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[pr0cs]

It certainly was a better episode than the last two. So much of it felt forced though. Euron and Jaimie appearing on the same beach at the same time? . Did they no show how big kings landing is? The chances of that happening is infinitesimally small. Euron should have simply died on his ship and been done with his terrible story. Shame really because book horn blower Euron was really cool.

I was never happy with what they did with Jamie's story. To me show version died when they removed his hand. Then leaving out Vargo Hoat was a travesty (kingthlayer)

I can live with the rest, yeah the golden company etc was a collosal waste, Maggie the frogs prophecy was pointless. But in general I can see why they had many of the characters stories end in this episode the way they did.

The cgi was pretty fucking amazing, anyone disputing this is crazy, I'm not sure I've ever seen, in any media a better interpretation of what dragonfire would do to a city. The books elaborate a bit of it taking about harrenhal but man watching the fire blow apart entire buildings, streets, ships like a candle was a sight to behold. Shame so many poor plot elements overshadow the fabulous art / animation.

 

[RedVIper]

They should have just had the civilians fight back against dany, atleast she would have some reason to kill them.

 

[MetalAlien]

I'm on this train until the last stop.

Hey this gif turned out to be really relevant.

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

Pretty wild that not too long ago I would have told anyone this is the best show on TV and maybe the greatest show of all-time.

Seasons 1-4 were a masterpiece, together. 5 and 6 were very good. 7 and 8 are just....big moments surrounded by weird writing decisions.

Subtlety and nuance has gone out the window. Meticulous buildup basically just thrown out the window.

At least I can still say what I said I last week. I have no idea what is going to happen. I thought Cersei was gonna win last night, obviously couldn't have been more wrong. I would like think Dany and Jon live but I dunno what is going to happen.

It's not that I wanted a happy ending for everyone. It's that I wanted an ending that felt like it made sense, that paid off all the years to get there.

 

[Kadayi]

Making of Episode: -

 

[mortal]

She is the ultimate villain, she is killing people for their own good.

Now she can build a new era over King's Landing ashes, in which future generations would never have to face a tyrant again. The Mother's mercy.

I'm sorry, but that sounds like a bunch of baloney lol. It's not even consistent with her motives and her arc up to this point. Idk it just feels contrived.

 

[Verdanth]

 

[mortal]

lol right?

 

[Jon Neu]

I'm sorry, but that sounds like a bunch of baloney lol. It's not even consistent with her motives and her arc up to this point. Idk it just feels contrived.

It's totally consisent with her arc and motives.

She has become what her father and brother were, and they didn't come out of a demonic fire with three dragons as babies.

 

[JimiNutz]

Biggest disappointment for me was definitely Cleganebowl. The Hound vs Brienne was a much more satisfying, brutal and shocking duel. Cleganebowl was just incredibly cheesy and not well executed at all. On paper it sounds epic as they battle to the death with the castle crumbling around them and Drogon soaring overhead. They set up The Mountain as too ridiculously overpowered for the fight to be anything other than completely unrealistic, cheesy nonsense though.

 

[mortal]

It's totally consisent with her arc and motives.

She has become what her father and brother were, and they didn't come out of a demonic fire with three dragons as babies.

No it's not. Her actions throughout the course of the series showed that she was striving to be a liberator in spite of her lineage. She absolutely is willing and capable of killing her enemies, but she has never been one to kill innocent people, let alone thousands of them. her actions in this episode undermines so much of her motives as character.

I'm not even against the idea of her decent into madness, but the pacing was not at all in their favor this season. If they had her cracking under pressure earlier in the series, they could've made her turn more believable and impactful. If they had one more season planned they could've let that arc play out even better.

Great production values, some really great performances from many actors, but I'm sorry, there hasn't been much consistently with the writing. The rules kept changing.

 

[Art.Menegatti]

Also as soon as the dragons entered the series I thought “oh yeah eventually she is going to use them to roast tons of people”. What did people expect? Dragons were gonna go around building shelters or something?

Exactly. Is not like a How to train your dragon thing.

 

[PrCat88]

She always showed clear traits of not wanting to make the same mistakes of her past relatives, killing her enemies, sparing the innocents, breaking the chains, breaking the wheel, and making sacrifices for the greater good.

She finally awakened the shark. Which she then jumped over.

Lots of fantasy characters try to break from the sins of the father only to be as corrupted. Thorin from the Hobbit is a prime example. After Smaug was defeated he let the Dwarves gold consume him to the point of going to war.

