I only started watching HBO’s hit series Game of Thrones in 2013, just after the conclusion of the third season. I had never watched a full series of an American show before nor heard of A Song of Ice and Fire as a series. I don’t even really remember how I first heard of Game of Thrones, but I was immediately intrigued by the concept.

Arya Stark stands amidst the burning ruins of King’s Landing.

WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS FOR GAME OF THRONES, A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE AND AVENGERS: ENDGAME AHEAD. SOME LINKS CONTAIN GRAPHIC VIOLENCE.

My first exposure to fantasy as a genre came in 2007, when a school friend of mine introduced me to the Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG) RuneScape. Immediately I fell in love with the world created by Cambridge based Jagex, and a lifelong obsession with medieval fantasy developed. I went on to read Christopher Paolini’s Inheritance Cycle; another medieval fantasy epic with dragons, magic and elves, and absolutely adored it. To this day I have refused to watch the film adaptation of the first book, Eragon, as I’m so worried it’ll ruin my memories of that incredible series. Yes, it had its flaws, but ultimately it captured my young heart and granted me a satisfying conclusion which successfully tied up every loose end I can think of. Despite my love for fantasy, it took me an extremely long time to finally watch the biggest fantasy franchise, The Lord of the Rings, and again I absolutely loved it. I blame this on the fact that my family isn’t exactly great fans of genre so I never had that childhood experience.

So in the summer of 2013, having only had one experience of fantasy on screen, I found an extremely dodgy streaming site, sat down and watched Game of Thrones “Winter is Coming”. My fifteen year old self sat enthralled for an hour, and by the end I was hooked. My original decision to buy the first two seasons on DVD and watch them legally was, much like the young Bran Stark, thrown out of the window as I need to see what happened next. Over the course of that weekend I consumed 30 hours of Game of Thrones, never tiring or boring of the epic story which played out in front of me. By the end of the series I was a huge fan, poring over fan websites and theories in an attempt to get my latest dosage of George R.R. Martin’s world. Over the summer holidays I picked up and read every single one of Martin’s books cover to cover so I could “get ahead” of the series, and then sat and waited both eagerly and impatiently for the fourth season to air.

It has now been five years since I first binged three seasons of this show in an unhealthy amount of time. In that time we’ve had a further five seasons, numerous spin-off books, music and fashion collaborations, and unfortunately no new books from Martin. In the nine years since it premiered, Game of Thrones has become the biggest media property of all time. Actors who were either little known or only children when they first appeared in the series are now household names, not to mention the name “Khaleesi” entering nurseries and school playgrounds as new parents were inspired by their favourite characters. The impact of this show cannot be understated for its influence in our time.

Eddard Stark sits atop the coveted Iron Throne.

But for many, the wait to see who will take the coveted Iron Throne has concluded in a rather empty manner. Much has been made of a petition demanding a full re-release of the last season garnering upwards of a million signatures, and one only needs to glance at the IMDB or Rotten Tomatoes pages to identify the fall in ratings that has come over the last few weeks. Much like the theorised hero of the series, Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, the show has suffered a huge fall from grace.

Why has this happened? Many have been quick to blame the showrunners, David Benioff and Daniel Weiss, for the decline in writing quality as they rushed to finish Martin’s incomplete story. Others have blamed Martin himself for his notoriously slow writing creating this situation in the first place. Some have rallied against this criticism totally, declaring that anger at the show comes from those angry that their theories did not come to fruition or “incels” complaining about the part played by women in the concluding seasons. None of these criticisms are without merit, as the conversation surrounding Game of Thrones is now so large it would be impossible to attribute this fall from grace to one singular factor.

However, I have my own theory about why I, personally, found myself feeling so empty as the final credits rolled on “The Iron Throne”, and it comes from one of the most unlikely of sources: Call of Duty. And if that isn’t enough to convince you, perhaps the success of superhero films across the last decade can help justify my opinion.

