I liked the episode, mainly because I'd made my peace by last season that they were gonna rush the end and that it would probably be a mess. Despite liking it for what it was, I agree with many of the criticisms of this ep.
I said on this very board that they were taking too long with the White Walker threat, and that by the halfway point of the series, still hadn't done anything truly meaningful with them.
Once they got to season 4 or 5, they should've been in open war with the dead and had the Night King story wrapped up by the end of season 6. That gives it time to breath, as well as the throne story.
Yep. As soon as it cut to Arya in the empty hallway I was like "WTF?! There was a tidal wave of undead rushing into the castle, where are they now?" It was annoying. I also dislike this trend of giving us unstoppable and implacable hordes of enemies, and yet somehow there isn't a higher body count. See the Dothraki charge. No one should've returned from that. I initially thought the returning riders were zombified, even Jorah, thinking he was the first to go. Nope.
Given the amount of dead and the way they portrayed them taking the castle, everyone should've been dead. We were shown an unstoppable, untiring, unthinking gibbering hoard that washed into Winterfell like a tidal wave, yet even the one handed guy who can't fight very well managed to survive. Every last one of them should've been overwhelmed by sheer numbers.
I also got tired of the fake outs for literally every single character. One of the gimmicks (and it is a gimmick) of the show was on full display here. The "You think we're going to do one thing, but we're going to the opposite" thing. Since everyone thought there was going to be a high body count for a good deal of major characters.....let's have all the majors survive.
Sam got two fake outs, as if to say "we fooled you that first time, so you know he'll die nex....haha fooled you again!"
Surviving an undead army that's intent on killing every single living thing in the world is much more important to the people of Westeros. It's like saying you're not really concerned that Godzilla is attacking and destroying the city because what's really important to the average Joe is who's going to be mayor afterwards, assuming anyone is even left alive.
In the absence of a Night King level threat, the "game" of thrones is super interesting, what with all the politicking, maneuvering etc. When a Night King level threat shows up, it shows just how utterly meaningless that "game" is. I care less about the throne story than the NK story. Who ends up running the record company, the oil business, wins the election, etc after seasons of watching various cabals backstabbing each other, with shifting loyalties.....we've seen that before. Apparently this is just those shows with a medieval skin. Been there, done that.
This is still a fantasy story, and these stories usually tell of some transformational moment in the history of that world. It's funny thinking that the "real" story was about who get's to rule the land instead of how can we save every last living creature from being slaughtered. At this point, they need to do something that transforms this world. An end to the monarchy or something like that. Ending with "and everything was pretty much the same as before" is unrealistic, nor does it work as the ending to a show.
Edited to add: but yeah, I do like stories that have "and this is what happened after the "happy ending" added to them. I loved it in Lord Of The Rings (the book), where we get a glimpse of the general outline of the lives of the Fellowship members up to their deaths. So I hope we get a nice long denouement in the final episode.
There's no reason for the Night's Watch or the Wall anymore. The far North is empty of Wildlings and the dead army is no more.
Would've preferred Jon or Dany kill the Night King but okay with Arya dealing the killing blow. Cuz Arya's a bad ass. But I have a feeling we're all being set up to believe she'll kill Cersi and she'll be killed instead.
The strangest thing about last nights ep is I was literally dreading watching it, especially in those opening moments. I knew we were going to be losing characters we'd been following for years and strangely, when it was over, I was actually disappointed that more didn't die. Not because I want them to, but we know not everyone is going to make it out of the story alive, and it would've added more realism to the battle and the way the enemy was portrayed. Still, hope the show can give us a satisfactory ending.
I said on this very board that they were taking too long with the White Walker threat, and that by the halfway point of the series, still hadn't done anything truly meaningful with them.
Once they got to season 4 or 5, they should've been in open war with the dead and had the Night King story wrapped up by the end of season 6. That gives it time to breath, as well as the throne story.
Yep. As soon as it cut to Arya in the empty hallway I was like "WTF?! There was a tidal wave of undead rushing into the castle, where are they now?" It was annoying. I also dislike this trend of giving us unstoppable and implacable hordes of enemies, and yet somehow there isn't a higher body count. See the Dothraki charge. No one should've returned from that. I initially thought the returning riders were zombified, even Jorah, thinking he was the first to go. Nope.
Given the amount of dead and the way they portrayed them taking the castle, everyone should've been dead. We were shown an unstoppable, untiring, unthinking gibbering hoard that washed into Winterfell like a tidal wave, yet even the one handed guy who can't fight very well managed to survive. Every last one of them should've been overwhelmed by sheer numbers.
I also got tired of the fake outs for literally every single character. One of the gimmicks (and it is a gimmick) of the show was on full display here. The "You think we're going to do one thing, but we're going to the opposite" thing. Since everyone thought there was going to be a high body count for a good deal of major characters.....let's have all the majors survive.
Sam got two fake outs, as if to say "we fooled you that first time, so you know he'll die nex....haha fooled you again!"
Surviving an undead army that's intent on killing every single living thing in the world is much more important to the people of Westeros. It's like saying you're not really concerned that Godzilla is attacking and destroying the city because what's really important to the average Joe is who's going to be mayor afterwards, assuming anyone is even left alive.
In the absence of a Night King level threat, the "game" of thrones is super interesting, what with all the politicking, maneuvering etc. When a Night King level threat shows up, it shows just how utterly meaningless that "game" is. I care less about the throne story than the NK story. Who ends up running the record company, the oil business, wins the election, etc after seasons of watching various cabals backstabbing each other, with shifting loyalties.....we've seen that before. Apparently this is just those shows with a medieval skin. Been there, done that.
This is still a fantasy story, and these stories usually tell of some transformational moment in the history of that world. It's funny thinking that the "real" story was about who get's to rule the land instead of how can we save every last living creature from being slaughtered. At this point, they need to do something that transforms this world. An end to the monarchy or something like that. Ending with "and everything was pretty much the same as before" is unrealistic, nor does it work as the ending to a show.
Edited to add: but yeah, I do like stories that have "and this is what happened after the "happy ending" added to them. I loved it in Lord Of The Rings (the book), where we get a glimpse of the general outline of the lives of the Fellowship members up to their deaths. So I hope we get a nice long denouement in the final episode.
There's no reason for the Night's Watch or the Wall anymore. The far North is empty of Wildlings and the dead army is no more.
Would've preferred Jon or Dany kill the Night King but okay with Arya dealing the killing blow. Cuz Arya's a bad ass. But I have a feeling we're all being set up to believe she'll kill Cersi and she'll be killed instead.
The strangest thing about last nights ep is I was literally dreading watching it, especially in those opening moments. I knew we were going to be losing characters we'd been following for years and strangely, when it was over, I was actually disappointed that more didn't die. Not because I want them to, but we know not everyone is going to make it out of the story alive, and it would've added more realism to the battle and the way the enemy was portrayed. Still, hope the show can give us a satisfactory ending.
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