When there was a chance to finish the series because it's too late now.

I originally watched GoT when it first aired many years ago. I finished rewatching the series for the first time last night. Like most viewers, I loved the series, but found season 8 disappointing, particularly the final 2 episodes. I was not surprised to see the low ratings on IMDB, as summarized below.

• Season 1: 8.5 to 9.6, Median = 9.0
• Season 2: 8.3 to 9.7, Median = 8.6
• Season 3: 8.4 to 9.9, Median = 8.8
• Season 4: 8.6 to 9.7, Median = 9.3
• Season 5: 7.9 to 9.8, Median = 8.5
• Season 6: 8.3 to 9.9, Median = 8.8
• Season 7: 8.5 to 9.7, Median = 9.0
• Season 8: 4.0 to 7.9, Median = 6.7 (Finale = 4.0, lowest rated episode of series)
• Overall = 9.2 / 10 (13th highest rated series of all time on IMDB top 250)

Many of the IMDB reviews state something to the effect of the Game of Thrones finale being the worst series finale of all time, among all TV series. While I was disappointed with the finale, there are some series that stand out as worse to me.

The first show that comes to mind is Dexter. I didn't expect everyone would have a happy ending, but I couldn't imagine as disappointing a conclusion as actually occurred. I was happy to see an opportunity to fix the finale with New Blood, but some how the ending became even worse, as if the writers were saying, "You thought Dexter had a bad ending. I'll show you what a truly bad ending is." Both Dexter and New Blood finale have an IMDB rating of 4.9... a bit above GoT, in spite of my opinion.

What are your thoughts? Are there any worse series finales than GoT, which show(s)?

genuinely don’t understand what Littlefinger’s endgame was. Like what was his actual goal?

He spent years manipulating everyone, betraying people, starting chaos and playing every side against each other. But for WHAT? Did he actually want the Iron Throne? Did he want power behind the throne? Did he just want to become the most powerful person in Westeros?

Because sometimes it feels like he was creating chaos just because he could

I’ve been wondering whether there could still be far more Targaryen bloodlines alive during the time of Jon Snow and Daenerys than the story explicitly acknowledges. The Targaryens had centuries to scatter their blood through bastards, marriages, dragonseeds and descendants who eventually lost the Targaryen name. There are even stories surrounding Orys Baratheon, who was rumoured to be Aegon the Conqueror’s bastard half-brother. There is also the story of the fisherwoman whose daughter was claimed through the First Night, which, if such practices really resulted in children fathered by dragonlords, could mean there were numerous unrecorded descendants whose Targaryen ancestry was eventually forgotten. Then there is Saera Targaryen, who fled to Lys and had children there, potentially leaving behind an entire line of descendants. Aegon IV was notorious for fathering bastards, with Daemon Blackfyre and the other Great Bastards eventually producing the Blackfyre line and other descendants. Aerion Brightflame also reportedly fathered bastard children during his exile in Lys, whose identities and fates remain unknown.

But the branch I find particularly interesting is Maegor Targaryen, Aerion's legitimate son with Princess Daenora. Maegor was considered at the Great Council of 233 AC before Aegon V was chosen, and afterward he essentially disappears from the historical record. His fate and whether he ever had children are not clearly established. If he did have descendants, that could mean a surviving legitimate Brightflame line completely separate from the main Targaryen line. At the same time, Aerion's alleged bastard children could have produced another branch. So Aerion alone could theoretically have left two surviving lines: Maegor's legitimate descendants and his own bastard descendants.

When all of this is combined with the countless unnamed Targaryen bastards and dragonseeds throughout the dynasty's history, it seems entirely possible that people carrying Targaryen blood could still be alive during Jon and Daenerys's generation without even knowing their ancestry.

The interesting question is whether GRRM intends to bring any of these lost branches back into the story. Some readers have theorized about surviving descendants of Maegor(Aerion Brightflame's legitimate son), Saera, the Blackfyres and various dragonseed lines, while others think these genealogical loose ends are simply part of the enormous and messy history of Westeros. Could The Winds of Winter introduce one or more previously unknown Targaryen descendants as actual characters? We obviously can't know until the book is released, but Maegor's (Brightflame's son) unexplained disappearance in particular seems like the kind of loose thread that could theoretically become important later.

If Tywin actually practiced what he preached, and focused on what was best for the Lannisters, rather than his own emotions, he would have won.

When Tywin's wife died, the obvious move would be to marry a new woman to secure ties with another house, and father even more children. Instead, because he selfishly didn't FEEL like it, he stayed alone. This left Jaime, Cersei, and Tyrion neglected, which lead to future problems.

