I’d agree, except that everyone who has bet against Cersei thus far has ended up fucked.
So has everyone who has bet on Cersei too.
Ha! I have to admit, some perverse part of me wants to see Cersei’s plan succeed. All the other armies defeat the undead, and Cersei sweeps up the remains and takes control of the 7 kingdoms in the aftermath.
OK … so what was the deal with Arya and Sansa?
Option 1) They were playing Littlefinger the whole time, which means they staged all their interactions over the past couple of episodes, including behind a closed door when Arya threatened Sansa with a dagger. Were they confident that Littlefinger was lurking in the hallway, listening in? It just doesn’t make much sense in the way it was staged. Also, why all the elaborate shenanigans? If Bran brought them all up to speed at some point several episodes ago, why mess around? What did that accomplish? Just arrest him. Kill him. Whatever. It’s not like they got him to reveal his guilt to the other lords. And why send away Brienne?
Option 2) At some point in the late-game, perhaps after Littlefinger’s “I assume the worst” speech, they figured things out. Maybe they asked Bran “Hey, what’s up with Littlefinger?”. This is an awful option because it means their terrible interactions this season were genuine. Also, it means they went from Arya threatening to cut off Sansa’s face to having their “Sisters 4ever” moment up on the parapets not long after.
I liked where it ended up, and I thought that’s where they were heading when this all started, but it’s all just clumsy.
The Iron Bank guy said that Dany cost them a shitload of money when she torched Slaver’s Bay. There’s no money there for them anymore. Cersei is their best bet. That part seems really clear.
This is what I’ve been saying all along. It was either going to turn into a pointless ruse against Littlefinger, or it was genuine, making Arya the dumbest person on the planet. I guess the first option is better than the second, but it doesn’t stop it from being lame as heck.
They have mentioned twice this season, “I couldn’t have survived what you went through.” Too a certain degree, neither of them really did. They each become some weird, twisted extreme of their personalities.
I think if Sansa went through the worse case of Arya in Littlefinger’s game, I don’t think she really believed Arya would want to be Lady of Winterfell. There is nothing in Arya’s personality throughout the entire series that would make one think command is what she wants. Arya is that annoying little person that gets the job done, bitches about how management wants things done, but wants nothing to do with making the decisions.
I was actually expecting Littlefinger to be Arya in a mask.
I’m going with the latter. It has been clear all season Sansa wasn’t buying what Littlefinger was selling. As she so eloquently put it, she sold her out to the Boltons, which made Joffrey seem absolutely delightful by comparison. While I’m trying not to read too much into off-camera discussions, at some point the Vale people had to go “get a load of what this dude pulled.” I also think Bram doing the 'Chaos is a ladder" line was the story handling, “Bran knows everything and there will be a meeting.”
The deal with Arya and Sansa:
When they spoke in private (and Arya threatened Sansa with the dagger) at the end she reversed the dagger and gave it hilt first to Sansa. Sansa knows Arya is a faceless man, an assassin and had just provided her the perfect opportunity to kill her and take her face. Instead she reverses the dagger and gives it to Sansa, symbolizing (and cementing) her allegiance.
It was at that point Littlefingers schemes were undone. Everything else happened off camera though.
My take on this is that the Iron Bank is throwing in with the Golden Company. If Cersei doesn’t pay, the Iron Bank already has its “collectors” on the ground.
I’m just glad that the Golden Company is going to be introduced as a piece in the TV series, since it’s there in the books and already in Westeros.
I hope season 8 skips all the fighting and resumes 5 years later or so. Would be the ultimate troll after waiting another year or two to wrap this up.
“I can’t believe we survived that final battle with the Night King!”
“It was incredible!”
“Remember when the dragons…?”
“Gods, yes! Amazing! But then The Hound…”
“So good! He really redeemed himself, didn’t he?”
“Aye, but not all of us survived.”
“True. We honor the dead here, at our new capital city, Harrenhal!”
“HUZZZAH FOR JAIME! KING IN THE NORTH!”
Then episodes 8.2-8.6 are Bran telling the story of Dunk and Egg to a roomful of dragon-human hybrid children.
What are the chances that at the end, the Night King stands victorious over Westeros? My coworker and friends seems convinced that the chances are high, because he says the TV series always makes you think things are going to go well before they kick you in the gut again.
Low. Martin has said the ending will be “bittersweet”.
Unless you ship White Walkers (which really, who does), that doesn’t really match “bittersweet”.
To be fair, what’s the law of the internet that if something exists, there is porn for it?
Bittersweet is everyone dies, except Jamie, who returns to Kings Landing to kill Cersei, then rips off his face to reveal Arya, who is killed by zombie Gregor.
Ha, that would be awesome, just do a Big Trouble in Little China!
“Egg Shen, how did you survive that?”
“Wasn’t easy!”
They introduced one likely element for a bittersweet ending: If Dany wins, she won’t be able to keep her dragons. Her choices will be to cage them, send them away or kill them. There’s no way she cages them again.
Bittersweet means Jon Snow and Dany die whilst valiantly killing the Night King. Gendry takes the throne and marries Sansa.