The Kingsroad (24 Apr. 2011)

While Bran recovers from his fall, Ned takes only his daughters to Kings Landing. Jon Snow goes with his uncle Benjen to The Wall. Tyrion joins them.

Director:

Timothy Van Patten

Writers:

David Benioff (creator), D.B. Weiss (creator),

Stars:

Sean Bean, Mark Addy, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau

Cast

Episode cast overview, first billed only:
Sean Bean	...	Eddard 'Ned' Stark
Mark Addy	...	Robert Baratheon
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau	...	Jaime Lannister
Michelle Fairley	...	Catelyn Stark
Lena Headey	...	Cersei Lannister
Emilia Clarke	...	Daenerys Targaryen
Iain Glen	...	Jorah Mormont
Harry Lloyd	...	Viserys Targaryen
Kit Harington	...	Jon Snow
Sophie Turner	...	Sansa Stark
Maisie Williams	...	Arya Stark
Richard Madden	...	Robb Stark
Alfie Allen	...	Theon Greyjoy
Isaac Hempstead Wright	...	Bran Stark
Jack Gleeson	...	Joffrey Baratheon

Storyline

Although his son Bran is lying in bed unconscious from his fall, Ned Stark must return with King Robert to King's Landing. His wife Catelyn stays behind in in Winterfell, though there appears to be little hope of Bran's recovery. The King has agreed that his son Joffrey and Ned's daughter Sansa should marry, uniting their families forever. Problems arise when Joffrey challenges the butcher's boy who is out playing with Sansa's younger sister Arya. Joffrey is injured when Arya's pet wolf attacks him. The King's justice is swift but fair even if his wife Cersei doesn't agree. Meanwhile, Ned illegitimate son heads north to join the Night Watch. Across the Narrow Sea, Daenerys is having some difficulty accommodating herself to married life. She turns to one of her servants, a slave whose job it once was to pleasure men, to learn how she could make her husband happy.

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Plot Keywords:

fall | boy | wolf attack | intrigue | abuse | 

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Genres:

Adventure | Drama | Fantasy

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Certificate:

TV-MA

Details

Country:

USA Ireland UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

24 April 2011 (USA)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Television 360, Grok! Studio, Generator Entertainment

Technical Specs

Runtime:

56 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

16:9 HD

Did You Know?

Trivia

According to the novels, Cersei never gave birth to child of Robert. As she revealed to Eddard, she was once pregnant with a child of Robert, but had the child aborted out of hatred for him. Robert was unaware to both the pregnancy and the abortion.

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Goofs

(at around 30 mins) When a group of riders are leaving south out of Winterfell, they reach "The Kingsroad" which runs north and south. At the fork of the road, the riders split into two groups: Eddard Stark is heading south to serve at King's Landing, and Jon Snow is heading north to guard the Wall. But after they say their goodbyes, Eddard Stark takes the north road, and Jon goes south. The meeting is at a crossroads but the exact orientation of the roads, the p.o.v of the camera and the time of day are not specified. Both men could well have headed in their correct respective directions.

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Quotes

Jaime Lannister: Let me thank you ahead of time for guarding us all from the perils beyond the wall: Wildlings and White Walkers and whatnot.
[Jaime offers handshake. Jon shakes his hand, but Jaime does not let go of Jon's hand, as if testing his strength]
Jaime Lannister: We're grateful for there are good and strong men like you protecting us.
[Jaime pats on Jon's shoulder, finally releases his hand and starts walking away]
Jon Snow: We've guarded the kingdoms for 8,000 years.
[...]

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Crazy Credits

The cities and places featured in the opening credits change as the series progresses. For example, in the first episode, Pentos is shown whereas in later episodes, because it is not pertinent to the episode's narrative, it is not.

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Soundtracks

"Main Title"
(uncredited)
Written and Performed by Ramin Djawadi

User Reviews

A letdown after the perfect opener, but still very enjoyable

In the opener for this show, we had some major things happening in the plot, and now we see how the characters live with that. Just as in the George R. R. Martin novels, we see the story told from different points of view and just as in the opening episode, we learn that this show is more focused on introducing us to all the different characters rather than showing us immense fights or special effects like The Lord of the Rings movies. This is something that I highly appreciate and that I loved in "Winter Is Coming", but this episode was still a fairly big disappointment to me. I'll tell you why:

The first episode of GoT was perfect in every imaginable way. The visuals were immensely stunning, the screenplay was a hundred per cent Emmy-worthy and the actors were really talented. This doesn't also disappear with this episode, but it's a huge surprise that David Benioff and D. B. Weiss weren't able to recreate the unique and fantastic vibe that the screenplay of "Winter is Coming" had with this follow-up. Some scenes are unnecessary (never a good sign for shows like this), they included annoying and idiotic soliloquies at times, and they dialogs aren't so good as they were in the former episode. I wasn't bored at all by this episode because I was already so into all the characters (I watched the opening episode 3 times on 3 days), but it focused too much on stupid stuff. All the stuff with Arya, Sansa, the butcher's boy and this gay prince whose name I always forget was complete nonsense and I can't see how this is necessary to the plot. The show seemed like a soap opera to me at that point. Some other plot parts were really good though, a great example is the one with Daenerys (put more Viserys in the next episode, he is a great character!) who's currently trying to make the best out of her lousy situation.

Concluding, I enjoyed this episode a lot despite some things that bugged me. It's clearly inferior to "Winter is Coming", but it still has a magnificent visual look (gotta add that: the Blu-Ray quality is just one of the best I've ever seen!) and the actors really make the best out of it! The outstanding cast member in this episode was Lena Headey who was a fantastic minor villain.