Rant & Rave without Repercussion: Burn It All Edition

[hewman]

2 hours ago, Rockroi said:

fans like you have to go to the altar of D&D

Well, I’ve been to the altar and came back none the wiser. Dan says “I think” a lot - as if he didn’t write the damn text - and David decreed that showing a scene from a character’ pov is telling the story better. Really? Ya think? After ASoIAF’s 5 volumes of pov chapters. I’m relieved he agrees with George. 

[UKS]

I like that my decade old prediction that Dany is the final villain is true.

I dislike how they did it. It was almost Star Wars prequels in it's arbitrariness. 

Dany's turn to the Dark side is a brilliant ten episode season. The slow dip into darkness, the stripping away of allies. The realisation that the "kewl" stuff from earlier seasons (Dracarys) was actually a symptom of something far darker.

Alas, no. 

Frankly, Walkers could have been a season.

Then "Scouring of the shire" the last. 

 

 

[LokisRaider]

I honestly thought it was the better episode of the season, a low bar I know, mostly because some rational sense was applied to it. For example the Dragon actually being effective in any way shape or form. I think I mostly have nitpicks with a couple of blatantly egregious issues.

- Varys master of whisperers and smartest player of the game this show has ever seen. In the matter of two scenes was found out, because he A.) told the hand of the Queen he was going to commit treason and B.) told the Queens lover/nephew that he was going to commit treason and put him on the throne. I expected a little more form the spider then just straight up telling everyone closest to Dany he was going to commit treason against her. Might as well have told Grey Worm while he was at it.

- Tyrion why doe she think Cersei is capable of being rational? Nothing in show shows her capable of this, which solidifies that I don't really complain about the acting I complain about the lack of story. Things just happen and we are told characters are acting a certain way, but nothing in the last 3-4 seasons show us why they act this way.

- so ballistas are not effective against dragons? Last episode they were super effective, this episode they might as well have not even been there. Can they keep this stuff consistent from week to week? That's rhetorical because we know they can't. 

- Dany going mad has been foreshadowed and hinted at I get that. This season made that foreshadowing as subtle as a brick to the face but it was there... I guess. Her going mad when the city has surrendered is one of those things that I can't help but think "If this was a POV book chapter, and we had several others before this, explaining this mental collapse it might make sense" Think of the Cesei chapters in Feast, some of my favorites watching her spiral towards insanity. I think I get what they were going for (didn't really like it though), but if there isn't an incredibly good explanation next week this will be the worst.

       - Side rant, honestly with Dany this season and how Sansa Mean Girl'd her into insanity I don't really care. My real gripe was that Sansa wasn't in            the path of Drogon at all this episode. The forced animosity with Sansa hating her continually for no reason was so unbearable to watch. This              seasons treatment of Dan actually made me root for the Mad Queen to happen and burn it all down.

- Euron should have just died by dragon fire. Personally he was my least favorite adaptation in the entire series and I was glad to see him go. The fight was whatever, it was going to happen, but it was another one of those "D&D don't really know what to do with Euron" type moments for me. Oh good thing you killed Jamie, oh no it was the Red Keep falling down on him so pointless Euron.

- Jamie and Cersei, again in the context of this episode only I liked it. In the context of him taking until Season 8 Episode 3 to finally redeem himself  then throw it all away in 4 and 5 just kind of falls flat for me. So, I can see these two ending the same in the books, but the journey to get there will be different. I know D&D love Lena, and she's great, but were they trying to get me to sympathize with her? The only thing I felt was she got off easy.

       - Anyone else thinking that Brienne is pregnant with Jamie's kid and a new Lannister is on the way?

- Cleagane Bowl is the only thing I really wanted to see happen this season. Glad it did and glad it was only the Hound and the Mountain involved (no Arya helping theories came true thank the Seven). The Hound's "That's who you've always been line" I thought was the best of the episode.

- Arya, so all it takes are bumps on the head for her to regain her humanity? Glad she didn't get to kill anyone important this episode, I've been over the unstoppable Arya thing for awhile now. But how many times did we see her get knocked over or hit with debris then cut scene and then we see her waking up again? Hope they don't send her to kill Dany for revenge on the innocents at Kings Landing, seeing how the Hound convinced her that vengeance isn't the way. So the  jury is still out on her depending on what happens next week, but we do know they cannot keep things consistent between episodes. 

