The Watch - Breaking Down the Penultimate Episode of ‘Game of Thrones,’ Plus: Farewell to ‘Veep’ | The Watch

Episode Date: May 13, 2019

The penultimate episode of ‘Game of Thrones’ left us with a sense of betrayal (4:39). Daenerys’s descent into madness seemed rushed (9:09), and Jon has seemingly transitioned into a supporting character (16:09). Plus, predictions for the final episode (48:38) and saying goodbye to ‘Veep’ (49:26). Host: Chris Ryan Guest: Sean Fennessey Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of The Watch is brought to you by Bud Light. Bud Light is all about bringing friends together. And we're wondering which unlikely pairs will team up this season on Game of Thrones, seeing so many old friends and new come together. For example, this past episode, we saw my OTPs Jamie and Sersi get back together, albeit briefly. But, you know, it was great to see those crazy kids make it work finally. Bud Light is reminding you to enjoy responsibly 21 and up.

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Stand up and walk now. Hello, and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan, and I am an editor at the wrigger.com, and joining me in the studio, burning his letters and taking off all his rings. It's Sean Fentasy. Oh, man, to be compared to Vera so soon. Thanks for joining me today. Andy is away and parts unknown, but I really wanted to talk

you about this entire season of Game of Thrones, Sean, and you came in after the penultimate episode, the bells last night. The best of times, the worst of times, the worst of times. It was really a best of times, worst of times kind of day for me yesterday. For all of the people asking out there on Twitter, really quite kindly, actually, just being like, I can't believe you're doing this. Like, I did do it. I did watch the Thrones episode.

I did not watch the second half of Game 7, Sixers, Raptors. I was following along on the score. I have to admit that the opening 20 minutes of Game of Thrones are a little fuzzy to me. because of that. I'll tell you, the game was quite an appetizer for Glegan Bowl, you know? Kind of the same level of combat, I felt like we're happening in both situations. A lot of missed offensive rebounds. Truly.

And then I saw that it was like whatever was in 92-92 or 94-94. And it was like, and it said no time left on the score. Yes. That's what happens. And I was like, oh, yeah, overtime. Cool. And then I like picked up my computer again to write down Varis dies. And then it was like, no, 96-94.

or whatever the score was? And I was like, I don't understand. It was sort of a simultaneous death. Yeah. You know, the master of whisperers went down just as hopefully not Brett Brown went down, but certainly the Sixers did. I'm really sorry. That was so awful. The timing could not have been worse for you. Yeah. These are the two things you have been most focused on for the last three months of your life. I know. And, you know, I think there was some obvious clear on the surface pain with the Sixers. I think there's a lot of under the surface pain with Game

of Thrones. I just can't believe that there wasn't a guy somewhere in an office at like the Warner media conglomerate who's like, you know, we got these dynamite properties going on Sunday, man. What if we spread them out? You know, not to go too far behind the curtain of the ringer, but last weekend, last Sunday, me and Bill Simmons and Pat Muldowney, who runs social and video here at the Ringer, had a conversation about whether or not to spoil Thrones while the game, the previous Sunday, was happening. You know, because there's obviously here at the Ringer a convergence of interests.

We've thrown our hats in the Thrones full stop. And we ultimately decided, you know what? Thrones is happening and we've put all this energy and time and thought and care into it. And when the show is happening, there's 12 million people, 14 million people simultaneously watching. If a game three is spoiled, so be it. Game 7 is a different story. That was tough. Yeah. So did you watch the end of the game and then start Thrones? I had the game in my hand on my phone and I had the show on with my wife. Which is tough because you're a tape guy. You love to diagram plays like chart it out.

Yeah, so we paused Thrones and then I did about two hours watching the Kauai shot, you know, just drew that up, figured out what I would have done in that scenario. Running through it for your wife. Just be like... No, no. I mean, I was mostly just engaged with Thrones. I have been, even though I don't make content as much as you guys do, I'm not analyzing the show in the same way.

And it's kind of an interesting way for me to talk about my relationship to the show, because whether it's byproduct of working here or just the way that the anticipation culture has surrounded this show, I have just changed as a consumer of Game of Thrones. I have been tricked or convinced or compelled by. by binge mode and by the way that the show is covered on podcasts and the writing that we do here at the site, even though I've never read one page of the books, I feel like a book reader.

And you almost feel betrayed. In a lot of ways. I think that the sense of betrayal is organic. I don't think that that, I don't think you've been tricked about that because I do think that ultimately whether you have dog-eared every page of George R.R. Martin's books, or you've only watched the show once,

and maybe even missed some episodes, you have every right to feel like this is not quite delivering on the promise or quite delivering on the potential. Well, let me ask you something, because it seems like the core question around this is not so much what happened, but how we got here. So did you feel like, and I don't want to get too far ahead of ourselves, but the actual things that happened in this episode,

DeNaris deciding to destroy King's Landing. Everything was right. You thought that all the choices were correct. I think that they are all the things that will happen. I think they were the things that were charted out. I think that there are a couple of times where you can see the seam showing. I think that there is very obviously something up with the depiction and production of the Searcy character. She just has been immobile for pretty much since the shame walk.

I don't feel like she's left. And I guess you can make the argument that after that she wouldn't really be an outdoors person. But there's just been no movement to her character. There's been no physical kind of like, now I'm going to go over here. Now I'm going to go visit this person. Now I'm going to walk up and down these stairs. And that was what was kind of thrilling about King's Landing yesterday was, I think they shot a lot of that in Dubrovnik. I imagine because I've been to Dubrovnik.

I recognize some of those streets. It's quite a humble break. They're quite nice when they're not on fire. I think that they did a lot of like, here's what this street is like, and here's what that's true. I was like, I imagine that was very expensive to shoot that episode. No question. And I think it raises a little bit of a question to me about what we want out of shows like this. Because at some point while watching the show, it went from a Francis Ford Coppola saga to a Michael Bay movie.

And I think it was a – I like Michael Bay movies. And I thought it was a kick-ass Michael Bay movie. As far as television action goes, I thought it superseded Hard Home. I thought it superseded Battle of the Bastards. I thought it definitely superseded the Battle of Winterfell, which I didn't really understand very well. I thought the scale and even the staging, particularly like that scene with the Golden Company getting blown up from behind, was just like classic, awesome action movie making. You know, you and I talk about that on like the rewatchables all the time.

