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OT - Game of Thrones S8

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supersaiyanshel said:
The big winner in all of this hemming and hawing about the final season is George Martin and his publisher.

The next GOT book releases (whenever that will be) are gonna be Harry Potter level events.
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Either that or people are going to be burnt out by all of this and not give a fvck about GRRM's version of the story.

I'll be first in line, but I can see this fan fiction version of the final two books being canon.

My theory is that these books have not been released by GRRM yet because he has to do massive re-writes so he just doesn't parrot what the TV show has done, which, some of it has been GRRMs previously discussed bullet points. I also believe that the showrunners have deviated from what GRRM initially intended to make it enough of their own, but there are still some bullet points that will cross over (importance and ultimate identity of Jon Snow for example). GRRM books will lean more toward the lore, prophecy, and stay the course for what he was trying to do originally...while the show ultimately became a quilted piece of fan fiction -- I do not believe the books will have a massive white walker / Night King invasion, for example.
 
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BoxingRobes said:
Either that or people are going to be burnt out by all of this and not give a fvck about GRRM's version of the story.

I'll be first in line, but I can see this fan fiction version of the final two books being canon.

My theory is that these books have not been released by GRRM yet because he has to do massive re-writes so he just doesn't parrot what the TV show has done, which, some of it has been GRRMs previously discussed bullet points. I also believe that the showrunners have deviated from what GRRM initially intended to make it enough of their own, but there are still some bullet points that will cross over (importance and ultimate identity of Jon Snow for example). GRRM books will lean more toward the lore, prophecy, and stay the course for what he was trying to do originally...while the show ultimately became a quilted piece of fan fiction.
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Word is the next book (which some even believe is already finished) is the largest in the series so far.
 
AUcane said:
will you 4 dragon mongoloid people just stop? you are overthinking it. The last 4 episodes are proof enough that you're looking too much into things. The writers are just trying to wrap up everything quickly and clumsily. The last thing they're going to do is to bring out a 4th dragon. lol
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Wake up, genius, I was laughing about all of the people who want the scientific stuff spelled out for them. I only raised the point since I've read the books, know the background, and was legitimately curious about whether George RR Martin had tipped off the writers on that issue (of which he had not yet written). As is well-known, Weiss and Benioff had figured out the mystery of Jon Snow's parentage long before Martin would reveal or confirm it in print, though Martin confirmed this to them.

At any rate, the books and the TV show have diverged in many areas, so if Martin wants the dragons to procreate, he's got a couple of books left to do so.
 
@KingLew88 said:
Varys has been around a lot of kings and queens so he knows what to look for. If you go back in this season to after they defeated the NK and everyone is celebrating and she’s sitting there watching all the interactions you see she has the moment of awe man I really have nobody in my corner. That was a major scene. She then gets up and walks out in which Varys goes behind her. Gotta pay attention to the small things in GOT
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I saw that, that's one of the scenes I'm talking about. They just didn't build it up enough for me. Also, having her burn everyone after the bells were ringing seemed forced as well because of the lack of time they spent building up her going crazy. It was there but not enough was shown to support what she ended up doing. Everything was in her favor at that moment that she decided **** it, I'm burning them all. She had already won but still something triggered her but it wasn't obvious at all other than the writers just wanting her to be the bad guy. **** they even made Cersei look human at the end in comparison with all the ****ed up **** she's done.
 
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Hegemon said:
This season showed how much the books are missed.
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We are all trashing on the show...and rightfully so...but I'll die on the hill that the show really nailed the big moments and the big battles set pieces. Battle of the ********. Battle of Winterfell I and II, Battle of the Blackwater, Loot Train, Hardhome...I loved those episodes.

And, low key, even though it really made no **** sense, 60 minutes of run time of Mad Queen Dany lighting up the entirety of Kings Landing inch by inch as Cersei watches as a great idea that was failed by the intertwining scenes and poor payoff to Cersei and Jamie.
 
Poptimus said:
Tonight's episode had a heavy Arya focus that seemed to go nowhere. That and the weak killing of Cersei and Jamie render it disappointing to me.
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Misguided.

