In Which The Racists In Dorne Never Disappoint

I'll Make Thrones To You

by DICK CHENEY

The new Star Wars trailer came out last week, and it was like the prequels never happened. Harrison Ford appeared to be desiccating slowly into Jabba the Hut, and the rest of it looked like a hot mess as well. Star Wars never had a consistent theme outside of George Lucas's insane passion for random politicals parallels, and the situation in Mereen right now is even more of a thematic disaster. The writing is just so bad across the Narrow Sea. Game of Thrones already has great special effect, so it is missing the other thing that saved Star Wars from becoming Plan 9 from Outer Space: a love story.

"Perhaps. Perhaps." "Perhaps." "Perhaps." "Perhaps perhaps."

I am not even looking forward to the mansplaining to come from Tyrion Lannister about how Daenerys should be ruling Mereen. The number of times Tyrion will say My Lady will probably make Ser Barristan Selmy faint from an overdose of chivalry.

Whether he has truly given up whores or not I don't care. I do know that a love story is infinitely more fascinating than another conversation with Varys where he says perhaps fifty times, and Varys complains about the little guy's drinking. The two of them alone in a carriage to save money on production is more than I can bear. And girl, can you please wear a bra?

There's never been a woman in history, let alone a queen, who has changed her wardrobe this seldom

One thing Game of Thrones almost never has time for is something essential in drama, which is to watch what people do when they are alone. It is what makes watching Arya threatening boys with her shit sword so compelling — she has no one else to rely on, and so must make her own choices. Pairing everyone else up — Bronn and Jaime, Pod and Brienne, Sansa and LF, Jon Snow and Sam leads to twelve different renditions of The Odd Couple: two slightly different people bickering among themselves. It is far easier to write and keep track of such arrangements, but it leads to a simultaneity that jars me like the gross face of Stannis' wife.

Maybe she could have the Sons of the Harpy over for dins. They look hungry. 

I realize that Game of Thrones does have a lot of female characters, which is great and everything considering how bad most of the male ones are. Still, the women do seem to be acting in great haste lately. Cersei's moves are entirely emotional and Daenerys can't drop a No. 2 without getting the advice of some old guy and her boyfriend. Brienne's "plan" to save Sansa Stark consists of going up to them. Wow, how devious. Did Renly teach you that at a gay saloon in Storm's End?

"I know what I'll do. I'll randomly swear loyalty to someone who doesn't even know me!" This show needs Lady Stoneheart, bad.

I don't understand Cersei's moves to stack the King's council, either. I think they should have just recast Jack Gleeson (he played Joffrey) as Tommen, except maybe given him a moustache.

The unceremonius departure of Sir Kevan Lannister was a real kick in the nuts. That guy was pretty cute, maybe the cutest old guy on the show besides Margaery Tyrell's mom. (Where is that old bat? She just straight up disappeared one day after Oberyn Martell had a disagreement with the Mountain.)

Don't go Kevan. We'll give you the honored position of Hand of the Hand of the King.

Jon Snow murdering dudes right as left as Lord Commander has potential, as does the ambiguously sexual relationship he has with his newest charge, who I shall call Lord Molten. (Camile Paglia would be pleased.) I hope Jon eventually comes into conflict with Sam, because the unexplored sexual tension between those two could fill Craster's belly.

YKNJS, the peacocking is getting a bit much. You look like a fat pigeon in the outfit big guy.

Thrones is missing romance right now, the essence which moves us from moment to moment, the substance Chelsea Clinton was sadly born without. Even Sam and Gilly have yet to consummate their love, which should probably have occurred years ago for warmth/survival related reasons.

These days Sam mostly just stands around insisting that he will protect her from guys like Slynt, while it's Jon who does the actual dirty work. I swear to God Samwell hasn't done anything except turn coyly to look behind him since he killed that white walker.

would not be surprised if Melisandre sifts through his stool looking for treats

It's kind of odd how nobody gives a shit about Winterfell anymore. I mean, Ned Stark came across like such a pious ponce and a strong leader, but in the end he just was a dumb shit who let himself get outfoxed. His wife forgot about him in two seconds and his kids aren't exactly aching to retake Winterfell either. With that said, Stannis' annoying illiterate assistant really seems to have been entranced by Jon's brotential. Ser Davos reminds me of a Terry McAuliffe who can't read.

