I did not watch GOT in real time. I began the series when I was still living in Baltimore and wrapped it within a week. I enjoyed the show for the most part, and because I didn’t have to suffer the week to week 2 year gap between seasons I think that gave me a different vizion.

GOT wanted me to love Jon Snow. I did not and still do not. He was mid and boring. The final season they tossed out that he had some dragon blood but it was not enough for me to overcome the annoyance of his existence on my screen the prior 7 seasons. Yes I know he was crucial to the story they told but fuck Jon Snow. I was and shall forever be a Daenerys stan.

What I disliked about the show was the last season but for slightly different reasons than other GOT fans I know. In context I never read the books and likely won’t so my POV is only from the show itself. If they wanted to murder the “Mad” Queen they needed to show her descent into madness. Season 8 did not do that. Argue with your momma about it, they did not. No her burning King’s Landing doesn’t do that because that action is justified by anger. I am not saying that she was right, but I am saying I get it. Angry does not equal insane.

I took a moment to begin watching HOD because life. I watched the first 2 episodes, liked them shit I even had questions. Then I fell off and did other things. I came back to the show with season 2 about to hit committed to watching. The thing about those first few episodes was other than Dameon all those folx looked the same. They all had the same name and my brain kept asking what happened to all the Black people in the 100 years until GOT.

I returned to season one and after the 3rd episode I was invested enough to continue.

Now I find myself in the pickle others were in during GOT. I am all caught up and have to wait 2 years for the next episode. Ugh.

This year’s finale was – meh. The episode itself was good but for a finale – meh. I don’t know if it was the writer’s strike or what but if they were going to end the season without actually starting the bigger battles of the war they should have ended with this shot:

Had they done that I would not have gotten the reunification of her and Daemon but I would have rather had a 7 episode season then 8 episodes of any minute now we gonna knuck and buck.

The thing about the reunification….it was mad possible because my future ex husband had a download of GOT by touching the face tree and suddenly realized the world was bigger than him.

I’ve seen lots of people complain about Daemon’s time in Harrenhal but I didn’t hate that arc. Sure like lots of folx I was waiting for him to DO something, but I think a character like that needed ALLLLLL that time to break him down to receive the message. 1-2 episodes wouldn’t do it. So I appreciate that these show runners took the time to erode his baggage and create the empty vessel to drop the Song of Ice and Fire into him.

I also appreciate how they are slowly turning and corrupting Rhaeneyra. I am still Team Black but I get to be that way because I am an outside observer who knows that the King never changed his mind. Allicent and her hypocrite ass at least possibly thought that he did. Now it is still fuck her all day every day, but with Allicent at least there was a reason why she thought she was right. After all these weeks she finally realized ooops but not because she used some critical thinking but because the window of her cell she was warned of by the Queen who Never Was got shuttered.

Because Rhaenerya is the rightful heir, in the beginning of this season one can look at her actions and say cool. What HOD has done and it seems will continue to do, is show her evolution from rightful heir to zealot and that is what never happened with GOT. I mean herding bastards to DragonStone and then locking them all on the platform for Vermithor to snack on was some evil shit. She rationalized it though that it was a sign from the ‘gods’ and kept pushing. The show has also added the layers of her isolation and frustration which sullies her rightful claim and will taint her actions in upcoming seasons. It makes one ask the question yes the crown should be hers but is she RIGHT? Again something that never happened with GOT until that one episode where she happened to burn a few innocent people.

Back to my guy on demon time Daemon, he saw the vizion, the Song of Ice and Fire. At the end of that vizion was a recreation of Dani emerging from the funeral pyre unburnt and the mother of 3 dragons. A reminder that GOT was always about the Princess who was promised.

So not only did HOD not give me war it also reminded me that GOT screwed the pooch. ugh.

I will be back for season 3 of course because now I am invested. That doesn’t mean I won’t spend a moment getting angry again that GOT tried to make me love Jon Snow and downplay the significance of Dani in that final season.