Razor’s Rant: The Ides of Marsh and the Art of Subtlety

Warning: This is an article written from the perspective of a book reader. There will be speculation about Episode 510 and spoilers from the end of A Dance With Dragons. Unsullied, considered yourself warned.

If you’ve been paying attention this season, or heck, even if you haven’t, it’s probably been difficult to miss the not-so-subtle foreshadowing the producers have plastered over every just about every darn scene Olly is in. Every time Jon Snow even mentions the word “wildling”—to say nothing of when he trots out new wildling leader Tormund Giantsbane—Olly fixes him with a withering glare.

This all started in Season 4, when Olly’s village was raided by the wildling group heading for Mole’s Town and Castle Black. Olly’s parents were slaughtered and, if the Magnar of Thenn can be believed, eaten. More importantly, Olly was shown watching Ygritte blast a few of his fellow villages with arrows, a scene that would setup his ultimate revenge in Episode 409, “The Watchers on the Wall,” when he killed Ygritte in kind.

Fast Forward to Season 5. Olly has been made Jon Snow’s personal steward. Now, this is a departure from the books, as Edd Tollet is Jon’s steward until Jon sends him to repair and garrison Long Barrow, one of the many dilapidated castles along the Wall. Once Tollet leaves, Jon replaces him with a boy from Oldtown named Satin. This choice angers officers of the Night’s Watch like Lord Steward Bowen Marsh and First Builder Othell Yarwyck, because Satin was raised in a brothel and trained to be a whore.

It has widely been speculated that Olly is Satin’s replacement on the show (a theory to which I subscribe), and although Olly was not trained as a prostitute, he does draw the attention of Bowen Marsh in Season 5. In “Kill the Boy,” First Steward Marsh brings up the destruction of Olly’s village and the slaughter of his family as a means to rouse the other men of the Night’s Watch to go against Lord Commander Jon Snow’s plan to save the wildlings at Hardhome. Earlier in the season, when Jon was elected the 998th Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, Marsh is seen standing with Ser Alliser Thorne, not applauding or cheering Jon’s appointment.

This is where I believe the Ides of Marsh was set into motion.

The Ides of Marsh is a play on words taken from the Ides of March, which refers to the date (March 15) on which Julies Caesar was assassinated. In A Dance with Dragons, Bowen Marsh in the leader of the Night’s Watchmen who attempt an assassination of Jon Snow. Hence, March turns into Marsh—super clever, I know. Now, not many show-only fans even know who Bowen Marsh is, because he has never been prominently featured on the program, and yet he has still made his presence known.

The producers of Game of Thrones have not been subtle in their approach to Olly’s hatred of all things wildling, and they’ve even gone so far as to show a defiant Olly speaking to Jon in his chambers about the Lord Commander’s plans to allow the wildlings to travel south of the Wall. This is where the art of subtlety has been abandoned. When you combine Olly’s obstinate behavior with his constant stink eye and the show’s insistence of reminding us that his village was razed by wildlings, it becomes pretty clear that he’s going to be a member of the Jon Snow assassination squad. (Although it is worth noting that, in the books, Satin has nothing to do with the plot to murder Jon Snow, so Benioff and Weiss could be trying to use Olly to throw us off the scent.)

The show has foreshadowed the Ides of Marsh scene in other ways. For example, Jon gave Alliser Thorne temporary command of the Wall in “The Gift.” Before Jon left for Hardhome, Thorne made his disapproval of Jon’s plan plain. Later in that episode, Thorne tells Sam that he is losing all his friends—more foreshadowing.

This is how I believe Jon’s final scene is Season 5 will play out, based on the text from A Dance with Dragons: Jon will be crossing the yard of Castle Black. The wildlings he’s saved from Hardhome will be milling about, and perhaps Tormund will be in the picture. A scuffle will draw Jon’s attention, perhaps a fight between a wildling and a man of the Night’s Watch. As Jon begins to call for his men to break it up, he will see Olly lunge at him with a knife that barely grazes his throat. Jon will disarm him, and Olly will back away with his hands raised in surrender, and that’s when Bowen Marsh will appear, tears in his eyes, plunging a dagger into Jon’s stomach….but that won’t be the end, as the last person Jon sees will be Ser Alliser Thorne, who silently steps up to Jon, brings him close to whisper in his ear “For the Watch,” and drives his dagger home. Jon will fall to the ground, his vision blurring, and his last words will be “Ghost.”

When Wick Whittlestick [Olly], slashed at his throat, the word turned into a grunt. Jon twisted from the knife, just enough so it barely grazed his skin. He cut me. When he put his hand to the side of his neck, blood welled between his fingers. “Why?”

“For the Watch.” Wick [Olly] slashed at him again. This time Jon caught his wrist and bent his arm back until he dropped the dagger. The gangling steward backed away, his hands upraised as if to say, Not me, it was not me. Men were screaming. Jon reached for Longclaw, but his fingers had grown stiff and clumsy. Somehow he could not seem to get the sword free of its scabbard.

Then Bowen Marsh stood there before him, tears running down his cheeks. “For the Watch.” He punched Jon in the belly. When he pulled his hand away, the dagger stayed where he had buried it.

Jon fell to his knees. He found the dagger’s hilt and wrenched it free. In the cold night air the wound was smoking. “Ghost,” he whispered. Pain washed over him. Stick them with the pointy end. When the third dagger [Ser Alliser Thorne from the front] took him between the shoulder blades, he gave a grunt and fell face-first into the snow. He never felt the fourth knife [Othell Yarwyck]. Only the cold …

Hi, my name is Razor, and I’m a nervous book purist.

• Published on 05/29/2015 at 12:45 PM CDT
• Last updated on 10/21/2016 at 1:04 PM CDT