MovieChat Forums > Game of Thrones (2011) Discussion > Should s7 and s8 really have less episod...

Should s7 and s8 really have less episodes?

posted 7 years ago by JustinJackFlash (161)
15 replies | jump to latest

I'm not saying this just because I'm eager for as much GoT as possible. I'm talking about what's actually right for the show.

This is a show that's taken it's time to tell the story. The whole appeal is that it's slow and dense. So why change this for the ending? There is still loads that needs to happen and it's the stuff we've all been waiting for. Why rush it? As much time and depth should be spent telling the story of Daenerys' attack on King's Landing as there has been on everything else. And I'm assuming they also have to repel the whitewalkers too. How can you possibly tell all this in 13 episodes? I can't see how it wouldn't make the show very uneven.

[–] Volley (3368) 7 years ago

Yeah, there is a lot to cover still, for sure. Personally I'd rather see the series go to 10+ seasons...

It seems the only way this could be done is the moment Daenerys lands at the Westeros coastline, she really does start getting the support of the people there and they start flocking to her cause.

From the Season 7 Finale, We know Dorne and Highgarden are fully invested in Targaryen, which means the entire southern portion of Westeros is already Daenerys territory, including Oldtown--Westeros' second largest city, so that's already a huge chunk taken of support.

Next up is the Westerlands, most notably Casterly Rock, the Riverlands, and the Stormlands, which won't be difficult due to the smaller size of the Lannister army in comparison to Daenerys forces. What Petyr Baelish does with the Eyrie is unknown at this point. If Cersei has more wildfire to use is unknown at this point.

Since this is a Song of Ice & Fire, an alliance of Jon (Ice) and Daenerys (Fire), is very likely. It'll be interesting to see what the White Walkers have in store though, they will probably be injected into Season 7 when we least expect.

[–] JustinJackFlash (161) 7 years ago

Haha, you've really thought about this. I hope it's not that easy though.

"Since this is a Song of Ice & Fire, an alliance of Jon (Ice) and Daenerys (Fire), is very likely. It'll be interesting to see what the White Walkers have in store though, they will probably be injected into Season 7 when we least expect."

Yeah, I thought that would happen. After defeating Cersei, instead of fighting each other they join forces to fend off the White Walkers.

[–] Sentient Meat (1509) 7 years ago

I don't mind if the seasons are shorter if they move them closer together. Too much time will have elapsed to keep the momentum of the story going and the impact may be diluted. Maybe make them six to eight months apart instead of a full year.

[–] MinaVladimir (4077) 7 years ago

To me it seemed that the show quickened its pace when they were done with the books anyway. A lot of the things that happened last season, although a long time coming, seemed a bit... abrupt and sudden (maybe that's just me). And since we're moving towards the conclusion, I assume characters are going to start coming together, so the stories wouldn't be spread out all over. And you don't want the opposite to happen, them thinning it out and putting a bunch of filler in.

[–] JustinJackFlash (161) 7 years ago

"To me it seemed that the show quickened its pace when they were done with the books anyway. A lot of the things that happened last season, although a long time coming, seemed a bit... abrupt and sudden (maybe that's just me)."

No, I got that too. A lot did seem to happen that season. It's prob because Martin told the writers the plot details a little too loosely and now they don't have his deep texts to draw from. So that's prob why the next two seasons are shortened too.

But the way a story is told, for pacing reasons, it is drawn up into three acts, beginning, middle and end. Each act lasts a certain amount of time in relation to each other. The beginning lasts a quarter, the middle two quarters and the end a quarter. So for example, for a two hour film the beginning would be half hour, the middle an hour and the end half hour. Certain things happen in each act so the audience has a sense of where we are in the story while each act ends with a big event that propels us into the next act. (Forgive me if you already know all this)

So in the case of Game of Thrones, the big event that tells us we are now moving into the final act would be Daenerys and her army setting sale for Westeros. Which means there is a quarter of the story to go. As we have had six seasons this would mean seasons 1-2 are the beginning, seasons 3, 4, 5 and 6 are the middle and thus we need two full seasons for the end. To shorten these seasons so drastically would really interfere with the careful pacing of the show.

