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- [00:00]
A
Hey, everyone. We had the absolute pleasure of joining Misha Brown on his podcast the Big Flop to bring shame upon the disaster that was season eight of Game of Thrones.
- [00:10]
B
Each episode of the Big Flop chronicles one of the biggest pop culture fails of all time and tries to answer the age old question, who thought this was a good idea?
- [00:19]
A
It was supposed to be the epic finale to the realm's most adored TV series. But with the showrunners itching to leave, brutal night shoots and sloppy production mistakes, the final season of Game of Thrones Red Weddinged itself.
- [00:30]
B
You're about to hear a preview of the Big Flop. While you're listening, follow the Big Flop on the Wondery app or wherever you get podcasts.
- [00:44]
C
So episode four, the Last of the Starks, airs and some of the 17.2 million viewers spot something strange in Winterfell on the table next to Emilia Clarke. It looks like a Starbucks cup.
- [00:58]
A
That's when they lost me. I didn't notice the Starbucks cup there, but when I read that the next day, I was like, you guys, I'm trying to stand up for you, I'm trying, but a Starbucks cup? Come on.
- [01:10]
B
I was so mad that I did not see it myself. Like, I was so mad that I woke up the next day and it was all over the Internet and I was like, I missed a Starbucks. I feel like I have Starbucks star and I could spot it anywhere. But I failed. I failed entirely.
- [01:25]
C
Fun fact. Despite endless Internet memes poking fun at the cup being from Starbucks, production crew have said it's from a local Irish cafe. So support local business, everybody.
- [01:35]
A
That's nice that they're more worried about being seen as not supporting the local economy of Toome. Get the fuck out of here with that. What do you carry around a Starbucks cup to pour it in? Get out of here. Compliers.
- [01:47]
C
Now, I wish that was the only out of place beverage of the season, but no, the production coordinator must have been passed out from huffing wax fumes for the finale as well. So here's a photo.
- [01:59]
B
Oh, right.
- [02:02]
C
So for the listeners at home, there is a plastic bottle underneath one of the chairs, just visible by an actor's feet.
- [02:09]
A
That was the final meeting. Right. When they were all deciding who was gonna be the king.
- [02:13]
B
Yeah, yeah, their big council where they had to pull out all the, like the fold out chairs of Westeros to decide who's gonna be sitting on the Iron Throne.
- [02:19]
C
Yeah. So, I mean, they don't seem very concerned about microplastics.
- [02:24]
B
No, not at all. But by the way, that was from a local Irish convenience store who locally bought plastic.
- [02:35]
C
So fans, they've put up with a lot. They've been forgiving whenever possible, trusting the process and holding out for the perfect story ending to make up for the boring or confusing choices thus far. But that forgiveness ends here. When did you turn on the show?
- [02:52]
A
The sitting around all night episode was when it was done for me because I love the battles. The Battle of the Bastards is one of my all time faves. So I loved all the battling. And then they just stop. It's like the biggest war of the whole show. It's all leading up to this. And they all just stopped to sit around and decide, like, whose feelings were hurt about not banging Brienne or like whatever all of that was. I didn't even get it. I was like, why are we feeling things? You're on Game of Thrones. I don't want to see you feel things. Go decapitate a zombie.
- [03:20]
B
Here's where I lost my faith in the show. It was episode four and we'd spent more than half of this final season in gloomy Winterfell when there's this entire rich world of locations. And furthermore that Cersei was like a non entity. Like, how is it that we have our final victory lap for the show and Cersei is doing absolutely nothing? I don't want to watch Jon Snow moping around episode after episode. Jon Snow is actually one of my least favorite characters. He does nothing. He's bland, he's uninteresting. Cersei is doing cool shit and she's in the big city. I want to go there. And we got literally none of it.
- [03:59]
C
That's. And that's exactly it. I think that most people, they agreed it was bland. Even though we're talking about feelings, it was somehow emotionless. And then I think the biggest fault was the no longer acting like themselves. And for example, like Daenerys, she was always the most, shall we say, progressive candidate for the throne thus far. But then she makes that full heel turn and she turns cartoonishly evil over that one episode.
- [04:24]
A
I don't know, I kind of get that. Just because she'd been through so much and blah, blah, blah. And really, if you think back on her character, she was always burning everybody alive. Like they made it seem like, oh, this is so crazy. Everybody was like, I can't believe Dany did that. Dany literally did that every time she had a problem.
- [04:40]
B
Problem.
- [04:40]
C
Also, what do you think about Jaime Lannister? Because he started off as the most hated character on the show who spends seven seasons becoming the good guy and dumping his evil, sexy sister and then possibly falling in love with an awkward warrior lady just to return to his codependent twin to die needlessly. Yeah, what a weird arc.
- [05:00]
B
That was a weird arc. And I also felt like sort of wrapped up in that, too, was the death of Jaime. And Cersei was very. It was very meh. I felt like, especially for Cersei, given that Cersei really did very little this season. Except, I mean, she cut off Missandei's head. But, you know, that's like going to Starbucks for her. You know, she's like, oh, it's Tuesday. Okay, behead someone. And then I'll have a latte after that. Thank you.
- [05:25]
A
Then I'll leave the cup under a chair while we shoot.
- [05:28]
C
Overall, people think it's a mess, and the dissatisfaction with the show reaches critical mass. Everyone hates it, even the actors. Isaac Hempstead, who played Bran, he thought the final script was a joke. First read it because it said that he'd be the king. He literally thought everyone got a script, oh, as a joke saying that they were going to end up on the throne.
- [05:49]
A
Like the movie clue. Yeah, Multiple.
- [05:53]
B
Multiple endings.
- [05:55]
A
We called it in our recaps right at the start that Bran was going to be the king, and it was as a joke, but we were like, they're probably going to have Bran as the king because that's how politics works. We all glamorize things and we start rooting for people, but it's always like the most basic bitch who wins. And Bran, like, didn't have a ton of charisma, but he did, you know, he did have magic and he was probably the crow person or whatever the hell that was. And he did get dragged along the kingdom on a cardboard box or whatever the hell. Like, he kind of earned it.
- [06:24]
C
But he wasn't the only one who was surprised. Conleth Hill, who plays Varys, can be seen throwing down his script in frustration in the behind the scenes footage. Kit Harington or Jon Snow was surprised he wasn't going to kill the Night King, but he did stand up for Benioff and Weiss saying, quote, the critics can go fuck themselves.
- [06:45]
B
Yeah. And by the way, I love that it was Arya who did it, because Arya was on such a long, prolonged journey of becoming a little warrior herself that, like, if she didn't do anything significant with that by the end of the show, that would have been, like, very frustrating.
- [06:58]
A
I don't know. I feel like everybody just wanted to put everything on Jon Snow and just make Jon Snow the hero. Cause he's like the hottest and he's the love interest and like Jon Snow automatically wins. And I like that the nerd writers were like, no, guess what? The quarterback doesn't always win. You know, like some little girl ends up killing the Night King and then Jon Snow. Jon Snow gets screwed over by someone who would rather have power than him and, you know, then spends the rest of his life crying. I really liked that was one of my favorite moves of the writers, actually. And people didn't like that Arya kind of flew at the guy. They were like, that is so unrealistic that Arya did that.
- [07:32]
B
That's so unrealistic that that girl could jump higher than what would normally be physically allowed when killing an undead person who has the ability to make skeletons reanimate.
- [07:48]
A
That was just a preview of the big flop. Listen to the full episode wherever you get your podcasts.