But
winter did finally come and it delivered in terms of epic battles and
convincing CGI dragons, recapturing the awesome feeling of seeing the
Lanister troop caravan getting napalmed in the previous season. Each
of the 6 episodes was a 75 minute film in it's own right; the best of
television now truly drawn level, or even surpassing cinema, for my
liking.
But
yeah, of course the writing wasn't great, in terms of plot and
dialogue. The show runners had been left the unenviable task of
rounding off GRRM's epic fantasy garden of characters, with only
rough notes from him about where he has been aiming to take things.
The
natural expectation is that the original author will finish the book
series properly. But it sounds likely there's a good chance he'll
struggle just as much. if he ever gets there at all: GRRM describes
himself as a 'gardener', merely tending the seeds of the characters
he's planned. Giving them so much agency that he's struggled to get
them where they need to go for the plot - Daenerys being waylaid in
Meereen a symptom of this.
D&D
certainly made substantial compromises to bring things to a
deliberate ending. Even with many minor characters and huge elements
of the world entirely ignored (like religion and the whole of Essos), season 8 still feels very rushed. Major turning points are so
compressed as to be frustratingly unbelievable and stepping stones in
key character development are skipped over, making the shape of
their arc unrecognisable and actions unconvincing.
Writing quality as seasons progressed (popular meme).
I
felt they could have done with about 2 additional series, in place of
the last 3 episodes, to have everything make sense. I guess they felt
this would have stretched their weak writing even thinner, viewer
figures doping off as a result and hurting the appetite for the
spin-off shows.
Having
watched a few videos and read a few articles about the this last
season, here's a regurgitation of their most salient points, mixed in
with the biggest issues I had. Huge spoilers ahead, of course!
Final episode - "Bran the Broken [plot]":
This
felt more like a Saturday afternoon BBC radio play than top budget TV
show. They'd left a whole lot to wrap up in the last 90 minutes and
went out of their way to definitively conclude things for each of
our established main characters. The result was felt ridiculously
tame and in turns predictable or totally arbitrary.
A
kind of meaningless end credits epilogue, with a surreal feel at
times: Greyworm appearing back in front of Jon, at the top of the
stairs to the destroyed red keep, after having been left behind him,
slitting throats. Drogon emerging from hiding perfectly buried under
snow covered rubble, for no apparent reason (not enough time has
passed for this – Daenerys hadn't even walked over to the Iron
Throne yet). I guess it this aspect works in putting us inside Jon's
POV – staggering around in a bit of a daze, with nothing making any
sense anymore.
It
was no surprise that Jon had to kill "his queen". Only that
she seemingly didn't see it coming. Especially after Arya lays out,
for him (and us), how Danny knows who he truly is (to a fault).
Maybe she lost 60 or so IQ points in apparently going mad )or she
secretly wanted to die?).
There
was a whole lot of dialogue for everyone's favourite dwarf. Even
Greyworm's barked command to shut up couldn't stop him dictating the
order of realm; the new lord and lady masters of Westeros virtually
cardboard cut-outs in their chairs.
It
would make sense that GRRM wanted his Frodo character to take up the
ring crown of power. But there hasn't been nearly
enough build up to justify this in the show, let alone foreshadowing.
So when Tyrion says "no one has a better story than Bran"
it rings totally false - a name pulled out of a bag with totally
off-the-cuff justification.
 |
| "Why do you think I came all this way...?" |
After
all the time spent on his arc through the seasons, Bran's powers have
achieved nothing much beyond putting the final touches in place for
the downfall of the night king (which he presumably foresaw). I
mean, in terms of payoff there's no explanation about the lore or
powers of these two opposed magical forces. Presumably the White
walker stuff is deliberately left to be spun out in the forthcoming
nightswatch prequel series.
It
makes too little sense that the (second) dragon pit meeting of nobles
would meekly rubber stamp the true Stark heir as their supreme ruler.
Then also hold their peace as he literally nods through northern independence for his sister to be a true queen, too. Especially after
Yara Greyjoy won that promise previously from Danny.
But
also, there's nothing about Bran or his actions that might be sung in
songs and inspire the masses. If Tyrion could be left entirely out of
the history book(s), then Bran would naturally fall into obscurity
too, having lurked in the shadows for the brief time he wasn't
entirely isolated, beyond the wall. As slayer of the night
king, Arya might be famous, but no one (except Bran) was around to
see the reason the walkers stopped existing. Indeed, for the southern
populous the walkers will remain forever a distant fairy tale (unlike
the dragons!).