First, the Arya stuff is showing her transformation from being an assassin to being a person who chooses life. Now, some people may not like that arc, but everything in GoT (separate from the high body count) is showing an attempt to move away from the old ways of doing things.

As for Jaime and Cersei, it is completely fitting. Everything she had built up comes crashing down on her, in a death that is not unlike what she did in the Sept. I'm not sure why everyone thinks that all the deaths in the show should be inflicted by enemies. Cersei's death was entirely the result of her own bad choices. It's also a callback to the whole "things we do for love", as Jaime is choosing to die with her.
 
TheOriginalCane said:
Misguided.

First, the Arya stuff is showing her transformation from being an assassin to being a person who chooses life. Now, some people may not like that arc, but everything in GoT (separate from the high body count) is showing an attempt to move away from the old ways of doing things.

As for Jaime and Cersei, it is completely fitting. Everything she had built up comes crashing down on her, in a death that is not unlike what she did in the Sept. I'm not sure why everyone thinks that all the deaths in the show should be inflicted by enemies. Cersei's death was entirely the result of her own bad choices. It's also a callback to the whole "things we do for love", as Jaime is choosing to die with her.
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Just defies prophecy in the show canon. They set up a lot of the Cersei story from the books on the show and the follow through on those was pretty poor. Even if you diverge, the way they went about it, to me, was some focus group type decision.
 
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TheOriginalCane said:
Misguided.

First, the Arya stuff is showing her transformation from being an assassin to being a person who chooses life. Now, some people may not like that arc, but everything in GoT (separate from the high body count) is showing an attempt to move away from the old ways of doing things.

As for Jaime and Cersei, it is completely fitting. Everything she had built up comes crashing down on her, in a death that is not unlike what she did in the Sept. I'm not sure why everyone thinks that all the deaths in the show should be inflicted by enemies. Cersei's death was entirely the result of her own bad choices. It's also a callback to the whole "things we do for love", as Jaime is choosing to die with her.
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Ori, I can't put my thumb on it, but as much as I loved S1 through S6, these last two seasons have been largely disappointing to me.

To put it in context, had S1 and S2 been the same caliber as S7 and (especially) S8, I probably would not have made it through them. There's just something amiss, I don't know if it's the story itself or the writing, but it's definitely not what it once was.

Prior to S7, I thought GoT was the best show of all-time.
 
BoxingRobes said:
Just defies prophecy in the show canon. They set up a lot of the Cersei story from the books on the show and the follow through on those was pretty poor. Even if you diverge, the way they went about it, to me, was some focus group type decision.
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I'm not saying that there aren't some issues because Martin didn't finish the books.

Even Walking Dead, with the actual creator of the comic book working on the TV show, diverges from the source material.

But this Season 8 over-analysis of everything ("poor writing", "focus group type decision", "political correctness", "pacing", "show has lost its ruthless edge") is just a bunch of garbage because people want the show to wrap up the way they want it to wrap up.

The pathway to how the show would end has always been pointing this way. That "prophesies" do not have to be followed, that the reason why prophesies usually prove out is because people end up making the decisions that they think they have to make.

We've seen this coming since Season 1. Dany, for all of her ideals, usually resorts to a "kill them all" speech. Cersei, for all her brilliant plotting, is always her own worst enemy. That the eventual "break in the cycle" of all of the revenge-killing would need to involve multiple key characters choosing not to go down the same old pathway. Jon doesn't want the throne, Arya doesn't enjoy all the killing anymore, The Hound embraces fire, etc.

I realize that the people who viewed the show as some sort of "ruthless" NCAA Tournament bracket of murder are going to find certain deaths "weak", and some sort of a departure from how they perceived the show. But let's not act as if this wasn't the plan all along, by both Martin and Weiss/Benioff.
 
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Poptimus said:
Ori, I can't put my thumb on it, but as much as I loved S1 through S6, these last two seasons have been largely disappointing to me.