But where Tolkien has redemption for Thorin, I don't see Martin envisioning such for Daenerys.

 

[MastAndo]

To add insult to magically healing injury...

 

[Jon Neu]

No it's not. Her actions through the show showed that she was striving to be a liberator. She absolutely is willing and capable of killing her enemies, but she has never been one to kill innocent people, let alone thousands of them. her motives in this episode undermines so much of her motives as character.

Yes it is, her actions through the show showed that she was striving to be a liberator, but her natural side was to be a mad tyrant with a God complex. Her arc was her trying to run from the Targaryen curse, from the legacy of her father and the heavy influence of her brother regarding on how she sees herself and her family in the world.

Her father was also a good person before descending into the Targaryen madness, the show literally tells you this already happened before.

 

[RedVIper]

To add insult to magically healing injury...

This scene isn't the episode I think.

 

[mortal]

Yes it is, her actions through the show showed that she was striving to be a liberator, but her natural side was to be a mad tyrant with a God complex. Her arc was her trying to run from the Targaryen curse, from the legacy of her father and the heavy influence of her brother regarding on how she sees herself and her family in the world.

Her father was also a good person before descending into the Targaryen madness, the show literally tells you this already happened before.

D&D can drop as many"the gods flip a coin" lines as they want. The writing did very little to convey the weight and very real possibility of that. Like I said, the pacing was not in their favor. This has people, such as myself, feeling perplexed rather than devastated.

 

[mortal]

It's kind of funny seeing so many people comment and try to retcon this scene so that it's ash falling.

It's fucking snow.

People are doing that? lol
I always figured the snow falling implies that Jon would sit on the Iron throne. It seems rather obvious no?

 

[Tesseract]

clarke's acting in this episode was god tier

 

[hivsteak]

No use arguing over fan fiction

 

[Jon Neu]

D&D can drop as many"the gods flip a coin" lines as they want. The writing did very little to convey the weight and very real possibility of that. Like I said, the pacing was not in their favor. This has people, such as myself, feeling perplexed rather than devastated.

The writing is shit, but that wasn't the point.

I'm sure in the books is going to be handled better.

 

[CrankyJay™]

People are doing that? lol
I always figured the snow falling implies that Jon would sit on the Iron throne. It seems rather obvious no?

Yeah, people are doing that.

 

[Javthusiast]

 

[Jon Neu]

The lost ending was awesome, it was everything before the ending that was shit.

 

[mortal]

The writing is shit, but that wasn't the point.

I'm sure in the books is going to be handled better.

Call me crazy, but isn't that sort of important to storytelling lol

 

[Musky_Cheese]

I will ask you this GAF.

I am not a book reader so without your knowledge of Dany from the books, how do you feel about the shows (and only the show) setup for Dany turn to heel. Was it done well.

Because for me, the build up was almost non existent

 

[Javthusiast]

 

[RedVIper]

I will ask you this GAF.

I am not a book reader so without your knowledge of Dany from the books, how do you feel about the shows (and only the show) setup for Dany turn to heel. Was it done well.

Because for me, the build up was almost non existent

There is definitely some build up throughout the seasons, but yeah the show didn't handle it in a great way.

The books do it better because you can see what she's thinking, she's also younger so some of the stuff she does makes more sense.

 

[xandaca]

Rewatching the episode, I find it mildly amusing how the writers emphasize the 'the gods flip a coin when a Targaryen is born' line about Dany, forgetting that their beloved replacement, Jon, is a Targaryen as well. Presumably, after this long, everyone's seen what a hopeless, flaccid soggysocks he is and decided that even if he does go 'mad', on his own he's basically as threatening as a defanged turbot.

 

[Jon Neu]

Call me crazy, but isn't that sort of important to storytelling lol

This is the show we have, there's no point in continue to bitch about the writing in every episode.

The show is dumb since at least 2 seasons ago. I came to accept that this season wasn't going to be any different 2 episodes ago.

Some ideas behind the plot are good, the production is awesome, the actors are good, the music is awesome. Shut off your brain and enjoy.

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

Wait am I reading this right, these guys, this whole time, THESE GUYS behind the show are the dudes who did X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and now are going to be heading towards Star Wars projects?

