That’s not to say that we shouldn’t also raise a glass to the late King in the North: a brave man, certainly, but one who lost first an alliance, then a cause, and ultimately his life – and all for love.

Her Catelyn has always been fierce in her devotion and the episode’s final moment, in which she begged for her oldest son’s life before slitting the throat of an innocent woman as he died, was absolutely devastating. That those last desperate moments worked so well was largely down to the outstanding Michelle Fairley. That said, the Red Wedding itself was superbly judged, from Lord Frey’s lascivious leering at Talisa to the grimly desperate bedding of Roslin and Edmure, and the awful moment when Catelyn, hearing the opening strains of the Rains of Castamere, realises too late what is about to come. Similarly there was no real need for the brief scene between Sam and Gilly. While the battle for Yunkai was gorgeously staged, it felt out of place in what was, and should have stayed, a Stark-focused week.

The blood-drenched wedding of Edmure Tully and Roslin Frey was the harrowing centrepiece of a strong episode, albeit an episode with the occasional misstep. The Freys (and the ever-slippery Roose Bolton) may hide under the Lannister name, but the dreadful crime of breaking guest right is theirs at heart. What was fascinating, and horrible, about Frey and his Red Wedding is that this man is no implacable Tywin Lannister but rather a petty tyrant dwelling on a perceived injustice until it consumes him.

The host with the least is clearly Walder Frey, a man prepared to break the sacred vows of hospitality and bring down a great house merely to avenge a slight on his honour. ‘The wine will flow red and the music will play loud and we’ll put this mess behind us’įorget what I said about Lannister weddings.

Game of thrones red flags