394
by Olorin
My theory on how the show would end would be that the Dead would make it to Kings Landing and Cersei would blow the whole place up with wildfire. No one would sit on the Iron Throne because there would BE no Iron Throne. Obviously, that's not going to come to pass, at least not in that particular way, since the Night King has already been killed. I supposed she could still do it to wipe out whatever army Dany musters. And as to how scary the Golden Company may seem after defeating the Night King, I'd say "pretty damned," if my army had been reduced to about 20 soldiers.
Beyond that, where do I go? I'm surprised at the amount of vitriol being voiced here against this episode. Everyone I talked to in the real world liked it. Is this a fandom vs. man in the street perspective thing? I don't know. In any event, I will ill-advisedly swim upstream against the consensus opinion. I don't know that I'll do this in an orderly fashion, as there are simply far too many things to respond to, and I don't want to be at this for two hours.
So, in whatever order, and to whatever effect....
I was surprised, first of all, that the White Walker story line ended here. It had been built up as the big bad of the series, and I just assumed it would not be resolved until the very end. And beyond that, I was surprised that Arya was the one to deal the death blow. However, in retrospect, it was telegraphed several times in the episode (if not also in Melisandre and Arya's meeting several seasons ago), and I was simply too dense to pick up on it. I'm not very good at things like that. So I didn't see it coming, and to me it definitely felt like Neville Longbottom coming out of nowhere to behead Nagini. However, I don't buy that Arya was somehow unworthy. We spent how many seasons watching her to train, both physically and mentally, to be an assassin? And certainly her achievement was much more earned that the killing of the Witch-king by Merry. Tolkien makes it clear in the book that it was the spells upon the Barrow Blade that broke the power holding the Witch-king's body together and subject to his will. Merry, who though had been through some harrowing encounters, had never had any training or notable prior accomplishments. He was simply in the right place at the right time with the right weapon. Yet I've never heard Merry described as unworthy. Getting back to Arya, she was fiercely defensive of her family, even to the point of the veiled threat to Jon upon their reunion. Lastly, I doubt Jon thought, "Damn, I wanted to kill the Night King. I am like so pissed at Arya!" Yes, it would definitely have been more obvious for him to have dealt the death blow, but everything he did set the stage for the demise of the Night King. Had he not massed an army and all the pieces played out as they did, Arya would not have been in position to deliver the death blow. There would have been a different outcome.
Regarding the darkness, I found it bothersome but it did not keep from from having a pretty good notion of what was going on. Someone posted a theory on Gizmodo that it wasn't even an intentional choice (at least, not to the extent we saw) but rather a miscalculation and a bitrate issue. He thinks the producers processed the scene as though it would be seen in a pitch-black theater as opposed to the typical semi-brightly lit living room on an uncalibrated TV. He also believed that so many people were trying to stream it that HBO's servers simply couldn't supply the data fast enough. When he restreamed the show later, he claimed it looked gorgeous. Now, I watched on cable, not streaming, and it was still pretty dark, though my room wasn't pitch black. But in any event, I have some hope that the BluRay will look better. But in any event, i t was also plagued by color banding, something I rarely see on my TV.
It's true, no main characters and few secondary characters died. Was that realistic? No. But we're not watching reality, we're watching fantasy. Again, consider Tolkien. Of the 9 members of the Fellowship, only one dies and stays dead. Of the other good guys that are at least of secondary character status, the only one I can think of who dies, right off the top of my head, is Theoden. So, that's not realistic either. But if I want realism, I will watch the news (and be even more depressed).
At no point did I ever feel like Arya being awarded the death blow was a nod to women's empowerment. To me, she's just one of the good guys, and the facts that she's female and that she killed the Night King never occupied my mind at the same time. Nor do I think she's one-dimensional, or at least not inexplicably so. She saw her father murdered when she was very young. She was always a tom-boy and warrior-wannabe, so how would she respond to that? By becoming a very dark person, bent on revenge. Yet, she still has traces of a kinder, more human and humane Arya. She didn't want to kill the kindly actress who no doubt reminded her of her mother. And she wanted to experience sex before she died. So there are facets of her personality that don't often come to the fore, because she's consumed with her quest.
Bran? I don't know. Ever since he came into full possession of his powers, he's really no longer human, so it's hard to understand his motivations or lack thereof. A lot of people online were making fun of his passivity, but what could he do? He's a guy in a wheelchair, so it's not like he's going into battle. Sure, he can warg into animals and control them, but we've already seen that the Night King can disrupt that control. I'll admit, I felt the plot point of why the Night King wants to destroy him, so there there would be no living memory left of history, was a bit of a stretch, but again, this is fantasy. I think maybe we become inured to that since GOT is otherwise so gritty. As to more mystical motivations, like he IS the Night King, I'm not a fan of those theories. We've already seen him accidentally change the past (or so it appeared) by interacting with it in his visions, and I wouldn't want the show to go any further down the science fiction path by setting up some sort of paradox where Bran becomes the Night King, or his own grandfather, or anything like that. Finally, Bran could have some role yet to play, so we'll have to wait and see. But even if he doesn't, to me he's more than fulfilled his role by showing us Jon's true parentage, and by warning everyone that the Night King had turned Viscerion and felled the Wall. So I'm granting a pass on Bran.
I also wonder if the disappointment of folks here is due somewhat to the show's own success. It built up a stunning legacy over seven seasons, to the extent we've all been trained to expect anything and everything, even the seemingly impossible. Yet definitely, these last two seasons have had the feeling of closing the loops and tying off loose ends. They've been out of published story for some time now, and are now only basing the scripts on Martin's outline. Since they are not working from nearly the amount of detail and story, there's less to pick from to flesh out the show. It's coming to a close, and there's no more new characters or new stories to introduce. And so, the pace of the plot accelerates. I realized that last season but made my peace with it. Yet, it does feel rushed now, and folks may feel like characters they like get short shrift. Personally, I was more than ready for Littlefinger to die, but even were I a fan of his, I'd have to admit, he's served his purpose, it's time to go. And he got outsmarted by two people whom he clearly thought he was in control of, so, so much the better. I'll certainly miss Ser Jorah more! Part of me hoped he'd end up with Dany, though I knew that would never happen. But he was a beloved character.
Oh, shark jumping. To me, the ONLY time GOT has ever jumped the shark was when they went north of the Wall to capture a wight to bring back to Cersei. Why would they risk this, knowing they had little chance of success and great chance of dying? And yet, upon reflection, it was something they had to do. The Cerseis of the world are not going to believe the Undead exist, unless you bring them one. Imagine there's a very large, undocumented ape in the forests of our Pacific Northwest. People won't finally believe it till there's a body. You get the idea. So the wight mission.... Foolhardy? Yes. Ultimately necessary? Definitely. Even if Cersei still wasn't swayed, Dany was, and that made a difference.
Well, I've spent far more time on this post than I hoped to. My point, I suppose, is that I'm sorry so many of you don't enjoy show now, but I'll look forward to it for these final three episodes. If my heart can take it! Last night, from about 45 minutes after it started until the end, I was nervously looking at the clock every few minutes, hoping it was almost over, because it was nerve-wracking to me. Of course, I was already strung out from just having seen Avengers: Endgame about an hour before. But certainly to me, if an episode can affect me like that, the show still has it going on.
By the way, in no way do I mean any of this to be dismissive or condescending of anyone's feelings or opinions. I fully understand disappointment with a beloved franchise. Star Wars has been disappointing me for decades now! Yet I still keep hoping they'll put that rabbit out of the hat again, though sadly that seems very unlikely now.
"Olorin I was in the West that is forgotten...."