HBO's adaptation of Game of Thrones - Thread 2. There are a lot of nerds.

wasn't Dany's (weak ass) explanation for annihilating king's landing was she had to kill a shitload of people to liberate future generations for good?

fwiw I don't think that what I said was very well set up by the plot over the seasons and her portrayal has been broadly sympathetic, even with the number of moments where she's told (often by Jorah) how she should act and it seems like she grumpily accepts it. Maybe if he made it and was there on the roof when she parked the dragon for a moment, we'd have gotten a happier ending.

Still waiting for a GoT battle scene that doesn't have Jon Snow staring helplessly into space for five minutes.

I don't know how the show is going to justify his inevitable ascent to the throne - has he done anything remotely useful in the past season and a half? couldn't win the Battle of the Bastards without Sansa, couldn't win the Battle of Winterfell without Arya, didn't kill the Night King, didn't kill Cersei, and was completely wrong about Dany. He's the ultimate personification of the mediocre white man failing upwards.

i think the fans did a great job of creating a mad queen narrative around dany through close-reading (or close-watching, whatever) and theorizing. most of that arc was happening behind-the-scenes or in the minds of watchers, not really in-text.

xp this is why i'm holding out a little hope for king gendry lol

Jon Sno'Rourke

i think one main issue is Clarke has portrayed her as someone who has the best intentions and whose fury has largely been aimed at those who generally deserve it, even if one might say "wow maybe that was a bit much, D!" and she has been fairly likable as a protagonist when considering the alternatives we've had opposing her forces (Joffrey, Cersei, etc...) I think some more effective deployed foreshadowing or larger character flaws would have gone a long way, which isn't to take away from what she did the past couple episodes and at other points this season; she's been good at this arc performance-wise, more than her other arcs. it's the writing that failed in the run-up to this.

I don't know how the show is going to justify his inevitable ascent to the throne - has he done anything remotely useful in the past season and a half? couldn't win the Battle of the Bastards without Sansa, couldn't win the Battle of Winterfell without Arya, didn't kill the Night King, didn't kill Cersei, and was completely wrong about Dany. He's the ultimate personification of the mediocre white man failing upwards.

― Roz, Monday, May 13, 2019 1:48 PM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

he doesn't have to. he's the rightful heir

My initial thoughts, in no particular order:

- I found it quite gripping!
- I wonder who received the raven messages Varys managed to get out before he got scorched.
- Poofs of green going up all over the city among the dragon fire: were these Cersei’s secret stashes of wildfire? How was she planning to use them?
- There have been so many articles asking ‘will the showrunners stick the landing?’ recently I started wondering if it was some kind of hidden reference. Initially I thought it would be the Night King who Stuck the Landing but when he didn’t I guessed it must be Dany.
- I found the Pompeii-like bits quite moving - the snow of ash falling down and the charred corpses clinging to their charred children.

I don't know how the show is going to justify his inevitable ascent to the throne - has he done anything remotely useful in the past season and a half? couldn't win the Battle of the Bastards without Sansa, couldn't win the Battle of Winterfell without Arya, didn't kill the Night King, didn't kill Cersei, and was completely wrong about Dany. He's the ultimate personification of the mediocre white man failing upwards.

― Roz, Monday, May 13, 2019 10:48 AM (four minutes ago

THANK YOU!!! Like, I even find myself asking, why does this fool get to command any army?

Oh, and they key scene for Dany’s ‘mental state’ was when she and Jon snogged, he backed out, and she decided she could never be a ruler who would be loved without Jon by her side, so she decided “Fear, then”.

he doesn't have to. he's the rightful heir

not if Gendry Baratheon has anything to say about it! lol yeah King Gendry would be kind of awesome. also hilarious for Dany - she spent so long dismissing the noble houses of westeros only to find herself, in a brief moment of spite, legitimising the system and possibly restarting the cycle all over again by recognising Gendry's parentage.

honestly been wondering if this just ends with dany executing snow and tyrion for treason, like she just straight up wins

my dark horse in this race for the throne remains Davos.

at this point would anyone rebel against Dany's rule? Even if someone assassinates her, Jon might be the only one who can deal with the dragon.

as a blacksmith, he would be a good person to have in a position of power to help design structures and infrastructure that are fire resistant

And finally: good job there’s another throne in Dragonstone, eh?

moving the capitol of a country is a standard revolutionary/regime change move

plus, dragonstone is completely empty, which means it is very clean and ready for lots of people to move in

nice views too!

wasn't Dany's (weak ass) explanation for annihilating king's landing was she had to kill a shitload of people to liberate future generations for good?

