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The Bard of Banefort
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20 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

I was originally going to post the next two chapters together, but it's easier to just do them separately. Here's Chapter 25:

  • D&D originally wanted to adapt the end of GOT in movie format, but this was shut down by HBO, who said their subscribers would feel ripped off.
  • Hibberd points out that D&D always planned on seven seasons, and I have to agree. For all the talks that they just wanted to move on to other things, I remember reading this back before they even surpassed the books.
  • HBO desperately wanted GOT to go on longer, but D&D refused, and the network wasn't willing to risk bringing in new showrunners. D&D had several reasons for wanting to end the show where they did: cast members were getting scooped up by other studios and wanted to move on to other roles (it's ironic that most of the S8 cast hasn't hit it big, but none of them could have known that at the time); some of the cast had health problems and injuries they were nursing, such as Emilia's brain aneurysms (Hibberd doesn't mention any of the casts' mental health/substance abuse issues, but I have to wonder if that was a concern as well); an obsession with Breaking Bad and trying to emulate it; and a fear that they would damage the show's reputation if it went on for too long. 
  • One reason why HBO agreed to eight seasons was because of their reputation for allowing creators to maintain a certain level of independence. I wonder if that's starting to change now; not just because of GOT, but also Sam Levinson's alleged lunacy, and all the GOT spin-offs. Like it or not, by launching a GOT Cinematic Universe, HBO is now less like Showtime and more like Disney+.

The movie format should be obvious to anyone that it is a bad idea. Got episodes lasted an hour. You can't add 30 mins to a normal ep and call it a movie. At most they could do something to the last kingdom where a 2 to 3 hours movie would replace the last ep.

Given that the Ds were adapting 1 book per season it is normal for them to plan 7 seasons. That doesn't really mean anything. Even saying that actors were scooped is kind of stupid. Given the filming time and number of eps of each season I doubt that filming GoT took a lot of time for the actors. They could clearly film GoT and another project. And I would risk that several actors had important roles is movies while shooting GoT.

And I think that when HBO stops giving independence to the creators it will lose some of its spark. You can't create controversial things if there is a guy from the network breathing down your neck making sure your series follow some kind of guidelines. The problem with the Ds is that they are charlatans. They were able to gain power, trust and influence with the earlier seasons so they had a lot of credibility to do whatever they wanted towards the latter seasons despite not having the talent to write or direct a show as big as Got. I bet there must be a lot of stories how HBO aproved the script for season 8. Any person related to the industry had to know there were a lot of red flags there.

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17 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

You're right, Mr. Benioff. Jon and Dany had no chemistry. At any point.

lots of people disagree.

17 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

Liam Cunningham refused to hit on Missandei. He said it would make Davos look like a perv creeping on a much younger woman.

creepy that anyone would want davos hitting on missandei, 

18 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

Jacob Anderson confirms that Grey Worm still has the pillar, just not the stones

how the hell is he suposed to know this? and isn't the gelding process for the unsullied discribed in the books?

19 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

After having his scenes in S6 cut back, Pilou wanted to reconceptualize Euron. It was his idea to turn him into a rock star pirate.

LOL. I don't even know what to say.

20 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

They weren't sure how the Wall was going to come down, and decided on a dragon since they didn't want to introduce "new deus ex machina pieces." I'm not sure what that means for the books, but it might indicate that the Horn of Joramun is legit.

I think this shows how disconected they were from grrm until season 8. If they were suposed to use the horn they just had to have the NK take it and have tormund on top of the wall say something like this:

"the fucker. He had it all along. RRUUUUUNNN" 

And then have some ask him what was that horn and have him explain...

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57 minutes ago, SeanF said:

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?

 

That’s why I think the Snow show is some kind of therapy for Kit. It sounds like he’s an emotional guy who didn’t get the closure he needed after ten years of work on GOT.

55 minutes ago, SeanF said:

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.

Assuming the plan was always to have Cersei be Dany’s primary antagonist, who would have been on her side if they never included Euron? Just Qyburn?

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8 hours ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

 

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.

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2 hours ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

That’s why I think the Snow show is some kind of therapy for Kit. It sounds like he’s an emotional guy who didn’t get the closure he needed after ten years of work on GOT.