- Jon do you do anything useful anymore?

[joaozinm]

4 minutes ago, UKS said:

I like that my decade old prediction that Dany is the final villain is true.

I dislike how they did it. It was almost Star Wars prequels in it's arbitrariness. 

Dany's turn to the Dark side is a brilliant ten episode season. The slow dip into darkness, the stripping away of allies. The realisation that the "kewl" stuff from earlier seasons (Dracarys) was actually a symptom of something far darker.

Alas, no. 

Frankly, Walkers could have been a season.

Then "Scouring of the shire" the last. 

 

 

I think Anakin turning to dark side has a lot more build up than this.

[Tijgy]

8 minutes ago, LokisRaider said:

- Dany going mad has been foreshadowed and hinted at I get that. This season made that foreshadowing as subtle as a brick to the face but it was there... I guess. Her going mad when the city has surrendered is one of those things that I can't help but think "If this was a POV book chapter, and we had several others before this, explaining this mental collapse it might make sense" Think of the Cesei chapters in Feast, some of my favorites watching her spiral towards insanity. I think I get what they were going for (didn't really like it though), but if there isn't an incredibly good explanation next week this will be the worst.

I spent so many times ranting about the fact all Dany's awful actions have been glorified I cannot actually say D&D did a complete 180° turn. Everyone always forget how Dany treated poor Hizzy  

Nevertheless if so many people think it is undeserved they actually did fail in making her way to 'darkness' clear.

[Anarchosaurus Rex]

"GoT" no longer has any characters - not in any meaningful sense. None of the characters have consistent personalities or motivations, let alone any development. They're just a bunch of puppets that the writers get to do whatever they need them to do in order to move through their checklist. (Except it makes even less sense, because some of the items that seem to be on their checklist can't be from GRRM.)

It's bizarre to me how little the Ding-Dongs either don't understand or don't care about these characters. It's got to be some combination of both, but why? How can you be in charge of a story like this and be so careless and thoughtless?

There's just too much to criticize at this point. It's an avalanche of failure that just gets bigger as it rolls downhill. After enduring so much abuse from the show and its fans for so many years, I'm delighted that "GoT" is ending on such a sour note. Hopefully this taints its memory as a whole and we'll be spared some of the nauseating encomiums to this "masterpiece" to which we'd otherwise be subjected forever and ever.

It has nothing to do with the show overtaking the books, either. That's a common misconception among fans. These problems were evident from the very beginning, though they became undeniable by S05 and S06. "GoT" was a bad-faith and low-effort adaptation of "ASoIaF" long before they ran out of source material.

[Consigliere]

21 minutes ago, Rhodan said:

Curious what he will be doing there now....

Lumberjack. The Dexter-isation of GoT will be complete. 

[Corvinus85]

Btw, where's the new lord of Storm's End? As Dany's newest, most "loyal" bannerman, he should have been at this critical battle, no? Was he moping after Arya? Did he actually go to Storm's End to press his claim, and is gathering his troops? Surely, with all the jetpacks available, his forces would have made it in time.

[Anarchosaurus Rex]

2 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

Btw, where's the new lord of Storm's End? As Dany's newest, most "loyal" bannerman, he should have been at this critical battle, no? Was he moping after Arya? Did he actually go to Storm's End to press his claim, and is gathering his troops? Surely, with all the jetpacks available, his forces would have made it in time.

Gendry and Dany both kinda forgot...

[divica]

14 minutes ago, Tijgy said:

I spent so many times ranting about the fact all Dany's awful actions have been glorified I cannot actually say D&D did a complete 180° turn. Everyone always forget how Dany treated poor Hizzy  

Nevertheless if so many people think it is undeserved they actually did fail in making her way to 'darkness' clear.

Cruel isn t the same as mad. Killing everybody in KL when they surrender is madder than aerys... 

[Ice Queen]

9 hours ago, -Winterfellian- said:

Is it me or when Frankengregor lost the mask for a moment he look like purple Varys?

For one crazy moment I even thought hey how did Qyburn got a hold of Varys' body? 

Is lucky the Dothraki in the series do not seem to wear bells in their heads or they may accidentally turn Dany's crazy mode on. 

I thought he looked like Anakin Skywalker in The Last Jedi. Even his helmet looked like Darth Vader's. 