Stannis looked like FDR behind the desk. "I don't punish brave men, I reward them," he said in the tone of someone who has just passed a kidney stone and is happy to be alive. I'm really sad that Stannis can't change from this emasculated state into a real hero. Given that this is Thrones, he's already on death row.

Arya's trip to the House of Black and White exploded HBO's budget and created a lavish setting surround the Braavosi/Israeli stronghold for no real reason. Arya is supposed to become one of these assassins, but in doing so it seems she will have to lose everything that brought her to this point. Bringing back Jaqen H'ghar was kind of a waste of time also, and Maisie Williams looks to have not aged perceptibly in the past five seasons. I hope she meets a cute Jew while she is training to be a Faceless Woman. There's a lot riding on this.

Dick Cheney is the senior contributor to This Recording.

"That's My Shit" - The-Dream ft. T.I. (mp3)

"All I Need" - The-Dream (mp3)

In Which We Celebrate The Return Of Hot Pie With The Same

you incredible selection of man

Kidney Trouble

by DICK CHENEY

A matinee idol can emerge from almost anywhere. His charismatic energy infiltrates every aspect of a scene; his raw sexual charisma pervades each moment. The more that he explains how it is best to take the kidney from the cow when it is very young, the more an elongated shudder of pleasure makes its way through my entire body, stopping at the tip of my penis, what the French call a pènis.  

Oh Hot Pie, you returned to me you swarthy little devil, you culinary genius, you measure of a male chef!

missed u so much. what have you been up to? Will I see you later? Is it really ethical to eat veal? Lots of questions Hot Pie. Let's talk later on your cot in the kitchen.

One of writing's greatest clichés is to have people arguing over what exactly they should call each other. There was famously a Jesse Stone novel where the only dialogue consisted of people calling the main character Mr. Stone, and him correcting them and muttering, "Call me Jesse." There is really nothing in a name, unless the entire point of a name is to explain who someone is because it is too much work to create an actual character.

"Do you know how much syndication revenue I am losing by perishing in a few minutes you ginger scallion pancake!"

Often in real life things are named for other than what they are. This is appropriate unless it is done ironically, like when you call your tall, slim drug dealer Shorty. Don't do that - nickname him after a civil rights leader or a basketball player as God intended. Nicknames, actually, are just as lazy a form of nomenclature, and Thrones has given up on them almost entirely, refusing to make The Onion Knight happen, or to allow Bran to go by his soporific nickname in the novels: Jewbits.

In real life people don't say each other's names very often, except if they are having wintercourse with Jon Snow in a cave: then it's just a given.

Bob Arryn was a super nice guy. He brought donuts to work every day.

The pace of events in the Eeyrie was accelerated by a scene that did not really seem provident for Littlefinger's plans. I don't really know why the absurdly named fellow permitted Lysa Arryn to view him pressing his lips against her alliterative niece's, but considering the Arryns tend to hang out exclusively around the Moon Door, that bit of murder probably could have been accomplished at any time.

An appropriate twist would have had one of the Targaryen dragons swooping in to save her. Daenerys and Lysa could then consummate a turgid romance based on how both of their husbands were poisoned. Twinsies.

Could you not just have run water on the burn?

At least everyone is Mereen is a grown-up. The Hound's pathetic whining about how sadsies his brother made him when he tossed the man into a fire really got on my last nerve, a nerve I had believed destroyed when Lynne informed me that Topanga was not, nor had ever been, a first-rate lesbian.

The Hound knows all about acting like something you are not. What kind of self-proclaimed tough guy sobs about a bite wound? Arya's transformation into a cold-blooded killer is just as unlikely. I mean, we all need to kick back, squeeze our direwolf Nymeria, and ponder why our father was such a naive idiot from time to time. Boy, the Lannisters are fucking terrible at killing Ned Stark's children, aren't they?

We get it, he's actually an inch taller than her so you had to shoot it from a weird angle. The same technique was used to make Patricia Richardson seem shorter than Tim Allen on Home Improvement. OK later.