I don't know that it ever really got beyond it being a TV show as far as the plotting went. I'll take you one step further to go back to your original question about like, do I have a problem? Like we can talk about whether how we got here, but what is it what we're getting, what we wanted. I think that the show, and I would stipulate that when you come to Jesus about this, it makes the show a little bit better, is the show feels like a Wikipedia entry for itself. Yeah. And which I think I've sometimes used that phrase about different things. But when I am prepping for, like, Talk to the Thrones episodes or I'm just trying to, like, catch up on, like, what I need to know for different pods and stuff like that, you know, you go through these Westeros Wikipedias and Song of Ice and Fire Wikipedia's and show Wikipedia's. And you kind of just, like, read through these histories that are covering hundreds and hundreds of years or even short battles and short conflicts.

And you're like, oh, wow. And then that happened? Oh, okay. And then he did that live. Whoa. Okay. Got it. And that's what this feels like.

It feels basically like a synopsis of itself. Like all the moments, yeah, those are there. Like, yeah, I bet she snaps. I bet she kills all the people in King's Landing. I bet Tyrion is devastated. I bet John decides, like, I can't let this go forward. I bet Aria witnesses it for a reason And we'll probably use her faceless man assassin skills in the final episode to do something about it

But there's something about The speed with which we're moving And what they're leaving out So that they can show 30 minutes of people being incinerated because they're like because we can So when I walked away from the episode I found myself confused by the motivations of basically all of the key characters that we saw The one key character we didn't see was Sonsa but those sort of like five classic.

Jamie, Tyrion, Searcy, John, and Teneres. And I couldn't really, an aria, I couldn't really understand why they were doing a lot of things they were doing. And I agree with you that where we got to actually seems like where the, probably where the books will go to, I guess. But, I mean, should we start with D'Naris? Like, who do you think is the most? We can start with whoever you want. I mean, so Denearis, I've been thinking, I've inevitably been thinking a lot about Breaking Bad and relationships. Because I think that it's essentially a model for her character, obviously.

Great comparison. She's not the only time that somebody has gone from being like this kind and loving figure to a villain. But you think about the journey you go on with Walter and the things that he does over the course of the several seasons of Breaking Bad that kind of are points of no return that not just break him bad but break him as a person and to kind of make it so that he can never go back to his old life, though it starts out that he just wants to provide for his family when he's gone. And then it turns out that maybe he wants to create a different character for himself because that's what makes him feel alive. And then he's in too deep to know which way is up. And at the end of the show, you get an episode like Granite State,

which is this meditation on what that costs him and what it's like to be him. And ultimately, for the great ensemble the Breaking Bad was, that was a character study. That was essentially a study of Walter. You could even sub in a lot of the characters. from Breaking Bad for Game of Thrones. You could even say that Gus was the Knight King. You could even say that Aaron Paul was Tyrion to some extent. But I think that what you saw was they took their time to show cause and effect.

They took their time to show how a person would deal with all these things happening. What happens to Dandy, they laid the groundwork. Like, they did do the work. They just didn't actually give Amelia Clark enough of a runway to show it. They just needed one more season, I think. I think one more season would have gotten it done. Or four more episodes per season. Sure.

Yeah. Either elongate the last two or give it one more season because I think particularly the thing that people seem to be frustrated by is specifically why she was driven mad by the ringing of the bells. That being the moment, though, sort of the moment of surrender being the moment when she finally lost it and flipped to sort of her familial heritage of madness. And I don't have an answer. I actually don't understand that specific character choice. Like, why did she go nuts once the bells rang?

Yeah. What was the inciting incident that ultimately led to this? Was it being rejected by John? Was it the death of Mascendi? Was it the death of Regal? What was it that happened? Because all of those things happened before she flipped and she snapped. So why not just go directly to the Red Keep?

Rather, like, why burn the entire King's Landing? That specifically, and it's a plotting question. It's not, and it relates to the intentionality. of the character, but while it was happening, it actually made it difficult for me to connect with the show because I was like, why is this happening? Well, because they only gave us one second of her

being like, I haven't been eating or sleeping, and I have circles under my eyes, so I'm losing it. Now, I thought that the scene between John and Danny, where he goes to her, and he's like, you're my queen, I love you, you could rule and be a benefactor for this world instead of

a conqueror. He didn't say that, but that's what he meant. And she's like, am I only your queen and kisses him and he kind of recoils a little bit. Curve. Yeah. That's the moment where she's just like, I am alone in this world. Certainly, but everything that happens in the run-up to that in the battle is extremely precise. The attack on the iron fleet, the destruction of the crossbows, all of that stuff that

happened, it seemed like it was designed. Yeah. And then we get this one single shot of her after the destruction of all the scorpion bows. And then she's got the quivering lip, she's crying, and she's losing it. Yeah. And I don't know why she would lose it at that moment. So they are afraid of her. The people are saying, please ring the bells, please ring the bells. They're not cheering for the Mother of Dragons.

They're not saying the breaker of chains. They're not saying you've come to free us from Circe's. They're saying we're scared of you. And she said you can either govern by love or fear. And I let then fear it is. And I think that she knows that that point where she's won essentially, is the end of this whole part of her story where maybe she can be a person in the world

who has a lover and has a family and has friends and has dragons that are just like affectionate pets. She's just a destroyer and she kind of just embraces that. Now, they didn't spend that much time articulating that, nor did they give her even any space. And I think that's where you kind of get this collision of

that's fucking hard to do to act on a dragon. And that's hard to do to show So, like, I, some people were like, well, they didn't show Danny the entire time she's killing millions of people. I'm like, that would look stupid. There's converging opinions about this. I think Zach Cram and our Slack actually eloquently noted that it was metaphorical, that she becomes the dragon in that moment. So we don't have to see her all we have to see is the dragon. I thought that was well put.

I don't have a problem with that so much. It was just, I think an extra couple episodes indicating the sort of de-evolution of her mind and her kind of like slowly realizing that she is, just the destroyer now, that she is this sort of mythological, literal fire breather. I guess that would have helped. It would have helped.

