Meanwhile in Bran’s Plotline
Before I begin talking about the wretched disaster that is Game of Thrones: Season 8, I’ll sum up what little has transpired in Bran’s neck of the woods. Remember Bran? Nor do I!
Over the past three seasons, Bran Stark has been training to become the Three-Eyed Raven—the time-traveling Chosen One. This will rob him of his humanity, and it’s a good thing Bran was never much of a character to begin with, because turning a character into a lifeless robot is rarely a good idea.
Even when Gandalf returned as Gandalf the White, despite becoming more serious he still had a personality, and he was still capable of emotion. He still felt grief when bad things happened.
Even with the maia equivalent of PTSD, our most basic human reaction of laughter was still within Gandalf’s emotional range. In short, Gandalf the White is a character—deeply affected by his death, but a character nonetheless.
The same cannot be said of Bran, who went from bland to blander. The story is much the same with Jon Snow, who… ate a bowl of soup in a brooding manner one time. In either case, Martin’s characters barely change, and when they do they become even less interesting than before.
The Three-Eyed Rearden
Bran’s dialogue after losing his capacity for emotion is strikingly similar to the “heroes” of an Ayn Rand novel. When one of his friends says that he doesn’t need her anymore, Bran replies in a monotone:
“No, I don’t.”
Bran Stark, the Three Eyed Raven
I can’t help but be reminded of Hank Rearden from Atlas Shrugged (a book even worse than the ones this show is based on), who uses the same wording when he “heroically” abandons his family to starve. There are some Dagny Taggart similarities, as well. Keep this in mind for when we get to the ending, alright? Thanks.
The Night King: Game of Thrones as an Adaptation
One thing I find quite amusing is how the show’s Night King—the leader of the White Walkers—seems to have little or no connection with a figure from the books called “Night’s King.” I mean, stupid changes are ubiquitous in adaptations, but somehow one seldom thinks about this being equally true when adapting rubbish.
You see, since the books are still unfinished—and probably will be indefinitely—Game of Thrones found itself in the unenviable position of having to work from the author’s outlines for the rest of the series. The consequences of this are numerous and, to someone who never liked the story to begin with, side-splittingly funny.
Thus far, there’s been little or no indication that the Others (called White Walkers in the show) have a leader of any kind; George R.R. Martin has even said that he’s “not sure they have a culture.” There is, however, a legendary figure from millennia ago called “Night’s King.”
Attack of the Night King
On one of his journeys through time and space, Bran discovers the White Walkers’ origin story (which isn’t important) but inadvertently alerts the Night King to his location.
After learning of Jon Snow’s true parentage, Bran sacrifices his mentally-challenged servant to get himself and his privileged companions to safety. Because, you see, those living with cognitive impairments are only considered worthy of existence if they serve the purposes of neurotypicals.
Bran, now with a fancy new wheelchair, joins all the other supposed “heroes” and prepares for the coming war against the undead. As Season Seven concludes, the Night King kills one of Daenerys’ dragons so he can resurrect it as an undead White Walker-dragon. With his new weapon, the leader of the White Walkers destroys a section of the Wall and enters Westeros.
Game of Thrones: Season Eight
The various factions hold a parley to discuss terms of surrender or something—I don’t really care… Our “heroes” decide they need to present the lords and ladies of Westeros with proof of the White Walkers’ existence.
To this end they capture one of the White Walkers’ undead servants and bring it to the negotiations.
Upon seeing the wight, the Evil Queen Cersei decides she’s going to let our supposed “heroes” defeat the White Walkers, after which she’ll kill all of them in their moment of weakness and attain more power. When her incestuous lover Jaime hears this, he defects to whatever Game of Thrones considers the good side.
More Game of Thrones Incest
Now that all the characters we’re meant to like are on the same side, Season Eight Proper begins with pretty much all of them gathering at the Starks’ home of Winterfell to prepare for their last stand against the White Walkers.
Jon Snow and his lover Daenerys find out that Jon is the true heir to the throne and that Daenerys is actually Jon’s aunt.
This bothers Jon a bit, but Daenerys is cool with it. The only thing she’s worried about is whether Jon will challenge her claim to the Iron Throne. On the bright side, one of her dragons takes a liking to Jon.
Dying for the White Saviour
The main characters decide on a strategy for the coming battle, and then the final war for the fate of humanity begins with the Battle of Winterfell.
Our white “heroes” send the non-white soldiers out first, and they die! Jon and Daenerys ride out on their respective dragons to engage in an aerial battle with the Knight King. It’s not nearly as cool as it sounds.
In the end, the Night King gets away and raises the corpses in the Stark family crypts as undead. Most of the women and children hiding there are killed, but all the characters we’re supposed to care about are fine.
The Night King’s Defeat
As the Battle of Winterfell rages, Bran the Three-Eyed Chosen One acts as bait for the Night King, with child murderer Theon Greyjoy as his bodyguard.
Bran tells Theon, “You are a good man. Thank you,” because being a good friend to one of the main characters automatically absolves all wrongdoings.
After the Night King kills Theon and the other bodyguards, it looks like we’re finally going to have a confrontation between the two most powerful beings in the world: ice magic versus time-travel magic! Who will win?
The Night King prepares to attack Bran, but before he can get to him, Bran’s assassin sister Arya jumps the Night King from out of nowhere and stabs him with a dagger made from a special metal that kills White Walkers.
The Night King shatters into a million pieces, and so do all the other undead. The day is saved! And without a single interesting fight scene—hooray!
