Iâm not saying how I just spent the last three days wasnât fun or interesting, but I am saying it was definitely a way to procrastinate on figuring out how the heist in Book Two is going to work...
Iâm not saying how I just spent the last three days wasnât fun or interesting, but I am saying it was definitely a way to procrastinate on figuring out how the heist in Book Two is going to work.
I was the kid who waited until 9PM the night before an assignment was due (and⌠a few times until 6AM before it was due) and then banged it out and got 110% and ruined the curve for everyone. AndâŚ
Setting aside several good points made last night, and without diving into the implications for the remainder of the season, the actual Battle of Winterfell was DEEPLY unsatisfying.
I kept turning to the friend I was watching with and asking âWHAT is this battle plan?!â because it just made no sense. You dug an entire trench around Winterfell but only made it six feet wide? And only far enough from the castle to protect NOBODY within its boundaries?
You sent the Dothraki off alone to die for... what reason? To âdraw them outâ and force the Army of the Dead to march on the castle? We just spent seven seasons figuring out how to get the Dothraki and their horses across the Narrow Sea and theyâre wiped out in a visually interesting if oddly distant massacre. Fine, the world is terrible and sometimes bad things happen to the good guys (they were misogynistic assholes who probs didnât have a place in Westeros long-term, but STILL).
Only, once youâd handed over 20,000 new recruits for the dead and theyâd charged all the way back to the Unsullied, NOW you decide to bring out the dragons and fricassee some zombies? But not in any kind of coordinated strafing runs, and not along the front lines where theyâre attacking your men. Dany and Jon just randomly sweep the back nine for a bit. Cool.
The Night Kingâs Snowpocalypse was a good counter-tactic and rightfully knocked Dany and Jon out of being helpful, except, no, wait, Jon lands back on the wall of the Godswood, and just... hangs out? For a bit? While Davos frantically signals for Dany to light the trench (which, as Iâve said, we light too late and at a distance that is unable to save anyone, really. WHY WASNâT EVERYONE BEHIND THE TRENCH okay anywho). Turn around, Davos. Jon is just sitting there atop his own ignitor doing fuck all.
Once the dead reach the walls, it disintegrates into truly understandable chaos. There wasnât much they were going to be able to do once there are zombies in the yard. Though Iâm not sure where all of the North went, exactly? Once they retreated into the castle? Since Arya went running through a dozen empty halls. Is Winterfell bigger on the inside?
And what the holy hell, Bran. Why warg at all? Chekovâs gun is screaming at me right now (donât get me started on Tyrion lamenting that heâd be helpful up top and then... they just donât do anything with that (Iâm glad to see Glen Weldon at NPR also thought we were going to get a murder-suicide pact from Tyrion and Sansa (I yelled at the TVÂ âDonât go out too early! Learn from the ending of The Mist!â))). I kept thinking Bran was going to have some secret trick, that he had flitted off somewhere to learn or do something and heâd have the deus ex machina to resolve it.
Not that Iâm complaining about the Arya of it all, that was PRETTY GREAT (and the symmetry of the Blade that started the War of the Five Kings coming full circle to end the Night King is perfect).
But this leads me to the actual problem at the root of all of this complaining:Â
There was nothing narratively satisfying about this episode. We didnât have any sense for what the strategy was, and so there werenât feints and attacks that succeeded or failed that we were invested in.
When you watch a Heist movie, the joy is in learning about Plan A, watching Plan A fall apart, and being surprised and impressed that there were actually Plans B-D each of which succeed or fail. But ultimately the stakes and tension come from your understanding of what is and isnât working.
This wasnât a well-executed battle plan from the Living. This wasnât a case of experienced commanders setting up a plan that fails to account for the tactics or overwhelming numbers of the Dead. There were no moments of âOH they knew this wouldnât work, that was a feint, now theyâre doing something else and OH MAN thatâs failing too because theyâve never faced an enemy like this.â
And even if the intention of the writers was âlook how entirely hopeless this is for the Living, they are well and truly fucked no matter what,â there are ways to do it that donât make the Living look like total knobs. If Iâm on my couch formulating better battle strategies on the fly and yelling them at the TV, Jamie and Brienne and Davos should be planning better.
Why send out the Dothraki alone? Why not goad them into action with the Trebuchets? Why didnât you have entire flanks of soldiers hidden in the woods to the east and west to attack the flanks of the dead? Why werenât you strafing the dead with dragons once the trench was lit? Why werenât you strafing the dead with dragons as they marched toward your front line? Why werenât archers on the wall igniting the stationary dead post-trench? Why wasnât there burning oil to be poured on the climbing dead from the walls?
What was your plan for Bran in the Godswood? Why didnât Theon have dragonglass-tipped arrows? And a dozen concealed dragonglass knives on him?
There simply wasnât enough, narratively, to hang on to. At the end of this, no one in charge deserves the Iron Throne. That was a terrible plan to defend Winterfell (Iâm not sure it deserves the word âplanâ tbh) and all of you should be ashamed.