And otherwise, I thought fascinating character, truly one of the great characters. I mean, she, I think, particularly in those middle seasons when the dragons started to grow three and four around there,

when the show kind of, even if it wasn't always about her, felt like culturally it was about her. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, I think Aria and the Starks and John are the primary figures of the story.

but Danny became what was pop about Game of Thrones. And I think a lot of people who came to the show for the pop aspect of it feel betrayed. And there's also a lot like a complicated question about the sexual politics of this, the gender politics of this, and like what it takes to drive a woman mad and that old cliche. And I think people are struggling with the aftermath of that too. Like that's a bit of a cliche. Yeah. I mean it was it's not a 180 if you've been actually paying attention to what the characters have been saying to one and over the other for the last couple of seasons. It feels like a 180 in the moment because literally four or five hours ago in television time,

she was this savior and was the lover of one of the main characters. Like she was this really sweet, warm, caring person. And now she's a mass murder. She almost committed genocide. You know what I mean? Yeah, I guess if you look at it with some removed, let's just put things in practical terms. She basically lost two of her children and her best friend. And, and...

Several of her best friends. And got dumped. Yeah, two of her, because Jora and Missandy. That's right, and Jora and Missandy. Yeah. And so... And got dumped. If a normal human, not in Westeros, were to lose their two best friends and two of

their children, you'd be like, that person is damaged forever. And they'll never recover. Right. It was just honestly the execution, the strategic execution of her going mad that I was just confounded by. Because I think you're right. I think this is where she was going to go. It was where she always had to go.

So let's talk a little bit about the other character. that you brought up. Let's talk a little bit about John, because I think that in some ways, that character had such a clear arc and had such like an amazing momentum behind him over the last few seasons through Hard Home and then through Winds of Winter

where he finds out or it's discovered who he is. Through this kind of Battle of the Bastards, Winterfell, King of the North, do you want to be King, who are you? All this stuff. And then it kind of gets past the Night King who he did not kill. and the Night King.

And then he gets down here, and it's like, John is now weirdly a supporting character. Unless we are supposed to take that him looking at her from the streets of King's Landing is, I guess I got to sit on that throne because this isn't going to work. That wasn't my impression. I think it indicated to me that he's always a general, never a king.

You know, that he can never be anything really beyond somebody on the battlefield, and even then there's a general loss of control. You know, John is like, he's kind of a beta. he's kind of always been a beta. He's brave and he's a warrior and fearless, but he's already died once. You know, he's already failed. And he obviously did not have control over the moment.

I mean, I guess the thing that was kind of interesting to me about the way that that was told was, why did everyone in his army also go mad when their queen went mad? I think it's just supposed to... Maybe we talk about the battle itself where I think that... And Jason and I were kind of chatting about this last night on the show and before and after, where, you know, you read in these accounts of...

of sackings and the falls of cities and battles and dragon civil wars and stuff like that. And you're like, oh, wow, it sounds awesome. Or that sounds insane. And then you, what I think that they were trying to do, and I don't think it was, I think it was very pointed that at one point Danny burns up a map of Westeros, you know, that all that stuff is falling on the map

that Circe and Jamie are standing on. You could sub in Beniov and Weiss for Danny on that dragon and be like, this is what you guys, you know, you guys wanted this. This is what you wanted to see the fall of Kings Landing. Well, this is what it looks like. There isn't a benevolent. There isn't a cool way for this to happen.

There isn't like a fair way for this to happen. This is how cities fall. This is how changes of power take place. And this is what you wanted. Are you not entertained? It was kind of what happened there. Do you think of this as a purely nihilistic show? You know, yeah, I do.

Yeah. I do think so. That seems to be like the tension point. I think it kind of went away from that over the last couple of years because it tried to, it was really talking about who is going to be the hero that saves the world. And it turns out there will not be. It turns out no matter what happens in that next episode, it's not going to change what happened in this episode. It's not going to smooth that out.

Now, what I thought they were sort of going for was maybe the way in which Spielberg was like, we talk a lot about the greatest generation. We do a lot of like saluting of World War II, the best and the brightest troops or whatever. This is what they went through. This is what it was actually like to storm the beach. I was thinking it was Vietnam. It was sort of like when you're in the... So those soldiers that survived the Battle of Winterfell,

then go to King's Landing to fight a battle that is essentially inspired by vengeance. And... And Sonset was like, they're too tired. They shouldn't go. We shouldn't send these guys. And they snap. And then you get this, like, Milai massacre. It was just an awful...

And it was fascinating. You know, they created, like, Chekhov's mother and daughter character that you kind of follow throughout the episode, which is something that this series has done before. And it was kind of intense and fascinating. And John, ever the moral, upright guidepost of the show, is baffled. He doesn't know what to do. He doesn't know how to control the terror and the agony around him. So I don't know.

I thought that was pretty fitting. I just couldn't see anything coming. No one could see anything coming, especially the smartest people on the show. Could he, though? I thought that the reason why, for his grinding and uncomfortable as it obviously was, to see women and children being incinerated. I thought the reason that they were so focused on that was to say, this is what Tyrum was talking about.

This is why he was begging her not to do this. It's not a game. It's not like, oh, you just blow up the top of a tower and, like, four guys get killed because the bell falls. It's like, this is what happens when you let a city on fire. And this is what happens to the world when it goes up in flames. And I thought that that was like a really effective, almost reality check inside of a fantasy story.

What do you think about Tyrion's character right now? Because I think Dinklage is doing an amazing performance, but I think it's a different character than the one that we knew for the first five seasons. Yeah, I mean, he has the same problem as Sersi does. He's essentially been paralyzed as a physical character. I mean, when you think about him being in the box, when you think about him going to all these different countries

and seeing the world, when you think about him being on trial multiple times or fighting in Blackwater, and like just really being a mobile, interesting character interacting with his physical world. He's essentially been in the last two seasons like a city counselor. He just stands up and he says, well, I don't think we should do that. And she says, I think we're going to do it. And he's like, well, okay.

And then, you know, he tries to. And I think he's been screwed over by the compression because the thing that people don't like is him consistently being like, well, Circe will change her mind because she's pregnant. Sercy will change her mind because she's pregnant. Let's not kill everybody. we can figure out a better way to do this, but my better way to do it relies on a bell ringing, a gate opening, Searcy and Jamie getting out of there,

nobody caring after the fact that Searcy and Jamie have escaped, even though Searcy is responsible for all this. I mean, it just seems like if you compress it, his character, it really gets tough for him. So I see what you're saying. I do think that he's been kind of trapped. Yeah, I mean, he's my favorite character.

