#im not faulting him for it it's just that he naturally dominates any scene he's in

[q-morning-crew]

You know, I've been seeing a lot of posts about Wilbur coming back to the qsmp, and I'm conflicted.

Obviously, Wilbur coming back would be great in most aspects. It would be awesome to see him interacting with the lore, the new members and the new dynamics the server created.

The one problem I see with him coming back is, funny enough, also the main reason people want him to return so badly: tallulah.

Tallulah. His daughter. The reason Wilbur logged on more than twice and pretty much the only reason he is still semi present in the lore despite not having logged on for months.

On the surface, it seems like Wilbur returning would be great for tallulah, wouldn't it?

Wilbur has not logged on for months. Tallulah has been alive for over 100 days, and Wilbur has been there for 8 of them.*

Tallulah sees chayanne as her brother. She calls philza papa. She sleeps in the basement she and chayanne decorated every night, her bed next to his. She has her own projects with phil. She hangs out with him (or bad) practically every day.

Philza can recognize all of her mannerisms and quirks, he knows how to properly accommodate her, he can tell whenever her admin plays any character and whenever any other admin plays her.

If Wilbur came back, what would happen to all of that?

Would she return to her room in the tower? Would chayanne have to sleep alone in their Garden of Hope and Music? Would she have to start calling phil "abuelito" again, after getting used to calling him papa?

In addition, Wilbur doesn't know tallulah the way she is now. He doesn't know the island the way it is now.

One thing I've seen other people point out and still haunts me is: if Wilbur had returned for the election dinner, would he have recognised the fake tallulah as fake? It breaks my heart to say this, but... I don't think he would.

The only way I can see his return not completely disrupting tallulah's existing dynamics is if Wilbur moved in with phil and let her keep calling him papa. I doubt that would happen, but fingers crossed

*not counting appearance on other people's streams because I have no way to count that

#it probably won't happen but i can hope #phil has been adamant on not letting other people move in #and wil wouldn't step back and let phil take care of her #hes just not that type of roleplayer #wilbur inserts himself into a situation learns and adapts to it and then find a way to take center stage #im not faulting him for it it's just that he naturally dominates any scene he's in #my main issue is actually something i glossed over in the post #chayanne and tallulah #theyve been living together and sharing a room and being siblings for ages #and the idea of tallulah having to go back to her old room #and chayanne suddenly being alone in his room which now feels so much emptier #i can't handle it #it makes me not want wilbur back #which sucks because i do mostly want him back #wilbur soot #philza #tallulah #chayanne #qsmp #qsmp wilbur #qsmp phil #qsmp philza #qsmp tallulah #qsmp chayanne

[late-tothe-party-07]

So haha update on that monster fic:

...

I made her love interest into a monster too BUT

He's vegetarian.

Cause I thought to myself well, maybe monsters can eat ANY living thing, not just humans.

Which, I realized, meant these terrifying shapeshifters could seriously survive on just a butt ton of dandelions if they really wanted too.

Still need to figure out the details of how to get these two character TOGETHER and INTERACTING at all, but Im getting there.

I really just need lies at this point. I know that the government has been experimenting the love interest cause he's a monster and they wanna know if they can use him as a weapon without the risk of their soldiers being eaten. I just know they wont tell the person they're dealing with about that.

For 1, that person is the main villain, who though he might not CARE for the mc, she is still valuable to him like a chess player has valuable chess pieces. So if he knew that the person he's forcing her to work with can be someone that will possibly EAT her....

Yeah he probably wouldn't agree to those terms.

At least not unless I can back him in a corner and have some type of leverage where he HAS to say yes....

Cause I sure as hell know the government isnt gonna offer anything to bribe him with, especially seeing as how it'd have to be basic world domination or smth for him to be like "Oh yeah I cant possibly pass this up"

Hmmmm

I must think more about this yes yes.

I do know when the mc figures out the love interest is a monster tho! Cause I had this scene where they both get injured during one of her assassination jobs and it was his fault somehow. She gets a pretty bad cut on her arm and stitches herself up in the bathroom, sending him away out of annoyance.

When she's done she walks out and notices he's leaning against the wall rather weirdly, and is way too quiet and down right nervous compared to his usual sassy snappy attitude.