Assuming the plan was always to have Cersei be Dany’s primary antagonist, who would have been on her side if they never included Euron? Just Qyburn?

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.

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Chapters 27 and 28:

  • Sophie didn't like the Arya vs. Sansa arc in S7. Her favorite scene was when they killed Littlefinger.
  • There's some waxing poetic about "chaos is a ladder," which. . . ugh. I hate that stupid speech. Weiss wrote it in S1 and spent the next three seasons looking for a place to insert it.
  • Aidan Gillen bought the crew 70 bottles of whiskey each year.
  • The showrunners considered having Littlefinger and Varys face off one last time but couldn't make it work.
  • Aidan talks a bit about Littlefinger's death and how it harkens back to his duel with Brandon, and the quote gets a little weird. I'm not sure how much is him and how much is him speaking through the character:
    Quote

    As soon as he walked into that room and Arya produced the dagger, he knew the game was up. It was an emotional farewell and a humiliating position to be in. He was back in the position that had been a driver for him--the rejection of Catelyn Stark, the humiliation by Brandon Stark.

    There had to be more feelings for Sansa than I let on. But I don't want to say too much about that. I want to preserve that. I don't want to lay my cards on the table.

  • The cast received their scripts for S8 in October 2017. D&D were very anxious to find out everybody's reactions and were worried they wouldn't like it.
  • Isaac thought Bran ending up as king was a joke. Sophie was worried that her end was a prank too.
  • Maisie hadn't read most of the scripts beforehand and only learned that Arya killed the Night King during the table read. 
  • Many of the actors were very emotional when they found out how their stories ended. Conleth says he was "inconsolable" (you made it to the penultimate episode and went out like a champ, Conleth, calm down).
  • Rory brought a trumpet with him to the table read and blew it when Cleganebowl started (not sure how that got left out of the S8 documentary).
  • We've all seen the clip, but Kit was mortified when he found out that Jon kills Dany. He describes how reading that scene made him emotional, as did reaching the last page of the script, which concluded with "End of Game of Thrones."
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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.

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Chapter 29:

  • The Long Night was a miserable, nightmarish battle to shoot. It took eleven weeks to film, including 55 consecutive nights in a row. Most people involved with GOT consider it the worst experience they had on the show. 
  • The battle was over 80 minutes long, making it the longest battle ever filmed. It was shot in wintertime and, as usual, the weather was atrocious.
  • They originally planned on filming the battle in increments, but MS was worried that would disturb the continuity, especially if they had to make any last-minute changes.
  • Lyanna Mormont was originally only supposed to appear in one episode back in S6, but the showrunners liked her so much that they kept bringing her back.
  • Maisie was worried about how people would react when Arya killed the Night King instead of Jon.
  • E3 and E4 overlapped, and both required the Winterfell sets. At one point, it was essentially a 24-hour film set, with the two crews alternating and some people having to work both.
  • Originally the plan was for Jorah to join the Night's Watch after the battle, but they didn't think it was realistic for him to leave Daenerys' side before she took King's Landing.
  • Bella Ramsey said she either wanted to end up on the Iron Throne or have an epic death. She was pleased with what they gave her.
  • Carice Van Houten claims her last line was "You don't have to kill me because I'll be dead before dawn," but wasn't her last line "What do we say to the God of Death?"
  • On a side note, Carice seems to handle playing a hated character remarkably well.
  • Other contenders for killing the Night King included Brienne and the Hound.
  • D&D never seriously considered including the ice spiders.
  • They burned paraffin and fish oil in the crypt scenes to create fog. Soon, crew members started coughing up fish wax and had to begin wearing masks on set.
  • Benioff credits the night they screened The Long Night at Mann's Chinese Theatre as his "proudest moment" from the show.
  • Not mentioned: why Jon thought it was a wise idea to yell at a dragon.
  • This chapter is used to to explain how filming more than six episodes would have taken much longer to film and would have overtaxed the cast and crew. As someone who became disenchanted with GOT starting back in S5, the only solution I can think of is that the last several seasons should have been written differently.
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Chapter 30, the Daenerys one:

