by A lot of people are talking about the recent finale of Game of Thrones. For 71 episodes spanning eight years, the epic feudal intrigue based on George R. R. Martin’s classic fantasy novels captured record-breaking audiences. Some 17.4 million viewers watched the finale , so if you’re rolling your eyes and thinking snarky thoughts–like “who spends that much time on a TV show?”–then you’re neglecting a huge aspect of shared humanity. People love stories.
And, evidently, we want them to end well.
What Makes a Good TV Finale?
People are talking about Game of Thrones because the ending . . . well, it sucked. Now, only a fool would expect that a beloved series could wrap up in a way that pleases everyone. Fifty-fifty is a pretty abysmal split when you consider that successful TV series, just like successful book series, are based on known characters, repeating themes, and logical plot developments. But according to a USA Today informal poll, some 60 percent of viewers didn’t like GoT’s ending.
I hated it.
Why? The writing was sloppy and timing weird. Sure, scenes of epic battles and flame-drenched destruction were fabulously executed but throughout this season, plot development often took a backseat to some cool visual (hello, charging into the night, torch-bearing Dothraki!). I mean, why would a dragon melt a chair before incinerating the man who killed its mother? Which brings me to the central issue–truth.
Game of Throne’s finale simply didn’t ring true to its characters.
Put aside the details of plot. Forget about logistics, such as time and place. Discard old themes and minor characters. All the writers had to do was stay close to home on what fans knew (and enjoyed and even loved) about GoT’s main characters.
All they had to do . . . and yet, this is everything.
Season 8’s six episodes were written by four writers; the final four, including the finale, were created by co-creators, producers, and directors David Benioff and D.B. Weiss. Martin quit writing after Season 4; by then, he’d given most of the essential characters flesh and heart. We knew them. In the end, all Benioff and Weiss had to do was let those characters do their thing.
Other finales have had wonderful endings. Six Feet Under kept true to the show’s premise (each episode explored a death, and the last episode was epically death-filled). In “Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen,” M.A.S.H.‘s finale–still the most-watched TV show ever–showcased each of its characters departing the Korean war hospital they’d inhabited for 255 episodes.
I think the most perfect finale ever belonged to Breaking Bad. The entire story was a tragedy, so the finale’s destiny included Walt’s death. But before that moment, he sought to accomplish whatever redemption he could–whether the people he’d hurt agreed with his amends or not.
As creator Vince Gilligan said in a 2013 Entertainment article,
There’s no right or wrong way to do this job — it’s just a matter of: You get as many smart people around you as possible in the writers room . . . And when our gut told us we had it, we wrote it . . . We found over the years that the way we can please the majority of the audience most of the time is to tune out as much extraneous factors as possible and please the eight of us in the writers’ room. If we can make ourselves happy day in and day out, we had a pretty good chance of making most viewers happy as well . . . .”
Vince Gilligan
Honestly, nothing about the GoT’s finale made my gut happy. So, naturally, I wrote my own endings with what I see as these characters’ truths: “In Which I Imagine the Endings These Game of Thrones Characters Truly Deserve.” Let me know what your gut says.
