C’mon, people.
(Spoilers below, obviously.)
Listen. Did we really think that the “Game of How Long Will it Take This Newly Introduced Character to Show Us Her Boobs?”, the show that has inspired legions of literal “Game of Boobs” online quizzes, was going to serve up some kind of feminist utopic ending featuring an unproblematic feminist ruler? The show that reliably and unreflectively uses rape as a plot device, including incestuous brother-on-sister rape that takes place next to the corpse of their dead son and boy-king whose favorite passtime is torturing prostitutes?
That show?
Sure, GoT has featured some badass and stereotype defying female characters, but a feminist anthem it definitely is not. It takes place in an aggressively and regressively patriarchal universe, a universe that is seeming uncomfortably similar, these days, to our own regressively patriarchal one.
And, yet, I loved this imperfect and surprising show, and I loved the way it ended. I loved that it ended with a whimper, that its prophesies and destinies might have been accidentally fulfilled, but mostly ended in bureaucratic wrangling, in petty argument and compromise. I love the show’s skepticism towards leaders who know without question that their path is true and just (and if you don’t think Daenerys as potential tyrant was adequately foreshadowed, kindly check out the image, above, of her presiding over Meereen and ignoring the cries of people being crucified in a way that seems, pardon me, more than a little tyrant-esque and ominous). I even loved the weirdness and ham handedness of Bran’s becoming king (I’ll admit that the writing here, as many have pointed out, left something to be desired, but I don’t care), and that the story that started with him pushed from a window ended with him ruling the whole damn kingdom (except the North, where Sansa presides as a very chic and competent queen). I love that Arya never finished ticking off her revenge list as we all expected she would, but instead blithely sailed off to the ends of the earth. I love that Jon is banished back to the wall to protect the realm from nothing and to hang out with the wildlings, and that the last shot is of people walking into the forest for no ostensible reason or end.
In the chaos we sometimes find accidental purpose, we sometimes break archetype, we sometimes find signs of spring.
And also boobs. We also sometimes find boobs, and if we are really lucky, an elusive penis shot.
