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Atarimaster's Replies
> There should have been real conflict between Jon and Dany,
> with Jon proclaiming he is the rightful King, Dany agrees
> and orders her armies to accept Jon as their King.
That would have made ME say: "Seriously - who wrote this crap?"
Totally out of character for both. But we’ve had this discussion before.
I still think you (that’s the general not the specific "you") should distinguish between things that you simply didn’t like because you hoped for/predicted something else, and things that really went bad.
> And her dragon and Grey Worm dont even try to avenge her?
Regarding Drogon:
We know that dragons aren’t stupid but we’ve never learned how intelligent they are exactly. If we assume they are about "dog intelligent", then it’d make sense that while Drogon gets that his beloved mother is dead, he simply can’t come to the conclusion that she was killed by Jon. However – the writers destroyed that assumption since Drogon, the way he roared at Jon, obviously knew what happened there. AND of course followed by burning down the throne which implies he is even capable of symbolic acts.
So basically it’s down to the explanation that he won’t burn a Targaryen no matter what. I’m not saying that this is a good explanation, but I guess that’s what the writers had in mind.
Oh yeah! Wonderful boobs!
When the High Septon was in Littlefinger’s brothel, surrounded by "the Seven", there was one that I liked a lot – I [i]think[/i] it was the "Maiden" but I’d have to watch the scene again to make sure.
(continuation:)
> while Arya called upon the many-faced god to take down the Freys,
> their deaths was the righteous judgment of the Seven
Didn’t Jaqen say that the Many-Faced God IS the Seven Gods anyway, in seven incarnations? I remember him saying SOMETHING like that but I can’t remember his exact words.
> recall the farmer telling Arya and the Hound that WF would burn in seven hells for the Red Wedding.
AND remember Bran’s story of the Rat Cook.
I guess that story was where Arya got the idea with the pie… most likely, Old Nan told it to Arya, too.
Talking of Old Nan: Hats off to Margaret John, may she rest in peace! She did such a great job in Season 1!
> by the way, I hope you read this as academic debate and not as trolling arguments.
Not to worry, I understand this. But thank you nonetheless for voicing it. :-)
> Now, I see it completely differently. I've always viewed it as all the various faiths are
> presented as being "real" and their gods "having power." (…)
While the examples you mention are all true, I still feel that in the TV show, they (probably intentionally) handled this matter quite vaguely, it works both with being explained with "real gods" and "magic only". As for the books, as I’ve said before, I don’t remember them very all. I think I should be prepare a list of things that I should pay attention to when I read them again. ;-)
However I’m quite sure (correct me if I’m wrong) that we don’t get a "proof" there, too.
And there’s one thing that I do remember from the books:
> and you'll notice that there are wargs only in places where they are worshiped.
Yes, but in the novels (book spoilers following)
[spoiler]Arya can warg, too, but for a long time, she doesn’t know what to make of it when she e.g. has dreams in which she sees through Nymeria’s eyes.[/spoiler]
So theoretically, it IS possible that there are wargs all over Westeros (and Essos) but nobody teaches them about their power thus they never learn how to use it. Granted, if that’s what GRRM had in mind, he could have easily introduced one character from the south/east who unknowingly is a warg. I don’t think there is such a character, which might be a hint that your theory is correct.
> And one could probably say it was the power of the Great Stallion
> that actually enabled Dany to birth the dragons.
And there is the thing that Dany is impervious to fire (and apparently, all kinds of heat).
While some people thought that it’s a Targaryen thing, we saw Viserys die from heat, and more importantly: In the DVD/BD audio commentaries, GRRM mentions at one point that this is not a power that is inherited by all Targaryens. (Sorry, can’t remember on which episode that specific comment is to be found.)
So yes, this *might* hint at the involvement of Gods.
(tbc)
(continuation:)
– And of course: I’m still not sure whether the writers wanted us to believe that Dany turned mad or if they were following the "she has always been a villain but everybody refused to believe that" approach that some people (here in the forum and in other places of the web) were propagating. Maybe this means I’m dumb but in that case, I simply wish they had made this clear even for dullards.
– Not trashing Jaime’s redemption arc in a jiff by making him say: "Oh, I just noticed, I am, and always have been, evil."
– While I actually liked that Cersei did NOT get a memorable death, I would’ve preferred to see her die all alone, screaming "I don’t want to die" to herself and not to her brother/lover.
– etc. pp.
I’d probably find some more things but I just stop here.
I’ve given this a bit of thought, but – to be honest, I’m too lazy to come up with detailed description of my own version.
And as I’ve said in other threads, I am mostly satisfied with the ending in itself, I just wish they had taken more time to flesh out some things and give some better explanations. And somethings you’d have to do more than just rewriting season 8, for example: What was the Night King’s original plan to get past the wall before Dany conveniently provided him with a dragon? At the time the episode aired, I assumed that he might have some kind of greensight, too, so he ALWAYS knew that he’ll have a dragon. But if he had, how could he be surprised by Arya in the Godswood?
