And talking of convenient stupidity, there is poor Jaime – who last week, of course, decided to backtrack on his whole redemptive narrative arc to leave new flame Brienne of Tarth behind and come to his twisted sister-lover’s aid. Now we find him captured by Dany’s forces, after apparently deciding he could simply ride back into the citadel through enemy lines – not even bothering to conceal his signature golden prosthetic arm in the process.

Anyway, it’s all fine, because Tyrion manages to sneakily release him so he can try to persuade Cersei to give up the ghost. In what turns out to be a farewell scene between the brothers, we hear Jaime claim he cares not a jot for the potential obliteration of the citizens of King’s Landing – despite his life having been defined by his killing of the Mad King, Aerys Targaryen, in their defence all those years ago. But then, within an instant, he is also converted from his belief that there is no point trying to persuade his sister to stand down, into deciding that this is exactly what he will do. Once this was a show that intelligently delineated a senseless world; now, truly, it is just nonsense.

But all this is nothing compared to Dany’s full-throttle transition into her father’s demented daughter – a twist that was not unpredictable, based on her trajectory in recent episodes, yet now it’s happened, still feels thoroughly unearned. Her hardening into an unconscious tyrant, prepared to sacrifice innocents in her delusional belief that her quest for power served a greater good, was not beyond the bounds of credibility. But to turn her into a full-blooded psychopath, who ignores the capitulation of her potential subjects, and wilfully destroys them instead? After her clear obsession with being some kind of saviour figure? It feels like a complete ceding of characterisation to the necessities of creating an admittedly spectacular final set-piece. It also means that the scenes of mass slaughter, as the denizens of King’s Landing are variously burnt to a crisp by Drogon from above or slaughtered on the ground, are particularly nauseating. Game of Thrones has never been less than Grand Guignol gory, of course, but this simply comes off as a cynical, concluding reiteration of its USP.

And what a shame that, in the final reckoning, the show doesn’t give Cersei Lannister anything like her due. For most of the episode, she is stuck surveying the encroaching havoc from her tower – and then, when that edifice crumbles, she is denied the kind of climactic showdown that her profound villainy has always merited. In the end, despite long-time fan predictions, neither Jaime kills her, nor Arya: the latter is seemingly set up to do so, but reneges on her kill-list mission at the last minute on the advice of long-time love-hate buddy The Hound, who persuades her there’s more to life than revenge. Instead, the Lannister matriarch apparently dies alongside Jaime, as they are crushed trying to escape the castle through an underground tunnel. It is an unceremonious, and frankly uninteresting, end for one of the show’s most compelling characters.

There is one more episode to go, and possibly something to play for. But, by the end of this 90 minutes, as the ash settled, it is difficult not to feel one was looking at the charred remains of an era-defining television show’s integrity. Or have we fans, like the dopey faithful Jon Snow (who barely merits a mention at this stage, with his off-the-peg nobility and single furrow-browed expression) always been blinded by a sense of loyalty that it simply never merited? Benioff has declared he plans “to be very drunk and very far from the internet” for next week’s finale. Some of his audience may feel the need to follow suit.

★★☆☆☆

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