using the RT score for the episode to say its the worst episode of the series is about as sus as it gets.
The fact that I'm still enjoying the show doesn't mean I can't see the flaws. I totally agree that this all has felt rushed in terms of the pacing, but I also think that they have laid everything out and set everything up, however rushed it was. It just could have been better with more episodes. And that's on them mismanaging the final seasons. In their rush to move on from this they've torpedoed the show's potential legacy. I fundamentally disagree with that approach and have really lost whatever respect I still had for them as creatives as a result.
I know other people have said this before but Ramin Djawadi is a goddamn force of nature. His work has been consistently incredible.
Also, someone with a big white dog and a fluffy fur coat needs to go out in their backyard and film a quick insert to be spliced in so Jon can pet Ghost goodbye.
i should clarify a buddy tried to use the imdb score. so RT isn’t the absolute worst. second worst isn’t great though.
I was referring to her walking away from Cersei this episode. He couldn’t get beyond his blind rage and need for revenge, but she could. Killing Cersei wasn’t actually something she needed at the end of the day when her life was at stake to make it happen. She had to really look her own humanity in the face in that scene with him, and human costs in general were shown to her over and over and over again once she left. I’m not really sure what we will have learned about her character if what she saw in KL doesn’t change her in any way.
I'm almost positive there's a closeup on Dany's face after the bells ring and she's surveying the city and you can see her mentally click to destroy it even more.
I'm not crazy about Dany's decision, but maybe it'll play better once/if we get the final books and get some of her internal monologues to help frame her changing mindset. Provided that's actually something she also does in the books, of course. My biggest issue with it at the moment is similar to the other issues I had with that episode (and most of the last two seasons), all of which seem borne out of haste to conclude the show quickly. We're no longer seeing any journeys, whether literal or figurative. Rather, they've mapped out their destinations (maybe just a list of bullet points from Martin himself), and are just showing us those. Part of what makes this world so enjoyable is experiencing all of those journeys with the characters. It makes it feel lived-in, and episodes like A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms feel much more earned. But, it is what is. They're still getting people to tune in, and Weiss & Benioff can move on to the next project.
Even if that was her deciding to discard her own personal vendettas and petty vengeance, I don't think her going after Daenerys is "vengeance," it reads more like justice for her crimes. Arya's desire to kill Cersei was never about justice for Cersei's crimes, it was about what Cersei did to Arya and her family personally.
I believe that closeup is the last time we see her. It had to be a conscious choice to dehumanize her completely after that moment and only show the carnage, but that switch from the show making her sympathetic just a few minutes before to a literal flying monster is a big example of how rushed her descent was.
it's nitpicky but this is still driving me nuts this morning. last episode they hit three shots on a flying dragon firing those bolts like a goddamn turret and then last night's episode it took them several moments to load a single bolt and they couldn't hit shit on a dragon that's a bigger target than the one they hit last episode. like this recut scene from someone on reddit made it 1000x better and more believable using the same footage cut differently, so they have no excuse.
Honestly, that was so much better and more believable. I know they really wanted to go for the surprise and shock of it all, but it did not work or make sense. That recut works perfectly. They set an ambush and shot a bunch of bolts where they knew (hoped) the dragons were gonna fly.
We got full on redemption arcs for Theon and the Hound. It’s bewildering to me that people are upset Jamie didn’t get the same treatment too. Does everyone have to be redeemed? Cersei’s been this monster for years and expecting Jamie to turn on her now feels way more out of character than what we got. I thought his ending was perfect.