Subverting Expectations

Those familiar with the First Person Shooter (FPS) franchise Call of Duty are probably confused with how it could possibly be linked with a medieval fantasy like Game of Thrones, and in time I will explain my reasoning, but first it would be appropriate to explain the background of the Call of Duty franchise.

During the 1990s, video gaming was far from the giant media form we know it as today, but it was growing rapidly. The FPS subgenre, however, was still a small one; games with this style of play weren’t even known as “FPS’s” for a long time. Video games such as Wolfenstein and Doom, which first appeared in the 1980s, pioneered in a genre which saw the player take control of a gun-toting super-soldier in first person fighting their way either through hordes of demons or genetically enhanced Nazis. These games were confined exclusively to the PC market, rather than the growing home console which was both more accessible and user friendly. This began to change during the 1990s as more and more “Doom clones”, as they were then known, began to hit the market. Arguably inspired by the success of the 1998 film Saving Private Ryan, the first title to adapt the FPS model into a grounded, military setting was the Medal of Honor (sic) franchise.

The iconic opening scene from Saving Private Ryan (1998), which likely inspired the transition to a military setting in FPS games.

Containing missions such as the storming of Omaha Beach during the D-Day landings and battling Nazi soldiers during the allied advance towards Berlin, Medal of Honor offered something different to FPS games that had come before, but it was still haunted by the gremlins of its predecessors. Fans complained that despite the more grounded setting, Medal of Honor still depicted the player as a super-soldier. influencing the warfare around them rather than being influenced by it. A difference of opinion in how to continue the franchise eventually led to the split of Medal of Honor’s development team, with a group forming a new company named Infinity Ward. It was this company that would eventually turn the FPS genre into the dominant video game style and arguably turn video gaming from niche, “geeky” hobby into the behemoth it is today with their franchise Call of Duty.

Call of Duty (2003) captured the essence of being a frontline soldier during the Second World War by removing the superhuman elements from the player. In one mission whilst playing as a Russian soldier, the player isn’t even given a gun — they must survive by picking one up from their fallen comrades. It captured the feeling of desperation and vulnerability as the largest human conflict unfolded around the player, not as a result of them, completely overturning the model created by Doom years before. The game quickly overtook Medal of Honor to become the most popular of military shooters, and later would go on to become one of the biggest selling video game franchises of all time.

But how is this linked to Game of Thrones? Because almost the exact same thing happened with onscreen medieval fantasy. The Lord of the Rings had brought fantasy into the spotlight with a clear-cut, good vs. evil battle to save the world from Sauron and his forces. Heroes were clearly defined, villains were even more so, and ultimately the “good guys” were always going to win. Game of Thrones turned these tropes on their head within a single season; the supposed main character, Eddard Stark, is dead by the ninth episode. Characters show mixed motivations and loyalties throughout the series, leading to numerous plot twists and unexpected character deaths, creating the illusion that nobody, regardless of screen time, is safe.

Jaime Lannister and Brienne of Tarth share a moment of character development in Season 3.

Across the course of the first four seasons the character development is almost unmatched within the fantasy genre. The clearest example of this can be seen in Jaime Lannister, who at first glance is clearly a villain in the series. Within the first season, Jaime throws a child from a tower window, murders a long-time servant of the “good guy” Starks and is engaged in an incestuous affair with his twin sister. By the end of the fourth season, Jaime has lost his sword fighting hand and gained humility through his time as a prisoner of war, saving his captor Brienne of Tarth from rape and death during that time. His emotions gain new layers when his he witnesses his first-born son die from poisoning, although he cannot admit this to anyone. By the end of the series, his character arc is one of the best in the show, and possibly one of the best to be seen on the silver screen. The complexity of a character who once seemed like an 18-Rated version of Shrek’s Prince Charming is perfectly demonstrated as he holds his sister and lover as the walls of the Red Keep collapse on top of him, despite him recognising her megalomania and escaping it just a few episodes before. It calls back his notorious line “The things I do for love” from the first episode. This character development is not even unique, showing how Game of Thrones managed to completely subvert the stereotypical patterns of a fantasy epic.