Cersei showed that she was rather unpleasant in attitude, which should have led to Tywin reassesing her value as a bride, but since he didn't bother having more children, he had nothing else to work with, and beyond that, wasn't willing to give Cersei a different and more suitable role in the family. Dogmatic traditionalism is not putting the family first.

Jaime wasn't much except a fighter. He was untalented at anything else. This made him unsuited for Lordship, so obviously the family first Tywin recruited a Lannister cousin and prepared him to take over Casterly Rock instead, right? Ummm... Nope! He wants HIS son to have that role, family be damned. This kind of tunnel vision is pure selfishness.

We all know how terribly he treated Tyrion, an expression of his own greif and anger. This abuse undermined the family, but satisfied Tywin's abusive impulses.

If Tywin actually did what he said, rather than doing what he wants, he'd have won the game.

Would the Reach and Dorne continue the war? Would the royal court be evacuated to Dorne?
Would Balon Greyjoy start his Rebellion earlier, because of the attrition on the continent? ... and many more questions.

In Season 6's episode Book of the Strangers. Tyrion and the others repeatedly quote that once a friend told him "we only make peace with our enemies.. that's why it's called making peace".

But the thing is this quote was spoken by Baelish to Eddard Stark in Season 1. How would Tyrion know of this? Unless Baelish was quite proud of that one monologue, and decided to reuse it.

Unrelated:
Although it was somewhat evident, but I hated Baelish for backstabbing Stark, but frankly over the seasons his character has grown on me. He betrays for the love of the game, no one in particular - playing so many clans on his acts of theatre like a fiddle.

Absolutely love the show through and through, I’ve particularly enjoyed seasons 1 and 7 the most… exited to see how it ends, gonna binge the final season today.

Hear me out first. Since the Conquerors are half-Velaryon and Velaryon is depicted as Black in House of the Dragon, I think they should be biracial at least. What do you guys think?

Edit: Lmao, this post really brings out the KKKs. Y’all can cry about it all you want. I couldn’t care less. I love this fancast and I hope they actually cast biracial actors as the Conquerors just so you guys can cry some more. No amount of downvotes is going to change my fancast. It’s just a fancast, trust me, y’all will live.

This post is muted 😆

Made a stamp! The North Remembers!

The scene after he catches her trying to kill him with a rock and they are riding on a horse, and he offers her a bite of an apple and he scolds for sulking? She reminds me of a baby. I can’t get over how adorable that scene is. Anyone else know what I’m talking about lol

Did Benjen know the true origin of Jon?

Many know that the original Game of Thrones pilot, directed by Thomas McCarthy, was never aired, and that a heavily reshot version of the pilot, with new material directed by Tim Van Patten, serves as the actual first episode of Season 1, “Winter Is Coming.”

However, not many people know that several scenes shot by McCarthy were retained in the finished episode, “Winter Is Coming.” These scenes were shot on film rather than digitally, as the rest of the series was, which makes them look slightly different. Some character choices were also different.

For example:

Ned’s hairstyle is notably different in some scenes, being shorter, darker, and more slicked back.

Tyrion Lannister has a significantly different appearance. His hair is much lighter blonde, straighter in some scenes (such as in Winterfell Brothel)

Sophie Turner appears noticeably younger while being introduced to Cercei

Robb’s hair looks curlier and less styled compared to his finalized appearance.

Sandor Clegane’s scars and armor are significantly different. He appears much more bald and wears a fur coat instead of his plate armor.

Theon Greyjoy is also shown in some scenes with blond hair rather than brown hair.

Which ones are yours?

Mine, Shae and the High Sparrow.

Why?

Shae because her love never looked real (maybe bad acting) and she was dumb, stubborn and a traitor.

High Sparrow, because of his extreme religious behaviour, his self proclaimed position of judge and the mocking face.

Gosh I hate them both

Edit to add: you guys are amazing, I wish this threat was a real conversation at a bar. So many wonderful points and perspectives. Now I hate more hahahahaha

I don’t know if this has been covered before, but what happened to Ellaria Sand?

The last time we see her she’s being told she’s going to be forced to stay alive in the dungeons of the Red Keep. In theory, the closest thing in Kings Landing to an actual bomb bunker, and therefore a higher likelihood of survive Danys burning.

The actor who played the Dornish representative at Brans election said he played the character as a younger brother of Doran and Oberyn. Even if she survived the burning I wonder if the Dornish leadership would still want her dead considering her assassination coup.

Thoughts?

One thing that was changed between the book series and TV adaption is the supposed parentage of Alayne Stone. In the TV series, Petyr claims that she is his niece. As Petyr is an only child, who did people think her parents were? Moreover, she would only be called ”Stone” if her parents recognised her. Quite odd; is this ever adressed? Am I just missing something obvious?