Tell me this isn't true

 

[Tesseract]

Rewatching the episode, I find it mildly amusing how the writers emphasize the 'the gods flip a coin when a Targaryen is born' line about Dany, forgetting that their beloved replacement, Jon, is a Targaryen as well. Presumably, after this long, everyone's seen what a hopeless, flaccid soggysocks he is and decided that even if he does go 'mad', on his own he's basically as threatening as a defanged turbot.

jon appears to be the best of both worlds, and he was raised a stark, ned's bastard boy

he's an honorable fool

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

Also wouldn't Dany, even in her mad bloodrage, been more interested in making a beeline toward Cersei instead of just massacring thousands of civilians?

 

[Jon Neu]

When the first episode aired, I remember I noted that Bran watched with joy how Jon arrived to Winterfell, and his face became much more serious/angry when he saw Dany.

A little bit of foreshadowing there.

 

[autoduelist]

Dexter was worse. Battlestar Galactica was worse. Lost was worse.
GoT is still awful though.

Snip.

This seems especially relevant for Lost and GoT as there was such a massive amount of online speculation and "fan theories" that inevitable some of these would be really really good. Then the show has to try and compete with that.

GoT was always going to struggle as they came into the home stretch with social media people waiting to "react" to whatever happens.

Unfortunately, the attempts at "subverting expectations" are at odds with things like character building and investment in characters and just doing stuff that feels logical or "right".

"The Red Wedding" made sense in that the political wheeling and dealing behind the scenes that led to betrayal were realistic and believable.
"Arya comes out of nowhere to kill the Night King" is a bit less weighty and believable and so it kind of falls flat.

So here we are with Daenerys "heel turn" and it just feels rushed and not very well set up and it's just a big disappointment.
It's too late in the game for them to redeem themselves also. This is what we are left with.

I feel like The Wire, The Sopranos and Breaking Bad are still the gold standard in that long form story telling that delivers slowly developed characters and big meaningful shocks and "gut punch" moments.

GoT (and Lost, still) deserve credit for trying to do that in a more fantasy setting that encouraged fan theories and more outlandish possibilities but in the end they probably played it too safe by coasting for a few seasons before being forced into a conclusion that was not well considered or thought out.

Meh.

I forgot about Battlestar.
I don't think writers should care if they take something from a fan theory if it improves the story. The fan will be happy they got right, not think it was stolen.

Regarding 'subverting expectations. The writers just arent good enough. It can be done. The Red Wedding subverts expectations but is brilliant because it is still internally consistent with the game. We don't expect Rob to lose so completely, but his death drives everyone else's story forward.

You mention the wire:

Spoiler: The Wire spoiler

Omar's death subverts expectations. They built him into a superhero, and then a small kid takes him out. But that's the point. And they send it home with the morgue scene, where you realize this larger-than-life character you've grown so attached to amounts to nothing in the real world, he isn't even recognized.

But here? They care about spectacle. They want Jaime to fight Euron for some reason, so the tides make it happen. They dont expose a hidden second thread of character development, where we go 'oh my God I didnt see that coming, that's brilliant', but rather just a 'wtf?'.

 

[ConnorDuffy1977]

Also wouldn't Dany, even in her mad bloodrage, been more interested in making a beeline toward Cersei instead of just massacring thousands of civilians?

She wanted Cersei to see her beloved King's Landing fall before her eyes. Literally to watch it crumble. I thought Cersei would be captured.

Also, poor Varys.

 

[mortal]

This is the show we have, there's no point in continue to bitch about the writing in every episode.

The show is dumb since at least 2 seasons ago. I came to accept that this season wasn't going to be any different 2 episodes ago.

Some ideas behind the plot are good, the production is awesome, the actors are good, the music is awesome. Shut off your brain and enjoy.

Calling it "bitching" is a bit dismissive. We can still criticize aspects we don't like or agree with and that's fine. That's a valid part of experiencing a story as the intended audience or participant. That's part of the fun, even when I happen to disagree with people. I mean at that point why bother engaging on a forum at all. I don't come to talk about the show on a message board to shut off my mind. You know what I mean?

 

[Silent Duck]

Screenshot of the finale!
The only way I can imagine this shit ending.

 

[ConnorDuffy1977]

We can still criticize aspects we don't like or agree with and that's fine, as that's a valid part of experiencing a story as the intended audience or participant.