How Game of Thrones Lost its Identity

Drawing parallels between the rise of these two franchises is not the point of this article, however, but rather the fall of these two franchises. I will place a disclaimer before I continue in regards to Call of Duty, however, as this “fall from grace” I am describing refers only to the single player stories, or “campaigns”, in Call of Duty games, rather than referencing the online component which has since superseded them, as it would only serve to complicate the argument.

The cover art for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (2007).

Back in 2015, a YouTube channel called Raycevick uploaded an eighteen minute long video simply titled “How Call of Duty Lost its Identity”. You can view the video yourself here, but I will summarise its general argument as well. The video talks about the aforementioned redefinition of the standard FPS model during the early 2000s, with the Call of Duty franchise reaching its peak (in terms of narrative, he argues) in 2007 with Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. This was the first time Call of Duty had left the realm of the Second World War to tell a story, and it changed the landscape forever. The campaign follows the parallel plots of an SAS platoon as well as a soldier in the US Marines, as they try to prevent a newly ascended dictator in a fictional depiction of Iraq from accessing nuclear weaponry. Whilst the SAS storyline focuses on extracting an informant from civil-war torn Russia, the US Marines invade the capital and attempt to capture the villain, Al-Assad. Whilst mainly sticking to its roots as a grounded, military experience, Modern Warfare’s huge plot twist shows a nuclear detonation within the city being invaded by the Marines. There is an even an aptly named mission simply titled “Shock and Awe” which shows the aftermath of the explosion, capturing the feeling of the player at the same point. This moment is named a “wow” moment by Racyevick; a plot twist which served to shock the player and radically change the direction of the story.

Again, the similarities with Game of Thrones are plain to see; similar “wow” moments such as the execution of Eddard Stark or the infamous “Red Wedding” (Which can be viewed here. WARNING: Graphic violence) shocked viewers across the world whilst also seeming believable and advancing the story. Its moments like these which helped cement Game of Thrones’ reputation as the brutal, unforgiving show it is known as today, but the popularity of these narrative choices may well have been the downfall of the series. Again, I return to Call of Duty to explain this.

Modern Warfare’s highly anticipated sequel, imaginatively named Modern Warfare 2, released in 2009, and boasted a campaign markedly distinct from its prequel. Within the first act alone, the player has witnessed a building explode from airstrikes, watched a slow motion explosion of a military base unfold and engaged in a high speed snowmobile chase within the space of just two missions. This description is even leaving out the infamous “No Russian” level (Which can be viewed here. WARNING: Graphic violence), which saw players assume the role of an undercover agent massacring civilians in a Russian airport before the villain, Makarov, murders the player for being an undercover agent and leaves his body at the airport in order to place blame for the massacre on the United States. This twist ultimately leads to a Russian invasion of US East Coast, where the rest of the campaign is largely based.

The cover art for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009).

… Yeeeaaah. It sounds really stupid doesn’t it? No slow build-up, no narrative undertones. Nothing. The game continues in a similar vein from start to finish. I never personally played the trilogy’s conclusion (also imaginatively named Modern Warfare 3), but I’ve heard it continues in a similar vein, and the campaigns of future Call of Duty titles did as well (Here is a scene from the latest title, Call of Duty: WW2. They really need to work on their names…). It is this sudden transition from grounded, military gameplay to strung together “balls to the wall” action sequences that Raycevick laments in his video essay, complaining that the series has abandoned what made it great in the first place in exchange for cheap thrills. It is no wonder that reviews of the campaign element of Call of Duty have declined ever since, and the developers opted to not even include one in their latest instalment, Call of Duty: Black Ops 4.

