angry hisses from the townsfolk.

There is some good news though. Daenerys’ totes fav dragon - cleverly named Drogon - swings by the Khaleesi’s gaff after being missing for ages, but then he buggers off when she tries to say hello. Rude. So Daenerys simply can’t control her dragons, what will this mean for the future? And if the whole city is mad at her, maybe there’s a quick-witted, sweet talking dwarf that could help her set things right?