I think he's many people's favorite character. He is the character who often has the best line. who often has the most fascinating motivations, who is the most underdog in a show full of underdogs. And has the most interesting relationships with all the characters. Completely. And he has managed to entice and compel almost everybody on the show, basically with the exception of Circe and his own father.

And so the continued trope of maybe Circe will see the light, I think that's just been hard for people who've been watching the show to accept. And the fact that he continues to return to that. And the fact that he almost created a reality where Jamie and Searcy lived. I mean, he would have been the only person who invented that by freeing Jamie

and then letting Jamie go and save Searcy. It's just a little bit confounding because this is the same guy who shot his father on the toilet with a bow and arrow. Sure. You know, it's like... I thought his speech to Jamie was pretty convincing where he's just like,

you're the only one who's ever treated me like a human being, so I'm going to save you like you saved me. I have always understood the Jamie and Tyrion relationship. I think they've done an amazing job with that. I think everything that's happened this season with Jamie and Tyrion has been great. I think, you know, brothers have a complicated relationship.

Sure. You know, they have a, there is like an unspeakable love that is difficult to put into words. And they've done a great job of evoking that. Tyrion is supposed to be the smartest guy in the realm. Yeah, he's supposed to be the smart. So the idea of him taking his entire army and a dragon and his dragon queen to Circe in the last episode, that was just confusing. Yeah. That was just, it was sort of illogical.

And in this episode, you know, he knew what was coming and he knew what was coming and he knew what was coming. And still he declined to team up with Varus. And still he sold Varis out. and still he let the dragon queen go to King's Landing and still she did everything he saw was coming. So it's this fascinating, you know, the difficulties of knowing your own wisdom, I think is an interesting story idea. And he seemed to know the whole time that he was wrong.

He had that forlorn look on his face basically for the last 12 episodes of this show. But still, I think a lot of fans are frustrated by that. Yeah. They want him to be the smartest guy. They want him to win. And I think that that also comes down to what we get to see versus what we have to fill in for our I think that the Veris-Tyrian conversation about whether or not, I guess, to overthrow Danny, although it remains to be seen what the plan was, if John had been like, yeah, you're right,

she's really losing it. We should do something about that. Is it just, I mean, obviously, was it to have Danny killed? Was it to somehow get rid of the dragon? Was it to imprison her? Like, what did they think that they could do against somebody who has a dragon and the unsullied on her side? I mean, they're going to be asking themselves that very question, essentially right now. You know, as soon as the next episode starts, right? Because no one who, who is near the upper level of power is going to be like, we should definitely let her rule. Yeah.

That was a conclusive. Well, except for the unsullied in the Dothraki. True. Yes. Or whatever Dothraki are remaining. I think it comes down to how much did we get to see. Was it an incremental kind of Varys only really started talking about this an episode ago and then died for it in this episode?

So that's a pretty short arc for that betrayal story. I do want to note that Varis, who is perhaps the all-time survivor of the realm, the person who has lived through many, many ruling kings and sat close to all of them, for some reason, just like, screw the pooch on this one? Like, he just didn't realize that if he couldn't convince Tyrion that he

was definitely dead, like, why was he so resigned to die? I don't even, I mean, because Melisandra told him he would. That's true. I guess, but also there's no more episodes. I mean, that is definitely a thing where it's like, why didn't Varis then sneak into Kings Landing and tell Sarsie, here's what you should do. Exactly. If you want to save this poor place. Now, obviously

Circe didn't care about saving the place. I thought, you mentioned Aria. Another example of, if you've got four more episodes, you get to see the hound and aria taking the two-month or however long in his journey from Winterfell to King's Landing by horse and talking about what it means to live a life that's dictated by vengeance. And instead, they get right up to the steps and inside King's Landing and all the way up to the point, like the goal line.

And he's like, you shouldn't do this. And she's like, yeah, you're right, I shouldn't do this. And she bounces. Now, story-wise, it's very effective because Aria gets to ride off on a pale horse, is arguably the prince who was promised, is arguably the last hero, will probably kill Danny. But is another example of them being like, here's the shorthand version of what happened. But if you'd seen, like we saw with Jamie and Brienne over the years, walking all over this country, and that's why that moment where they get together is so effective last episode, two episodes ago now, all you get is the synopsis for. version of the Aryan hound situation. Yeah, I think I couldn't have put it better.

We've learned over the course of eight or nine years now that there are these totems of power and justification. For years, it was dragons. And then a dragon dies last episode with three crossbows that we've never seen before. And we were like, what? Yeah. How did those dragons die? And for years, it was Arias List.

Arias List was this motivating factor. It was this key aspect of the story. She went to graduate school to figure it out. Yes. And then all of a sudden... We watched her go to graduate school. She's a hundred yards away from two of the worst villains on her list, Circe in the Mountain, and she's like, no, I'm going to double back.

Yeah, I don't want to have this kind of complexion when I grow up. Yeah, exactly. So you're right, it was strange. I think that would have been great to watch them talk through the concept of vengeance. Because the hound, you and 80 talk about it all the time. Definitely one of the five best characters on the show. Fascinating, incredible performance. I don't know if this should lead us into Klegain Bowl.

Maybe we can figure out what's going on with Ari a little bit more. Although I feel like you kind of said it all. But what they, I mean, and I say, oh, I would have loved to have seen them walking and talking for two months. Also, they always were so good on this show of when people would be on their journeys. That's where they would have the most interesting interactions with the world. That's where, like, Jamie got captured. You know, that's where they would run into the father and daughter who were in their hut who helped help them out or something like that. That's where they had these amazing, like, and that's where you get to see all these people who are essentially now just,

like risk ponds, like in a game of risk and get swept off the board. But you got to see the actual people out there who were being quote unquote governed. And I think that the show has definitely moved away from, they're just spending all the money that they have on these huge set pieces rather than to go back to your Coppola Bay thing, rather than this is what a village looks like. This is what it looks like inside of one of the bars that they have in this world. This is what it would look like if you were at a market.

