Re: Game Of Thrones

321
it's their own fucking fault:
Forbes wrote:It Is Now Clear Having Two Short ‘Game Of Thrones’ Final Seasons Was A Mistake

We are now marching toward the final episode of Game of Thrones ever, and while we don’t know exactly how it will end, the events of the past two seasons have taken us to a place where it seems…difficult to extract a worthwhile ending, to say the least.

Some of the problems are specific decisions the showrunners made, now free of the guiding light of Martin’s books, but the further we’ve gotten into these final seasons, it has become clear to almost everyone that a core problem with the ending of Game of Thrones is that the idea that the final two seasons should be 7 episodes, then a year break, then 6 episodes.

Sure, we may get to where we’re going and it could be a passable ending. But there is no benefit to arranging the show this way, instead of having a more standard ending with two or three seasons that were the traditional ten episodes in length. No benefit to anyone except the showrunners, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss who want to move on to other projects.

No one wanted this except them. HBO wanted more. Here’s an EW interview from 2015, back when the showrunners were threatening to end the series after seven seasons:

“This is the hard part of what we do,” sighs HBO programming president Michael Lombardo. “We started this journey with David and Dan. It’s their vision. Would I love the show to go 10 years as both a fan and a network executive? Absolutely…If they weren’t comfortable going beyond seven seasons, I trust them implicitly and trust that’s the right decision—as horrifying as that is to me.”

More recently, HBO offered the showrunners more money and time to at least add more episodes to the final season, after eight seasons, the last two being shortened, was concocted as a compromise.

"HBO would have been happy for the show to keep going, to have more episodes in the final season," Benioff said. "We always believed it was about 73 hours, and it will be roughly that. As much as they wanted more, they understood that this is where the story ends."

And then there’s George RR Martin, who has always thought the show was cutting too much from the books. A long time ago he said the 10 episode seasons should be more like 13, and more recently he’s said that the show could continue well, well beyond eight seasons. Here’s him at the Emmys last year:

"I don't know," Martin said. "Ask David [Benioff] and Dan [Weiss] when they come through. We could have gone to 11, 12, 13 seasons, but I guess they wanted a life.”

And finally there are fans, who have now seen the results of this spaced-out, shortened final pair of seasons, and most everyone believes that the show has felt painfully rushed as a result. How so? It’s tough to know where to even start.

The Jon and Daenerys relationship, what should be the most important one of the show, has been massively rushed, with the two not getting together until the finale of season seven, and yet Jon has become slavishly devoted to her in just a few episodes’ time, making their entire rollercoaster ride of a relationship
(ending now with Dany going full Mad Queen)
feel way, way too fast.

There are the bent-out-of-shape character arcs, which have flung these characters toward a specific end goal, ignoring that the path to get there does not make much sense.
In episode 2 of season 8, Jaime is hanging out with all his new friends in Winterfell, knighting Brienne. In episode 5, he’s throwing away six years of an arc to run away to be with Cersei as she dies because nothing else matters but her. In episode 2 Dany and Jon are riding dragons in the snow like they’re in a Dreamworks movie. In two more episodes, Dany loses half her army, Jorah and Missandei, learns the truth about Jon and develops a taste for genocide.
One complaint from last episode is not that these characters turns happened, it’s that not enough time was given to make them feel earned, hence why these two characters (among others) have had arcs that have given fans whiplash.

Then there’s the now infamous teleportation of the last few seasons. Game of Thrones has always been about these long, epic journeys from place to place, which is where a load of character development happens, and twists and turns derail characters along the way. But after six years of that, the show realized it was running out of time because of this self-imposed deadline, and suddenly everyone is warping all around the map instantly, erasing that entire part of the show that was a key aspect of it before. This results in some plot holes, but also a general sense of disorientation and like everything is moving at breakneck speed. And usually, this is done in service of just hammering us with battle after battle, with maybe one episode of downtime in between them. It’s felt exhausting, and like the show is trying to sprint its way through a marathon, losing steam far before it should.