He has a hand pressed to his side and it takes her a second to process that he's bleeding,

It takes her a second longer to realize his blood isnt a natural, human red. Its black. Just like she's seen time and time again after murdering monsters.

He collapses, she begrudgingly patches him up and says she only did it cause she has strict orders not to let him die or kill him herself.

Yknow, in true Haters to Lovers/Enemies to Lovers fashion.

#writing #haters to lovers #writing update #fic progress #original fiction #original world #original work #We Thy Monsters #Yes thats the title #And funnily enough it was before actual monsters were added #Foreshadowing amiright

[katsuukiwii]

Could I get a matchup for AOT, Black Butler and MHA, please? 😊

Personality: I push myself REALLY hard. I have a lot of willpower and am VERY stubborn. I try to be highly independent, usually to a fault. I don't like asking for help and it takes me a very long time to realize and admit I need it.

I'm distrusting and cynical and have been through a lot. I get stressed out really easy and am anxious and depressed. But my anxiety is usually hostile/aggressive. When I get anxious or stressed, I usually lash out or try to control things. When I'm depressed I usually shut down completely or dissociate really bad. (Wow this sounds so negative when I type this.)

This combination (being stubborn and refusing help, but also being very handicapped) is harmful to myself and I've begun to finally realize that. I've been gradually trying to accept help from others more and allow myself to not live up to unrealistic standards. I would need someone who is supportive of this and someone would help me stop pushing myself into oblivion.

On a more positive note, when I'm not stressed or being combative, I really love life and am one of those people that appreciates seemingly insignificant things that most people take for granted. I'm also very sensory oriented. Even something really small can greatly lift my mood, like a nice breeze or rain or a flower. I like being outside for a part of the day because of this.

I can be a little weird and don't really care too much tbh. I do weird or sometimes childish/childlike things like chase/stalk geese or immitate animal sounds. I can also be very mischievous if my mental health has been doing well for a long time and I am happy. I will pull pranks or be evasive when speaking or play (not malicious) mind games.

I also tend to love VERY deeply when I fall in love. I feel very strong emotion and affection towards that person, am fiercely loyal and am usually sacrificial to a fault for them (again, push myself too hard).

I'm easily crushed if that person I love abuses my love or neglects me.

(I also hate very intensely too and can be very petty, spiteful and vengeful. Just strong emotions, I guess.)

Sexually, I honestly can't see myself being dominant even if I tried. I probably would try, but would fall apart. I also have a very big masochistic streak. I like very intimate sex. Not necessarily soft, slow or gentle (but it could be these), just physically and emotionally intimate.

That's it cause I don't want to type too much and make this super long! Thank you very much, you are great! 😞 Matchups can be hard, I appreciate your effort!!

Matchups!

No, no, thank you for making this long! I got a lot of details from it! I appreciate the appreciation! It SOUNDS negative, but I know people PERSONALLY who have experienced similar things to you (from what I read) and have seen these sorts of things, so I hope I gave you good results! Im glad you were willing to be so open, even if it’s through anon, that stuff can be hard to talk about ^^

Attack On Titan:

I ship you with Reiner Braun!

He doesn’t know EXACTLY what you’re going through, but he does his hardest to try and understand so he can help you out. He’s dealt with some issues on his own, and knows that its no fun to experience it on your own!

Your can get aggressive, all good! Reiner knows you truly don’t mean any harm towards him, you just have a lot on your mind that you need to let out.

He wants you to come to him if anything is on your mind, good or bad! He wants you to know that he’s there for you, and that he loves you no matter what! He gets so happy when you say that you want to reach out to people, and get help

Now, onto happier things! He loves taking you on walks, especially if it’s raining! He likes to get outside too, so he doesn’t mind a bit!

He’s uh...not the smartest, so mind games can confuse him! He loves to pull pranks with you, usually on poor Connie, or Jean.

He understands that you like to be independent, but he also knows that nobody is capable of doing everything! He likes for you to admit if you need help with something, since it helps you learn, but if you refuse to he’ll just try and have you do something else while he helps. It doesn’t work often, but he still tries!

He doesn’t mind your weird side! He’ll watch you stalk geese, but won’t actually join you. It doesn’t make him ashamed, it’s just not his thing. As usual, if you REALLY want him to, he will.

BUT he does like to try and imitate animal sounds with you, he thinks if silly!

