Thank You, Game of Thrones

Spoilers through the end of Game of Thrones.

Reading back over your own work can be hard. Past Me has said a few things that make Present Me cringe, especially on those things that I was so, so, so wrong about.

Like this line, from my 2017 On Jon Snow post: “I really do trust that Game of Thrones won’t take the easy route.”

Whoops. So much for that.

I’ve written before about the three basic ways we critique film and television: screenwriting and narrative, production values, and political correctness. In one way or another, Season 8 of Game of Thrones fails in each of these three ways. The dialogue is awful, but thinks it’s clever. The ending makes no sense. The nighttime scenes are confusingly dark and there are Starbucks cups being left on the set. The people of color are killed off or further reduced to shrieking savages and the female de facto protagonist is, as the great Lindsay Ellis would say, “put down like Old Yeller” by her boyfriend. Everyone, it seems, has given up.

(No hatred on the actors, though. they were great.)

I don’t want to go too much into why it was so bad, because it makes me a little sad to think about it and because more talented people than me have already done it. I’ll just leave Lindsay Ellis’ two wonderful videos on it here for your viewing pleasure:

Part 1: We Need to Talk About Game of Thrones I Guess

Part 2: The Last of the Game of Thrones Hot Takes

So with that said, let’s leave the negativity behind for a bit.

Game of Thrones came into my life at a time when I was getting ready to leave high school–a very scary transitional time for many of us. I began reading A Song of Ice and Fire at the beginning of my senior year, and watched the show–which was three seasons in by then–alongside it. There was a group of guys I hung out with at lunch who had seen the show and read the books, and I wanted to be part of the conversation.

I look back on that time as one of the most important in my life: a time when I was finally beginning to accept and love myself, to embrace those things I had been afraid to in the past because I thought they were embarrassing or nerdy, and to find real connection with other people in the world.

Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire reignited a dormant love of fantasy in me. The popularity of the show contributed to the sense that it wasn’t just acceptable to be a nerd; it was cool. I’ve met new people, built friendships on our shared love for Game of Thrones. It’s gotten me in the door at internships and even jobs. I once had an hour-long conversation with a total stranger in Madison Square Park about our predictions for the show–something a younger me would have never, never believed possible. For the five seasons that I watched it as it aired, it was a Sunday-night ritual with whatever friends were around me, and, even till the end, it was my favorite time of the year.

The ending was a letdown in every possible sense, and I think it’s going to be hard to go back and rewatch the early seasons and enjoy them like I used to. But the journey was a good one. A fantastic one. The positive contributions Game of Thrones made in my life more than make up for its disappointing ending.

No, I don’t think I’ll be naming my first kid Daenerys or Khaleesi. But I also don’t believe the absolute shafting that character got negates the things I loved about her before. Like how good it felt to watch a complex, amazing, flawed female character rise to power in a world that kept trying to keep her down.

So, y’know, that’s all I’ve got. Ultimately, it’s just a dumb TV show and we move on eventually. Yeah, it’s disappointing, but in a world where everything kind of sucks right now, this is one thing for which I can choose to focus on the positives. Thank you, Game of Thrones.

(See you back here in thirty years when the next book comes out!)