SeanF

Orso is who I had in mind! Yes, there was this strange shifting of the ethical goalposts, in Season 7, to condemn Dany. And the Tarlys were a revolting family! The show was grimdark, but maybe D & D didn’t realise it. WRT Jon’s claim, everyone had a selfish motive to promote it. Sam wanted revenge for his lovely father and brother. Bran wanted power. Varys wanted a malleable ruler. And Sansa wanted a Northern crown, or failing that, to be heir apparent. At the end, no one even bothered to mention Jon’s claim. I’d have more respected an ending, where the winners are toasting their success, and laughing about what a fool Jon was.

@Joe Abercrombiewould have been the man to finish it. His tales are bleak and cynical, but laced with enough black humour to make it bearable. Admittedly, he’d have finished it with Bran, Sansa, and Tyrion privately giving the nod to Grey Worm to execute Jon (while publicly proclaiming the opposite) in order to ensure that the “true king” could never challenge their rule. I do think that throughout Season 8, Jon’s claim was used as a pretext to strike at Daenerys, rather than something that anyone wanted for Jon.

The show ultimately became crapulent fanfiction. No, opinions have not softened, over four years. They’ve become harsher. There is a lot of fanfic that is better than what D & D produced. Booing members of the cast is never right. They had to deliver this clusterfuck. Booing the show runners is entirely right.

It confirms my belief that the Seven Kingdoms would remain a shithole. A surveillance state ruled by a non-human, sounds like a totalitarian nightmare. Lucky Gilly. Now she’ll be known as the Grand Maester’s whore, and her children as bastards. Sam was a classic incel, who staked his claim to Gilly by forcing that bloody thimble on her. Tyrion was a moron, after Season 4. The smartest guy on the show? My arse. Sophie’s necklace is the sort of thing that gets advertised on Fetlife. Arya enjoyed torture. Had she been with the Northern army she’d have joined on the killing. Kit has confirmed Jon’s ending was not happy. Nothing in the show suggests that Jon wanted to live in the Wilderness, a place that could only have bad memories for him.

Grey Worm ought to have held out for Tyrion’s execution. No faction would have stuck up for the little shit.

Aegon will have enemies, I think. I'm sure the people of Kings Landing and its surrounds, and the Dornish, will love him. But, the families of those who have lost out (and there will be many of those, falling victim to Jon Connington and the Sand Snakes), they will think very differently. That's where I expect Dany would get local support.

Jorah is such a horrid old pervert in the books, and so plainly desperate to get into Dany's knickers, that it would almost certainly be jealousy.

I don't see why "Mad Queen Daenerys" would be needed to produce a huge conflict in Jon, if Daenerys and his siblings were at odds politically. People can come into political conflict (over say, Northern independence) without either party being "mad."

As to the "why" Kings Landing was sacked and burned, I think there are reasons that would apply to the soldiers in general, and to Daenerys in particular. 1. These people have all been fighting for years. The Northern and Vale soldiers have no liking for Daenerys, nor any commitment to her cause. But, they, like she and her soldiers, do have an intense hatred for the Lannisters. The Lannisters kicked off years of warfare that likely resulted in millions of deaths (once you take into account widespread famine, caused by war). They're the faction in charge of Kings Landing. And, this is the final battle. 2. The Northmen have the death of Ned Stark and his retainers, the ill-treatment of Sansa, and the Red Wedding to avenge. Extras who played as Northern soldiers have confirmed that this was at the forefront of their minds. 3. Both armies also had the experience of fighting the Dead. We should assume that this was terrifying for them. No one knows of combat stress, in this world, but we should assume that many soldiers have been heavily traumatised. And, the defenders of the city betrayed them, breaking their promise to aid them. 4. The Northmen have marched a thousand miles. They likely need the spoils that the city can provide in order to for them to purchase essentials. 5. Cersei has rejected an offer of quarter. Then, she executed Missandei on the battlements. Any soldier in this world would take that to mean that there would be no further negotiation, no surrender sought nor taken, and that this was a fight to the death. And if the city is taken by storm, it will be sacked, and the defenders put to the sword. 6. Daenerys herself has suffered one loss after another. She's been fighting for years, like the soldiers. She's seen her best friend killed in front of her eyes by a faithless enemy, and she knows that many of her ostensible allies and supporters are working to undermine her. She's just survived an attempt by Varys to murder her, and can probably expect further attempts in the future. So, neither she, nor the vast majority of the soldiers, would be in many mood for mercy, whatsoever. There is, interestingly enough, a deleted scene in which Jon makes clear to Tyrion that he's expecting a massacre. Presumably, this was deleted as it would make Jon complicit, but in all honesty, would Jon truly be unaware of the mood in his army?

