Missing The Point Of The Game

As we enter the final few episodes of Game of Thrones, we are awash in hot takes. One that I keep bumping into (prior to last night's blowout battle between the living and the dead) is that GoT is so into subverting our expectations that the Night King should win and humanity reduced to...something.  Much of this is based on the execution of certain characters along the way, most notably Nedd and Robb Stark.  Those two men were typical fantasy heroes - noble, handsome - who turned out to be doomed because they were noble (and in Robb's case, handsome).

The point of beheading the star (Sean Bean) at the end of the first season and the Red Wedding was to point out the capricious nature of violence.  You establish those stakes early.  Think of the Omaha Beach sequence in Saving Private Ryan.  While there was another similar action sequence at the end, very little of the rest of the movie comes anywhere close to the brutal first half hour.  However, that first half hour hovers at the edge of every scene, every encounter.  The death of a single character by a sniper lands a bit harder, but we are also waiting for death at every moment.

GoT set up the same dynamic.  Too many critics decided that this meant that Cersei or the Night King should wind up on the Iron Throne.  I doubt very, very much that this will happen. Martin and the showrunners are interested in how power works.  How it works when it is exercised and how it works upon those who exercise it. The Starks who died put too much faith in human decency and justice. The Starks who remain don't seem to have much of that - perhaps with the exception of Jon Snow/Aemon Targaryen. Arya and Sansa certainly don't put much faith in human decency.

The final three episodes will deal fundamentally with these ideas of what makes a good ruler and how to gain power, and the fact that they are often at odds with each other.  The Targaryens first created the Iron Throne because they had dragons.  Might made right.  Robert's Rebellion overthrew the Targaryens because they were both weak and incompetent. Danerys' claim to throne is based on heredity and dragons (and perhaps saving humanity from the Dead), but that's no different than Jon's claim.  He has blood and fire, too. For that matter, Cersei can bring blood and fire her own self.

Ultimately, the question that GoT should resolve is whether the ability to gain power is at all compatible with being a good ruler.  I'm not sure they can really resolve this issue, however.  Basically, we are headed for a few possible landing spots.

Very unlikely, but Cersei retains the throne by being the most ruthless and cunning.

More likely, Danerys finds a way to overthrow Cersei and "break the wheel."

Most interesting, Danerys and Jon overthrow Cersei and then turn on each other.  Even more interesting would be a resolution that removes Cersei in Episode 5 (Arya FTW) and then Jon and Dany kill each other in a dragon duel, leaving the remnants of the cast to piece together some sort of political order that doesn't revolve entirely around military power.

Least interesting (but maybe most likely) is Jon and Dany ascending to the throne together and complementing each other's best attributes to create a just rule.

The Night King was never going to win.  Cersei is almost certainly not going to win.  Cruelty isn't a sound governing philosophy. Even dictators bestow favors on their subjects. That doesn't mean we are headed for some saccharine happy ending. 

In the end, all that matters is that Hot Pie lives.