For sex, you’re submissive, all good! I picture him being more of a top anyway! So, you like something kind of rough, but intimate, and loving, and he’s totally cool with that as well! It fits him perfectly! Plus he’s a big guy, so sometimes he can unintentionally hurt you (not horribly), and he’ll apologize even if you liked it.

Aftercare g o d. Always makes sure you feel okay, and comfortable about what happened! He’ll make sure you’re nice and clean, and then give you some snuggles if you want!

Runner-Ups: Erwin Smith and Armin Arlert

My Hero Academia:

I ship you with Eijiro Kirishima!

It takes Kirishima a minute to get used to your hostility (only when you have those moments, ofc). He doesn’t really know what to do until one day, where he doesn’t force you to do anything. He speaks to you in a gentle voice,

“I’m not going to force you to do anything. But I would really appreciate it if you just....opened up to me. I’m not sure how to help you out, I need you to show me. So can we talk, please?”

You try to be more open after that, and in all honesty, it didn’t just help you, but it helped him. A LOT. He just wants to do his best for you!

Yes, maybe he has called people whiny before, but he still knows that emotions are very important. Everybody has to let them out every now and then!

He will NOT take your for granted. Not just because it’s “manly”, but because he cares so much about you, and he wants you to know that you aren’t alone!

Now, he, unlike Reiner will TOTALLY chase geese with you AND imitate animal sounds! He’s a child at heart as well. He’ll take a walk outside with you! He prefers to be inside, but he doesn’t hate it! Plus he loves to see how calm you are when letting the rain fall on our hand, on taking in the vibrant colors of a flower!

He’ll catch on to SOME of your mind games, but he can get stumped! You often pull pranks on him, and he still laughs about it and has fun! What a sweetheart!

During sex, he’s all good with being on top! He will be a bit reluctant to hurt you if you ask, but eventually you’ll make him comfortable enough to be a little rough, nothing to far though!

He IS a switch, but he’s absolutely fine with you wanting to be on bottom! The only thing is that he is very sensitive physically, so he can get vocal. SO even if he is on top, his face could be bright red with his eyes shut tight, it’s cute!

Runner-Ups: Hizashi Yamada and Shouta Aizawa

Black Butler:

I ship you with Sebastian Michaelis!

This man is probably one of the BEST options for you, honestly!

He knows just how to calm you down almost right off the bat! Of course, everybody requires a bit of adjustment, but for him it was a piece of cake!

Of course, he can get a bit annoyed if you get SUPER aggressive, but that doesn’t mean he hates you! He still cares about you so much, but it can be a lot, even for him. 

He makes sure you get the help you need!

Let’s be honest, most of us know that scene with Beast. He CAN be manipulative, but he would N E V E R do it towards you. He’ll tell you and show you. So he will praise you in bed if you need it, or even if he feels like it.

You absolutely cannot play mind games with him. He’s too smart. If anything it’ll turn into him playing a (not malicious) mind game on you. He likes to tease you, but he makes sure not to take it too far!

Absolutely will not chase geese. It’s not for him. He will only do it if you wanted him to catch one. In that case, he could probably catch a few with his skills!

He doesn’t imitate animals sounds with you...in public, that is. In private, he likes to as well! He’s not quite sure why.

And now, for sex! We’ve seen the scene with the nun. This man goes HARD! Of course, he can be gentle, but it’s in his nature to be rougher than the average person. If you want him to be gentle, he will. BUT if you do want a little pain he is totally down. Definitely a sadist. He fine with you being on bottom!

Runner-Ups:  Adrian Crevan and Claude Faustus

#matchups #aot matchup #mha matchup #black butler matchup #liv ships you with ___!