(On a sidenote: Regarding plot holes, "Beyond the Wall" is in my opinion easily the worst of all 73 episodes. Yet on imdb.com it gets a 9.1. Ouch.)
So here are just a few notes of what I would have preferred:
– I would have loved to see Jaqen H’ghar one more time. It doesn’t matter to me whether he tries to kill Arya (and preferably fails because I wanted Arya to survive) or if he just explains why he let her get away from the Faceless Men. The main point is that this story arc is closed properly.
– Of course giving some explanation for the Jon/Grey Worm/Unsullied situation mentioned above.
– Leaving out the "a dragon is no match for a bunch of scorpions / a bunch of scorpions is no match for a dragon" contradiction.
– Leaving out that stupid negotiations at the walls of King’s Landing et the end of S08E04. They’ve seen that Cersei can’t be trusted, so what do they do? Send their most important people AND their dragon to the walls where a battery of scorpions is pointed at them. And Cersei in a sudden burst of honor doesn’t take advantage of this. Yeah, right.
(tbc)
Wait, we don’t know HOW smart Hodor is. After all, it’s hard to show your intelligence when all that you can say is a single word. And he liked fried eggs with with a rasher of bacon and some blood sausage, so he can’t be THAT dumb.
;-)
> OK! We both assume he's innocent.
Nope.
Of course, you can label Sauron as innocent, or Emperor Palpatine or the great majority of all fictional villians we’ve ever seen or read about who never got a trial, too. I don’t apply our real-world juristic rules to a piece of fiction, because there, we habe other ways to know the truth (which even are more reliable).
> The answer is probably in the DVD with the commentary on.
Maybe, but I guess they save this for the prequel. We’ll see.
> Part of the training is to make fighting automatic or instinctual
> so that they don't freeze during battle.
Yeah, but *this* part of the training (I don’t doubt there are others) isn’t very helpful when you’re tied to a tree with someone approaching you with a weapon in his hand…
But as you said, maybe we’ll get the background in another way.
Feel free to have the last word on this, but I’m not going to continue this discussion.
> Correct me if I am wrong but I do not think there is a Waif character
The Waif is also in the books.
> and Arya does not kill Meryn Trant, correct?
Correct.
> She is blinded for a different reason, i think killing a night's watch deserter
She kills the deserter, but the way I remember it, she is not blinded because of the kill itself, but because she mentions to The-man-who-is-Jaqen-H'ghar-in-the-show-but-not-in-the-books ;-) that "Arya" killed him, thus showing that she still isn’t no one.
One difference between Tolkien’s and GRRM’s world is: In Tolkien’s world, there definetely ARE Gods. In GRRM’s world there are, just like in out world, different beliefs and different religions, but we, the readers and viewers, never get to learn if there are Gods at all. (At least I think it was this way in the books also, but as I’ve said before, I forgot so much I surely wouldn’t bet on it.)
Except for the Lord of Light. Bringing back Beric and Jon always seemed like a proof that HE really exists. Now, the writers could have taken a turn on that by somehow explaining that actually both Thoros and Melisandre (unknowingly!) had the power to bring back the dead in themselves (we do know that magic exists in this world). They just *thought* it was the Lord of Light, granting a request.
That would explain a bit, but… it doesn’t feel like a good solution as well, does it?
It’s more like replacing an anticlimatic ending with a different anticlimatic ending.
> prior to that (…) it seemed like a person did not need to be dead for their face to be used.
Hmm, well, I seem to remember we did see them taking off the faces of the dead at the time when Arya was still ordered to clean the bodies, which implies that they need the faces, however at the moment I’m not sure if we REALLY saw that of if, you know, my imagination filled in some blanks.
Moreover, what I know for sure, when Arya killed Meryn Trant she wore the face of the little ill girl that was brought to the House of Black & White by her father a few episodes earlier.
But you are right on how the removing of the faces changed, although it never occured to me before. How the hell could I miss that?
On the scene where Arya sees her own face, I have no idea. I already wondered about that when I first saw it (because at that time, I already assumed that they need the faces of the dead) but as you say, they never came up with a proper explanation.
I see, when you wrote "when Jon mounts his dragon for the final battle" I suspected that battle would be a "one on one on dragons", which would give her the advantage IMO. But now I understand that you actually include other options.
> Well it's fun to pretend we're all staff writers or something.
It is! :-)
Let me start by saying that I would’ve been fine with your version.
I like that you did NOT take the course some people suggested, that Daenerys should have taken King’s Landing BEFORE going north to stop the Army of the Dead, which would’ve made no sense at all to me. (I’m not going to elaborate on that here because this is the thread regarding your alternate ending.)