Instead of a duel to the death between two almighty creatures, we get an anticlimax where the villain is dispatched with ease. To make things even easier for the protagonists, all the other undead immediately follow suit.
Melisandre’s Death
With the White Walkers gone forever, Melisandre (the priestess who raped a teenage boy and burned a little girl to death) has finally completed her mission and saved the world. She removes the magic necklace that keeps her young, dying of old age in a matter of seconds. As happens often in Game of Thrones, killing innocent people is shown to have been the right thing to do.
Don’t mistake what I’m saying here. This theme within Game of Thrones is not a utilitarian “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few” moral like in Alan Moore’s graphic novel masterpiece Watchmen. If Game of Thrones resembled Watchmen even a little, this article probably wouldn’t have needed to exist.
What we have here is more-or-less the opposite of Watchmen. Throughout Game of Thrones, atrocities such as the slaughter of innocent people is framed as a pragmatic “grey area” when supposedly “virtuous” characters commit them, and these atrocities often benefit no one except the perpetrators or those close to them.
Far from the utilitarianism of Watchmen, the result of this framing is that Game of Thrones implicitly—and often explicitly—endorses a fundamentally egoistic philosophy, where the morality of an action depends not on its overall consequences, but on how it affects oneself.
This being Game of Thrones, it’s admittedly a little inconsistent in its philosophy and often swerves into what feels suspiciously like right-wing virtue ethics. Suppressing one’s emotions is always presented as a positive thing, regardless of consequences, and atrocities committed by women are far more likely to be condemned by the text than those done by men.
The Feast at Winterfell
Daenerys mourns the death of her friend the slave-trading pedophile, who died saving her in the battle. A lot of other side characters are dead, too. Moving on, the characters celebrate their victory with a feast.
Sansa reconnects with Sandor “the Hound” Clegane, whom she last saw that time he decided not to rape her. He comments on how she was later raped by Ramsay Bolton, to which she replies that it made her a stronger person.
How do I even comment on this? This is one of the worst ways to handle rape in a story short of glorifying the rapist—something Game of Thrones also does regularly.
Jon’s Claim
Jaime Lannister and Brienne of Tarth have a shag, but almost immediately afterwards Jaime leaves her to go back to his ex-lover (who’s also his sister).
Jon Snow tells Arya and Sansa Stark about his true parentage, and Sansa spills the beans to Tyrion, who tells an unimportant side character. That side character tries to push Jon’s claim, but Daenerys kills him.
The Sack of King’s Landing
Evil Queen Cersei’s evil ally Euron arrives with a fleet of ships—whose existence Daenerys conveniently forgot about—and kills Jon Snow’s dragon.
Euron also captures the only black woman in Game of Thrones, whom Cersei beheads after commenting that she’s chained like a slave.
Daenerys uses her last dragon to destroy the enemy fleet that she just failed to destroy with two dragons, also making sure to destroy all Cersei’s ballistae so she can’t kill her remaining dragon.
Daenerys’ and Jon’s soldiers storm Cersei’s capital of King’s Landing. Once the enemy soldiers surrender, the soldiers on the “good” side start raping and murdering all the women and children.
Daenerys herself uses her dragon to burn the whole city to the ground, killing Jaime and Cersei in the process.
Jon and a few of the other noblemen try in vain to stop the atrocities, because George R.R. Martin’s is a world where rich, entitled arseholes are somehow less prone to rape than everyone else. This final sack of King’s Landing is a perfect example, as it’s the rich people who try to stop the unwashed peasants from raping everyone.
Shadowfax
Arya Stark, who came to King’s Landing to kill Cersei, decides to escape with her own life instead. Not so for her friend Sandor, who kills his evil brother at the cost of his own life.
Arya sees a woman and her daughter burn to death, and then she herself is knocked out. After regaining consciousness, Arya inexplicably finds Shadowfax in the middle of a burning city, and the Lord of Horses carries her off to safety.
Note that this is Shadowfax from the film trilogy, as opposed to the novel. Tolkien actually described Shadowfax’s coat as being silvery grey in colour, making for effective camouflage at night, in contrast to the white horse seen in the film.
I don’t quite know how they managed to miss that, to be honest. Even the name “Shadowfax” evokes the image of a grey horse far more than a white one.
The Mad Queen
After the sack of King’s Landing, Jon and Tyrion discover that Daenerys’ soldiers are executing innocent civilians in the streets. When Tyrion refuses to be a part of this, Daenerys has him imprisoned and sentences him to death.
This is the point where we’re supposed to realize that Daenerys has gone insane like her father before her. Hers would make a good cautionary tale about the evils of incest and imperialism, but that’s not where this is going.
The Assassination of Daenerys Targaryen
Daenerys lays eyes on the Iron Throne of Westeros for the first time, and Jon approaches her. They talk about the world that Daenerys wants to create: “a good world.”
Some pretentious dialogue follows, and I think I know where this is going. They make out, and Jon Snow—who’s already come back from the dead once—ticks the last box in the Harry Potter checklist as he stabs his incestuous lover in the heart.
As Jon weeps over his queen, Daenerys’ last dragon (whose name is “Drogon,” after the second man to rape Daenerys) finds her corpse and, after Drogon fails to wake her, Jon stands ready to die for his actions, ready to make the ultimate sacrifice to save the world from her madness.
And just like Harry Potter before him, Jon Snow is spared this sacrifice when the dragon merely melts the iron throne instead.
Just as Harry should have stayed dead, Jon actually making this great sacrifice would have lent this ending some small amount of actual gravitas—something it sorely lacks all-round.