Game of Thrones

[AndrewCrossett]

I guess they realize that this last season will be considered a failure if it's anything less than the best thing ever shown on television.

[JBatmanFan05]

I guess they realize that this last season will be considered a failure if it's anything less than the best thing ever shown on television.

Many will have some high standards. I don't need "best thing ever shown on television" or even "best season of GoT", those aren't gonna happen no matter what sadly, but this season better be seriously aiming for like third best season, at the very least, as far as most critics and fans. If "third best season" is achieved (a difficult feat), I think most everyone will say the show finished strong enough. Third or fourth best season will require better really-makes-you-think writing, squeezing all the acting outta the main cast, avoiding too many Hollywood conventions, genuine shocks, making the war feel truly epic, etc.

[Emperor-of-Dragons]

I heard they are planning releasing graphic novels for Clash Of Kings book(the second book and the second season of the show).Might check them,as i am a big Stannis fan.

7 issues is out already, i would have thought they would be further along already in terms of books being adapted. They should be on the 4th book by now, at least.

[hulahulk]

2019....

....can I summon Bran to take me there, so I can report back to everyone here? Will he allow for a detour to my high school days to correct some things? Does it even work that way? I'll pay top dollar or large quantities of booze!

[Da Boat]

My biggest hope is that the show learns from S7. Particularly, S7 just felt like the show was losing its edge to Hollywood considerations. Plentiful happy endings, cute friendships, over-the-top death-defying plot armor survivals, etc. The writing was just way off the level of quality I was expecting. The “Let's capture a wight!” plan was weak writing that raised too many questions and took me out of that important part of the season.

Seasons 1 & 2 and others were just significantly better and smarter than this season IMHO. And it's sad that this show, like many shows, is going downhill when it has all the talent and money to defy that all too common trend and save its strongest seasons for the end. The show couldn't even manage IMHO to stay "on par" with previous seasons. It's a noticeably weaker season.

S8 will have to do a lot to diminish the stain of S7 for me and redeem the show's overall conclusion. Frankly, I have a ton of doubt now.


The Wire had some problems for me after Season 2, but its last season, particularly some of the last episodes were so powerful and brilliantly genius (and subversive) (writing-wise) that they redeemed much of show's lesser parts.

Felt like movie Josh Whedon wrote the seventh season.

Also part of the screw up was they didn't have Martin's great writing and they got scared and decided to rush things to get to the end of the series as soon as possible. And they stumbled a lot. Instead of panicking cause Martin was doing his own thing, they should have waited further till the guy finish the books.

They were afraid to lose viewers by killing favorite characters so most everybody got a free pass and to compensate they did a few revenge killings to satisfy people like the Freys and Baelish. Yea we all hated Baelish but that was the point, it's a World of Grey, he should have made till the end cause of how freaking devious he was and how great he was at playing the game.

[Madam-Shogun-Assassin]

Also part of the screw up was they didn't have Martin's great writing and they got scared and decided to rush things to get to the end of the series as soon as possible.

I don't think so, D&D just seem like they're over the show and just wanted to move on to something else. There's a **** ton of other stuff that they could have done from the books that could have filled that gap. A much darker theory i read elsewhere was that D&D saw what George had planned as a ending for his book series and was like "**** that" and went a different route.

[Starter Set]

A much darker theory i read elsewhere was that D&D saw what George had planned as a ending for his book series and was like "**** that" and went a different route.

Intriguing theory. That would be pretty funny.

[Confuzzled]

Felt like movie Josh Whedon wrote the seventh season.

Also part of the screw up was they didn't have Martin's great writing and they got scared and decided to rush things to get to the end of the series as soon as possible. And they stumbled a lot. Instead of panicking cause Martin was doing his own thing, they should have waited further till the guy finish the books.

They were afraid to lose viewers by killing favorite characters so most everybody got a free pass and to compensate they did a few revenge killings to satisfy people like the Freys and Baelish. Yea we all hated Baelish but that was the point, it's a World of Grey, he should have made till the end cause of how freaking devious he was and how great he was at playing the game.

If Whedon had written it then Brienne, Pod, Tormund, Arya, Sam and Gilly would have been slaughtered in quick succession just "for the feels"

A Dance of Dragons awkwardly lumbers and stumbles all over the place. If that is a sign of the GRRM's writing and pacing in the last two books then good on D&D for streamlining the story and reaching the end game fast.

And Baelish while devious, had to be removed from the board before the White Walkers hit. They are way too OP so his machinations would have been useless. I wonder if Book Sansa never returned to Winterfell and somehow has him killed in the Eyrie itself. That would be even more anticlimactic in a way.

[XPac]

I guess they realize that this last season will be considered a failure if it's anything less than the best thing ever shown on television.

It will be "considered" a failure, but really it won't be. We all know it'll get ridiculously high ratings and make the show and HBO a good deal of money I'm sure.

Yeah, if it's anything short of brilliant it's likely people will walk away with some disappointment, but its earned a strong loyal fanbase which will see it through to the end.

[JBatmanFan05]

It will be "considered" a failure, but really it won't be. We all know it'll get ridiculously high ratings and make the show and HBO a good deal of money I'm sure.

Yeah, if it's anything short of brilliant it's likely people will walk away with some disappointment, but its earned a strong loyal fanbase which will see it through to the end.

Exactly. No threat of financial failure at all. The only question will be the court of critic and non-critic fan public opinion.

[Emperor-of-Dragons]

If Whedon had written it then Brienne, Pod, Tormund, Arya, Sam and Gilly would have been slaughtered in quick succession just "for the feels"

To be fair, he said movie Whedon, not TV Whedon.

[Emperor-of-Dragons]

Exactly. No threat of financial failure at all. The only question will be the court of critic and non-critic fan public opinion.

It's been said before, but it'll likely end up being divisive like Lost.

[JBatmanFan05]

It's been said before, but it'll likely end up being divisive like Lost.

HBO and the showrunners would be content enough with divisiveness about who lost/who won (there are huge passionate fans of every character and they won't all live or win), that's pretty much inevitable, but what they don't want is public opinion against the quality and execution of the season.

They at least want: "Man, I'm soooo bummed the Hound beheaded Tyrion, but what a great season!"

[AndrewCrossett]

I wonder how HBO measures the financial success of GoT season 8. With no advertising, the main barometer of success is "how many people subscribed to HBO specifically to watch this show." I'm guessing not a lot of new subscribers will show up to watch the 8th season if they hadn't already subscribed... and a lot of people will drop their subscriptions when it's over because it's the main HBO show they care about.

The biggest value of season 8 is that it ties a bow around the series and allows HBO to market it as a complete work. And, of course, in a show like this a disappointing ending devalues the whole thing. Lots and lots of "Lost" fans never went back and re-visited the show at all because the ending ruined the whole thing for them.

[XPac]

I wonder how HBO measures the financial success of GoT season 8. With no advertising, the main barometer of success is "how many people subscribed to HBO specifically to watch this show." I'm guessing not a lot of new subscribers will show up to watch the 8th season if they hadn't already subscribed... and a lot of people will drop their subscriptions when it's over because it's the main HBO show they care about.

The biggest value of season 8 is that it ties a bow around the series and allows HBO to market it as a complete work. And, of course, in a show like this a disappointing ending devalues the whole thing. Lots and lots of "Lost" fans never went back and re-visited the show at all because the ending ruined the whole thing for them.

Given the relatively large gap between season 7 and 8, I think it's entirely possible many people cancelled their HBO but plan on renewing it again when season 8 starts.