[its-jijii]

chuuya’s masculinity

i was talking to hannah and thinking about the whole chuuya feminine/masculine debate and decided its time to write an essay on this. i have been waiting for the opportunity. and now my thoughts are gathered, so prepare for a mildly frustrated tangent abt the portrayal of chuuya in canon and in fan-made things.

i think that there are a lot of factors in play that influence how people see chuuya, the main one being canon content of course. in the manga, i do not get the vibe that he is feminine or weak in any way; in fact, he’s very aggressive and his stance indicates that he does not intend to be viewed as less. i will agree that the anime portrays him as more feminine: he has a higher pitched voice, and he is short. 

my problem with this is both the people who take that as being feminine, and the people who try to say chuuya is not feminine or weak. i don’t enjoy seeing chuuya in dresses not because i view it as feminine and therefore weak- rather, the circumstances of the source that makes me dislike it. for instance, primarily when he is drawn in dresses, he is clearly annoyed and doesn’t like it. i believe that to be because despite his “feminine” body type, his personality is very masculine. the way he acts and speaks does not imply that he is weak or feminine in any way.

my thought process isn’t dress = feminine = weak, so chuuya in a dress = weak, but in contrast, he is doing nothing about it. he is out of his comfort zone and obviously doesn’t enjoy it, yet he always seems compliant in wearing a dress. all of that is also usually for dazai’s entertainment, in some way. same thing when i see scenarios of them on an undercover mission together. one always dresses up like a girl, and that is usually chuuya. that is still because people equate his height and body type with girls, which makes sense to a certain degree, but one i still disagree with.

chuuya’s body type has almost nothing to do with being feminine, in my opinion. subconsciously people equate his height with femininity, which is not really the case. i don’t think they are necessarily equating his body with that of a girls and determining its weak. rather, they likely look at his height and body build and think “that’s weak.” that has no direct relation to being feminine, nor is it true. i think everyone knows he is far from weak, he is just never portrayed in the way he should be: masculine and dominant. 

his body type being feminine does not change the fact that he is strong and fit; his outfit doesn’t exactly show that off, so his features can be dumbed-down to long hair, cute face, and curves. this is completely disregarding his personality and actions, which annoys me considerably. in people there are often traits that are tied together- outgoing and dominant, quiet and submissive- and there are actions that tie into those categories, too. people on the quiet and introverted side tend to curl up and take up as little space as possible. extroverts assume a position that takes up more space (called power posing) 

“power posing” is a stance that indicates that the person is comfortable and confident. many times i have noted that despite chuuya being small, he does tend to stand in ways that take up more space. just from his body language, you can tell that he feels strong and in control. the art and scenarios of him unhappily sitting in a dress for someone else’s entertainment, but doing nothing to get out of the dress? that shows he is yielding to someone else, which is incredibly unlike him.

more chuuya in high power pose positions here lol

the reason i believe a lot of people think of chuuya as feminine ties into how he was introduced and how dazai treats him. upon his introduction in the dungeon, he is shown as a powerful and confident character. to me it seems that the first impression he made, which was asserting dominance and strength over dazai, was erased somewhere along the way. well, dazai happened to plot things out in advance, and later felt like he had the upper hand on chuuya. so despite chuuya’s strength and intentions, in the end he was rendered powerless by dazai. and to finish that off, he ended up pretending like he was a very feminine girl for dazai’s amusement.

his initially strong introduction was overwritten by the funny scene where chuuya acted like a girl. chuuya continues being masculine and dominant throughout the series, but oh so often is ending up following what dazai wants, or used as the object of dazai’s jokes. in the end, that rubs off on people so they think of him as less than dazai. his voice actor and the way he is animated likely ties in the thoughts of him being feminine, and when combined, people tend to think of him as either feminine, weak, or both.

it seems that no matter how this argument is presented, i find fault with it. even when people state that femininity =/= weakness, i feel that they are not presenting it right at all. i understand where they are coming from, but from my standpoint it isn’t as in depth as it should be (which i guess is why i’m writing this lol). maybe im overthinking things i accidentally analyze stuff and feel disappointed when people post unpopular opinions with nothing to back it up 😭

lastly, slight nsfw warning? (discussing top bottom stuff nothing explicit)

the entire top/bottom debate regarding soukoku also exhausts me. i believe chuuya to be a top, but again not because i equate being a bottom with being weak or submissive. power bottoms are a thing. however, i do acknowledge that there is a power difference between tops and bottoms- tops have considerably more control over the situation than bottoms do. and that is where i believe people have misconceived notions of whether he is a top or a bottom. on some level they do associate him with being a bottom, likely due to his size and believed inferiority to dazai. as dazai always seems to be ahead of chuuya, isn’t it only natural that dazai would be in control and would top?

