How to Move On to House of the Dragon: A Festivus for Westeros

And let the **House of the Dragon** be born

Deciding How to Move On

Three years and nearly three months. I finished writing and posting the recap of “The Iron Throne” on May 25, 2019; since then, we’ve had a presidential election, a worldwide pandemic, a false start or two with other spinoff series, and, naturally, no Winds of Winter. All that time, including 12+ months in lockdown, and I haven’t rewatched a single episode of Game of Thrones (I have watched Jon dunk on Ramsay more than a few times).

How does that happen? I wrote episode recaps for four full seasons, I’ve read the books multiple times, and I’ve even dabbled in Thrones analytics like a true lunatic. It must be the bad taste left in my mouth from the finale and most of the final two seasons. Its distinct flavor of disappointment hasn’t diminished sufficiently to allow for a rewatch, and I fear it’s dampening my excitement for House of the Dragon.

So: how do we simultaneously celebrate the return of Westeros to our televisions AND rid ourselves of the Hodor-sized baggage Benioff and Weiss left us with by clumsily racing to the finish line of the most popular show on television?

The commonly circled dates on the calendar just won’t cut it. St. Patrick’s Day is effective at helping us forget, but it’s determinedly revelatory. Halloween does an interesting dance between happy and spooky, but that vibe isn’t quite right either. New Year’s Eve is probably the closest a holiday I’m familiar with comes to capturing concurrent looks into the past and future, in a much less annoying manner than whatever Bran Stark has been up to since becoming the Three-Eyed Raven. But the best celebration for a moment like this is clear: Festivus.

Wikipedia tells us the five major components of Festivus are as follows:

The Festivus Pole
The Festivus Dinner
The Airing of Grievances
The Feats of Strength
Festivus Miracles

For the purposes of our preparation, we’ll combine the Feats of Strength and the Festivus Miracles into one section. In a world populated with zombies, dragons, and genuine magic, “miracles” is limited to stunning physical accomplishments and sudden changes of heart anyway. The Festivus Dinner is just too dangerous for this section of the website; if anyone in Westeros invites you to dinner, line up a life insurance policy and a will before getting dressed. Hopefully the Airing of Grievances will allow us to move on into House of the Dragon with an open mind, and we’ll see what we can do to provide a Festivus Pole in a digital format. Let’s start by running through everything in Seasons 7 and 8 we’ve been stewing about since the series finale in a segment I could have titled “What My Friends Missed Least About Me During COVID”.

The Airing of Grievances

Ludicrous Speed, Go! (Speeding of the Timeline)

The first sign we were headed for trouble was watching the storyline speed up dramatically, something I noticed around the start of Season 7. The Season 6 Finale, ”The Winds of Winter”, pointed most of the characters down their final paths: Cersei secured her stranglehold on King’s Landing and the Iron Throne, Jon was named King In the North, and Daenerys set sail for Westeros. To that point, we had spent 60 hours with key characters largely isolated from one another, and for good reason: Westeros and Essos are pretty big, and unless you have a dragon or only need to visit port cities, you’re limited to walking or riding a horse. In the books it took Jon and Tyrion 18 days of hard riding to get from Winterfell to the Wall. For context, here are some comparisons based on the maps in The Lands of Ice and Fire:

Winterfell to the Vale: 36 days
Winterfell to King’s Landing: 40 days
King’s Landing to Casterly Rock: 21 days
Casterly Rock to Highgarden: 18 days
Highgarden to King’s Landing: 20 days
Sunspear to King’s Landing: 33 days

Okay, so why should folks less nerdy and obsessive than me care? If you’ve only watched the show, what difference does it make if Littlefinger goes from the Vale to Winterfell to King’s Landing (76 days of travel, minimum) in Season 5? Is it really so bad if the seven episodes in Season 7 show Jon crushing travel this hard?

After all, it’s fun to see these characters in the same place after so much time!

That’s true, but it creates two major problems: first, what are we supposed to think everyone else is doing during these long stretches? And second, if travel isn’t as slow as I’m making it out to be, earlier storylines and decisions stop making sense.

I Never Know What She’s Doing Back There
As an example of the first problem, let’s look at the movements of some of the other main characters during Season 7.

When Daenerys and her advisors arrive in Dragonstone in Episode 1, Tyrion convinces her not to immediately take King’s Landing by force because of a likelihood of civilian casualties. In the next episode she loses a fleet and an army to Euron Greyjoy when he destroys Yara’s ships transporting soldiers from Dorne. One episode later, she’s distanced from the Unsullied on their useless takeover of Casterly Rock, and in Episode 4 she uses Drogon and Dothraki to win a massive victory over the Lannister forces returning from Highgarden.