However, I think in one regard you’re making the same mistake that the writers did:
> Well, he wins somehow.
You see, in my opinion it’s highly unlikely that Jon CAN win. Drogon always was shown as the largest and strongest of the Dragons, Daenerys IS Rhaegal’s mother, and Daenerys has more experience how to ride a dragon and use it as a weapon.
So, how did the writers handle such unlikely things?
– How is it possible that the Unsullied didn’t kill Jon right away after he killed Daenerys? Oh, somehow. Let’s just not show it.
– How is it possible that the Council persuaded Grey Worm to accept Jon’s "punsihment"? Somehow.
By just saying "he wins somehow", you’re doing the same in my opinion, you’re neglecting to explain how a VERY important part of the story actually worked.
Of course I understand that this is just a draft so just take my posting as a suggestion of which part has to elaborated on in order to make the story work. I’m not saying it is impossible that Jon wins (after all, unlikely things DO happen, in our real world and even more so in stories), just that I’m not satisfied with a "somehow" because that "somehow" approach of the writers was one of the things that spoiled the ending for me.
> Then we both agree that he's innocent.
No.
I said "I don’t think" so this is my assumption. Doesn’t make it real. But more importantly: In real life, the "innocent until proven guilty" concept is good and just because we usually have no way of actually *knowing* what happened until a trial tries to find it out.
In books we’ve got the "omniscient narrator" (not used in The Song of Fire and Ice of course) who tells us what really happened. In TV shows we see often what really happened (and this has been used in GoT). Thus, while a person might not be proven guilty to the other people in the story, we, the viewers, may know fully well if he’s innocent or not.
> At some point you have to use your common sense
Well, my common sense tells me if you want to create a monster you might prefer select a human who already has shown signs of cruelity, not someone who wouldn’t harm a hair on sb.’s head. Maybe that’s even the reason that the spell went wrong and the NK turned against his creators.
Of course you’re right that this would be less dramatic – a true tragedy would be if the NK was the Jon Snow of his time before he was turned. Therefore I kinda HOPE that you’re right here.
But my point was that at the current stage, we don’t KNOW what happened.
And since I sincerely hope that the prequel will tell us the full story of the CotF and NK, I’ll stop speculating here.
> It sounds like those soldiers were poorly trained.
I’m very lucky that I never needed to go to war. So I’m not going to judge my family members who meanwhile are dead, nor any other soldiers who died fulfilling their duty. I just hope that you don’t believe that all well-trained soldiers die with "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" on their lips.
But what makes you think that all the soldiers in the GoT world get a proper training?
> Innocent until proven guilty. Children of the Forest never gave him a trail.
Sorry, but you’re contradicting yourself here. On one hand, you say "innocent until proven guilty", on the other hand, you *assume* that the CotF didn’t gave him a trial.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they gave him a trial either. But in my opinion you can’t play the "not proven guilty" card in one sentence, and in the next, comdemn another one as guilty (of not giving a trial) without a proof.
> Notice how much screaming he did. Very unsoldierlike behavior on his part.
Well. My grandfather and some of my great-uncles were soldiers in WWII. According to the stories they told me, screaming like a baby at the moments before death is not uncommon among soldiers.
Not at all.
Alright.
Have it your way if you are desperate to see Nazi resemblence in the White Walkers.
Maybe tomorrow I’ll think of something which makes The Faceless Men Nazis because – Hey! Why did they hire a German actor for it and allowed him to speak with an German accent? Must be Nazi stuff.
I’m outta here.
I’m not convinced with your White Walkers theory, because there’s nothing in there except a faint resemblance to the swastika. From the north? – That’s in the books. Polar? – That’s in the books.
Blue eyes, white (not blond) hairs? Yeah, but what colors would YOU apply to creatures who are from the icy north?
Red hair, brown eyes? Please.
The real historic prototypes? Yes, of course you’re right there.
As far Dany’s speech, of course it resembled Nazi speeches, I didn’t question this. We also saw something like this in "Star Wars: The Force Awakens". But the design of Dany's banner was the Targaryen sigil that was used from the beginning, and I seriously doubt the showrunners knew that Dany would end up being evil at that point.
We don’t know if he was really innocent, do we?
For all we know he could have been one of the men slaughtering the Children of the Forest – or did I miss something?
It *might* have made more sense if we had seen
– how Jon Snow got taken prisoner instead of being killed at once,
– how the council talked Grey Worm into accepting the "punishment" they proposed for Jon.
I admit that I couldn’t come up with a satisfying logical version of that scenes. I mean, a scene that makes the viewers think: "Alright, this makes sense", but then again I’m not a writer.
But who knows, maybe they couldn’t think of anything logical here, too, so they just left it out and thought that nobody would notice.