w r o n g you can’t convince me dazai isn’t a lazy bottom, at best a switch. he does not seem like he would enjoy putting forth the required effort for topping. additionally, dazai himself isn’t exactly dominant or controlling. often he is relied on and respected, yes, but he only really tries to dominate and control chuuya as a way to harass him. chuuya on the other hand is outwardly dominant and likes being in control of a situation- and above all, hates doing what dazai wants. so even if chuuya was ever to bottom, no way in hell would i believe that he’d do it with dazai. he would not want to surrender control to him unless absolutely necessary.

additionally, i guess i just see chuuya as an active person. bottoms don’t seem to really do much,, they are on the receiving end of it all, so they often aren’t controlling the situation or moving around. it is hard for me to imagine chuuya to be the type to sit around and take something like that. it is much more reasonable to me to believe that he would rather be the one in control, and the one actually moving and doing things. if talking in the terms of soukoku, that seems doubled in my eyes. chuuya is far more physically capable than dazai, and likely has better stamina too. dazai would be one lousy top lol

thank u for reading! ive always thought about this, as there was a lot of art and fanfics that were the opposite of the impression i got from chuuya. to me, chuuya has always radiated big dick energy, top/dominant vibes, etc. i love chuuya and its not really a big surprise to me that my first post/analysis regarding him is talking about his masculinity haha. it’s always been a hot topic for me to think about and talk to my friends about.

i apologize for the lack of posting & original content rn ;; still con crunching for ota this weekend, and then i will be at the beach for a week. so i’ll probably just be reblogging art nd stuff when i can. hopefully ill get back to writing and posting normally after im not ultra mega busy. edit: forgot to say earlier but thank u for 200 followers! didn’t really expect anyone to care for my content but it means a lot to me

#chuuya #chuuya nakahara #nakahara chuuya #bsd chuuya #chuuya bsd #bsd #bungou stray dogs #bsd manga #bsd analysis #chuuya analysis #dazai osamu #osamu dazai #dazai #bsd dazai #soukoku #is chuuya a top or a bottom? #find out in this rant #brought to you by sleep deprived me

[cometsweepandleonidsfly]

David Sims: “ As a fan of the TV show, I felt battered into submission. This season has been the same story over and over again: a lot of tin-eared writing trying to justify some of the most drastic story developments imaginable, as quickly as possible....[T]ime and time again in recent years, Benioff and Weiss have opted for grand cinematic gestures over granular world building, and Drogon burning the Throne to sludge was their last big mic drop.

Spencer Kornhaber: The penultimate episode of Game of Thrones gave us one of the most dramatic reversals in TV history, with the once-good queen going genocidal. The finale gave us yet another historic reversal, in that this drama turned into a sitcom. Not a slick HBO sitcom either, but a cheapo network affair, or maybe even a webisode of outtakes from one. Tonally odd, logically strained, and emotionally thin, “The Iron Throne” felt like the first draft of a finale.

When Dany torched King’s Landing last week, viewers were incensed, but I’d argue it was less because the onetime hero went bad than because it wasn’t clearwhy she did. Long-simmering madness? Sudden emotional break? Tough-minded strategy? A desire to implement an innovative new city grid? The answer to this would seem to help answer some of the show’s most fundamental inquiries about might and right, little people and greater goods, noble nature and cruel nurture. Thrones has been shaky quality-wise for some time now, but surely the show would be competent enough to hinge the finale around the mystery of Dany’s decision.

Nope. The first parts of the episode loaded up on ponderous scenes of the characters whose horror at the razing of King’s Landing had been made plenty clear during the course of the razing. Tyrion speculated a bit to Jon about what had happened—Dany truly believed she was out to save the world and could thus justify any means on the way to messianic ends—but it was, truly, just speculation. When Jon and Dany met up, he raged at her, and she gave some tyrannical talk knowing what “the good world” would need (shades of “I alone can fix it,” no?). But whether her total firebombing was premeditated, tactical, or a tantrum remained unclear. Whether she was always this deranged or just now became so determines what story Thrones was telling all along, and Benioff and Weiss have left it to be argued about in Facebook threads.