Which may be why we’re probably never getting the ending. Martin may say he’ll write the ending he wants, but few authors want an ending that their readers receive like a cup of cold sick. Or as you’ve said before, what might have seemed daring in 1993, (heroic young woman goes mad and gets put down like Old Yeller by her boyfriend) looks less great in the current cultural climate. my own view is that if Jon kills Dany, it will (as in the show) be Tyrion who persuades him, but for base motives (most likely sexual jealousy).

As to MQD, we have three leaders in the book, who are framed as sympathetic, even righteous, who wage war and kill enemies to attain their ends, Robb, Stannis and Jon. Robb’s men pillage the West, rape, and hang young women. Stannis burns the Kingswood, and comes close to sacking Kings Landing. He uses black magic to kill enemies, and burns traitors. Jon steals Gilly’s baby, tortures Karstark and his men, wages war by proxy against the Boltons, takes children hostage. Is the overall message of the tale to be that killing, when done by a man, is simply a soldier’s duty? When done by a woman, however, it’s proof of madness?

The problem I have with this is that this series was set in a medieval world at war. Nothing that Daenerys did - up to and including the sack of Kings Landing, would have been considered unusual on the part of a medieval or early modern commander. Indeed, guys like Zhukov, Curtis Le May, and Sir Arthur Harris were not much different in WWII. Cersei refused an offer of quarter and executed Missandei at a parley. The Northmen had marched a thousand miles to exact vengeance on the Lannisters. There is no way that the city would not have been put to the sack in that situation. And don’t get me started on “I’ve never known bells to mean surrender”, or Tyrion advocating starving the inhabitants to death in order to save them. The problem with “the moral choice” in the show is that it was always so utterly stupid. Jorah’s advice not to kill the Wise Masters of Yunkai, after they resumbed slave trading, in Season 4, led to their assembling a coalition to attack Meereen. Tyrion’s stupid advice, in Season 7, led to her losing thousands of soldiers, when she could have ended the war in an afternoon by flattening the Red Keep, at a much lower cost in casualties. There’s nothing moral about getting your own followers killed, in order to spare the enemy. And in the books, the roles are reversed. It’s Jorah, Daario and (in all likelihood) Tyrion who are always saying “be more ruthless”, which she baulks from. As for the Tarlys, really? They were offered a full pardon for sacking Highgarden and they rejected it. Again, what medieval ruler would do anything other than execute them (most wouldn’t even offer them a pardon). And it’s two episodes after Arya poisoned an entire House, purely for revenge, previously having fed a man his own sons. We were expected to cheer her on. Daenerys’ treatment of the Tarlys was entirely normative. Tyrion’s biggest mistake was being a fucking incompetent gnome, over the course of two seasons. And treacherous too. His determination to save his siblings was quite in conflict with his position.

The Long Night was a miserable nightmarish failure. So much effort for so poor a return.

LF’s “trial” was a farce. The prosecutor and judge were one and the same, and the verdict was predetermined. And Sansa was party to one of the crimes he was charged with. Varys went from cunning spymaster to a moron, talking treason at the top of his voice. Dany had done nothing to merit his disloyalty, other than mourn for dead friends and soldiers at the banquet, and being born a woman. I can understand Conleth being pissed. As to Jon, that ties with my last comment. Jon was made into a moral coward in Season 8, a man any woman should steer well clear of, because he’ll let her down. Kit had every right to be upset. I don’t know if Jon’s decharacterisation was due to malice or incompetence, on the part of the two D’s.

WRT chemistry, had we not been told that Jon loved Daenerys, I would never have thought he did, based upon what we were shown. He was portrayed as the boyfriend from hell, which may well have contributed towards his depression.

She'd have had the Westlands, and her sellswords. And here's a point. We could have had a scene where Qyburn's agents were spreading the word that the explosion at the Great Sept was the work of Dany's agents. Perhaps we could have had a scene where scapegoats were being executed, in front of a furious crowd, having been framed as spies. That way, it would make sense for the people in the capital to rally to Cersei. Instead, it's such common knowledge that Cersei blew up the Great Sept that even Hot Pie knew about it.