It is easy to see how the last 13 episodes of the series could have been 20-30 episodes if the showrunners had decided to take their time, taking an unlimited budget from HBO, respecting the opinion of the series’ creator, and doing service to fans who would loyally show up for a decade or more if asked. Instead, they wanted to be done, and rather than leave and hand the show off to someone who actually wanted to be there, they’re just blasting through it, and clearly, it’s suffering as a result.
HBO would have been better off telling these guys if they wanted out, they can fuck right off then, and getting someone else to come in and at least have the final two seasons be normal length. at least. call their bluff. i will never understand how HBO allowed this decision to happen. so what we have in the end is 5-6 extremely well-written seasons that made for a great show, and 2 seasons of them racing from goalpost to goalpost, ignoring what made them successful, at the expense of good writing. sad.

Re: Game Of Thrones

323
I think everything that happened in the last episode should have. My issue is the path they took to get there. They should have built up to the results of the final episode slowly, so that it didn't seem like shit was just happening quickly out of left field. There should have been at least one season before this one. Conclude season 8 with the final White Walker battle, which is built up to (smaller skirmishes, intelligence missions, character building, etc) over the course of the season. Then let the final season 9 be all about the final human battle for Winterfell. Give foreshadowing of what was to come, and plant character motivations as to why they make the choices they do. Give breathing room so we, and the characters, can feel the emotional impacts of what is happening.
I don't fault the final destination, just the journey there.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

Re: Game Of Thrones

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right. at the very least full seasons. but like i said above, it was their own choice. if they don't like the hate, or want to say that people are mad because of what the characters did ("oh noes,
dany torched KL!!111!11
", which just isn't true for anyone that's been paying attention), they can fuck off. i just hope they didn't fuck up interest in the spinoffs with this bullshit, as someone else coming in to play in this world is beyond what it needs. see: empire strikes back, the last jedi, etc. and yes, i realize we are going to get (very far in the past) prequel first, but
how cool would it be if, in ten years, we revisit this timeline, just like tyrion tells john - "ask me again in 10 years". perfect set up, ala twin peaks, to return and see what's going on. just please, not these showrunners.

Re: Game Of Thrones

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GRRM wrote:WRAPPED!

Exciting news out of London — I am informed that shooting has WRAPPED for the first season of HOUSE OF THE DRAGON.

Yes, all ten episodes. I have seen rough cuts of a few of them, and I’m loving them. Of course, a lot more work needs to be done. Special effects, color timing, score, all the post production work.

But the writing, the directing, the acting all look terrific. I hope you will like them as much as I do. My hat is off to Ryan and Miguel and their team, and to our amazing cast.

So when will you get to see it, you ask? When will the dragons dance?

I wish I could tell you. Lots of work remains to be done, as I said, and covid makes planning difficult. This spring? Unlikely. Maybe summer? Could be. Fall? Who knows?

You’ll know when we do.

Re: Game Of Thrones

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so we decided to watch this weekly as it airs and then go back and binge re-watch, since we're assuming it will be as complicated to follow as GoT so it will require a second watch anyway. two episodes in and a few things have been changed from the book, and they skipped over the entire first century of targaryan rule, but it is a good show so far. i'm kind of curious how the timeline changes are going to play out, but guess we'll see pretty shortly. i'm still in.

Re: Game Of Thrones

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still watching. things definitely picked up after the first two episodes. shit is happening now. lots of things changed from the source material. but it looks as if we're about to make a 15-year or so time jump. wonder how the internet will react, given how attached it seems people are to the younger versions of the lead actresses. loving the show, but it's a totally different vibe from GoT. in the first season of GoT, they had no idea if what they were doing was going to work, so they were going hard at it, every episode. with this, you can tell that they knew going in they would have multiple seasons to tell their story. that's a huge safety net and has allowed them to go slowly, which i think is a good thing, but don't know how history will judge it. i suppose it depends on where they go next, and how well they stick the landing. wonder exactly where they will draw the line and end s1 - that will also be key.

Re: Game Of Thrones

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now THAT's how you do a season finale. goddamn that was intense. excellent end to this. i know there are gripes about time jumps, etc., and it being hard to follow. i suspect this is really built for binge re-watching rather than focusing on the weekly watch-as-it-airs crowd. these things won't be a big deal when you binge it, which i will be doing after a break. the real bummer is that it seems s2 won't be here until fall 2024 - that's the bigger error.