In King's Landing, Tyrion's sulks have finally started to get to me. This guy has more visitors than Suge Knight. The man who once had a whole city doing his bidding as Hand of the King now has to lazily ask all his friends to fight to the death for him. How about a little self-awareness, buddy? Just nominate Cersei as your champion, two birds with one stone.

It's never too early to integrate pain into your lovemaking.

Benioff & co seem to have taken some of the prudes complaining about the show's excess nudity to heart. They somehow zipped right past an important scene where a recast Daario Naharis made the Queen of Dragons feel like a vibrant young snapchattress again. The old Daario had a sort of clean-shaven creepy thing going on - he even shaved his arms and scrotum for his Queen, which struck me as a courteous touch. The new Daario looks like someone who might approach your girlfriend at a brunch in Williamsburg and tell her that he loves anything that smells like radishes and shoot her a significant look.

"Dario, I remember your dick being a lot tanner. Let's meet at Spoonbill & Sugartown later. I want to pick up a copy of Night Film for Jorah. He's suck a fucking plebe sometimes."

Since we never actually see Daario disrobe and place himself into the Queen, I guess what actually occurs is open to interpretation. I imagine the following circumstances:

Daario leaned over Daenerys. "What are your thoughts on gay marriage?" she whispered to him as her rogue scent infiltrated his nostrils.

"I don't know if I really recognize marriage as a vital concept," he whispered back, rubbing himself against her thigh with slow, meaningful scrapes. "I mean, is God married?"

"God's not like an actual person," she said. "What are you saying?" She put the tip of her pinkie finger on the space under his pènis and wiggled it back and forth, muttering, "Moonwalk," as she did so.

"I know he's not an actual person," the sellsword said. "I just mean, if marriage was so important to him, he probably would have implied it was something he had done." He put her right nipple in his mouth and blew bubbles like you would on a baby's stomach. He hummed the chorus of a Phantogram song and Daenerys groaned.

this is the softest lighting I have seen since the blowjob scene in Buffalo 66

Daario repeated "Is this okay?" six or seven times while entering his Queen. Eventually she put her hand over his mouth and instructed him to rub her clit and stfu. His thrusts began to increase in intensity and depth, until he slowed for a bit and asked, "Do you want me to do to you what Brad did to Angelina?"

She looked at him a bit warily. "Go ahead," she decided.

He pulled himself out of her vagina and made a quick phone call. When he turned back to her, his pènis (PUH-NIS) was soft and dripping come. He wiped it off with an Emily Books t-shirt and said, "OK. My agent cast you in a Disney movie. You're welcome."

Dick Cheney is the senior contributor to This Recording. You can find an archive of his writing on This Recording here. You can find last week's GoT recap here.

"Beauty Leads the Way" - Jeremy Casella (mp3)

"The City of the Lord" - Jeremy Casella (mp3

In Which We Journey To The Jacuzzi Beyond The Wall

A Weird, Complacent Feeling

by DICK CHENEY

Thrones. Right before something you will remember occurs, or immediately after it happens, there is a sensation. Previously undescribed in the literature outside of Kathy Acker and, at some length, Proust, this urge contains two parallel desires:

1) To undo what has taken place, in order to restore events to their previous berth;

2) To go wild in celebration at the very simple idea that the world is changeable.

It's always like that for Jaime Lannister. He's a punch bowl full of regret, a lion with eleven manes. He loves saying the word wildfire even more than his beneficent little brother.

Quickly, before you know it, something hard becomes very soft. A politician (any politician) enters office with the promise of closing an infamous prison, where criminals in an ongoing war are incarcerated because of presumed danger to society. When this politician hears of their tales, he could end their lives with dark purpose, prolong them with an even greater absence of mercy, or set them free.

People are always whining about Ned Stark's lessons, but at least he picked one and went through with it. Tywin Lannister, at his core, is a similar creature. When Tyrion asks Grandma Tyrell to fund the wedding, she changes her mind and agrees to pay half the cost. Tywin would never make such a concession, no matter its actual merit. It's more important to say what you're going to do and go through with it; that's the type of person that can really be trusted.

the hand of the king's office leaves something to be desired

Tywin Lannister and Grandma Tyrell had an extremely high level meeting. For some reason they had never actually met before; do you find this believable? As believable as someone caring enough about Bran Stark to find him in the wilderness and guide him to his bastard half-brother? As believable as the idea that Littlefinger's revenge on Catelyn Stark now extends to marrying off her identical-ish daughter to the only bookkeeper in King's Landing worth a damn?