― officer sonny bonds, lytton pd (mayor jingleberries), Monday, May 13, 2019 10:44 AM (thirty-two minutes ago)

yes. that was what made me thinking of the U.S./Allies tactics during WW2

I want them to start next week's episode with Jon and company outside the city watching as the city continues to get dragon-razed

"why isn't she stopping?"
"no clue, she's been at it for two days now"

nice bit of jon snow being a dumbass in this ep was when varys says the "when a targaryen is born the gods flip a coin.." and jon says "we don't go much for riddles where I'm from"

That response got me too, at this point I just assume they're leaning into making Jon look as clueless and hapless as possible.

really gonna miss Varys :(

wrt Jon being a dumbass, lord yes, but this season it's hard not to have a "this whole court is out of order" meltdown wrt to dumbassery with most of the characters this season

Oh, and they key scene for Dany’s ‘mental state’ was when she and Jon snogged, he backed out, and she decided she could never be a ruler who would be loved without Jon by her side, so she decided “Fear, then”.

Implication being that if only Jon had subdued her with his magic cock, all this mess could've been avoided.

Everything is his fault.

the lord of light brought him back to fuck, but he fucked up instead

irl lol

as dany and her dragon torched and ruined the city all I could think was "man they're going to have to clean all that shit up"

episode missed doing a callback to the first season when Arya was running around Kings Landing in hiding

xp. they made short shrift of all the wight corpses up at winterfell so king's landing cleanup should be a doddle

https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/a-better-way-game-of-thrones-could-have-arrived-at-this-1834720538

I like that idea. And, if they still needed someone to be witnessing what Jon did on the ground in the actual episode, Davos would have been perfect for that.

all of the post-GRRM choices are so uninspired. all this show has left is "you-are-there" action setpieces. what a bummer.

help I'm trapped on a planet of pissed-off dorks

it's interesting to me that *this* is the episode where consensus has really congealed against the show, against the writers. as a grumbling non-fan it seemed fine! not great, but ok, certainly more direct and clear and about-something than a lot of the show has been.

the Big Idea we're supposed to be watching play out is Actual medieval politics, + some magic, i think we got that well enough. torching and sacking resisting cities was absolutely in the repertoire of "good" rulers, everybody knew the deal! the show has not really shown how miserable the endless war is for the populace. there has always been a lot of personal sadism but not much ambient fear and displacement imo.

i thought Clarke's moment of decision on the walls was pretty good! i could almost hear some cod-Shakespeare kind of line, like "Am I yet Queen?" the writers have not been good at showing people make decisions or think in real time (they always stage major turns like that as surprises, coming from off-screen) but it seems pretty clear that bells mean dick dealing with the T's

the white horse showing up at the end was pretty lame

can't break a wheel without cooking a few eh you get me

was arya responsible for that woman dying or was the idea that whether she stayed or went she was a goner

i think the latter

Still waiting for a GoT battle scene that doesn't have Jon Snow staring helplessly into space for five minutes.

I don't know how the show is going to justify his inevitable ascent to the throne - has he done anything remotely useful in the past season and a half? couldn't win the Battle of the Bastards without Sansa, couldn't win the Battle of Winterfell without Arya, didn't kill the Night King, didn't kill Cersei, and was completely wrong about Dany. He's the ultimate personification of the mediocre white man failing upwards.

then they can bring him back from the dead again and do it all over.

kind of got the stark gene for being guileless and gullible in a noble manner

trying to decide who are bigger douches: the dudes that run the show or ppl who write for gawker media idk

like i give anti-fucks about what someone writing for deadspin thinks ... would rather read about what plebeian job in Westeros I would have based on my astrological sign

every site on earth generating several dozen GoT articles a week, some are not going to be insightful

Is dragonglass the preferred weapon for Cancerians?

it's interesting to me that *this* is the episode where consensus has really congealed against the show, against the writers. as a grumbling non-fan it seemed fine! not great, but ok, certainly more direct and clear and about-something than a lot of the show has been.

Didn't this happen last week? Last week's ep was objectively much worse than this one.

i think the internet furore will be higher from this ep because a lot of people like the character of dany and apparently haven't noticed the telegraphing of "she is bad" the last few eps

For a lot of people it happened last season when they went zombie hunting beyond the wall. In Nerd-dom it seemingly congealed when their Night King theories didn't pan out.