DMC

One could (and many have) make the exact same argument about Bran becoming King. That D&D clearly didn't really care about him, and definitely didn't know what to do with him upon him becoming "the three-eyed raven" suggests the exact same type of argument. Because it's the ending of the books we're discussing. Honestly, I don't see, like, Arianne becoming Queen, or Edric, or, I dunno, Davos, or anyone else. If there will still be a monarch over (most of) Westeros - and I agree that that's still very debatable - I expect it to be a major character. That's just a deep held assumption I have. That isn't really true. Henry VII would be a key character in the last book in a War of the Roses series. Quite strikingly like Aegon VI in ASOIAF at this juncture, for obvious reasons. If you think Aegon VI is gonna end up the monarch, fair enough, but I disagree. But does Edric Storm make more sense than Bran for a council to choose? I'm skeptical. And certainly Bran is a better choice than Robin Arryn. Your options aren't the best beyond Jon. No offense, but I was just emphasizing my skepticism that he would survive. Even he does, no, he's not a better option than Bran. He is a deranged young man, and we've been given no evidence of any type of competency - in fact quite the opposite. So sorry to disrupt your delicate sensibilities. And the actor in question turns 19 in two months.

So your response to my argument is Jon - who I specifically disregarded as the premise - of course he'd be a better candidate than anyone else if available. Than two ancillary characters - which I specifically mentioned I was not dealing with, but let's look at them: Edric Storm - sure, has a pretty damn good claim, noble birth on both sides if by ignoble means, seems like a fine young man. Also barely been in the books thus far, and frankly doesn't promise to play a role in the future. Would seem anti-climactic and out of nowhere. And Robin Arryn? Really. We'll see if Robin survives to the end. I'm glad that actor got to get laid a bunch for the next five years due to showing up in the finale, but that doesn't mean he's not still in dire straits last time we saw him, and borderline sane at best. Then Sansa, which is the one I dealt with in most detail. Aye, she could "unite" two kingdoms via marriage. Would the lords of all the other kingdoms want such an arrangement? I don't see this as a plus. Sansa has yet to reveal herself. Bran is gaining power that no one else in Westeros possesses. We'll see how the last two books turn out.

Another thing I wanna say on this idea that Bran being King is incredibly unlikely, is, uh, who's more likely? If we accept the premise that Dany is dead and Jon is..out of the picture, what other candidates do we have among major characters? There's Sansa, of course. She is a woman, clearly would presumably have dynastic ambitions, has no claim as a Stark, and is negligibly older than Bran (who gives a shit about four years). So the latter two cancel out. As for the first, Martin's entire fake history has been pretty clear Westeros as a whole is very against it (and that's likely to be exacerbated if Dany turns heel). And the second, see my previous post. Only other thing Sansa's got going for her that Bran doesn't vis-a-vis a council is she could accept the new gods on behalf of her mother's side of the family. Obviously, Bran could do this too considering the two have identical heritage. Dude doesn't have to present himself as the "high priest" of the old gods. Who else? Tyrion? The guy who admittedly killed his father (blood or no), then - I think many are in agreement here - will likely betray Dany as well? And, oh yeah, the last time we saw him in KL he told all of their nobles to go fuck themselves? Doesn't seem likely. Only one left in terms of main characters is Arya, and no. So then we get to ancillary characters. I suppose there are many candidates there, but seems anti-climactic, plus there's just so many I don't wanna go over that. Thus, I'd contend Bran is actually the most likely to be chosen monarch by any type of council out of the main characters in such a situation -- regardless of the television finale.

I was not arguing both that Bran will be King and the South and Sansa will be Queen in the North. As I said, ambivalent on the latter. I suppose it's possible, but in such a case I'd expect many other Kingdoms gaining their independence as well, and Bran "rebuilding" the remnants of the others.

Bran rules from the Twins.

I too think a Great Council will almost certainly choose the last monarch of Westeros in the books. I don't know why it's so unrealistic for Bran to be the Council's choice, or at least the logic isn't so bereft as to repeatedly insist there's no possibility of this happening. You cite first and foremost that Bran can't have kids, but to say there's no logic for a group of lords to choose him for precisely this reason is simply a lack of imagination on your part. Power-wise, it makes perfect sense because it allows those lords to retain the power of choosing his successor. Hell, they could officially invest this power, putting in something like "upon King Stark's 30th nameday this Council will reconvene to name a 'Crown Prince' (or some other non-hereditary title) as the official successor so as to begin preparing him for rule." Moreover, Bran indeed will be a rather weak ruler with little allies in the South. In this respect he's more of a placeholder there to just ensure no-one else embarks on dynastic designs. With such an inherently weak king, that decentralizes influence to the lords that named him. It's not "inventing democracy" (which is a silly thing the internet says), but it is creating something reminiscent of the Parliament of England (or the House of Lords), which indeed has at least tried to assert power for (checks notes) a very long time. Plotwise it even makes more sense to not want to raise another dynastic monarch. They just went through three (if you count Dance 2) major wars in ~20 years, each of which basically revolved around succession crises. Show Tyrion finally got something right in pointing this out. That the surviving Lords would be like, you know what, we'll put this guy in and choose again when he dies (or maybe even a timeframe, I dunno), there's certainly a logic to that - at least regarding the Lords' perspective. Will it work, or is this exactly how it will play out? Who knows and probably not (certainly not exactly). But to say there's no logic that could possibly explain this being plausible in ASOIAF is just your own bias. Anyway, regarding the endings, I do (obviously) think Bran will be chosen by a council, Arya will go off into the unknown, Jon will kill Dany, and Sansa will rule the North (ambivalent whether it will be independent). I still think Jon may die, but if not yeah I think he'll def end up beyond the wall - just it'll be self-imposed exile as I don't think the NW will continue to exist. As for Tyrion, eh, I suppose a lion is a cat, so maybe he has nine lives? It just seems outlandish because I do agree he's probably going to betray Dany at least in some way. So for another regime to install him as hand after that? Doesn't really track for me, wouldn't be surprised if he dies. Other than that, I don't really care. I mean, of course Bronn is not going to rule the Reach - have you seem the Tyrell family tree? But that's the type of stuff it's just like, no, don't think D&D cared about getting this close to right.