And this is how people are talking about this. state of the world right now. Instead, it's all like, people love John. They love John, but they don't love Danny. It's like, who? Who? Why? What are you even talking about? You got Gallup numbers on that? Like, what are you talking about? You're right. It's a show that is known for its sex and violence, and particularly its violence, but it's defined by its conversations. The dialogue, the character building, that's the thing that everybody became obsessed with. That's how it ensorcelled the whole world. I mean, it's the most popular show in the world right now. And to not, to lose some of those conversations, I think, hurts the ability to believe the sex and specifically the violence.

It's tricky. I still think Ari is a great character. I think she's probably the character they've handled best over these last couple of complex seasons. She definitely has the most... I think also it helps that, in a weird way, like, it's always a dice role when you're working with kids on long-term shows because the actors tend to age out of the age that they're supposed to play on the show unless, you know, like, Stranger Things is going through that now. They're going to have to, like, wrap this up unless they just keep addressing. the fact that these kids are getting older and older. But for Macy Williams to go from this child to a woman is pretty amazing.

You know, it's like, Jamie can grow a beard, you know, or whatever. But Macy Williams, you're like, oh, wow, I've really watched this person grow up. I agree. She's been really tremendous. She's simultaneously convincing as one of the deadliest people in the land. And also as a person who has this, you know, this wellspring of emotion underneath that she's trying to tamp down at all times. You know, her character is motivated by pain.

by the death of her father, by the death of these people that are close to her, by these terrible things that have been done to her. And, you know, it has thus far been a satisfying journey. I still think the best moment of the season by far as her killing the Night King. That was truly thrilling and felt worthwhile. And even though I didn't love that episode, I lived for that moment. I hope they do right by her in the final episode. Today's episode of The Watch is brought to you by Hulu Live.

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Or a Denver gal. Whatever floats your boat, don't wait for the weekend to add a little hot, hearty breakfast love to your AM. It's time to run with your arms wide open to the egg aisle and take breakfast back with just crack an egg. Let's talk a little bit about the Jamie and Circe thing because I think that was an amazingly transgressive and button pushing an interesting storyline that they introduced. The entire idea of Jamie and Circe, the entire idea that these twins could be actually truly in love with each other,

no matter what the other has done. Incredible creation. To one another. I mean, it's just such an amazing. And the rendering of that to have it be Prince Charming and Cinderella basically be these monsters, but also sometimes capable of charm. I think obviously they just completely leaned into making Jamie this three-dimensional person and kind of left Lena Heady to stare out a balcony for two years.

there will maybe one day be a story as to why that was the case. I don't really know. I'm obviously not a book reader, so I don't really know if there's a ton more surcey stuff that they left on the table. But ultimately, as Mal said last night on Talk to Thrones, I thought that in the end, Jamie going back to her finally made sense.

After everybody was kind of like hot under the collar about how could you leave Brianne? What's he doing? This doesn't make any sense. What's the point? His death wish with her, his like need to be with her. at the end of it, totally tracked for me. It was the same problem that we've talked about

with virtually every character, which is that that motivation ultimately does make sense and is how he should have gone. The Brienne's storyline now feels very cheap. And he basically spent four nights with her and then bounced. And I don't know what we're supposed to think about Brianne. I don't know, I don't specifically know what Jamie realized

other than just actually I love my sister and not this night. Yeah. And it's not so much what happened in this episode between the two of them because I thought that was actually really well staged. I thought everything that they did in, I'm going to Magers. Hold fast. Yeah, right. Was fascinating and beautiful.

And, you know, all the lead up through the cocaine bowl, you know, Searcy walking very slowly past the hound very carefully. I'm just going to squeeze right by. Yes. You guys of mine. No, I'm just going to, I'm just going to get to scoot right by here. She nudged him a little bit. Hey. I'm just going to.

Their reunion post, Jamie's throwdown with Uron, was probably the most emotional moment of the episode, for me at least. I loved that he was like, look at me, like, we're here, this is it, like to be here with me now, because I came all the way back for this. Yeah, they still managed to make us feel connected to awful people, and that's kind of one of the gifts of the show. You know, how we got there again, I'm not sure I totally loved it. Yeah, there's just little things.

Yaron could have seen that the dragons were going to light the ships on fire and dove off his boat and started swimming back to the beach. You should repeat, though, your Uron take from last night, which I thought was brilliant, which is what they could have done with Yaron. Yeah, so last night, I just thought

the death scene of Uron when he gets stabbed by Jamie and he looks up into the skies, Jamie's sort of trudging off, and he says, I'm the man who killed Jamie Lannister, which he wasn't, because the rocks did it. I thought it was like,

all of a sudden, this amazing snapshot of a far more interesting version of Uron. And the first thing I thought of was Robert Ford and Jesse James. The first thing I thought of was this guy who's from this hard scrabble rock-strewn island that everybody jokes about basically and thinks it's like a fucking punchline to this show. And he somehow maneuvers his way into the seat of power and within touching distance of this golden lion family essentially and sees everything he's ever wanted to be and is obsessed with that guy. and is obsessed with his accomplishments

and he's obsessed with who he has sex with and he's obsessed with his mythology about being the Kingslayer and is constantly like at once nagging him but also being like I need your approval. And I thought that oh my God, I'd be so much more interested

in a version of this show where Huron's in love with Jamie basically or Huron's obsessed with Jamie rather than I need to fuck the queen, I need to fuck the queen, like all he talked about for the last couple seasons and I was like,

this would be fucking amazing. If this was the assassination of Jamie Lanister by the coward Yuron Greyjoy I would watch the hell out of that. I thought that was so smart when you said that. And it's so true because the plot contrivance of it just so happens that Jamie's on the shore, right? When you're on the shore and then they have their battle.

It was fine. It wasn't bad. It was very convenient. But there was a confusing lack of motivation on both sides. You know, Jamie obviously is on a mission to get somewhere. And you're on like, he got blown off a boat and swam to this one inlet that Jamie was also. using to get up into King's Landing. Yeah, if they had forged a connection between those

characters like you described, it would have been an incredible payoff. It would have been a perfect moment. But again, a lack of episodes, a lack of time with Iran, the late introduction of neuron, the sort of like, it's funny, in some ways I thought he was a useful character because he revealed that most people in the world are simple,

and they're driven by simple things, they're driven by sex, or driven by power, they're driven by money. He was a simpleton, and he was very powerful, and he was a good fighter, and he was devious. But... Good aim, too. He was quite a marksman, perhaps unrealistically so. But there was ultimately no real reason for them to have that.