Now let us compare this to Game of Thrones. During the entire course of the first season, the most significant moment comes in the ninth episode with the execution of Eddard Stark. This started a trend which saw the ninth episode of each season become infamous for its plot twists or grand battles, with the previous eight building up to them and the tenth episode setting the stage for what would follow in the next season, whilst also building hype for it. This model worked well; to this day the S06E09 “The Battle of the Bastards” is one of the highest rated episodes in the series for its depiction of a brutal battle between the forces of Jon Snow and Ramsay Bolton. The aforementioned “Red Wedding” is still seen as one of the hugest plot twists to ever be shown on television, despite the show arguably outdoing itself later on.

After the sixth season, a decision was taken by the Game of Thrones production team to create the last two seasons over the course of thirteen episodes, with Season 7 have seven of them, followed by a two year gap before the airing of the eighth and final season with the remaining six episodes. Even before the latest season, the cracks were beginning to show in this strategy, with the number of episodes severely damaging the show’s pacing. Journeys which once took months suddenly seemed doable in a matter of hours. Dialogue was stripped down or removed entirely to further the plot, and the “wow” moments arrived. Starting with the Dothraki and dragon charge on the Lannister army at the Field of Fire (you can watch it here. WARNING: Graphic violence) and culminating in the episode “Beyond the Wall”, which contains about five of these “wow” moments in the space of twenty minutes.

The way the seventh season concluded made it inevitable that the final season would be an action packed experience. The show needed to show two huge battles in Winterfell and King’s Landing as well as wrap up the storylines of tens of characters we’ve come to love across the last eight years. The way they did it? “Wow” moments, but it didn’t have to be this way. The first two episodes were characterised by their slow build-up and focus on character interactions, much like in previous seasons, and are tellingly the highest rated episodes in this season. It is after this that things get hairy. “The Long Night” had more than its fair share of “wow” moments, but the one that drew the ire of the fans the most was the decision for Arya Stark to appear from almost out of nowhere, dodging around the undead and supersoldier White Walkers to defeat the Night King, a villain who had been built up as a huge adversary across the previous four seasons (You can see the moment here). Complaints were made that Arya’s sudden jump from behind the Night King was done simply to subvert expectations, whilst some complained that foreshadowing and the “Prince that was Promised” theory (which you can read about here. WARNING: Potential book spoilers) had been dumped by the wayside in exchange for cheap thrills.

Daenerys Targaryen — The Mad Queen?

The complaints did not end there, however. Over the next two episodes, Daenerys’ dragon is brutally murdered by a Skorpion shot which appears from out of nowhere (Watch here), Daenerys seemingly goes mad after the murder of her adviser Missandei of Naath and commits genocide against the residents of King’s Landing (Watch here. WARNING: Graphic violence), and Jon Snow finally murders her only to be spared by her mourning dragon in exchange for the coveted Iron Throne being melted (Watch here). There are countless other examples of “wow” moments that can also be listed, but its these which generated the most criticism from fans and critic alike. Just take a look at the decline in ratings on Rotten Tomatoes as the season progresses.

Can “Wow” Moments be Done Right?

Clearly, I do not speak for every viewer of Game of Thrones when I say the excess of “wow” moments is the reason for the decline in the show’s quality. I myself don’t believe it to be the sole reason either, but I do think it explains why I found myself feeling so empty at the show’s conclusion. The ending, which sees Bran Stark take the Iron Throne, Sansa Stark becoming Queen in the North and Jon Snow becoming King Beyond the Wall, has divided fans and critics. Personally, I don’t have a particular problem with this ending on paper, but when I consider what its taken to get to this point, I can’t help but feel disappointed. The cramming of big action set-pieces with either poor writing or extremely rushed character development into such a short space of time has detracted greatly from the experience. Should all of the moments I’ve described be removed entirely? Of course not, but a question I will always ask myself when I think about Game of Thrones is what could have been had the last two seasons been told over the course of twenty episodes. This would have given enough time to build up Arya Stark killing the Night King, or Daenerys Targaryen becoming the Mad Queen, or ultimately how Bran Stark has ended up king of the now Six Kingdoms. I think the addition of seven episodes would have allowed this and allowed these “wow” moments to remain with further justification and, therefore, with more weight. It would have been this weight which would have delivered a far more satisfying conclusion to the series.

