Way back in another career, I covered the NBA and an annual rite was assigning grades to players at mid-season. Nowadays, the only seasons I obsess about are those of HBO’s Game of Thrones or as the late, great Khal Drogo once put it, “Trrhones.” Had I been swept up in the show last season the way I am now, I would have graded Daenerys’ Sun and Stars a B, for badass. Alas, the heralded horseman suffered a death by pillow which, combined with the beloved Eddard Stark’s death by neck trim, shocking for those who didn’t read George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series, means two central and interesting characters down in Season 1 alone (I don’t count the sniveling Viserys, whose death by helmet was a welcomed comeuppance, as a central character). Fortunately, Westeros is teaming with players begging to be graded with five of the Season 2’s 10 episodes down.

The Clash of Kings season was meant to be epic and vast in comparison to the first, and so far it has been. There’s already been a great episode with a great name, What is Dead May Never Die, that sounds like the Bond film that should have come after Goldeneye. Westeros and beyond this season reminds me of the U.S., circa spring of 2008. Back then, the winter of Obama was coming, but the country still was ruled by the enfant terrible George W. Bush, and Obama and Clinton and McCain (he being the Balon Greyjoy of the bunch) were vying for power, with the land under siege by the likes of Al-Qaeda and Wall Street and wars raging in Iraq and Afghanistan. Then as now in Westeros was a great time to be a blogger, only now we don’t have to employ ravens as a delivery system. Speaking of media, if the Trrhones got commentators, ala The Hunger Games, let them be A.Ron and Mad Brew from The Night’s Watch, the smart and funny, best unofficial Game of Thrones podcast of the bunch.

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