  • Although I think that Targ stans have a tendency to infantilize Emilia--they act like she has only ever lived to be Daenerys and has no life beyond her character--there's no denying Emilia's devastation at learning that Daenerys becomes a tyrant. She loved the role, leaned on it to get her through her health problems, and was crushed by Dany's fall to the dark side.
  • "Clarke reevaluated every previous Daenerys scene and realized that she had helped set up her characters' twist without even knowing it." Yeah, somehow I doubt that.
  • Weiss: "We didn't know the details until after the third season, but Dany's trajectory was implicit in the first season." After the third season was when they met with George in Santa Fe. Which means, yes, some version of MQD is planned for the books too (and I hope we get to read it someday because it actually sounds pretty damn interesting to me.
  • The showrunners were surprised that people cheered Dany on in killing the Tarlys. You guys framed her crucifying 163 people, burning down a temple full of people, and feeding an innocent man to her dragon as righteous, but you expected them to be disturbed by that?
  • Emilia notes how she was sometimes told to act cold and emotionless (as "foreshadowing") but she didn't know why at the time. They definitely should have told her where Dany's story was going. Even if the details were kept secret, D&D could at least have told her that she was going to be a tragic character.
  • So theoretically Jon always being the moral one and Dany always being the ruthless one who needed to be "pushed toward the moral choice" by her advisors, as is stated in this chapter, should be alright. In theory. But the problem is that we have a couple thousand years of history against us, so having the man be the hero and the woman be the Lilith who can't be trusted with her emotions comes across as pretty sexist.
  • Another example of a bizarre Sophie Turner interview. Regardless of what Sophie's said in the past, here she says that Sansa fears Dany is trying to take Jon away from her (I don't think she meant it in a romantic way) and that she's offended Jon would trust the Mad King's daughter over his own sister.
  • Hibberd describes the scene where Dany begs Jon not to reveal his parentage as "perhaps Clarke's best scene in the series" and, while I wouldn't call it her very best scene, I agree that it's up there. Like I've said before, I think she performed significantly better in S8 than during the rest of the series. (At the same time, David Nutter claims he's "never worked with a better actress than Emilia," which I have a very hard time believing).
  • An uplifting quote from Dan Weiss: 
    Quote

    Tyrion's biggest mistake was finally daring to believe in somebody. His mistake is something we all hope for. To find somebody to lead us.

  • Jacob always assumed Grey Worm would die in the final season and Missandei would live (so did I, Jacob).
  • Not mentioned: Dany kinda forgot about the Iron Fleet.
  • The weirdest thing about this chapter is how D&D don't actually seem to understand why Dany snapped. They just talk about how she's lost so much and how, throughout history, leaders have made calls that have led to the deaths of innocents. The person who comes the closest to getting it is Jason Momoa, who says "the woman just wanted love her whole life." Dany killed the people of King's Landing because they refused to love her, unlike the people she led in Essos. You can view that as the tragedy of someone who has been living with trauma for too long, or you can view it as narcissism. But the idea that she killed hundreds of thousands of people because her temper got to her is weak reasoning.
  • They shot Dany's death over the course of a week. It was the first time Emilia died on screen, and for her it brought back memories of her father's death and her own brushes with death.
  • Weirdly, Hibberd doesn't mention that Tyrion persuaded Jon to kill Dany by convincing him that she was a danger to his sisters, even though he quotes the speech Tyrion gave him.
  • Emilia thinks Drogon carried Dany's body with him until she decomposed. It was how he grieved.
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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.

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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?

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4 minutes ago, SeanF said:

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 in Season 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.

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

If the Dance is anything to go by, then Dany will lose her supporters by refusing to pardon her enemies and instead execute them after a long and disastrous war, as Aegon II planned to do before he was assassinated. Perhaps she’ll also do what Rhaenyra didn’t, and unleash her dragon on the smallfolk when they revolt, as Maegor did, and that’s the real story of the King’s Landing barbecue. For Jon though, I think the final straw will be Dany wanting to execute one or both of his sisters for some reason, and in the end he’ll choose to save them by killing Dany, just like on the show.

But reading FCKAD has convinced me thoroughly that Dany going nuts, Jon killing her, and Bran becoming king are all part of George’s planned ending. Because D&D really don’t seem to have any idea why any of this happened, and Hibberd never asks them what their decision-making process was (like he did with  killing the Night King, for example). Reading their words, it sounds like they’re trying to work it out for themselves. 