To put it in context, had S1 and S2 been the same caliber as S7 and (especially) S8, I probably would not have made it through them. There's just something amiss, I don't know if it's the story itself or the writing, but it's definitely not what it once was.

Prior to S7, I thought GoT was the best show of all-time.
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I understand what you are saying. And as I just said in a response to another poster, there is definitely a change going on from what the shows/books were in prior periods until now. There is not as much cunning back-stabbing, and we now come to all-out battles instead of intrigue.

I certainly think that PART of the equation is Martin, but it's not that the writers of the TV show have no guidance, he has confirmed to them where the story was going all along. And if you want total honesty on what might be going on with Martin, go back and watch the PBS Finding Your Roots episode with Martin, where a lot of what he believed his family background to be was proved to be something else. I think his own personal life hints at how he is struggling to wrap up this massive undertaking.

But I think that the more reasonable overall explanation is that there are some expectation differentials (among the fan base) and some practical issues with wrapping up the show. We could debate number of episodes, though the actual minute-length of most episodes puts us a bit closer to what the "normal" season is like. I definitely think that the earlier seasons were an exercise in how to "tighten" Martin's massive books, while they have very little roadmap (outside of big reveals like Jon's parentage) to guide them now. But you still have the thematic issues, and if Martin's ultimate goal is to show how the outcomes need to CHANGE the prior historical patterns, so be it.

You can see this in things such as the entire decimation of certain ancient Houses; the ending of male-domination in certain roles, such as Brienne becoming a knight, Arya becoming an assassin, Cersei (and perhaps Dany) ruling even when a man may have the superior claim; the ending of slavery in Essos; a focus on characters choosing to be together for love, rather than arranged marriage (sometimes with bad outcomes, of course).

I could cite a lot of other examples, but I think that Martin has been shooting for something a bit different than Lord of the Rings. At the end of Tolken's story, many of the characters return to the same kind of life. Evil has been vanquished, but there were not as many societal changes. I think that Martin is trying to tell a story, and also look toward a future that is not as medieval as it was at the beginning of his story.

So many GoT "fans" are so desperate to see one character "win the Game of Thrones", that they are going to be disappointed to see that it wasn't in the plans of Martin/Weiss/Benioff from the beginning.

For the record, I'm not dismissing your gut instincts on Seasons 7/8. I get it. It's definitely different. But I will say that I liked Season 7 a lot more when I watched all episodes back-to-back. Having a week between episodes gives us all the chance to second-guess everything, particularly as the series comes to an end.

I'd just like to see everyone watch it to the end, and THEN debate it, rather than pick it apart on a weekly basis.

Thematically, the show is changing, and I think that the books will as well.
 
TheOriginalCane said:
I'm not saying that there aren't some issues because Martin didn't finish the books.

Even Walking Dead, with the actual creator of the comic book working on the TV show, diverges from the source material.

But this Season 8 over-analysis of everything ("poor writing", "focus group type decision", "political correctness", "pacing", "show has lost its ruthless edge") is just a bunch of garbage because people want the show to wrap up the way they want it to wrap up.

The pathway to how the show would end has always been pointing this way. That "prophesies" do not have to be followed, that the reason why prophesies usually prove out is because people end up making the decisions that they think they have to make.

We've seen this coming since Season 1. Dany, for all of her ideals, usually resorts to a "kill them all" speech. Cersei, for all her brilliant plotting, is always her own worst enemy. That the eventual "break in the cycle" of all of the revenge-killing would need to involve multiple key characters choosing not to go down the same old pathway. Jon doesn't want the throne, Arya doesn't enjoy all the killing anymore, The Hound embraces fire, etc.

I realize that the people who viewed the show as some sort of "ruthless" NCAA Tournament bracket of murder are going to find certain deaths "weak", and some sort of a departure from how they perceived the show. But let's not act as if this wasn't the plan all along, by both Martin and Weiss/Benioff.
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At this point, the consensus is that the writing is poor and the execution of what they are even trying to do, has been rushed and poor as well. If you feel otherwise, you're just in the minority at this point. Thats not to say you are wrong...but, these eyes see it much differently.
 
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