Death is coming. And nothing will stop the Grim Reaper in The Rains of Castamere, the penultimate and bloody episode of the third season of Game Of Thrones. Neither the political shrewdness of Catelyn Stark nor the courage and resilience of Arya, much less the honor drowned in House Frey’s thirst for revenge. Not even the fear of the screenwriters vis-à-vis the reaction of the fans in front of the unbearable massacre of the most beloved heroes of the saga of George RR Martin, during the aptly named purple wedding. The result ? Twelve minutes among the most trying and traumatic in the history of the series, at the end of which the Stark clan is decimated… and Game Of Thrones entered into legend.
Because this deadly sequence, broadcast on June 2, 2013, marked a major turning point for fantastic fiction. First in terms of audiences: it gained two million followers on average between season 3 and season 4, reaching nearly 7 million addicts in the United States. Then, in terms of storylines: many of the killings, betrayals and political shenanigans that followed were rooted in the blood of the cowardly murdered Starks. Finally, in terms of size: the series has come out of its only circle of insiders and fantasy lovers to reach the general public, rising to the rank of major work on the small screen. And a global phenomenon.
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A shocking and unpredictable scene
David Benioff and DB Weiss, the creators and screenwriters of the series, were not mistaken. It is by discovering the passage of the Crimson Wedding in the third novel of the cycle Game of Thrones (A Storm of Swords), that they decided to acquire the rights to the literary epic to adapt it. Both are convinced of its emotional strength and its potential, summed up by this single scene that is all the more shocking and unpredictable. In the book, as in the series, nothing (or very little) indeed suggests the disastrous conclusion. Except perhaps, the propensity of authors to sacrifice their heroes. Fans are thus still haunted by the unjust and sudden killing of their beloved Ned Stark, in season 1.
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The episode, however, begins on a note of hope for the supporters of House Stark. As Bran discovers the power to enter the human mind, Arya finally sees the end of her journey to reunite with her family. In Port Réal, Sansa and Tyrion experience a real bond, if not in body, at least in spirit. As for Robb, he is convinced that he can win the war against the Lannisters with the support of the Freys.
With his mother and his pregnant wife, he goes to the Twins in order to obtain the forgiveness of the patriarch Walder for having disdained one of his daughters and preferred to take Talisa as his wife. It is his uncle Edmure who will marry Roslin Frey and thus seal the alliance between the two families. The lord accepts Robb’s apologies and offers hospitality to the wolf clan while they celebrate the wedding. Which starts under the auspices of reconciliation and in jubilation. The alcohol is flowing, the guests are enjoying the banquet. Until Frey kicks off the bedtime ceremony.
Let the slaughter begin!
The newlyweds retire to their bedroom while the doors to the reception room are closed. The orchestra (composed of real musicians, including Will Campion, the drummer of Coldplay) begins to play “The Rains of Castamere”, the song of the Lannisters. This macabre ballad, which has already punctuated a few episodes of season 3, celebrates their crushing victory over a competing house. It sounds here the death knell of the Starks.
Catelyn, and the public with her, understands that her people have fallen into a trap. As she tries to warn her son, a soldier repeatedly stabs Talisa under the helpless eyes of Robb, himself pierced with an arrow. The entire clan is exterminated by the Frey henchmen and Bolton, united to betray the Starks under the Lannister banner. In a last gasp to save the King in the North, Catelyn takes Walder’s wife hostage. In vain. Bolton fatally skewers Robb. Catelyn, in despair, cuts her prisoner’s throat… and lets herself have her throat slit. Outside, Arya, barely arrived, witnesses the carnage of the guard and of Vert-gris, her brother’s wolf.
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Black screen, end credits. Which is, for the first time in the history of the series, completely silent. The noise is on the other hand deafening on the social networks, where the fans express their rage and their amazement. Some, who had read the novels, post videos of the horrified faces of their neophyte friends. It’s an emotional cataclysm: “George (RR Martin) sets the trap beautifully. You never see the slaughter coming, but when you read the chapter again, all the clues are there and you curse yourself for having been blind to those clues, David Benioff and DB Weiss told Variety in 2013. We wanted to get the same effect: the staging was our main ally. » A successful bet for the creators of game of thrones and for the whole team, which was, like the viewers, deeply impacted by this sequence.
A genesis and a grueling filming
It took five days to box it in Belfast. Five days during which everyone’s emotions were put to the test. Oona Chaplin, the interpreter of Talisa, was in tears during the filming of her death, as were the cameramen, scriptwriters and other sound engineers: “I was sobbing when I was dead. The director had to come up to me and say, ‘Oona, you need to stop crying. The dead don’t cry. You are dead !” “, she recalled in 2019 in an interview with Entertainment Weekly.
The most heartbreaking moment? The assassination of Catelyn, camped by Michelle Fairley: “(She) is such a powerhouse… It’s one of the greatest death scenes ever shot. His performance […] is simply epic”, estimated David Benioff who, after this final take, could not reach the actress for days: ” A week later, she emailed us saying, “Sorry, I couldn’t speak to anyone because I was so devastated.” »
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Years earlier, George RR Martin had felt the same heartbreak as he wrote down this chilling chapter: ” It was the hardest scene I had ever had to write. It was like murdering your own children,” said the author, who was inspired by the Wars of the Roses in 15th-century Scotland.e century to imagine its epic. This passage refers in particular to a bloody event, the black dinner, during which innocent children (but belonging to the rival clan of the young King James II) were invited to a tea party and then killed, again flouting all the sacred rules of the hospitality.
Great history was marked by this massacre, just as the small history of television was marked by these Crimson Weddings, which erected Game Of Thrones as a monument to pop culture. Witness the tributes paid by other programs such as South Park where the Saturday Night Live. For the heroes and all the fans, there was a before and after The Rains of Castamere. Not sure, however, that the good weather then came…
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