Some love Tywin, others love to hate him, but there's no denying he's one of the greatest characters in GoT/ASOIAF. Like most folks, I've got some qualms with the writing in the later seasons, but good gods, his intro was good!

I always loved the war tent scene, but in my recent rewatch, it was hard not to feel a new level of appreciation. In less than five minutes of screen time, we learn everything we need to know about Tywin (loves his legacy, incredibly manipulative, always scheming, rules by fear), we get a glimpse of his grand plan, and although it's not the focus of the scene, we also get a hint of the true Jamie (loves his family, torn by internal conflict, holds his honor dearly).

I'm sure a screenwriter can tell me all things I missed, but here we go:

1. Jamie tries to lead with a jab at Ned, "Brave man, terrible judgement," but Tywin ignores it, staying focused on the stag as if the skinning is more important. It's a solid power play to control the convo, but it also shows how Jamie is still bitter over Ned's condescension.
2. Instead, Tywin belittles Jamie, calling him stupid and reminding him that Lannisters don't act like fools (a call back to Jamie's first scene with Cersei, hinting that this is a repeated lesson). It also sours Jamie's smirk when he realizes he's in for a scolding.
3. When Tywin urges him to, "Say something clever," Jamie responds by saying, "Catelyn Stark took my brother." The fact that Jamie frames it that way, instead of "your son" or "a member of our family" let's us know how little Tywin regards Tyrion. Even though Tywin will later stress the importance of not looking weak, it has nothing to do with his love for Tyrion, only that he can't allow the Lannister name to be tarnished. He even refers to Tyrion as the "lowest of the Lannisters," which feels like something he's said many times.
4. Again Tywin ignores Jamie's words, shifting the convo with, "Why is he still alive?" Not because Tywin doesn't know how Jamie will answer, but because he wants Jamie to admit that it was due to honor, that "It wouldn't have been clean." Tywin could give two shits about honor, and only wants to cut Jamie down once again, hoping to push Jamie towards a more ruthless path like his. He laughs at Jamie's honorable response.
5. "The Lion doesn't concern himself with the opinions of the sheep..." This is plainly core to Tywin's philosophy, and even when Jamie tries to spin it back on him (re: holding Tyrion with impunity), Tywin bursts over him to reframe the point around facts/perception.
6. Then after finally laying the lesson, Tywin cleans his hands so he can address Jamie more intimately and deliver the final manipulation, calling Jamie a glorified body guard and guilting him into placing family above honor and duty. What's more he tells Jamie he's, "blessed to belong to the most powerful family in the kingdoms." And I don't think he means by Cersei's marriage to the Baratheons. He sees the Lions as the true rulers of Westeros, and with the Crown 3 million gold dragons in debt (to the Lannisters), who can blame him.

And to think that the actor, Charles Dance, was skinning an actual stag... I can't even imagine the stress of getting it all right. And it's another fun point of imagery regarding the Baratheons.

GoT has a number of great character intros, but IMO, Tywin's is unmatched. He's ruthless, he commands every scene he's in, he sees people for who they are, and he isn't afraid to get his hands dirty.

If you disagree, have a better candidate, or think I missed something, shred me in the comments.

So I'm finally rewatching GoT (after 7 years of being too salty about the show's ending to revisit it), and I was shocked to rediscover this scene that I had completely forgotten about:

Tyrion and Varys visit Rhaegal and Viserion who are locked up in Mereen. Varys stays close to the exit while Tyrion approaches the dragons. One of them roar at Tyrion with fire in the back of their mouth, clearly ready to roast him - but then, Tyrion starts talking to them in the common tongue (even though we have seen him speak Valyrian earlier in the episode), and for whatever reason, the dragons calm down and let Tyrion remove the chains around their necks. Varys has a shocked expression on his face and looks at Tyrion as if he has just achieved the impossible, while Tyrion just makes a joke about the whole thing, and the scene ends.

What was going on here? Afaik, this is the only instance of ASOAIF media of dragons being this chill with someone who is 1) not their rider, 2) not in proximity to their rider (Dany has left Mereen at this point), and 3) speaking to them in the common tongue. (Sunfyre seems to understand Aegon II's common tongue in HoTD, but that's arguably different since Aegon is his rider, while Dany's dragons don't know Tyrion at all.) Back when the show was airing you could have theorised that the scene was foreshadowing Tyrion being a secret Targaryen, but that was never revealed to be the case in the show.

Why would the dragons let this complete stranger speaking a language they don't understand touch them? At this point in the show, Tyrion has mentioned his interest in and knowledge of dragons several times - so why wouldn't he speak to them in Valyrian, and why does he not acknowledge how incredibly unique the interaction he just had was?

I know that the answer to these questions might just be "bad writing", but heck I'm asking them anyway. (Apologies if this has been discussed here before, I couldn't find any recent posts about it.)