Game of Thrones S8 E6: The Iron Throne

I’m sorry, what? “Bran the Broken, First of His Name, Lord of the Six Kingdoms”? Get outta town, Game of Thrones. Really, I had to laugh last night. Of course, the character I absolutely cannot stand becomes king. Of course he does. It’s not that I expect anyone to write something just for me, and I’m not outraged or anything; just kind of amused and vaguely annoyed.

There are several reasons why Bran would be a bad king. He doesn’t have many actual skills. He can warg into animals and see the past, but that won’t help his subjects, especially when they need so much practical help after the destruction of King’s Landing. He is completely charisma-free, and not the type of person who could get people to follow him. Sure, Bran is the repository of a lot of wisdom and stories, but he hasn’t shown much that he actually cares about people, which is a trait good leaders would have. For years, people physically dragged him to hell and back and he never showed much gratitude or that he was concerned about those people’s well-being.

Also, didn’t Bran get the Children of the Forest killed because of his carelessness? Or are we glossing over that?

Anyway, meet your new king, Westeros, and good luck with that. Samwell tried to invent democracy, which got him laughed almost out of town. Sansa was smart enough to declare Northern independence in an unintentionally hilarious way: “Love you, Bran; you’ll be a great king; we’re seceding.” It was very gratifying to see Sansa ascend the throne. She’s been through hell. She started as a starry-eyed kid with unrealistic ideas about the world and love and royalty, and emerged as a real leader. Sansa has probably had my favorite character arc of the series. All hail the Queen in the North.

I thought about it between episodes and maybe I misread Daenerys’s nuking of King’s Landing. I think there was more rationality in her destruction than I appreciated at first. I watched the footage again and she and Drogon go back and forth across the city, almost like mowing a lawn. That’s more methodical and not the act of someone who just “flipped out.” Maybe Daenerys just believed a little too much in her own cause and went too far.

“Everywhere she goes, evil men die, and we cheer her for it,” Tyrion says. When Daenerys goes too far, King’s Landing becomes a nightmare, with the creepy Targaryen flag draped over the rubble as snow and ash fall (and a beautiful shot of Drogon’s wings emerging from behind Dany). She will liberate the entire world from tyrants, a promise that she pointedly extends to Winterfell and the Stark rule. I really liked Emilia Clarke’s performance this episode.

In the end, like Dark Phoenix, maybe Daenerys has killed too many people to be allowed to live. Jon, the only one who can get close enough to kill his queen, stabs her before she can even sit in the Iron Throne. The staging was sort of anticlimactic, although I did like Drogon poking at his mother’s lifeless body. Then the whole Iron Throne is gone, melted down by Drogon. It’s all over.

I think season eight could have used more episodes to flesh out Dany’s turn into destruction and Bran’s worthiness of the throne. I write these reviews off the cuff first thing Monday mornings, without much time to delve deeper, so my thinking on this season may evolve, and I’m open to be convinced of other points of view.

It’s all over. Game of Thrones is a show that I had not expected to enjoy, and I resisted it for a few years. It turned out to be a sprawling world of adventure combined with politics and intrigue, and I’m so glad I took a chance on it.