It's
been drilled into us (again by Varys) that "power resides where
men believe it resides". But if they've heard of him at all, I'd
expect the masses to find this magical cripple to be creepy and
ominous. They'd be right to. Making him king is worst than making the
NSA the P(ressident)OTUS – he's omniscient of everything that's
ever happened anywhere in Westeros, can see glimpses into the biggest
future events and has eyes everywhere there are birds (and other
animals and simple minded folk). Which also, incidentally gives him
complete control of their telecommunications network – no raven
flying where he don't want it to, for sure!
At
best they've installed a benevolent god dictator. A cheat of an
answer to the entire question of the show: "Is it possible to
rule for the benefit of all, without getting assassinated?".
It's
far more interesting to consider this as an ultra-dark ending: Tyrion
visibly takes momentary consider the implications of "Why do you
think I came all this way?". Surely he'd realise, now, that Bran
must also have foreseen something as monumental as Daenerys
incinerating Kings Landing (something teased in his first vision at
the end of season 1). Tyrion knows for a fact that he discovered
Jon's true heritage and chose to make him aware of it, driving the
lovers apart. Whatever guilt and culpability Tyrion feels, Bran's
(only significant) actions where seeding chaos even worst than Little
Finger's personal 'ladder' of war across the 7 kingdoms. The ladder
Lord Baelish fell from when Arya and Sansa blindsided him, due to his
imperfect knowledge. Bran would not fall to intrigue so easily and
his brute force opposition, of Walkers and Dragons, have been dealt with...
The
most tragic death - physical realism:
► The
first half of the final season was all well and good for me, right up
until the start of episode 4, where we discover that most of what we
saw in episode 3 was a lie. It had been an epic battle of sacrifice,
almost down to the very last, with seemingly only the last few main
characters slogging it out, backs to the wall, atop a writhing pile
of reanimated corpses.
My
expectations where that these handful of survivors would be helpless
against Cersei's southern forces marching in to take them captive,
with the best possible outcome a suicidal victory from Drogon to slay
the evil queen. Or maybe Cersei just wins, things go back to normal
and maybe we flash forwards to gradual improvements in the nature of
rule...
But
no, despite the dramatic visuals, apparently only half the dothraki died! I guess the survivors (of the stupidest cavalry charge in
Westerosy history) must have fled on their horses, under the cover of
darkness, because where the hell else could they have been?! It even
looked like the vast majority of the unsullied perished, used as a
meat shield to cover the retreat against the incoming waves of dead.
There wasn't even any sign of the regular northern armies inside the
halls of Winterfell, haunted only by zombies in Arya's interlude, or
inside the walls in general, as the Night King and his wing-men take
a casual stroll right through from the front to the little forest
annex at the rear.
So
I was rather surprised to see there had apparently been enough
survivors to build a bunch of over-sized funeral pyres for the
honoured dead (I guess all those bodies that had been longer deceased
simple turned to dust?). And that there were the kitchen staff to put
on a celebratory feast?! Did anyone actually die, sealed in the
crypts?
I
guess it's hard to portray the movements of entire armies throughout
massive battles, so we're left with more of a metaphorical
illustration, whatever...
► But
then the cheapest death in the show – Rhaegal effectively gets run
over by a bus while crossing the road. Just because the audience is
watching a close cropped shot looking back at Danny flying, with her
two remaining scaly children, we are to believe that no one spotted
Euron's Iron Fleet a few hundred meters in front of them?! And their
first ever volley of arrows, fired at sea verses a flying target,
scores 3 direct hits!
This
was so epically frustrating because it could so easily have been made believable with a mere 30 seconds more footage. e.g. Danny spots the
fleet (like, 10 minutes out, probably), swoops in to burn it, but
it's a trap with Euron unveiling the new scorpions at the last
second, getting one lucky shot off after loosing a few ships. (It
would make sense that they'd keep the fleet's scorpions ultra-secret
in port and en-route, with the risk of spies giving the game away.)
 |
| 3 direct hits on Rhaegal, captain, and there's an Iron fleet de-cloaking off the starboard bow! |
But
no. The Iron fleet is a cut-scene that happens with a coin flip as to
weather it will achieve a flawless victory, as it did in the previous
season, appearing magically out of the mist to ambush Yara's fleet in
the dead of night. Or a perfect loss, as in the penultimate episode.