Has anybody managed to achieve the balance between a strong narrative and a large number of “wow” moments? Yes, they have. You need look no further than the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) to see it in action. Unless you have been living under a rock, you will have no doubt been made aware of Avengers: Endgame (2019), which released in cinemas last month. Endgame marks the end of a superhero epic which has spanned eleven years and a whopping twenty-two films, not including spin-off TV and streaming network shows as well. Alongside its prequel, Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Marvel has successfully delivered a satisfying de-facto conclusion for its franchise which started with Iron Man, and fittingly ended with him as well.

Captain America prepares to fight Thanos in Avengers: Endgame (2019).

The reason why the “wow” moments, of which there are many, work so well in Endgame is because they all feel so earned. It feels appropriate that Captain America should be worthy of wielding “Mjolnir”, the mythical weapon of Asgard, because of events shown in Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) and Captain America: Civil War (2016). It feels earned that when we finally see every superhero introduced to use over the last decade emerge from portals to stand and face off against the villain Thanos that we hear the famous line “Avengers, Assemble”. Even the presence of Thanos feels like it is well earned after we’ve seen him be teased in endless post-credits scenes and films since The Avengers (2012). The difference between Kevin Feige, the man in charge of the MCU, and David Benioff and Daniel Weiss is that Feige has clearly had a vision in place before the “wow” moments have come together. Benioff and Weiss, it seems, thought of these “wow” moments before the narrative could fit around them, which has damaged the final product. This is so clearly demonstrated by the revelation that Iron Man’s final line, a famous call-back to the film which kicked the whole series off, was only added at the last minute.

Marvel achieved this over the course of twenty-two films. Any less and it simply would not have worked. Its clear I am not the only one who believes this, since as I write this Endgame is fast gaining on the Worldwide Box Office record set by Avatar back in 2009. And if that isn’t evidence enough of how time is needed to build up to these “wow” moments, you need look no further than DC’s attempts to emulate Marvel’s success…

A Unique Experience

Despite the ending of the series, Game of Thrones has been huge in popular culture. Other production companies are scrambling to recreate its success, with Amazon Prime’s huge buyout of the Lord of the Rings license and Netflix attempting to adapt The Witcher into a series. I am personally looking forward to these endeavours; Amazon look to be creating new stories within J. R. R. Tolkien’s universe with a huge budget which will hopefully do it justice. I wait with baited breath for The Witcher as well, which is only being talked about by Netflix due to the highly successful The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt video game released by Polish developer CD Projekt Red in 2015. If successful, Netflix in particular will owe a lot of it to HBO and Game of Thrones, as I know from personal experience that I would only have played The Witcher 3 if medieval fantasy had been as popular as it has become in the Game of Thrones era.

Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia in Netlix’ upcoming The Witcher series.

The ending will also, I suspect, have a negative legacy. For every successful medieval fantasy adaptation, there will be many failures at the cinematic box office or on TV. It’s likely Game of Thrones will be the last entertainment form of its kind as TV and cinema begin to decline and give way to new wave streaming services like Netflix, a market which is only complicated as more companies launch their own services. And of course; the questions over what could have been will always hang over it.

I have considered that I am perhaps being unfair in my criticism. It is easy for me to criticise something like Call of Duty as it never had a particularly large impact upon my life. Yes, I spent many hours enjoying it when I was younger, but my interests and personality were never really defined by it. The same cannot be said for Game of Thrones, which as sad as it sounds has made up a large part of my life since I watched that first episode in 2013 in one way or another. In some ways, the failure of its conclusion has made its end easier to take, I guess, but I will still miss it. There are numerous spin-offs planned as well as the long anticipated next addition to the book series, The Winds of Winter, to look forward to, but I feel as though they will never capture my imagination in the same way again. It is this feeling that will mean Game of Thrones will always hold a place in my heart, regardless of my feelings on how it ended.

To the cast, crew, writers and inspirations for Game of Thrones; thank you. “And now your watch has ended”…