The Bells

"**The Bells**" is the fifth episode of the eighth season of *Game of Thrones*. It is the seventy-second episode of the series overall. It premiered on May 12, 2019. It was written by David Benioff & D.B. Weiss and directed by Miguel Sapochnik.

It is the eighth modified episode as part of this wiki's rewrite.

## Plot

Jaime faces a hard choice, while the dead surround King's Landing.

## Summary (abridged)

* In the Red Keep, Jaime reunites with Cersei. At this point, Cersei is growing increasingly desperate after hearing that Riverrun has been sacked and the dead have crossed the Trident.
* The Baratheon fleet arrives in Blackwater Bay and the stormlander forces offload. Despite Jon and Varys's protests, Daenerys orders her men to prepare to storm King's Landing should Cersei refuse to surrender. Owing to Drogon’s injuries from fighting Viserion, Daenerys decides to mount Rhaegal.
* Jaime and Cersei are attacked by Arya. Jaime defends Cersei from her long enough for the Mountain to arrive and engage Arya. Jaime, Cersei and Qyburn flee while Arya and the Mountain fight in Maegor’s holdfast. The Mountain quickly gains the upper hand over Arya, but before he can finish her off, the Hound rushes in (after secretly following Jaime) and begins fighting his brother. Arya flees.
* Cersei tries to order her men to attack the sieging army, but before she can, Daenerys launches her own attack. With Cersei’s men caught by surprise, Drogon and Rhaegal make short work of the large but unwieldy scorpions lining the battlements of King’s Landing.
* The Hound and the Mountain die after the Hound crash-tackles the Mountain out of Maegor’s Holdfast and into the flaming battlements below.
* As Cersei’s men begin surrendering, Cersei commands Qyburn to “burn them all” by igniting the wildfire caches under the city. Jaime, almost on instinct, kills Qyburn before stabbing Cersei. Cersei dies in Jaime’s arms.
* The dead appear on the horizon as the Unsullied, Dothraki, Stark, Baratheon, Arryn, Tully and Wildling forces enter the city, joining the Lannister and Golden Company forces. Yara Greyjoy and a token force of Ironborn warriors also ride in from the west. The defenders desperately douse the flames on the battlements to replace troops on the walls.
* Arya reunites with Jon, Sansa, Bran and Gendry, regretting her decision to try and kill Cersei.
* Tyrion enters the Great Hall to discover Jaime mourning over Cersei’s corpse. Tyrion joins him, but the two brothers are eventually forced to take her body outside and burn it.
* The Army of the Dead surround the walls of King’s Landing
* Daenerys walks up to the Iron Throne, but ultimately does not touch it and returns to marshalling her men to defend the city from the dead.
* Left alone in the Great Hall, Bran asks Jon to help him onto the Iron Throne. Bran once again begins seeing and witnesses many past events tied to the Iron Throne and the swords that it is made of, before being brought back to the events preceding Robert’s Rebellion. Bran discovers that Rhaegar Targaryen had become consumed by both the Old Gods as well as a prophecy that the ‘Prince that was Promised’ would be ‘born of his bloodline’. From this, Rhaegar had also begun suffering increasingly violent visions of his own, specifically of the White Walkers and their enigmatic leader. Together alone, Rhaegar confides all his beliefs in Lyanna Stark, the two falling in love, Rhaegar later coming to believe he needed a new trueborn heir by Lyanna, in case he fell in the wars to come.
* Bran ultimately realises that the Night King himself was behind Rhaegar's visions, and that he was attempting to remotely possess Rhaegar in order to facilitate an effortless conquest of the Seven Kingdoms. Many of Rhaegar's actions had also seemingly been influenced by the Night King, such as his decision to marry Lyanna.
* Bran is then once again pulled out of his visions of the past by a vision of the Night King disembarking off a ship crewed by wights onto the mainland, in sight of King’s Landing.
* The Night King begins his attack on King’s Landing. Most of the non-combatants go into hiding in Maegor’s holdfast.
* Many are killed in the fighting as the living are pushed back towards the Red Keep. Ultimately, Daenerys and Rhaegal are brought down after a large number of wights latch on to Rhaegal, tearing his wings and sending them tumbling into the Great Hall. With both dragon and rider presumed dead, a desperate retreat into the Red Keep is ordered.

## Appearances

### Deaths

* Sandor Clegane
* Ser Gregor Clegane
* Lord Hand Qyburn
* Queen Cersei Lannister
* Rhaegal
* Several White Walkers
* Many wights
* Many Lannister soldiers
* Many Baratheon soldiers
* Many Tully soldiers
* Many Arryn knights of the Vale
* Many Stark soldiers
* Many wildings
* Many Unsullied
* Many Dothraki
* Many Golden Company sellswords
* Many citizens of King's Landing

## Events

* Siege of King's Landing
* Battle of King's Landing

## See also

* The Bells on Wiki of Westeros
* The Bells on Wikipedia
* The Bells on IMDb