After a year-plus break, Game of Thrones finally returned with “Dragonstone.” We’ll have a complete recap later tonight and a questions-and-answers post tomorrow morning, but until then: Daenerys is finally in Westeros! Samwell is on poop duty in the Citadel! Jon and Sansa are sibling-squabbling (even if they’re not actually siblings)! Tormund is still making advances at an unimpressed Brienne! A lot happened in the episode — we checked in with nearly every main character, minus Theon, Melisandre, and Bronn, among a few others — but the first scene was probably the most eventful. And deadly.
In last season’s finale, Arya (no longer No One) fed Walder Frey his sons, Black Walder and Lothar; learned to bake a pie; then killed one of the orchestrators of the Red Wedding. She’s still hanging out at the Twins, unbeknownst to the Frey bannermen, who think Walder is throwing them a wine party for murdering Robb and Catelyn Stark. Nope, it was actually Arya all along, using what she learned from her training in the House of the Black and White to poison the rowdy soldiers and send a message: “Tell them the North remembers. Tell them winter came for the House of Frey.”
Oh yeah, and Ed Sheeran played a Lannister soldier.
And people had thoughts, of course.
https://twitter.com/edsheeran/status/886769703263375360
Not sure what was more shocking: Ed Sheeran as a Lannister soldier or learning there's a drinking age in Westeros #GameOfThronesS7 pic.twitter.com/gudFhygIkT
— Will Gallop (@wgallop9) July 17, 2017
https://twitter.com/d3ad0narrival/status/886764568948740096
https://twitter.com/AfricanKhaIeesi/status/886764459980709889
Ed Sheeran as a Lannister guard…still so very unsure about that
— ærən (@IsleOfAaron) July 17, 2017
https://twitter.com/diy2114/status/886768322888577024
https://twitter.com/fivefifths/status/886763198363435014
Ed Sheeran: literally says two lines
Me: pic.twitter.com/4sddM6r5rn
— Virginia (@jaimelsnnister) July 17, 2017
https://twitter.com/TVMcGee/status/886765938607050756
Ed Sheeran appearing on game of thrones but not being brutally disemboweled was very disappointing
— Brandy Jensen (@BrandyLJensen) July 17, 2017
https://twitter.com/TheDiLLon1/status/886768353943199744
I don't watch GAME OF THRONES but thanks to Twitter I can be annoyed that Ed Sheeran has a cameo.
— Steven Hyden (@Steven_Hyden) July 17, 2017
Ed Sheeran probably smells like an actual medieval soldier #ThronesYall
— Too Urban, Too Internet (@condorb90) July 17, 2017
#GoTS7 SPOILER ALERT: Special cameo by @edsheeran in Ep1. What will his songs reveal? Don't miss the encore tonight at 9pm (8pm Thai.Jkt). pic.twitter.com/HlJnVANbk7
— HBO Asia (@HBOAsia) July 17, 2017
Stay tuned for season eight, when Taylor Swift plays a dragon.