Season 7 was the dumbest. What bothered me about the Jon/Dany meeting is that it was so stupid. You have two monarchs advised by two experienced statesmen, neither of whom have any negotiating position. For Dany it was just "bend the knee." For Jon it was "come and fight for us, and recognise our independence," No modern general would hesitate to have just flattened the Red Keep, had they possessed bombers or drones. Modern generals aren't squeamish about civilian casualties, so how much less squeamish would medieval generals be? The stupid arguments against Dany doing so, and the stupid strategies which Tyrion devised, were among the worst aspects of this season, which leads to .... The wight hunt. Leave aside such stupidity as Gendry's 100 mile sprint through the snow, and Dany's flying up there at the speed of concorde. Why was there this endless belief in Cersei's essential trustworthiness? Cersei had repeatedly proved herself faithless, yet for some reason, this faithlessness had no adverse consequences for her. Worse, if the Night King had no way of getting through the Wall, without a dragon, then what was the bloody point of the whole thing? Why was Jon concerned to get Dany to march North at all, to deal with a threat that was safely confined to the other side of the Wall. WRT the ethics of warfare, nobody in power has any qualms, in our world, about killing enemies with fire, delivered from the air. Just take a look at photographs of the Highway of Death, out of Kuwait City. Let alone, photographs of Hamburg, Cologne, Tokyo etc. from WWII. Had Henry Tudor possessed a dragon at Bosworth, would he have hesitated to use it? It was far too late in the day in this show, for anyone to worry about the ethics of killing their enemies in war. This was a show which had revelled in, and glorified, cruelty, up to this point. Tyrion's loving Daenerys, may be a nod to something in the books, although I expect it would turn to murderous hate, if it were unrequited. If Jon killing Daenerys is a thing, I suspect it's because of poison dripped in his ear by Tyrion.

GOT could have been done in Seven seasons, had the pacing been better. @Ranhas commented on the fact that, after cutting out big chunks of AFFA and ADWD, they then had to pad them out again. I'll comment in more detail later, but IMHO, Season 7 was almost as bad as Season 8.

The fact that quite a toll, emotionally, was taken on the actors is the one thing that worries me about the criticism of Season Shit. OTOH, it's clear that some of them absolutely loathed the script for Season Shit, so it makes it worse that D & D should have subjected them to this. I doubt if many people thought that Jon was dead for good, so what was the point? One of their practical jokes? WRT Michelle Clapton's costumes, they're basically knocks-offs of the cenobites in Hellraiser. WRT Braavos, it was simply ridiculous to give Arya superpowers, such as the ability to survive a stab wound to the stomach, and falling into a germ-ridden canal, with just a night's sleep. Stomach wounds are always the deadliest, even with modern surgery, and almost no one survived them in medieval times. As to poisoning an entire House, at the start of Season 7, how did she manage that? Were the Freys so evil that they kept buckets marked "Acme Poison" about the place, for her to pick up?

Sophie Turner gave that explanation at Comic-Con in 2016. OGE’s point was that withholding vital information from one’s commander is considered a very serious offence in armies. At no point was Jon ever told of the possibility that the Vale Knights might join them.

As a fight, the B O T B was fine. What was stupid was Jon throwing away his plan, and going for a wild charge against people who massively outnumbered them. Jon, who by then was a seasoned commander, was made into a fool. Worse was Sansa not even mentioning the Vale Knights. At the time, @old gimlet eye, an ex-soldier, said most commanders, in such a setting, would have hanged Sansa for her behaviour. Yes, they wanted a shock, but it makes Sansa look treacherous, and Sophie Turner said she did it because she wanted the credit for victory. And Sansa’s integrity could easily have been preserved, and plenty of dramatic tension generated, by having her tell Jon, and then riding through the night to alert the Vale knights. It would have been like Waterloo, with Jon’s/Wellington’s forces grimly holding on, while waiting for the knights/Prussians to arrive.

At a personal level (I write from my wife’s experience) Diane Abbott can be a very kind and supportive person, but I do wonder if there’s something wrong with her. *No* serious politician would write such a letter. It’s career-ending. Peter Peston hinted that she is unwell.

I think Martin envisaged Tyrion as the Harry Flashman of the story, an entertaining rogue. But, there’s a real malice to him, that is more like Richard III or Iago. But, he may end up as you suggest.

WRT Sansa, I just can’t find any plausible reason for her to marry the son of the man who murdered her mother and brother. IIRC, that’s the point at which @Ranbailed out. I’m As to a “dark turn”, in TWOW, I can really only think of two possibilities, (a) she plays an active part in SR’s demise (b) she is at least nominally in charge of an army that sacks The Twins, and slaughters them to the last woman and child.. Killing LF would not be a dark turn. At least in the show, Sansa became a worse person, following her experiences at Winterfell. So, yes, some of her fans would not have been mollified by her future arc I agree, it’s unrealistic to expect Roose to tolerate Ramsay’s treatment of “Arya”. Ramsay is stupid, but Roose, while just as evil, is highly intelligent. There might be no concept of marital rape in medieval societies, but forcing a highborn woman into sex with dogs and torturing her would have been considered utterly deviant.

I did think Jonathan Pryce acted his part wonderfully well. But, D & D missed the point of what motivated the sparrows. They aren’t motivated by hatred of homosexuals or other religions. They are protesting noble misgovernment. Cersei’s penance walk resembles the treatment meted out to women who slept with German soldiers, in the immediate aftermath of WWII. Men were frequently stripped naked, as a means of shaming them, prior to their execution, in medieval societies. But, it was rarely done to women, let alone highborn women. Dorne? Well, the less said the better.