If we believe the events in a given episode are happening somewhat concurrently, there would be at least 60 days between when Euron ambushes Yara’s fleet (end of Episode 2) and Dany’s attack on the Lannister “Loot Train” (Season 7, Episode 4 – also, massive eyeroll). This is based on Jaime traveling from King’s Landing to Casterly Rock, then leading an army south to Highgarden, taking the castle, and bringing all of the Tyrell gold back to the capital.

What have Daenerys and her advisors been up to for these 2+ months? She could have been using Drogon to search for and destroy the Iron Fleet (if they’re anywhere near King’s Landing, where Euron appears in Episode 3 to deliver the Sand Snakes, they’re right next to Dragonstone). She also could have been doing reconnaissance around King’s Landing, collecting useful information like the movements of the Lannister’s top general and presumably some troops towards Casterly Rock. Instead, from what we can tell, she spent the entire time making googly eyes at Jon Snow (that cave lighting always works for him) and wondering if Tyrion was actively sabotaging her plans or just turning into an idiot. That’s a fair concern, as we’ll get to later, but I’d expect some multitasking.

Fast Travel is a Game Changer

For the second problem, let’s consider the possibility that TV show Westeros isn’t as large or difficult to traverse as book Westeros. Heck, maybe TV Dragonstone doesn’t even have a commanding position just outside King’s Landing that would allow someone with a dragon to easily manage the comings and goings of any ships (there’s a reason Aegon the Conqueror set up his capital where he did).

In that case, decisions, events, and storylines from the earlier, slower-paced stretches of the show are cheapened. The seasons-long journeys of Brienne and Jaime in Season 3, Arya and the Hound in Season 4, and Sansa in Seasons 4 and 5 all seem a little less harrowing if notable characters like Season 7 Jaime can scoot between major cities so easily. Why were the members of the Night’s Watch so hesitant to range out to the Fist of the First Men if getting back to the Wall is as easy as Season 7 Gendry makes it look? Would the Red Wedding have ever come about if circumventing the Twins and Walder Frey was a matter of days instead of weeks or months? Shouldn’t Stannis have been attacking Winterfell before Ramsay could infiltrate his camp and destroy critical supplies if it’s easier than we thought to get there from Castle Black? It’s not that you CAN’T answer any of these questions, but what was a carefully plotted show with real-world problems to overcome suddenly pressed fast forward in a very disorienting way.

Deus Ex Power Dynamics (Illogical Power Swings)

For a long time, Game of Thrones was the most fascinating show to talk about because of its suspense and unpredictability. No character was safe, single bad decisions had real and often fatal consequences, and being seen as a hero or protagonist didn’t come with plot armor to overcome long odds. Robb Stark was leading a sizable army and outmaneuvering his opponents, but being ambushed by troops in full armor at the Red Wedding was too much to overcome. Jon Snow blew up his approach at the Battle of Winterfell in hopes of scooping up straight-line Rickon before Ramsay’s arrows hit him, and his army was nearly wiped out. But with the series winding down, the showrunners felt the need to drive to a speedy conclusion AND maintain the high level of suspense we were accustomed to. Maybe someone out there could have managed both in just 13 episodes, but it wasn’t Benioff and Weiss. Instead, we had to watch manufactured stakes swing wildly from one episode to another. Here’s a brief rundown of the resulting shenanigans, starting in Season 7:

Daenerys shows up in Dragonstone with an overwhelming force: a fleet from Dorne and the Iron Islands, a Dothraki horde sizable enough to inspire fear on Westeros BEFORE a Civil War, an army of the Unsullied, and three dragons. With a clear advantage over the Lannisters and the conveniently located castle of Dragonstone to negotiate from, everything is looking up for Dany and her Hand. Tyrion, to this point an unparalleled strategist, suggests dividing their forces and sending the Unsullied (all the way around the southern tip of the continent!) to Casterly Rock while Yara’s ships head south to transport Dornish troops…up to King’s Landing. Casterly Rock has no strategic value and there are no hostile forces blocking the Dornish troops from marching north to King’s Landing, so there’s no REAL reason to pursue either course beyond balancing the scales. When the Unsullied find Casterly Rock unguarded and their ships burning behind them, Dany loses access to one of her armies. Yara’s fleet carrying the Dornish military is ambushed by Euron, and Dany is down her navy and another army.

With the scales balanced to some extent, Dany makes a move and ambushes the Lannister forces returning from Highgarden. The resulting battle gives us a sample of what just one dragon and the Dothraki horde can do, easily routing the Lannister forces and, in a sane world, killing Jaime Lannister (more on that later).

Now things seem clear again: the Targaryens have a sizable military advantage unless the Lannisters took Highgarden with a tiny army and even more motivation to attack King’s Landing quickly, before the Lannister forces can regroup. Instead, they choose to wait and see if Jon Snow can capture a wight from an army of the undead and transport it south as proof to the Lannisters of a larger threat.