[Kimbono]

7 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

Btw, where's the new lord of Storm's End? As Dany's newest, most "loyal" bannerman, he should have been at this critical battle, no? Was he moping after Arya? Did he actually go to Storm's End to press his claim, and is gathering his troops? Surely, with all the jetpacks available, his forces would have made it in time.

Thanks, i kinda hoped Gendry crafting atleast some "light armor" for Drogon to give a payoff for the Lordship and maybe adding a scene where an arrow gets blocked from said armor, giving atleast some reason why the Scorpions were completly useless in comparison to last episode.

Also why didnt Arya once told them in the war meeting that she will kill Cersei, you know,... maybe that would have helped. Just fly her down near Kingslanding with the Dragon and give her 1-2 Weeks while the rest marches from Winterfell, either she is succesfull or you go killing everyone anyway. But whatever. Also the fact that we don't see Aryas faceswitching ability anymore feels unreasonable.

[Beardy the Wildling]

5 hours ago, House Cambodia said:

Well, they start prophecy tropes and forget to finish them. Maybe this is one where we get the end of one they forgot they never introduced.

bUt SuBvErTeD eXpEcTaTiOnS.

[Madarjeen]

Series morghulis.

 

(Not much more to say, I actually somehow enjoy GOT's endgame.)

[Mindwalker]

53 minutes ago, Greywolf2375 said:

<screen starts out black and slowly lights up as the camera pans above a bed to see two people sleeping with candles on their bed tables>

<Ned Stark sits straight up in bed and shakes Catelyn>

"Cat!  I just had the worst dream!  There is something I have to tell you...."

<screen goes black>

Alternately, cold open to Danaerys opening her eyes while under whatever passes for a shower in Westeros.. .a waterfall?

[tallTale]

1 minute ago, Mindwalker said:

Alternately, cold open to Danaerys opening her eyes while under whatever passes for a shower in Westeros.. .a waterfall?

 

or Bran goes back in time and kills baby Daeny.

[Ice Queen]

6 hours ago, For Highgarden said:

I believed the Mad Queen Dany theory from Day 1. It was almost too obvious that it was gonna happen if you read and rewatch looking for the signs. No one believed me which is awesome because a lot of people owe me money tomorrow. All Season it was obvious that she has been mad. The bells didn't make her go mad. Jorah dying didn't make her go mad. Missendei dying did not make her go mad. Being born a Targaryen made her mad. She always cared about power more than the people. The only time she acted like she cared about the people was when they were worshipping her and doing exactly as she said and helping her get more power. I love that everyone sees it now and I can't wait for the hundreds of articles that will come out in the next few days that will point out all of the hints and foreshadowing for her to go crazy. More people would have realized that she was completely bonkers a lot sooner if she hadn't had such an amazing advisors in Tyrion and Varys. I knew she was going to be the final big bad. I didn't know we were going to kill the army of the dead so easily and then have her kill way more people than the army of the Dead. I wonder how many people following her regret that decision. I knew she didn't care about those people at all when she called it Jon's War.  if those are your people and you were the ruler of the Seven Kingdoms it is your War.

Speaking of Jon however. When he was looking around at the damage and destruction I screamed at the screen this is your fault too. I think Varys stopped whispering on purpose. He knew Danny would kill him and thought Jon watching him die would make him realize that she's not a good ruler. Jon clearly knew something was up with Dany. I honestly think (hope)  that the secret he asked Sansa and Arya to keep wasn't about him being a secret Targ (Bran told them that) I think he told them that he agreed with them and they needed to keep an eye on Dany to protect Sansa so he needed to keep pretending like he was super loyal until they came up with a plan. I'm more mad at Jon for not stopping her when she was clearly crazy than almost anything that happened in this episode. I still don't understand why most people didn't see her crazy coming a mile away. I get it I didn't want to believe it at first but just because somebody hatches dragons and is kind of magical doesn't mean they'll make a good ruler. She was a great conqueror but that does not make a good ruler and history has shown that.

What comes in a close second is the death of Cersei and Jamies redemption arc not being about redemption. Sometimes crappy people do good things but they're still crappy people and I think that's the point of his arc. I'm just mad at myself for rooting for a guy that pushed a kid out of window.