Like, why not have that fight take place in front of Searcy? I don't know. Why not have him get all the way back from the boats and climb up the King's Landing and gets up to the chamber room or whatever? And they're watching the dragons hit and Jamie gets up there and he's like, get the fuck out. That's my twin slash lover and the mother of my child. And he's like, you're not the mother of that child. I'm the mother of that child. And they fight.

And she's like, it was always you, Jamie. And he's like, cool, let's go downstairs and die. It would have been better that way. Yeah. And that's the thing is they stopped cross-cutting. They've stopped cross-cutting on this show. They don't really show like this is where this person is. I noticed that because they cross-cut between Aria and the Hound.

Now, obviously, to make a deep connection through the sort of physical baptism those two characters were going through and to go into this next part of their lives, either death or whatever Aria is going to become. But they did one set-up episode that did a little bit of Searcy Balcony King's Landing stuff, but only a little bit. then she was not in two and three I think she had like two scenes in four where she's just like yeah like let them come I'm gonna kill them anyway

and then last night was five so they have not been doing the Game of Thrones thing where they're like Kings Landing winter fell Harren Hall this Dorn Blang and granted there were times during those seasons where I was like Dorn again Jesus but it worked it accumulated into something

I mean you think about all the time we spent with a high sparrow and you're like, I're going to kill this guy. Why are, like, but when they did it, and when she blew that city up, to kill him, you were like,

she's a G. And I, this felt earned. This is also something that they lost with Circe in general, not just because we didn't spend time with her, but because her lack of action was confusing,

because she was often one step ahead. A lot of terrible things have happened to her, and that has motivated her to go mad herself. But her decision to not send the Golden Company and not send the King's Landing forces to the Battle of Winterfell was very savvy. That was a very strong strategic move.

That was right out of her father's playbook. And that was something we've understood that she is the true heir to Taiwan's reign. And for her to just sit in the Red Keep while the city burned, and she, you know, a single tear falling down her eyes as Kaiburn grabs her hand. I was kind of like, what?

She's like, my memo fight to the last. I was like, what is happening here? Did she just go dumb? Yeah, yeah. That was kind of confusing too, you know, especially because also she was pregnant. So she had something, and her family's legacy, and that also was lost.

Everybody just kind of went a little dumb in this episode, I think, with the exception of Aria. Yeah, and I think that, look, this has been a complicated season to talk about, because I think inevitably, in mid-flight, we would do shows, and I would just be like, Jesus Christ, it's the best thing on TV, and I've just never seen anything like it, and we're never going to see anything like it again. What an amazing story. What an amazing act of storytelling. And now, for this last season, and somewhat to the end of seven,

although in retrospect, I really liked seven quite a bit. I think that it's just immediately as soon as it's over, like let's kind of Monday morning quarterback all this stuff to death. But I think the reason why people are so fixated on why this doesn't feel the same way previous seasons has is because of these differences that Sean and I are outlining. This idea of a lack of road building to get to your final destination is actually this crucial thing. And I wanted to ask you about this specifically because you do the big picture, you do a movie podcast, you're thinking about the mechanics of filmmaking all the time

of a feature film level. The original plan for this final season was to be three movies, I think. I mean, that was one of the rumors was that they wanted to do three mega-sized movie episodes. Miguel Sipachnik said he wanted to do three, four, and five

because it was a beginning, middle, and end. That's clearly he was speaking about the DeNaris saga. Yes, I think he wanted to do the rise and fall of DeNus Targary in three episodes, which would have been like almost a three-and-a-half-hour movie. Well, actually more, I think. The funny thing that happened when I went back and watched seven before eight was that I was like,

this is pretty good. Some of this stuff doesn't make as much sense and the ice lake attack and all that stuff. And we have to get a white to show Circe that it's a real thing when in fact, it just turns out that it was a fucking dumb plan. Yes. You know, in hindsight, I had a huge problem with that plan too. In hindsight, we know that John is just really bad at strategizing. Like, just really bad. Sure.

Like he's had many, many bad plans heading into battle over and over again. So that actually stands up a little bit now? Yeah, well, because you're like, I got to get the white. And then the next one is we have to use Bran as Bate and let the Knight King in. He's made some poor choices. So, I mean, he's not, yeah, he's got some issues. But I was wondering whether or not, if you think about these episodes as one and two is a movie. One and two is the setup and like the goodbye to the characters and the somber kind of thing.

Sort of a mammat movie. Yeah. A lot of convos and dark rooms. And then three, four, and five are this, is this epic saga of winning Winner Fell, what happens after, and then losing to win Kings Landing, but losing your humanity, essentially. Okay, so I love movies much more than television. Here's the one thing that television has on movies. The one thing, time. It has so much time.

You can just take, this show works so well because it has taken its time to teach us about these people and this world. mythology is really hard to pull off. There's a reason Peter Jackson needed nine hours to do the Lord of the Rings. He probably could have done 18 hours. He probably wanted to do 18 hours. This show had the time to build that road that you're talking about. And for whatever reason, we can speculate as to Beniof and Weiss's desires

versus the network's desires versus who else wanted to pick up the mantle. There's a lot of talk about, what if Brian Cogman had just stepped up this year? I don't know. You and Andy know more about that than I do. You can look around and you can basically find confirmation bias. Like, you know, the George once said that he, he just basically alluded to like, you get notes from the studio or from the executives that are like, this character is doing really well. You got to keep, give him stuff to do. And it was, I think it was loosely understood to be referenced to Braun, who has nothing really to do with this show, but is a fan favorite and pops up every couple of episodes with a dumb mission that doesn't matter.