This is incredibly illogical for many reasons. To name a few: no living person should think Cersei will join in a cause for the greater good, especially after the Sept of Baelor; Daenerys can very easily fly a dragon north of the Wall to see if a large undead army is roaming about instead of asking a small troop to make a months-long trip with little chance of success; no one but Jon has any reason to believe the Night King exists. The audience knows an undead army is out there, but no one should think capturing a wight on foot and not being noticed by the White Walkers is a sound strategy. It’s a dumb idea proposed by one party and immediately accepted by another at the expense of any progress in their own separate war effort. But they do it anyway, because the showrunners needed to manufacture suspense by tilting the scales. Having the Night King snipe and reanimate one of Dany’s three dragons oughta do it.

Textbook electronic football quarterback form

Our main parties have been balanced out a bit, again. The Lannisters have the only operating navy and (I guess) enough money to hire the Golden Company through the Iron Bank despite nearly defaulting moments ago; the Night King has an undead army, a cannon of a spear arm, and one dragon; the Targaryens have the Unsullied, the Dothraki, and two dragons to go along with the combined Wildling-Stark forces. From what we’ve seen, the Night King and poor execution are the primary threats to Daenerys, and with his army breaching the Wall she turns her attention north.

It seems risky to fly your two remaining dragons around with the Night King doing his best Nolan Ryan impression, so the combined Targaryen-Stark forces wait for the undead army to reveal itself before counterattacking. Or at least, that would have made sense. After all, losing troops in a normal battle is one thing, but losing them to an opponent who can immediately resurrect and add them to his own forces is considerably worse. Still, the combined brainpower of Tyrion, Jon, Sansa, Dany, Bran, and Jaime decide to kick off the Battle of Winterfell by sending the mounted Dothraki charging across an open field and out of sight. Now we’re down one more important force as the battle gets underway, and the Night King hasn’t even had to step out of the trees or taunt yet.

“Dear Night King: we couldn’t help but notice you didn’t have a cavalry, so we’ve taken it upon ourselves to provide you with one. Sincerely, Humanity.

When he does, on the reanimated Viserion’s back, he has to face off against Dany on Drogon and Jon on Rhaegal. Let’s be generous and say the two-on-one makes things difficult for the Night King even though he picked one off in mid-flight just a few episodes ago. Maybe he didn’t warm up and his arm is a little sore. The undead army still does enough to breach Winterfell’s walls, and it’s only a matter of time until all of its defenders are dead and/or turned into fresh troops. All seems lost, until, inexplicably (literally, because we never get any glimpse of his motivations), the Night King approaches Bran on foot and begins to draw his sword to deliver the killing blow. No conversation, no need to capture him, plenty of foot soldiers and ranged weaponry, but I guess this is something he needs to do himself, dramatically. It gives us one of the coolest scenes in the entirety of the show when Arya saves the day, but how did any of that setup make sense? Samwell Tarly is smart enough to ask “Why? What does he want?” in the planning phase, and here’s Bran’s response:

“An endless night. He wants to erase this world, and I am its memory.”

Thanks Bran, definitely explains why he has to expose himself to kill you personally instead of any other option.

Forgot to pack his ice spears for the big day. More like n00b King, am I right?

The Night King is dead, the majority of our main characters are still alive (see: Festivus Miracles), and the Targaryen-Stark forces only have one more objective. Battle-hardened Unsullied, a shockingly large number of Dothraki (I guess these ones missed the memo about the opening charge), the combined forces of the North and the Vale, and two dragons against Euron’s fleet and whatever remains of the Lannister army. Doesn’t sound like much of a fight, right? Don’t worry – Euron Greyjoy is here doing his Night King impression and dropping Rhaegal with two consecutive scorpion bolts! Fired from a ship on the wavy sea! From a distance of…way too far to make any sense! All because Queen Daenerys (and all of her advisors) forgot about their one remaining opponent’s navy altogether.

Incredibly frustrating. But hey, we’ve reached the final showdown. All of the forces outlined above, minus one dragon on the Targaryen side. King’s Landing has been outfitted with scorpion turrets, and for some reason Dany and company are determined to attack with her black dragon in broad daylight. This could get dicey, right?

Wrong. Drogon is just as effective as we knew dragons were all along, no one manning the scorpions can land one shot on a larger dragon from a dramatically shorter distance on firm ground, and the final battle of the show is over with no suspense whatsoever. Now, with victory in hand and no major opponents left to face, Dany gives in to her hereditary insanity and burns King’s Landing to make sure we have some conflict to resolve in the series finale.

