What people saw coming was Cersei putting people in the Red Keep and Dany burning it down to kill her and in doing so killing the civilians. That is what the narrative set up ie that the civilians would be used as human shields. That was Cersei's plan.
In the end though they were not used as shields because Dany could have killed Cersei without killing them. So the narrative fails because it sets up a premise as civilians dying as human shields but then gives us civiliams dying for shits and giggles.