I dunno, why wouldn't they? There were the leaders of the Riverlands, Vale, Iron Islands, and I assume the one dude was supposed to be the prince of Dorne. All of them were right there, and they were all cool with it. Oh, and Gendry too. So that leaves the Reach - which I suppose is run by Bronn now so he'll do what he wants, obvs - and the Westerlands. They never did establish if Tyrion is Lord of Casterly Rock, did they?

My brother asked this. I think they did make clear that were only a few hundred left, both in the last episode and this one. So in that way, I dunno, new sell-sword company? They're not that threatening at this point.

Glad you're here for the comic relief. I feel like this thread is currently what D&D love producing - chaotic scenes with lots of explosions and sooo many extras.

I dunno if you had better outrage before, but noticed you posted here and figured I'd respond to annoy you. Why wouldn't Grey Worm know what happened to Dany in terms of her death? You think Jon kept it a secret? Nah, of course he confessed instantly. They didn't need to air that, frankly I'm glad they didn't. As for "allowing Jon to live," uh, he commands the other half of the armies in the city. So killing him would probably be a bad idea. Why that meant he had to go the NW, especially after his sisters showed up? Yeah, it's pretty dumb. But Grey Worm isn't gonna summarily execute him, having the sense not to do that isn't a valid criticism. Bronn as Master of Coin, all day every day. In terms of Dany, the way the show did it? Without doubt. Dany is most likely a tragic character. Jon probably is too, but it seems you need to see somebody about the former. She's not going to "win" in the end, it's time to get over that. Returning to Bronn, why the fuck not? That's a loanshark I don't wanna fuck with. There's a lot of ways to run agencies - the head definitely (and in the US case almost always) does not need to be an expert.

I came into the episode wanting to hate it. I guess that shows how important the expectations game is. I thought it was fine for what it was. They did the big moments pretty well. And I know I'll get a lot of resistance for this from book readers, but I suspect most of the endings are accurate. Jon killing Dany, specifically. But also Arya heading into the unkown, Bran being a council choice, Sansa as Queen of the North (and probably Vale). Only one I'm suspect about is Jon. Seems as if they're mimicking Bloodraven - the guy the new king had to exile for political reasons. But, that doesn't make much sense to me. Jon going back to the watch isn't a punishment, it's basically a reward for him. Whereas with Bloodraven that wasn't the case. Just so cheap. Plus - why the hell is there still a watch? Anyway I think in the books Jon probably dies too.

The phone app particularly annoyed me today. I am always unsuccessful clicking on the notification icons with the phone. For the "someone quoted/mentioned you" one, whatever, don't care, I almost always can figure out where they're coming from anyway. But for the PM (private message) one, it did bother me today. It is the only way I knew how to access that on the phone, and I kept on clicking on it thinking it would work...and it didn't. You kept me from responding to Jace's very minimal (two letter) response for a couple hours! You cruel bastards!

Arya's end if foreshadowed in the books as something to do with the Others/winter/cold. I'm not sure she'll actually survive whatever she actually does in the book version of this shit, but I'm not gonna deny I'm happy she's still alive.

Dunno if anyone's said this, but next ep they should name Arya Protector of the Realm. Don't think it has a chance of happening in the books, but it's all fan service now, right? Honestly, surprised how many apparently survived. Guess they're holding off for something.

Yeah I gotcha, just being a smartass.

He is? I honestly wouldn't know, but I have a hard time believing that regarding in-ring work. I mean, it's not like he was ever that great out there.

Goldust just turned 50. I don't think him fighting his baby brother again is what WWE is missing.

Sounds like Bryan may be done (again). Hard not to assume he has another head injury now that they're canceling dates for him. Oh well, at least he got a pretty good swan song - don't go to AEW and risk it man!

I don't think you can really say Sanity ever started on the main roster. Which is a shame. That raises something I actually was thinking in the shower a couple hours ago - whatever happened to mid-card stables? They weren't just an attitude era thing, that shit was around for the first twenty years of Vince's takeover. Considering all the talent they have, this should be a no-brainer. Put some tag teams together with some mid-carders and let them feud. One of the most entertaining angles I've ever enjoyed was DX vs. NOD.

I'm just glad AJ Styles is clearly not injured. And I think moving him to Raw is a good move. Wonder who will go to Smackdown tonight. Zayn is the easy pick. I also think Lashley could use a change of scenery. So could Balor, but I don't think they're gonna take that much top-end talent from Raw. My sleeper pick is Roode. He could have a solid mid-card run on Smackdown.

They shoulda made nap rooms available to all the kids that were attending an event that lasted until 12:25 AM.

Their entirely different shows, targeting entirely different markets. I'm not excusing the shittyness of the main shows - and I still don't get why WM has to be, like, 7 hours long - but it's silly to judge them on the same standard. Anyway, yeah, happy for Kofi!

Loved Cesaro spinning Ricochet for, like, 2 hours.

So..that's gotta be confirmation Lesner is fighting what's his face for UFC.

Agree with most of these, at least that I care about and haven't already happened. I think they might take the belts off of Banks and Bailey, seems time for them to feud. No opinion on either Tag title match(es). And I think Angle will win. Vince can't be that big of a dick.