Seriously someone couldn't have stopped her beforehand. The soldiers could have been like woah this has gone too far and started helping children out of the city. I guess this is why they killed rhaegal because another Dance of the Dragons would have been way too cool and we already got a dragon fight this season. Seriously where are the hidden dragons?  I mean I guess Arya was at least trying to help people get out of the city for all the good it did.

 I did agree with the Arya running around the city part.  I thought she was going to die and Jon was going to find her. I get that having a character we all know makes the scene matter just a little bit more. I don't know what was up with the musical score though.

Her vision in the House of the Undying in Season 2 foreshadowed all of this. The Iron Throne is covered in what everyone, including me, thought to be snow. But it wasn't snow. It was ash. There is also Bran's vision of the dragon flying over KL.

Her arc didn't come suddenly. She's been batshit since Episode 1 and Book 1, but it took owning 3 Patriot missiles in her dragons for her ambitions to blossom. Without her dragons, who is she? NO ONE. She is a narcissist and probably schizophrenic as well. Add to that the fact that she was brought up to believe that Westeros is her birthright and she has a divine right to rule regardless of how the people of Westeros feel about it...it's a recipe for disaster. Nature combined with nurture, and this was the result.

It's easy to be benevolent (or at least less brutal) as she was in Mereen when people worship you as a god. As she found out the second she set foot in Westeros, it's not so easy to win people's hearts and loyalty, especially when you don't listen to your advisers and you show no inclination to get to know the country you want to rule. Her answer to everything was "burn them". Varys warned her just last week to not become that which she's struggled against her whole life. It was always there, but show watchers are suckers for pretty faces and pretty words. 

 

[Beardy the Wildling]

23 hours ago, Mindwalker said:

D&D sure knew why they were going to hide for a week. I'm just waiting for their return, when they will tell interviewers that fans are just so unreasonable, and probably envious of D&D's genius and success and stuff.

I really fucking hate D&D's fan-blaming.

Fans: Stannis burning his daughter is out of character, and hammering in how much he loves her just to yank it away is hacky writing.
D&D: Stannis was an ambitious prick and you're just mad that your expectations weren't met. Shireen gets burnt in the books anyway, GRRM told us, so who cares about context and characterisation? NYEEEEEEEH!

Fans: Arya acted like an idiot in Braavos and shouldn't have survived her stabbing.
D&D: Do you morons even want a cool badass chase scene with your favourite paedo-killer? Creatively it made sense to us, because we wanted it to happen.

Fans: The septsplosion was an obvious ploy to remove scheming from the show because you obviously don't know how to write intrigue.
David Benioff: And you start to wonder... what the hell is this... plot. (original quote used for authenticity)

Fans: The Wight Hunt was moronic, implausible, and a blatant excuse to lose a dragon and have a wight polar bear.
D&D: GOD DAMN IT, WE JUST WANTED OUR WIGHT POLAR BEAR-- uh, we mean, uh, there are plausible implausibilities and implausible implausibilities, and ours are plausible. It's your fault for not suspending your disbelief.

Fans: The Long Night is dark and disappointing.
D&D: Well it's your fault for not having an expensive TV and not setting up your home to be a full-on cinema! Also, fuck you, we, heh, knew Arya would kill the Night King for three years, couldn't you tell by her amazing assassin skills?

Fans: You took two years to do Season 8 and it's the most rushed piece of trash season yet.
D&D: It's you idiots' fault for not managing your expectations! Stop getting mad when we subvert your expectations of basic logic and competent storytelling! We only get to wipe our asses with fifty dollar bills. Our hero, Harvey Weinstein, wiped his ass with hundred dollar bills, can't you let a man dream?

[Masha's apron]

I've just finished watching the episode. 

I'm actually disgusted. The episode is repulsive. 

It's pretty clear that they've used certain imagery for the shock factor. At one point, it seemed as thought they were trying to reproduce images from the fire bombing of Dresden, then 9/11, then Schindler's List and, in the context, just for the "shock and awe" of entertainment, it is pretty disgraceful. 

As for the story and the characters, well, nothing makes any sense. Dany has just incinerated a city for no reason apart from "feelz". No conqueror completely destroys a capital city in this way if they actually want to govern a country and its people because you destroy all the mechanisms of commerce and government if you do so. You only destroy a city like this if you want to wipe a people off the face of the earth. That, alongside the overtones of the Dothraki annihilation, leaves a very nasty taste in my mouth. 

They have completely destroyed GRRM's work. 

[kissdbyfire]

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