Where was he at in this episode? He was in Winterfell after his goodbye. but they insisted on kind of of doing basically some character service for him. But, you know, if they would have just taken a little bit more time, as we've said, kind of throughout this episode, I think a lot of these choices would have felt just a little bit more justified because on its face, and just an amazing 80 minutes of TV,

just an awesome, awesome battle sequencing, great dialogue, really strong performances by people who spent a lot of time thinking about these characters. You know, I genuinely think Game of Thrones is an amazing, amazing show. Last night, I almost think it's too good. I almost think it's A, set the bar way too high for itself, and B, last night especially, I was like, taken in and of itself, this thing that I just saw would be the coolest thing I've ever seen on television. And now it's got to deal with, like, everything else that's happening. It's like, there was no dynamite. There was no, like, quiet, quiet, loud part, you know? The risk, though, of saying this is, this is basically one long movie is you then get judged against the godfather. You get judged against. You get judged against. Apocalypse now. You get judged against the movies that are like, this is actually what a movie is. Judge against Tucker, a man in his dream? Yes. You get judged against Jack. You get judged against Bram Stoker's Dracula. No, I mean, forget about Coppola. John Ford, you know, you get judged against Howard Hawks. You get judged against Orson Wells. You get just against all the people that have made epics. Yeah, Kurosawa. Yeah, this is, exactly. This is an epic. And if you want to be that good, you have to be that good. It can't just be that the battle sequences are sick and the dragon looks cool.

And man, that was satisfying how Arria ran off on a white horse. Yeah. You have to believe the characters. You have to have to have a Toshiro Mufune. You know, you can't just have a cool fight. Yeah. Okay. I feel like we've probably, is there any other throne stuff that you wanted to hit?

I thought Clegan Bowl was awesome. Oh, yeah. I thought it was awesome. And it's something that among all of the other things that we discussed in this episode, we knew most of what was going to happen, Clegan Bowl more than anything. There was no way they weren't going to not do that. And I thought it was really good.

because one who is very humorously staged, which is something that the show doesn't get enough credit for, Kaiburn's death and Circe sneaking past the hound, were both hilarious moments. And the hound has always been a character about humor, you know, the way that he reacts to people in the world. And, you know, I think you could probably go either way on whether they've handled the mountain slash the revivified mountain.

What's really going on in the mountains? Hey, I don't really care about that stuff. But I just like a good battle scene. Show me where the mountain got here. Yeah, you know, it's like a, this is in many ways, King Arthur story. It's a subversion of a King Arthur story. Two brothers who hate each other is the inversion of the Jamie and and Circe being in love with each other thing. And that is also, there was just major payoff there. And both of them throwing each other over the, it was perfect.

It was great. Yeah. It was really fun. And it was also one of those things where it's like, you know, a hundred years from then, 200 years from then inside the world of Game of Thrones, they'll talk about the mountain and the hound. And there will be some recreation of that that isn't accurate because nobody saw it because everybody who saw it was dead but they'll just be like oh the the hound rode into a burning king's landing to fight his brother and die doing it. Print the legend. Yeah. And this thing that we

had been kind of like as viewers and readers looking forward to for such a long time is actually something that will be lost to time there, you know? Like it's kind of a cool moment. I enjoyed the callback too to the Red Viper eye burst, you know? Like he went for it and he couldn't pull it off and that was

fan service that worked for me. So I really enjoyed it. And I don't know, are there any other characters we didn't really... I mean, I thought Veris, the way Veris died was really cool. That was fucking sick. Savage.

The dragon appearing behind her, I was like, well, she's gone. Sapashnik is really good. Yeah, man. You know, he's a... He really does all those, like, oneers that's just like, you know, and I thought, like,

that was one of those things where it was like, they nearly killed Aria five times so that they could reset the oner a little bit. And I was like, oh, this is neat, but, like, could anyone live through this? Yeah, I mean, like, again, like motivations I thought were confusing.

Why would Aria try to lead people out of that little safe haven? She was like, we got to get out there. And then all of a sudden like, we're going to die. And she's like, no, no, no, we got to go. I mean, they did it because they wanted to have a children of men shot. And that shot was cool. Like, I don't really understand what she was trying to do there, but. How did you feel about your boy, Harry Strickland?

Just genius. I think Jason said it last night, but that was just genius. Within a minute of introducing him, just destroy him, just embarrass him. You know, I think they handled that well. I think they handled gray worm well. I think that like pure vengeance approach was, was effective. I don't totally know why the Onion Knight was leading the charge into Kings Landing. I also was kind of like in a season of when they're like they're cutting away from crucial conversations.

I would have loved to have heard his response to Tyrion being like, I'm breaking Jamie out of jail. Yeah, he wouldn't have not. And I'm going to facilitate Circe escaping. Would he just be like, yeah, sure, that sounds good? I need some Liam Cunningham in the final episode. I really do. Yeah. So, I mean, what are your, I don't know, expectations?

Do you have now? I mean, who knows? I think you've said it a couple of times. It feels certainly like Aria will kill Danny. It seems highly unlikely that John will sit on the throne. I guess the three prevailing theories are that either Sonsa, Aria, or Brant sit on the throne. I've long been a believer in no throne. Yeah, I don't think there's going to be a throne.

I have a weird feeling that the last shot is John walking off into the snow. Like, as Mal has kind of talked about a lot, that being like that conversation with Torman feeling like it was like this is where you belong but I have like a I think that they're cut to black

is going to be John just kind of walking off into the wilderness I could see it yeah I could see it let's talk a little bit about VEP speaking of walking off into the wilderness

speaking of evil that was like watching I don't know I'm trying to think of the sports analogy was it like Kauai hitting a dagger game winner just that cruel, vicious and kind of funny

I think that it was such an interesting finale. Like it was, you know, we've talked so much about fan service over the last few weeks with Endgame and with Thrones and everything and, you know, they bring Sue back. They do so many different things

that are like, oh yeah, that's a call back to this or like we're doing that. To not have it be like feel good at the end, to have it be, you know, she fucked Gary over because she would do anything. It was just so perfect. I think that you and I have actually

chatted off Mike, obviously, aka friendship. about it's a different show, but it's like, it's just pure flame thrower every week. Yeah, Armando Ayanucci left. David Mandel came in, and over time, the show just became extremely evil Beltway Seinfeld. Yeah. And that's great. I mean, Seinfeld is incredible.

I would have watched it for 10 more years. It's a shame that it went. And it was funny just reading some of the stories last night that were published about it, and everybody's a reaction to the end of it. And, you know, people seem to really in tears. And there's something funny about people bringing. such sentimentality to such viciousness? Yeah.

You know, I mean, this really was the nastiest show that I can remember. And Julie Louis Dreyfus goes to like, like, fuck 11. She goes to like 19s, a couple of times in this episode.