The Dany speechifying that we did get in this episode was, notably, not in the common tongue. Though conducted in Dothraki and Valaryian and not German, her victory rally was clearly meant to evoke Hitler in Triumph of the Will. It also visually recalled the white-cloaked Saruman rallying the orc armies in The Two Towers, another queasy echo. People talk about George R. R. Martin “subverting” Tolkien, but on the diciest element of Lord of the Rings—the capacity for it to be seen as a racist allegory, with Sauron’s horde of exotic brutes bearing down on an idyllic kingdom—this episode simply took the subtext and made it text. With the Northmen sitting out the march, the Dothraki and Unsullied were cast as bloodthirsty others eager to massacre a continent. Given all the baggage around Dany’s white-savior narrative from the start, going so heavy on the hooting and barking was a telling sign of the clumsiness to come.

Jon’s kiss-and-kill with Dany led to the one moment of sharp emotion—terror—I felt over the course of this bizarrely inert episode. That emotion came not from the assassination itself but rather from the suspense about what Drogon would do about it. For the dragon to roast the slayer of his mother would have been a fittingly awful but logical turn. Instead, Drogon turned his geyser toward the Iron Throne. Whether Aegon’s thousand swords were just a coincidental casualty of a dragon’s mourning or, rather, the chosen target of a beast with a higher purpose—R’hllor take the wheel?—is another key thing fans will be left to argue about.

Then came the epilogue, a parade of oofs. David, you say you were satisfied by where this finale moved all its game pieces, and if I step back … well, no, I’m not satisfied with Arya showing a sudden new interest in seafaring, but maybe I can be argued into it. What I can’t budge on is the parody-worthy crumminess of the execution. Take the council that decides the fate of Westeros. It appears that various lords gathered to force a confrontation with the Unsullied about the prisoners Tyrion and Jon Snow and the status of King’s Landing. But then one of those prisoners suggests they pick a ruler for the realm. They then … do just that. Right there and then. Huh?

It really undoes much of what we’ve learned about Westeros as a land of ruthlessly competing interests to see a group of far-flung factions unanimously agree to give the crown to the literal opposite of a “people person.” Yes, the council is dominated by protagonist types whom we know to be good-hearted and tired of war. But surely someone—hello, new prince of Dorne! What’s up, noted screamer Robin Arryn?—would make more of a case for another candidate than poor Edmure Tully did. Rather than hashing out the intrigue of it all as Thrones once would have done, we got Sam bringing up the concept of democracy and getting laughed down. The joke relied on the worst kind of anachronistic humor—breaking the fourth wall that had been so carefully mortared up over all these years—and much of the rest of the episode would coast on similarly wack moments.

It’s “nice” to see beloved characters ride off into various sunsets, but I balk at the notion that these endings even count as fan service. What true fan of Thronesthinks this show existed to deliver wish fulfillment? I’m not saying I wanted everyone to get gobbled up by a rogue zombie flank in the show’s final moments. Yet rather than honoring the complication and tough rules that made Thrones’ world so strangely lovable, Benioff and Weiss waved a wand and zapped away tension and consequence. You see this, for example, in the baffling arc of Bronn over the course of Season 8. What was the point of having him nearly kill Jaime and Tyrion if he was going to just be yada-yadaed onto the small council at the end?

One thing I can’t complain about: the hint that clean water will soon be coming to Westeros. Hopefully, someone will use it to give Ghost a bath. As the doggy and his dad rode north of the Wall with a band of men, women, and children, the message seemed to be that where death once ruled, life could begin. Winter Is Leaving. It’d seem like a hopeful takeaway for our own world, except that it’s not clear, even now, exactly how and why the realm of Thrones arrived at this happy outcome.

Lenika Cruz: Do I have answers? Who do you think I am—Bran the Broken? Before I get into this episode, I need to acknowledge how unfortunate it is that Tyrion decided to give the new ruler of the Six Kingdoms a name as horrifyingly ableist as Bran the Broken. You could, of course, argue that the moniker was intended as a reclamation of a slur or as a poignant callback to Season 1’s “Cripples, Bastards, and Broken Things,” when Tyrion and Bran first bonded. But given the “parade of oofs” this finale provided—including the troubling optics of Dany’s big speech—it’s hard to make excuses for the show.