I
guess the series really struggled with naval scenes in general, with
Euron apparently rebuilding his fleet between series 6 and 7 and I
totally lost track of where Danny's ships were supposed to have come
from in each instance in season 8, after all/most were destroyed in
the ambush at Lanisport during the Unsullied's siege of Casterly
Rock...?
Of
course it's majorly difficult for a TV show to depict navies
realistically, e.g. when Yara & Theon's dozen extras escaping
equates to 30 odd ships sailing away in the distance. But all naval
matters just happen arbitrarily – like the vastly superior Iron
Fleet sits idle in port while the northern armies make landfall on
the other side of King's Landing...?
Then,
of course the whole Iron Fleet is casually incinerated by Drogon, who
comes back inexplicably stronger than a powered up Batman. I guess he
was always capable of this, but Danny was too rattled to fight after
randomly loosing another child to unexpected anti-air weaponry. So
she just let her fleet get trashed right on the doorstep of Dragonstone castle, with Mesandi (alone) captured, pivotally.
Actually,
the ship-on-ship aspect of that naval engagement of made little sense
too: in equipping the Iron fleet with balistas they must have removed
the catapults/trebuchets we saw in action the previous season, which
flung flaming balls at Yara's fleet. The balistas could actually be
significantly worst for ship-to-ship combat, since it takes only one
fire strike to sink a wooden ship. And Dannys ships were presumably the ones captured from the rebelling slave masters, which were lobbing fire bombs at the great pyramid of Meereen, so should have been able
to return fire, literally. But I'm nitpicking speculation at this
point...
► The
burnination of Kings Landing was worst, in a way – it's an
eventually I'd not expected, partly because there's been no logical
reason for Danny to systematically raze every building in the city
(while ignoring Cersei), but more because I didn't think it possible
for a dragon to breath fire for 30 minutes straight!
The
fictional universe seemed to be very carefully constructed to not
have rainbow propelled unicorns – i.e. totally arbitrary magical
capabilities. There's a whole lot of time spent on human made
wildfire that's almost certainly a dragon-fire analogue. And the
dragons themselves are physical beasts who suffer in the cold and
have to eat (a lot) to continue existing and grow, etc. Kind of like
the dragons in the movie Reign of Fire, their CGI faces seem to have
place to expel flammable excretions, etc.
Each
explosive exhalation must consume physical mass from their bodies, so
they must have a hard physical limit. If each big Drogon "dracaris"
is roughly equivalent to a large napalm bomb, then dragon fire would
already need to be at least 10 times more mass efficient than real
life incendiaries to have facilitated all the previous engagements
we'd seen.
The
battle of Winterfell was really pushing this limit, but not tied from
that at all, Drogon has enough fuel to flame 150 odd ships in harbour
and the entire perimeter of a 1 million population (low rise) city.
And how dumb of a plan it was to take on the dragon slaying fleet
before opening the gates for
the main army? Unnecessary, too, except as dramatic revenge. I
guess it was mostly to make it feel cool to watch, exactly like a
Rocky comeback – a meaningless, logic free resurgence that
apparently many/most movie audiences would have no problem with, so
why not here?
To
really rub in the ludicrous scale of these flames we see caches of
wildfire, throughout the city, going up in green flames. All those
cellars stocked with tones of bottles barely even a side-note.
Despite all this, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of
secondary fires. Which was seemingly what Tyrion had worried about in
previous seasons, counselling against a direct attack on the capital
because it could easily raise a spreading firestorm. Like the WW2 Dresden bombing did, on purpose, or as happened to historical London
several times, with only a point source of ignition.
I
guess spreading flame would have been too slow and subtle to film;
much more fun and impactful to have a dragon roaring overhead like a
jet bomber in some war torn Middle Eastern region (with infinite
ammo). I guess the sequence did at least do a decent job of bringing
home the horror and carnage of being on the ground, under
air-strikes. Arya, victorious over unspeakable evil magic, now helplessly battered trying
to escape, to bring it home. And Jon yelling "Have you been down
there?!" could apply to US drone pilots, military commanders or
the public in general, funding our contemporary actions. (I doubt
it'll have much/any political impact, to be honest.)
► It's barely even worth mentioning that Jamie is miraculously able to
stagger up (and back down) hundreds of feet of Red Keep stairs
(there's no lifts) after being impaled through the chest twice with
Euron's foot long dagger. So set was the plot on having him reunite
with his whimpering damsel in distress sister/lover/tyrant.