The almonds, when she screams at him after he's like, do you want six almonds? And she's just like, no. I mean, it's, you know, everything with Anna Klombsky

and like the way she flipped on her, it's, it's, no show ever made me laugh harder in the last 10 years. I was never more impressed by the sheer kind of like

lead and kicker quality of a show you know it really had the like damn that was a killer line feeling that most shows can't get to incredibly committed performances from people in a ridiculous world and also and maybe this is just by dint of being a comedy

it didn't have to do the motivation thing that we needed to get from Game of Thrones no we never really cared about why Salina wanted this we never really had to understand why she needed to win it created a world in which all this stuff was possible and I think

everybody was kind of like, oh, is Trump going to break Veep because it can no longer like satirize something and it turns out that's not true. You can satirize it because you could just, everything that they were satirizing just kind of moved up a level. You just moved Jonah into a far more tinfoil

hat crazy person role and it kind of effectively does that. And even last night we were sort of sitting, my wife and I were watching and we were kind of like, is this supposed to be an analog for this person or that person? And I was just like, kind of yeah. Like it is. Yeah. Yeah. I shout out to the homie Tim Simons

I mean what an amazing transformation well not even that I mean like that's our boy I mean like he he should get any award that that he wants but like I was on fire all year I would even say on the complete flip side of that coin like Hugh Lorry was amazing

yeah like Hugh Lorry I was legitimately like he's super pissed like when he comes into the room and he gets accused of sexual harassment and he's just like you motherfucker I was like this is fucking Dr. House is going in this is great shit it pays to cast incredible actors. I think a couple of people

got to do stuff they never got to do. One, you get a very quiet, sad Kevin Dunn moment after he's had a heart attack. Kevin Dunn... They got a sponge bath. Probably unsung hero of the show. I think consistently... Him and Gary Cole. Yeah, and then Gary Cole, getting to have a big emotional moment when he flips out when she suggests having Jonah as her VP. Yeah. And both of those were huge payoffs. I thought Anna Kloomsky's whole

turning into Kellyanne. That was great. That was so funny and it let her go to like an insane register. Her eyes were popping out of her head for the last three episodes. It was like a payoff in hell, you know? Like, everybody there should be destroyed, but I somehow wanted to be with them longer. Yeah. And nothing ever felt extra. Like, it never felt like we don't need this.

It all felt beneficial. It was like even Marjorie and Catherine just coming into the room every five or six minutes and being distraught was awesome. The McClintock. Brilliant. What about Richard Splett? Everything they did with... I mean, Richard Splett, who I don't even remember

how he was introduced to the show, basically as Jonah's friend. He was like Jonah's assistant or something? Yeah, yeah. The final grace note of this show is that he becomes... Two-time present. It was such a brilliant show. It's so artfully crafted and could get away with anything,

which is part of what makes it good. I mean, Seinfeld often got by on the same tact, which is like, they could do any... Put any ridiculous situation towards you, and you'd be like, sure, I buy it, you know? Like, Cosmo Kramer has turned his den into a hot chicken emporium. And you're like, oh, yeah, sure, that makes sense. It's funny.

I thought that the ending with the funeral was like really, I thought, well, ending with the convention and Gary getting taken away, I was like, that's incredible. And that in some ways is Veep's granite state. But then ending with the coda of the funeral, which was hilarious to see where these people were. And then her getting one-uped by Tom Hanks was perfect. The fair faucet to her, his Michael Jackson. Yeah, it was so perfect.

And it was just like, oh no, I'm getting breaking news. I wonder, I mean, do you think we'll ever see a show like that again? Because I think what you said is so true that it was not really a show about Democrats and Republicans. No. You know, it really didn't have anything to do with that. And there were so many times while the show was on the air, which is, I guess, what, eight or nine seasons at this point? Where you could have... It's the seventh season, but I think it was on for like nine years or whatever, yeah.

So that's through an Obama administration and it's through a Trump administration. they could have leaned so hard on specific storytelling tropes, and they somehow managed, I mean, specifically the things that Selena did in this last episode, the sacrifices that she made politically, you know, giving up on gay marriage. I mean, you know, what with a gay daughter, to bet. Like, these are things that, you know,

they were really bipartisan in a lot of ways. They were so evil that you could see both people coming to the center on them. And it didn't matter sort of what the politics of the show was, even though it was a show that was entirely about what politics does to people. Yeah, I also would say that this is something that where it had such an inimitable voice that I don't think we'll ever see something like that again, and to also to see an ensemble of that caliber not get kind of chopped up by the waves of the industry of like, oh, yeah.

I mean, like, the fact that Dan is still on that show, the fact that Gary just did the Gary part for seven seasons, even though that guy's like an amazing comic actor, Gary Cole is busy enough. You know what I mean? These people were going back and back and back to do this because they really love working with Julie Lou Dreyfus and they really like working on the show. And they never lost like a beat.

Like they could come back in five years and have done like a reunion episode and I think it probably would have been of the same caliber. Total counterpoint to a lot of the conversation we've heard about Game of Thrones too, which is that man, some of these people just want to be done with this. Like this has been a slog. It's tough in Northern Ireland.

It's tough in Dubrovnik. Yeah. You know, we got to get out of here. conversely, these people seem to love each other. They seem to love making this show. It's like Deadwood, where you see those guys talk about the Deadwood movie coming up and they're just like, it's the best thing I'll ever work on.

And like, this show will be the highlight of my life. And I just, I would be happy. And Olafont, who like I think was on the fence about doing the movie, but has only ever been like, I will never do anything as good as Deadwood. This is a bit like saying, man, Jonas Salk's polio vaccination was truly incredible. But JLD is incredible. Yeah.

I mean, she really is. such a ferocious genius of an actress. Power rank them. You go New Adventures of Old Christine won, right? That's one, definitely one. And then... That's like Jordan. A deep chasm. A sort of, a sort of, uh, mager's hold fast. And then we get to the second level.

And then, uh, probably her one season stint on SNL. Yeah. And then we go, I guess, Seinfeld. And then Selena. Sleena's last, that sucked. No, I mean, you know, Elaine Bennis versus Selena Myers is a fascinating. I mean, it's not the same character, but it has similar character. No. And it's like 30 years of incredible comic acting on television.

She is literally a genius, a genius actor. And I'm really going to miss the show. And it's super good celebrity. So shout out to her. She seems great. Sean, thank you so much for doing the watch today. Chris, thank you for having me. All right, man. I'll talk to you later. Bye-bye.