Now that we’ve gotten our “the real Game of Thrones/Iron Throne/Song of Ice and Fire was the friends we made along the way” jokes out of our system, where to begin? I basically agree with Spencer’s scorched-earth take on “The Iron Throne.” I was already expecting the finale to be a disappointment, but I didn’t foresee the tonal and narrative whiplash that I experienced here. At one point during the small-council meeting, my mind stopped processing the dialogue because I was in such disbelief about the several enormous things that had happened within the span of 15 minutes: Jon stabs Dany. Instead of roasting Jon, Drogon symbolically melts the Iron Throne and carries the limp body of his mother off in his talons. A conclave of lords and ladies of Westeros is convened, and Tyrion is brought before them in chains, and they know Dany was murdered, and Tyrion argues for an entirely new system of government while being held prisoner by the Master of War of the person he just conspired to assassinate. Excuse me? (The way that Grey Worm huffed, “Make your choice, then,” at those assembled reminded me of an impatient father waiting for his children to pick which ice-cream flavor they want.)

David, Spencer—of the three of us, I’ve been the most stubborn about thinking this final season is bad and holding that badness against the show. I don’t fault viewers who’ve become inured to the shoddy writing and plotting, and who’ve been grading each episode on a curve as a result. But I personally haven’t been able to get into a mind-set where I can watch an episode and enjoy it for everything except stuff like pacing issues, rushed character development, tonal dissonance, the lack of attention to detail, unexplained reversals, and weak dialogue. All of those problems absolutely make the show less enjoyable for me, and I haven’t learned to compartmentalize them—even though I know how hard it must have been for Benioff and Weiss to piece together an airtight final act solely from Martin’s book notes.

...Much like with last week’s episode, I can actually see myself being on board with many of the plot points in the finale—if only they had been built up to properly and given the right sort of connective tissue. For all the episode’s earnest exhortations about the power of stories, “The Iron Throne” itself didn’t do much to model that value.

For example, I can’t be the only one who was let down, and at a loss for a larger takeaway, after seeing a high-stakes contest between two ambitious female rulers devolve after both became unhinged and got themselves killed. After all the intense discussion about gender politics that Thrones has spurred, and after seeing characters such as Sansa, Brienne, Cersei, Daenerys, and Yara reshape the patriarchal structures of Westeros, we’ve ended up with a male ruler (who once said, “I will never be lord of anything”) installed on the charismatic recommendation of another man and served by a small council composed almost entirely of … men.

Perhaps there’s no deeper meaning to any of this. Or perhaps this state of affairs is a commentary on the frustrating realities of incrementalism. I am, of course, beyond pleased that Sansa Stark has at least become the Queen in the North—a title that she, frankly, deserved from the beginning. But I haven’t forgotten that this show only recently had her articulate the silver lining of being raped and tortured. Nor am I waving away the fact that Brienne spent some of her last moments on-screen writing a fond tribute to a man who betrayed her and all but undid his entire character arc in one swoop. My sense is that the show’s writers didn’t think about Thrones resetting to the rule of men much at all, and that they were instead relishing having a gaggle of former misfits sitting on the small council. See? the show seemed to cry. Change!

At times, Thrones gestured more clearly to the ways in which the story was going a more circular route; this was especially true of the Starks. Jon headed up to Castle Black and became a kind of successor to Mance Rayder—someone leading not because of his last name or bloodline but because of the loyalty he’s earned. Arya’s seafaring didn’t feel out of character to me—it fit with her sense of adventure and reminded me of her voyage across the Narrow Sea to Braavos all those years ago. Sansa became Queen in the North in a scene that recalled the debut of “Dark Sansa” in the Vale, but that felt like a true acknowledgment of how much her character has transformed. I’ll admit, the crosscutting of the scenes showing the Starks finding their own, separate ways forward was beautifully done. It made me wish the episode as a whole had been more cohesive, less rushed, and more emotionally resonant.

Spencer, I think you smartly diagnosed so many of the big-picture problems with the finale—the sitcommy feel, the yada-yadaing of major points, the many attempts at fan service. So rather than elaborate even more, I’ll end this review by saying something sort of obvious: Viewers are perfectly entitled to feel about the ending of Game of Thrones however they want to. After eight seasons, they have earned the right to be as wrathful or blissed-out on this finale as they want; it’s been a long and stressful ride for us all. I’m genuinely happy that there are folks who don’t feel as though the hours and hours they’ve devoted to this show have been wasted. I know there are many others who wish they could say the same thing.” 

#game of thrones #spoilers #such rotten storytelling