I know what would be fun! Let’s read as Peter Dinklage makes excuses for why fans didn’t like Game of Thrones ending. Of course, he’s completely wrong on almost every point he makes. Dinklage also does a pretty good job of essentially insulted the entire fan base whilst he’s at it. This all from one interview is undoubtedly impressive work. In a recent talk with NY Times Dinklage said this of the fan reaction to Game of Thrones abysmal final Season.
“It was the right time. You don’t want to wear out your welcome, although I’m not sure that show could have. But I think the reason there was some backlash about the ending is because they were angry at us for breaking up with them. We were going off the air and they didn’t know what to do with their Sunday nights anymore. They wanted more, so they backlashed about that.”
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When the interviewer put it to Dinklage that many fans wanted Game of Thrones to have a happy ending, the actor was on it like a stray dog eating a burger. Here’s the thing, who were these fans that wanted Game of Thrones to have a happy ending? Was the interviewer talking for himself alone? I know he was not talking about me, a fan aware that author George R. R. Martin always wanted a “bittersweet” ending to his series.
“They wanted the pretty white people to ride off into the sunset together. By the way, it’s fiction. There’s dragons in it. Move on. [Laughs] No, but the show subverts what you think, and that’s what I love about it.”
“Yeah, it was called ‘Game of Thrones,’ but at the end, the whole dialogue when people would approach me on the street was, ‘Who’s going to be on the throne?’ I don’t know why that was their takeaway because the show really was more than that. One of my favorite moments was when the dragon burned the throne because it sort of just killed that whole conversation, which is really irreverent and kind of brilliant on behalf of the show’s creators: ‘Shut up, it’s not about that.'”
Where to Start?
I’m really not sure where to start to debunk this claim. I was, and still am involved in various online ASOIAF and Thrones communities and by and large everyone hated that final Season. It had absolutely nothing to do with wanting a happy ending and any fan of the series or books would tell you this was not the show for happy endings. The ‘who will be on the Throne’ was a valid questions fans pondered. However, that didn’t necessarily mean the good guys would end up there at all.
Whether Drogon burned that throne or not, we still sort of got an answer to the question. The simple problem is that that answer was emotionally redundant and made no sense. As Dinklage’s Lannister told us all about why Bran would make the perfect King, I think the majority of fans were scratching their heads. Yeah, Bran has the best story, that’s why they didn’t even have home in an entire season. Brilliant /s. Most of those fans concede Bran will probably end up ruler in the books as well. However we all hope that in the author’s version the decision will actually make some sense.
Equally whilst most fans also expected Daenerys to go power hungry nutso, the way it was handled was too stark a transition. Why was that the moment which broke Danny, why right there and then? There are answers if one looks deep enough, but a show which reveled in ‘show not tell’ quickly devolved in the last two season into an exposition filled race to the ending. It needed at minimum 4-6 more episodes, maybe even another two seasons just to not feel like it was all rushed.
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Ultimately, the reason fans are so disappointed, still to this day, is because Game of Thrones was so good. I’m not lying when I say that it was the best show I’ve ever seen, up until Season 7. I know some fans lost faith after Season 5 because the show strayed away from the books, but I enjoyed it. Those last two seasons though, despite having some great moments were just rushed and too many character arcs didn’t land.
So Peter Dinklage makes excuses for why fans didn’t like Game of Thrones ending. However the simple and lasting truth will always be that Benioff and Weiss wanted out sooner than the show needed and had too big an ego to let anyone else finish it. I hope the Netflix shows they produce are worth tainted your legacy forever for? I guess we’ll see, though. the guaranteed huge sums of cash will probably ease the pain.
Thoughts below as always.