True. I'm not denying that you have that right. But I think after a while, it comes off like the guy who sits in his armchair drinking beer telling the professional athlete how to thread the needle with a pass, make a fade-away three pointer or drain a 15 foot putt. Sure, there are things I don't love but I think you have to learn to look at the thing as a whole.

 

[mortal]

Screenshot of the finale!
The only way I can imagine this shit ending.

Nah, she's the final boss. She's dead bro.

 

[Jon Neu]

Calling it "bitching" is a bit dismissive. We can still criticize aspects we don't like or agree with and that's fine, as that's a valid part of experiencing a story as the intended audience or participant. I mean at that point why bother engaging on a forum at all. I don't come to talk about the show on a message board to shut off my mind. You know what I mean?

Sorry, that wasn't my intention, I'm just using informal language. If you followed the thread, you will see me on it bitching about the dumb writing as much or more than anyone else.

But at this point, for me, it's just futile to do so anymore. We already know what we are into with this show, so for me personally doesn't make sense to critizice the writing every episode, I just sadly give bad writing for granted already.

I'm not telling you or anybody else -especially people who hasn't been previously as vocal here in critizing the plot- can't do it, of course. It's just that there isn't much to discuss about it, really.

 

[Kalre]

Im so sad

 

[Silent Duck]

Nah, she's the final boss. She's dead bro.

Oops. I forgot about Arya the Hedgehog. With her super speed and plucky attitude she’ll vanquish the egg queen.

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

Also (again), when Grey Worm spears the Lannister guys the dudes who follow behind him don't look like unsullied, they look like North Men. Wouldn't men of the north follow and listen to Jon over anyone else?

 

[Musky_Cheese]

Am I wrong or did we not see Dany’s face once Bell Rage happened... even in next episode preview.

Why?

My guess... Sith eyes twist!

 

[Pejo]

Absolutely loved this ep. Holy shit so good. Shows all the awful sides of war, Dany finally ponying up, Jon realizing that he made a huge mistake.

Cleganebowl was a bit of a letdown, but really what could they do after a few seasons of building up the Mountain to be basically invincible.

I actually like this version of Dany, unfettered and does what she wants, instead of being manipulated by ~5 people at any given time. She even says in the ep that she'll never be loved, so all she has to work with is fear. I feel like that's her coming to grips with that fact. Her insecurities have been growing ever since she found out who Jon really was. Sure it hit a little fast and a little hard, but we're down to a handful of episodes left, so I understand why they did it that way.

The only thing that would have made the episode any better for me personally was if Cersei had a better death (though we're not certain she's dead yet) and if Arya died just as a nobody running through the alley. From Hero to nobody in an instant. Seems like a pretty GoT thing to do. Ah well.

This totally makes up for that awful Night King conclusion for me personally.

 

[Jon Neu]

Also (again), when Grey Worm spears the Lannister guys the dudes who follow behind him don't look like unsullied, they look like North Men. Wouldn't men of the north follow and listen to Jon over anyone else?

Those are medieval times, people who go to war and put their lives at risk expect to have the spoils of war as a reward, and those spoils are basically killing, raping and looting everything you want.

War corrupts.

 

[vpance]

Making of Episode: -

Some real impressive production behind this episode. It was worth it for all that dragon porn.

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

It was cool to see a dragon being the force it was supposed to be. Again, big cool scenes aren’t an issue these last two seasons, they definitely have nailed that aspect

 

[mortal]

True. I'm not denying that you have that right. But I think after a while, it comes off like the guy who sits in his armchair drinking beer telling the professional athlete how to thread the needle with a pass, make a fade-away three pointer or drain a 15 foot putt. Sure, there are things I don't love but I think you have to learn to look at the thing as a whole.

I don't think that's a fair analogy tbh. Speaking for myself here, I'm not trying to tell D&D how to do their jobs or think I can do it better than they could. I'm just reacting to the work. I'm judging every aspect of the show. The production, and performances, as well as the writing. As a creator you cannot control how an audience will receive your work. Some will judge favorably, other less so maybe. That's part and parcel no?

I don't agree with this sentiment that just because some think the show's writing has worsened, they shouldn't bother themselves speaking on it. I love many aspects of GOT, but I also dislike some of the creative choices. So why not discuss it all? Engaging in discourse is part of the fun for me. The show is known to illicit some devise reactions and impressions. I enjoy reading and watching much of it. We're on a forum right? That's kind the whole point.

This isn't about acknowledging expertise or authority, it's simply people critiquing art and reacting to storytelling.