► Or
how it makes any sense for closing scene with Tyrion leading a
meeting of the king's council with a sit com feel – Kings Landing
is literally a smouldering pile of rubble, with no support network to
sustain their existence in the old capital. They're talking about
rebuilding ships verses
brothels, but the infrastructure of society is gone. No food stores, bakeries,
breweries, blacksmiths,
nothing, and
EVERYONE IS DEAD! (Although
I suppose there was, in reality, only superficial damage, like the
troop looses from the battle of Winterfell being capped at 50%.)
 |
| Yes |
Real
world implications:
► For
my liking, this show's given value to society beyond entertainment,
in the same way that hard sci-fi does – to aid understanding
civilisation and how it will change.
The
remove of its medieval setting perhaps makes it easier for viewers to
gain a more objective insight into the individual and collective
human psyche. For example, how one little idea, the notion of royal
bloodline succession, can (and has) enabled massively destructive
wars and conflagrations.
Which
is why just installing Bran as ruler at the end is so bad, in
glossing right over this immense shift in thinking that's supposed to
suddenly happen. But then they just removed all religion too – a
set of ideas (a memeplex) historically closely intertwined with
supporting monarchic dictatorships, etc. The ending is empty of any
meaning to interpret or debate, here.
► Climate
change allegory – in the long forewarned coming of winter and white
walkers to kill everyone, that's being totally ignored or ridiculed
by most of Westeros, across the show. Deadly cold perhaps a mirror of
global warming (although played down by GRRM). Maybe there was a
net-positive effect here, helping people entertain the possibility of
such an insidious, unseen calamity.
I
was initially frustrated that the show failed to move up to a more
sci-fi plot line (naive as I was) after a few series. But I think
it's really fitting how the majority of human discourse, in both
fictional and real world cases, is unproductive back and forth arguments and unconnected side-issues.
It
kind of makes me wonder if we'll also see the worst effect of climate
change heroically mitigated by only a fraction half of the world's
nations. E.g. China/Asia boldly forging ahead and the less developed
countries sacrificing ever more, despite being hit the hardest by the
negative effects, while the global West backslides through corporate
and institutional inertia, fulfilling a similar antagonist role to
Cersei's southern kingdoms.
► Female
power – after initial titillation, the show grew us strong female
lead characters. Sansa ended up a cunning queen and Arya the ultimate
saviour of humanity. Although that was eroded by her failure to do
anything at all, purely buffeted around by events after episode 3.
Then
there's super-bitch Cersei, who was reduced to sipping wine and
whimpering in her brothers arms. And Danny who turned into a 2D,
deluded mad tyrant. While Yara didn't real get a looking and we don't
even know if mother sandsnake survived Cersei's tortuous
imprisonment.
Brienne
was finally accepted by the patriarchy and knighted by Sir Jamie, who
then finally managed to jumped her bones before leaving her brokenhearted and crying, though clearly still enamoured with him.
I
don't know if the last season undid any feminist positivity that this "tits
and dragons" show developed, but it felt like a bit of a wash in
conclusion.
► No
one ever really changes – is an arguable conclusion from several of
the character conclusions. A terrible moral philosophy to portray!:
• Falling entirely short of slaying Cersei (as I hoped/expected), Jamie's personal growth did nothing to free him from her, ending up right back in her arms, as always, damn the consequences.
• Jon
goes back to the wall, castigated by society.
• The
hound dies in fire, still hating his brother to death.
• Missandei
dies in chains.
• Daenerys
turned out to be a mad Targaryen after all, just like her father, but
far more damaging, thanks to rallying support by flying a banner of
justice and freedom.
• Of
course there are counter examples, too, Sansa being the most
prominent.
► Politics
– the dark dragon queen ending has the most political significance.
(Incidentally, I liked that the story threw us this sting in the
tail, but they just rushed it too much and dropped the ball entirely
in making it believable.)
Daenerys
basically becomes Hitler. And many my see our slow slide towards
authoritarian right wing leaders, here. But I worry that the events
of the show will work more potently the other way around:
For
seven seasons she was champion of the downtrodden, a progressive (if fiery) force for change. But it turned out her hopeful revolution was
a lie that tricked those with good intentions into empowering her.
I
think that better fits the GOP (and maybe Tory) narrative of the
danger of big government (taking excessive control). That socialist
ideals are doomed to fail like communist Russia, or even that the
Nazis were socialists and these ideas are synonymous with evil.
 |
| Dragon Hitler arises. |
I
think I'll end this overblown piece of writing on that melodramatic note. Until next time, heh.
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