Game of thrones overall thoughts

Guys of course there are spoilers. I'm going to put like 15 spaces below this so that it doesn't show up in the preview..

Firstly, I got spoiled about Jon and Daenerys like a month or so ago and I knew that things would culminate that way. Game of Thrones was always going to end with the family coming together, reuniting after everything, but I feel like the way the greatest threats were kept at bay made the series so good. When they finally faced those things, though, it felt a little bit small. I know that there are real-world reasons that this fantasy world was given such an unjust, abrupt ending, but still I can't help but mourn for what could have been. Nevertheless I enjoyed it a lot, and I watched it at a really reasonable pace with my sister and brother-in-law, who were huge fans of the show due for another rewatch. Getting through it with them was kind of like listening to companion podcasts or being able to look online for other fan opinions after each episode. After we wrapped yesterday, I looked at everything online. The "freefolk" of the Game of Thrones subreddit still have a bad taste in their mouths after so many years.

I really liked the reverence the show had for the world the characters inhabited. Mortality was high by design. These royals whose lives we followed could not always make rash decisions. Neither did they possess an omniscient eye for what was to come, which is why Robb followed his heart, believed he could have it all, and was killed for his naïveté. The Red Wedding was a high point in the storytelling, something which we watched with bated breath, left hopeless at the end of it. It was a sign of proper Lannister dominance in the nation. 

The audience's only respite was an emblazoned Arya Stark, who would go on to learn from one of the greatest swordsmen and then sail to Braavos to become a part of a mythical guild of contract killers. And then there was Sansa... I really liked both their character arcs, but Sansa's was often harder to watch. There was something funny about those two being exactly where they wanted to be— Sansa a princess in many high towers and Arya constantly on horseback or in combat. It meant a lot to me that they acknowledged that they could not have survived what the other went through. That for all of their strife, they made it back to each other so they could say that and be thankful. 

And I really liked Jon... when he died such an unceremonious death (the first time), it only made my hatred for the Night's Watch worse. I did not like them in principle and I thought they were useless, but it was interesting and volatile. I liked that loyalties fluctuated, I liked that they reminded us that these were outcasts and thieves and rapists. Of course they would stab Jon 400 times— he was too honorable and barely won the popular vote to become Lord Commander. When he was brought back, he was tired of it all, but took on the task anyway. I think that's what surprised me about how they ultimately wrapped his character. By the time he is proclaimed "King in the North," he does it for the love of his people, all of his people. Not only was his romance with Daenerys pure fan service, it just seemed like a departure from all that we knew. It's as if the writers remembered that last minute— love is the death of duty. If they were forced to make the pair a thing, guns to their heads, I do think that it would have been most interesting to make them enemies-to-lovers victims of a political marriage. Since we just pick out romance books by the tropes nowadays. Since we're going to be lazy about it anyway. 

I am split about the decision to make Daenerys another Mad Queen. One could argue that it was expected, but I'm not sure I buy it. I wish they stuck with the idea that we are not predetermined at birth, that Tyrion could be right when he repeatedly asserted that she wasn't her father. But maybe that was part of the irony of the events which followed. I feel like that decision was made at the very beginning of Season 8's production. The seeds of distrust were blatantly planted in a way that they can say Daenerys' sudden shift was backed by a proper build-up. To me it just seemed a waste of an interesting arc— I envisioned her learning hard truths, and having nightmares about the few she killed without hesitation, maybe a moment where she begins to question strict adherence to her principles. I think that she could have learned that sort of adaptability from Jon, like his second life was to come back, live through two great wars, and regale what he learned to a new, revolutionary leader. Instead, I felt sad to see her beg him to keep the secret and succumb to the patriarchal structure she so daringly faced all this time. 

Anyway, I had great solace seeing The Hound in Gladiator II and hearing Tyrion's voice in Wicked. I missed them a lot.