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14 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

If the Dance is anything to go by, then Dany will lose her supporters by refusing to pardon her enemies and instead execute them after a long and disastrous war, as Aegon II planned to do before he was assassinated. Perhaps she’ll also do what Rhaenyra didn’t, and unleash her dragon on the smallfolk when they revolt, as Maegor did, and that’s the real story of the King’s Landing barbecue. For Jon though, I think the final straw will be Dany wanting to execute one or both of his sisters for some reason, and in the end he’ll choose to save them by killing Dany, just like on the show.

But reading FCKAD has convinced me thoroughly that Dany going nuts, Jon killing her, and Bran becoming king are all part of George’s planned ending. Because D&D really don’t seem to have any idea why any of this happened, and Hibberd never asks them what their decision-making process was (like he did with  killing the Night King, for example). Reading their words, it sounds like they’re trying to work it out for themselves. 

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).

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11 minutes ago, SeanF said:

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).

I'd find "He does it for Sansa, who at this point is a wrong 'un and one of the reasons saving the world was a touch and go thing, he knows this, but she's his father's daughter, he loves her, it's one or the other and there it is." palatable. Figure out how to throw Arya in the mix and I may not even be angry, just sad. I haven't liked Bran since Book 2, he's already a wrong 'un.

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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?

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8 hours ago, illrede said:

I'd find "He does it for Sansa, who at this point is a wrong 'un and one of the reasons saving the world was a touch and go thing, he knows this, but she's his father's daughter, he loves her, it's one or the other and there it is." palatable. Figure out how to throw Arya in the mix and I may not even be angry, just sad. I haven't liked Bran since Book 2, he's already a wrong 'un.

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."

 

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11 hours ago, SeanF said:

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).

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

I don't think GRRM cares one whit about the 'cultural climate', that's not the reason why his books are stalling.

That said, I find it unlikely that Jon will kill Dany in the books.

1) The showrunners have said that GRRM told them three 'holy shit moments' - Stannis burning Shireen, Hold the Door, and Bran becoming King (+his story?) - and a scene where Jon (one main character) kills Dany (another main character) would have certainly been among these moments. 

2) Besides, their wording implies that they came up with the broad strokes of the scene:

"I think the final scene between Jon and Daenerys, is something we came up with... somewhere in the midst of the third season... of the show. The broad strokes of it anyways..."

Compare this to their wording when they talk about other major twist, like King Bran or Hodor's origin story - they give credit to GRRM.

3) It would thematically redundant in the books, at least if it played out similarly to the show. In the books, Jon has already chosen family (specifically Arya) over duty at the end of ADWD once, ending his story with making this choice once more would be repetitive.

4) The showrunners admitted that they originally wanted Jorah to go to the Wall, just they felt it is more right if he dies defending the woman he loves than him 'leaving Dany's side':

“For a long time we wanted Ser Jorah to be there at The Wall in the end,” writer Dave Hill said. “The three coming out of the tunnel would be Jon and Jorah and Tormund. But the amount of logic we’d have to bend to get Jorah up to The Wall and get him to leave Dany’s side right before [the events in the finale] … there’s no way to do that blithely. And Jorah should have the noble death he craves defending the woman he loves.”

This makes me think that in the books it will be Jorah who kills Dany, his will be the 'treason for love'. He is the one person who Dany wouldn't suspect of betrayal, since she believes (wrongly) that he already betrayed her for gold.

What will be his motive? Jealousy or 'doing the right thing'? I would say it's likely the first, but we will never find out, just like we don't know if Jaime really killed Aerys to protect the innocents or to protect his family and himself.

Edited by csuszka1948
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15 minutes ago, csuszka1948 said:

 

This makes me think that in the books it will be Jorah who kills Dany, his will be the 'treason for love'. He is the one person who Dany wouldn't suspect of betrayal, since she believes (wrongly) that he already betrayed her for gold.

What will be his motive? Jealousy or 'doing the right thing'? I would say it's likely the first, but we will never find out, just like we don't know if Jaime really killed Aerys to protect the innocents or to protect his family and himself.

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.

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