Where Was I, Again? (Poor Strategy, Character Reversals)

Tyrion’s advice from Season 7 on – Through the first six seasons of the show, Tyrion is on fire. He provides the blueprint for beating Stannis Baratheon’s army in the Battle of the Blackwater, cleverly roots out or buys off moles in the Red Keep, and generally crushes it until Cersei’s vendetta against him forces him into exile. It starts getting a little rough in Meereen, where he isn’t as familiar with the culture. But things really go off track when he returns to Westeros as Dany’s Hand. If anyone should know how inflexible Cersei is, or how unwilling she would be to cede power voluntarily, it would be Tyrion. Still, he advises against a direct attack, instead dividing the Targaryen forces to take a castle on the other side of the continent. He also supports the wight-napping plan, and every character in the show should be mocked for agreeing to that idea. I know there’s some odd rule against Dany using her dragons, but earlier-show Tyrion definitely could have come up with something better.

Daenerys falling for Jon – Queen Dany leaves Meereen in Daario Naharis’s hands both as a parting gift and to ensure she’s free to pursue beneficial marriages in Westeros. Within half a season, she’s jumping on board with Jon’s terrible ideas to the detriment of the war she’s fighting to attain her lifelong goal. Jon’s stoic, pouty look certainly works for some, but it seems odd that she’d put so much at risk so quickly after arriving.

Bran alternately emotionless and wry – Bran’s had a rough go from Season 1, Episode 1. Becoming the Three-Eyed Raven seemed to cut him off from his humanity, to the point that he offends longtime companion Meera Reed with his indifference. He also possesses some ability to look into the future, which we never see him use to help the people closest to him; maybe it’s a Doctor Strange situation where there’s only one path to victory, but after his vision of Jon’s birth, we don’t really get any information on how his abilities work. But when Tyrion shocks the not-so-Great Council by suggesting Bran for King, he responds “why do you think I came all this way?” Where’s this random pop of personality coming from, Three-Eyed Raven? It’s a scene made terrible by the show’s haste to reach its conclusion, and tossing in wry Bran just makes it more annoying.

Littlefinger getting impatient - Petyr Baelish has worked his way up from being a figure of minor note in Riverrun to serving as the Master of Coin and later Lord of Harrenhal by patiently taking advantage of small opportunities and always making himself useful. He even makes his position as Lord Protector of the Vale indispensable to Sansa and the Starks in the Battle of the Bastards, and seems situated to remain a figure of influence in the North even after Sansa shuts down his romantic advances. Then…he decides to go for broke? Maybe he dramatically underestimated the Starks he didn’t personally train, but it was surprising to see him caught with no escape route after getting an ominous warning that his past actions weren’t hidden from the Three-Eyed Raven.

There’s Only Room for One on this Door (Unnecessary Deaths)

The Blackfish – great character, sound strategist, dangerous fighter. Right up until the moment he helps Brienne and Podrick escape Riverrun but decides to stay behind himself because..? There’s no reason he couldn’t join them on the boat and continue fighting the war from the North, but apparently it was time to pack it in.

Benjen Stark – Benjen Stark has been fighting endlessly into whatever kind of an afterlife his later form represents. He has a real knack for timing, rescuing Meera and Bran after Hodor does his thing and later Jon Snow as wights are closing in. Jon suggests they ride back to the Wall together on Benjen’s horse, but he refuses…to buy Jon two seconds? Just hop on the horse with him, my dude.

There are 20 seconds of episode time between our guy Benjen saying “There’s no time” and even drawing his weapon. Unless the horse could only carry one person, there was definitely time.

Feats of Strength and Festivus Miracles

Meera towing Bran – Hodor’s final act is one of the lasting images of the entire series, but it shouldn’t fully overshadow what Meera manages to do in the immediate aftermath. She’s pulling Bran Stark’s lanky ass through the snow, and gets enough distance from the wights that Benjen can save them in the forest. That’s a long haul!

Bronn Towing Jaime…Across a Lake! – this might be the most impressive feat of all. Check out this sequence of events:

Did you know that a suit of armor weighs about 50 pounds? Not only did Bronn keep Jaime from drowning, he evidently paddled them across the lake quickly enough that none of the Targaryen forces noticed. Truly a Festivus Miracle!

Gendry Running from North of the Wall to Eastwatch-by-the-Sea – it would be nice to get some firm locations on this one to see just how impressive it was, but Gendry can join Meera in the Winter Olympics cross-country running event. They’ve been traveling for at least a couple of days by the time he sets out for Eastwatch, and that’s a heck of a distance in bad weather and winter clothes.

Night King’s Shot to Take Out Viserion – Get that dude a scholarship. Unless it’s a Rookie of the Year situation where he lost the magic arm right after this epic toss.

Euron’s Shots to Take Out Rhaegal – I mean…sure. Two in a row on his first try. What do you think they used for target practice? Clay dragons? Guess he’s just a natural at ship-mounted-ballista warfare, like he is hand-to-hand combat (the Sand Snakes are so damn disappointing) and early stealth technology.