"...you're marrying an accountant."

Tyrion had to break the bad news to his girlfriend and his wife at the same time, which is never easy. He should have led with "where do whores go" or maybe his material about Jamie telling everyone his betrothed was a prostitute, god knows he hasn't got enough mileage out of that story. Peter Dinklage's arsenal of resigned or cautious facial expressions will be sorely tested with this engagement.

I think there's more on redtube along these lines
It's always a pity when the only glimpse of Joffrey we get is him putting a crossbow bolt through Varys' ginger spy. The guy's had like three lines of dialogue; usually all they let him do is giggle when he sees blood.

Along with the Freys, Joffrey gets the most unfair rap of anyone in the Seven Kingdoms. I mean the guy repels Stannis Baratheon's fleet, is able to make a very generous and inquisitive woman attracted to him, and he didn't have to throw his daughter's illiterate best friend in the dungeon to make it happen.

boo hoo you have to marry a beautiful, generous gay man, he is betrothed to a ginga

Rhetorical questions are the refuge of cowards. I had an instructor, when I was first trained in intelligence work, who told us to never ask a rhetorical question, because it was a distinctly Western appendage. In other parts of the world, the person who asks a question they don't want answered is considered relatively rude.

still trying to get the memory of Stannis Baratheon's wife stillborn babies out of my head

On occasion, a question that appears merely a polite gesture can have greater significance, most often when it is asked of the god. It's unclear who exactly Melissandre plans to bring back from death; maybe Aegon Targaryen? If not, the concept of "light" has never been a more confusing symbol in any fictional work, applied as it is to about half the factions in this Thronesing.

bran this will be you. shut your face bran.

Thoros of Myr is identified as Peter in early Christian literature. The Brotherhoods Without Banners stuff is not to be trifled with, these guys all have serious long personal backstories. They care for each other maybe a bit too much. It was weird how Melissandre read Arya's fortune, doesn't she usually charge for that? "We will meet again" is pretty dumb.

do they not have foreplay in the south Jon Snow???

Actually a far worse symbol was a never-ending, phallic wall that the wildlings climbed, at length. Jon Snow, to me, really elevated his acting skills. He basically used a grimace as his main featured expression and agreed with whatever his ginger girlfriend was saying the rest of the time. There was still a lot of loneliness there. I guess she felt like she couldn't trust him. I wouldn't know.

"YOU WAS ALWAYS A CROW"

The political machinations surrounding Littlefinger's departure from King's Landing eluded me. Clearly something very bad is going to happen there, something to put his own life at risk. He wanted to take Sansa with him; but he wanted even more so to punish her for not wanting to be with him. There's a Chris Brown joke there somewhere, but I'll leave the racist and bigotry to Howard Kurtz because it comes more naturally to him.

It's hard sometimes to realize that Sansa and Arya are of the same uncaring and uncooperative mother, who basically allowed them to flee to the winds of time for no reason. Despite the fact that she's been in King's Landing for years now, Sansa is not even the least bit wiser. This is proof positive that GRRM has never met an actual living teenage girl, who can sniff bullshit out more quickly than her dire wolf.

"put Hot Pie's belly out of your mind"

Meanwhile, Arya is telling an archer how to shoot arrows, or a priest about how to show mercy, or a smith about how he should be her family. Her emotions are just everywhere, and yet she gets a noticeably better reaction from the surrounding world than her passive creature of a sister. If you want something, it's best just to take it. It's because of the sensation I described; the very human urge to see what happens. People, even the best ones, get tired of both saying and hearing the word No.

Dick Cheney is the senior contributor to This Recording. He has composed a steak sauce meant to mimic the blood of Theon Greyjoy. It was roundly mediocre.

"The Three Of Us In The Dark" - Carly Simon (mp3)

"Take Me As I Am" - Carly Simon (mp3)