[–] MinaVladimir (4077) 7 years ago

I understand your points. I think a lot of the pacing came from Martin's books. I got the feeling that once they were done with them, they decided to speed things along, almost like the books were keeping them back or something. I'm still not sure if I like that.

Also the characters were so spread out, that you needed all those episodes to tell everyone's story. My view is, now that everyone's going to be more or less in the same place, you don't need all that time to jump from location to location (maybe I'm repeating myself). Though I do think that the pacing has already been messed with, so I expect the final too seasons to move more quickly. And I share your concerns of how they're going to fit all that's left to tell in 13 episodes. But if they manage, as I said, I don't want a bunch of useless filler put in there, just to bulk up the season.

I'm really of two minds on this, I think I contradict with all my points :D

[–] Otter (24464) 7 years ago

IMHO picking up the pace when they ran out of book is a good thing! Because seriously, GRRM quite literally lost the plot with the last two, we saw the characters living their lives or wandering around lost, with no sense of a progression towards anything. The writers had to ruthlessly edit that material, notice how they reduced about 500 pages of Iron Island kingsmoot to about 10 minutes of TV? Even edited that stuff moved slowly, like the interminable squabbling in Mereen; the minute they ran out of book the pace picked up to season ! level excitement.

So now they're bringing characters together and having them experience dramatic changes, but there's still so much ground to cover that I'm worried that two short seasons won't be enough. Can they really get through Dany's invasion and the fall of the Lannisters and the romance I expect between Dany and Jon the war between the living and the dead... in less than 20 episodes?

[–] MinaVladimir (4077) 7 years ago

I'm only half way through the forth book (have been for a while), but I agree. It's the contrast between the progresion of events in previous seasons and the latest one that threw me off. It just felt odd.

Martin does put a lot of stuff in the books. Which is fine for a book, because you can just skim through the bits that aren't that interesting to you, but you can't really do that with a TV show. Diana Gabaldon suffers from the same habbit with the Outlander books (though she's just adding endless characters).

As I mentioned, I'm of two minds on this. But the length of the seasons does worry me somewhat. If they keep up with the quickened pace they just might fit everything in, but it won't have the same feel as previous seasons, I don't think. My guess is, we're going to get the squabbling over the Iron Throne dealt with this season, and the final one's going to be them fighting the undead. And we'll probably get a bunch more Varys-esque teleportations and armies appearing out of nowhere.

[–] vicky_lc2001 (1907) 7 years ago

Have you guys watched HBO's Rome? It's supposed to have been a 5 season arch show and season 1 was brilliant. Season 2 was suddenly rushed because the writers/producers found out the show was cancelled and was given only 1 season (the second season) to fit all their material from season 2-5. I hope GOT turns out better than that, though I'm happy with the quicker pace because the show was starting to feel the effects of the books (going on and on but going nowhere) by season 5.

[–] vicky_lc2001 (1907) 7 years ago

I really hated what they did to the Martell characters, I wish they focused more on Doran and his 'plans' for seasons 5 & 6 since season 5 was meandering anyway. And instead of having him killed in the most idiotic way possible, it would've been better to have him ally with others against Cersei and for him to die in the beginning or middle of season 7 instead.

[–] ADBruno1985 (3307) 7 years ago

I agree, it does seem rushed. I guess we'll just have to wait and see. But I suppose one way to look at it is that there will likely be little to no filler now. This show doesn't typically have too much of it, in my opinion, but now it'll be all but non-existent.

[–] EloraWood (158) 7 years ago

It does seem a bit rushed.
But if they insist on finishing it after 13 episodes- I wish that they'd just finish it with season 7 with 13 episodes. The number is also kind of important in GOT, so would have made sense anyway :p

[–] JustinJackFlash (161) 7 years ago

Yeah, it's like they want to rush it and draw it out at the same time. They sound very conflicted.

[–] vicky_lc2001 (1907) 7 years ago

Post production takes a very long time and the 2 producers are very stressed by it and are always rushing to finish it for every season premiere. They probably need the time to finish it and doing 13 expensive episodes with cgi and battle scenes will take longer than a few months for them.

[–] vicky_lc2001 (1907) 7 years ago

I imagine that the usual 20 2 season episodes has been reduced to 13 due to financial constraints. This last 2 seasons will be very expensive to produce and that was a concession, to have fewer episodes to account for the budget.