Game Of Thrones season 8 [SPOILERS]

I think they were saving the dragons because they weren't eating well, or at all.
It was literally a matter of conserving every calorie.
Whereas Zombie-Viserion was animated by magic, and had no such limits.

The show was drip, drip, drip for six seasons. Then the show runners accelerated everything because they want to move on to other ventures. We are going to get some answers. But many questions will remain unanswered.

Well that and they literally ran out of material to adapt other than an outline of future books.

I don’t know if GRRM has even written the Battle Of Winterfell yet so the show writers just had to make up their own stuff.

Remember where they left off in the books, Tyrion hasn’t even met Dany yet. And there is no release date announced for book six yet! He’s been writing slow as shit so that put the show writers in a bind.

Book 5 came out 8 years ago.

I've read reviews and comments on reviews that note how not only the plotting hasn't been as good since the show outpaced the books, but even the dialogue quality has gone down because they're no longer adapting Martin's words and are having to write their own.

Option C) No drama/suspense for the last 3 episodes if Dany/Jon have the greatest army in the land PLUS two dragons.

Says it better:

https://www.wired.com/story/game-of-thrones-winterfell-battle-tactical-analysis/

Honestly it was both fantastic and disappointing

I had always felt the Night King and his march toward the living was such a huge part of the GoT universe, so to see him and his plans get taken out just like that was definitely disappointing. I seriously thought that arc would go on until one of the last scenes of the show

Who knows though, GoT is pretty prophetic with visions and the like, and remember the Dragon Queen had the vision of the Red Keep destroyed and covered in snow, so maybe we haven't seen the last of the Night King

Saying that, I was pretty happy it was Arya. She has been training for years and years to become a badass assassin who can kill anyone and she got the biggest prize of them all

The tactics in the battle were pretty Definitely wouldn't be hiring anyone involved to take care of strategy for a battle I was planning. What a waste of perfectly good Dothraki

Was definitely on the edge of my seat throughout the entire episode though, can't remember the last time a television show did that to me. Some really stressful and great moments, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't supremely entertained

Couple of lingering questions and observations:
What's the status of the two remaining dragons?
What was Bran warging that whole time? We saw the ravens who located the Night King, sure, but he was doing it right up until the Night King approached him. I feel like there's something there

Theon died like a bitch, talk about telegraphing your pass. At least give yourself a chance and fight him toe to toe

When Jon was running towards the Night King and he raised the dead, that was epic

The moments with Tyrion and Sansa were great

The moment the dead hit the soldiers in front of Winterfell like a literal tidal wave was unreal

One doing fine, one apparently recovering.

I honestly thought the wights killed Drogon, but apparently not.

Think necklaces will bring back dead people or defeat cersie's army. Bron will kill cerise or Jamie Lannister. Watched it on xfinity on firefox with dts 5.1 surround sound sounded look great.

Even still, there were something’s they did on their own that was fantastic... Hardhome (S5E8) for instance was not depicted in the books. Jon was told about what happened, but putting him there was a stroke of genius.... that means the characters that we were introduced to and then died all in 1 episode were strictly show creations. Great dialogue and my personal favorite battle episode. The show producers are really great and I do believe that the last 2 seasons are a function of them wanting to wrap things up for HBO & move on precisely because they signed up to adapt a work of fiction they were fans of... not to finish it.

As I read somewhere today, it’s not called Game of Thrones for nothing.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bw080BuHbJG/?igshid=wfw4d2fkagnk

BTW, did I miss something with Bran warging into the ravens? What exactly did that accomplish?

I'm thinking he secretly set something up for the final episode.

Also this, borrowed from a review comment:

A commenter I read agrees with you:

My review.

Plot what plot? DRAKRÖJ!!!

Wow. Talk about a mood swing!

I think you're both wrong.

The true "villain" of the series has always been greed, ambition and envy. Yeah, I know it's metaphysical.

I thought it was him saying "Come at me bro" to the Night King.

Did anyone else notice that Melisandre's death scene was lifted directly out of The Chronicles of Riddick?

This guy brightened the Viserion/Rhaegal throwdown. You can see a lot that I missed in watching three times because it was so dark. I'd wondered what had happened to Viserion's jaw.

https://www.reddit.com/r/gameofthro...ilers_s08e03_fight_of_the_dragons_brightness/

I'm a bit puzzled by the criticism that the whole thing was "over too quickly".

An 80-minute battle wasn't enough? I think the problem comes from the fact that too much time passes between seasons. If you binge-watch the series up until the latest episode, the whole White Walker story flows fairly nicely and comes to a nice conclusion. Even though the Night King is dead, I expect the story will be flushed out a bit further over the next three episodes. If it's not, then some of the criticism may be warranted.

Also, @Ancalagon posted a link to a great analysis of the battle strategy and why it made sense.

FTFY

Thanks. Sorry, I should have put more context around that.

The strategy of using Bran to bait the Night King made sense (and hence why I didn't entirely feel the ending was rushed) but everything else was indeed a hot mess.

I like to imagine the discussion the day before between all of the battlefield commanders.

Dothraki Commander: "We charge straight towards the attackers totally unsupported."

Davos: "No...no...NO! We've gone over this a dozen times. You are our screen! You locate the enemy, report it's movements, and delay them until the infantry passes through. Then you harass the flanks! DO. YOU. UNDERSTAND?"

Dothraki Commander: "Yes. I think so."

Davos: "Good. Now repeat it back to me."

Dothraki Commander: "We charge straight towards the attackers totally unsupported."

Davos:

Greyworm:

Tormund: "Good Plan!"

Given the troop deployment, it seems they took a page from South Park's strategy.

Dothrakis, not darkhis.

Dracharys.

*cough*

Anyone got a throat lozenge?

I wouldn't call Night King the biggest villain in TV history. Sure, he looked cool. But he really didn't do much of anything when he appeared. He stands and looks menacing. He raises his arms and resurrects the dead. Yeah, he did kill the dragon with an ice spear. But otherwise, not much. Unlike Thanos, he never joins the battle and fights the heroes head-on.

Personally, I thought this episode was phenomenal. I really appreciated the effort it must have taken to put this together, and I thought they put it all on the screen. For my money, Arya is 100 times the "girl power" heroine compared to Captain Marvel.

In case it was unclear what Jon was trying to do with the dragon at the very end, it seems he was trying to distract it so Arya could pass and get to the Night King.

https://www.countryliving.com/life/...roof-jon-snow-helped-arya-kill-the-night-king