‘Game of Thrones’: Nikolaj Coster-Waldau Breaks Down Some Season 8 Critiques
Game of Thrones: Nikolaj Coster-Waldau Breaks Down Some Season 8 Critiques
During Con of Thrones 2019, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jamie Lannister) addressed some of the criticism plaguing the final season of HBO’s hit series, Game of Thrones. During the panel, Coster-Waldau was asked to determine if fan’s reactions to the finale were fair or not.
One of the biggest criticisms from Season 8 was that everything happened too fast. Fans wanted more time to develop some of the storylines. In response, Coster-Waldau admitted that’s a fair critique. “I would’ve loved to have another season,” he said, “but I think that the crew would’ve died. It was so hard to film this last season.”
Another issue fans had was with Episode 3, claiming that the Battle at Winterfell was too dark. Again, Coster-Waldau called it fair. He then explained that the picture quality suffered a bit due to the high traffic HBO experienced. According to Coster-Waldau, there was a screening of the episode at the Chinese Theatre in Hollywood and everyone thoroughly enjoyed the episode. There were no complaints about the lighting.
“You got to believe me, they did everything they could to make this the most exciting action sequence ever made–put on film, TV, anything. So, to wake up and see the Twitter or whatever talking about ‘I can’t see it’ was… certainly a surprise to everyone. Because it was, but was made in a way you should’ve been able to see it.”
Another of the biggest critiques dealt with the death of Jamie and Cersei. They were the reason for all the bloodshed over the years, and despite Jamie recognizing that their relationship was toxic, he still found himself bound to her. Several seasons ago, Jamie told Bronn that he wanted to die in the arms of the woman he loved, and he did just that. Fans, however, were upset it was Cersei instead of Brienne. Coster-Waldau loved the relationship Jamie found with Brienne, but questions if that would’ve been true to his character.
In regards to how they died, Coster-Waldau brought up all the fan theories of Jamie killing Cersei, or Arya killing Jamie, then using his face to murder Cersei. He then asked the audience to imagine if that had actually happened. “The outcry,” he said. “‘So obvious! Gah! Saw that coming years ago!'”
Coster-Waldau finished by saying it would be impossible to please everyone. He addressed the online petition, loving that fans are this passionate However, for people to think that the creators don’t love the show and haven’t been thinking about how it ends, is silly. Regardless, even if they were to redo it, the people won’t be able to agree on what they want.
“At the core, I felt they did a great job with the way they ended it. Obviously I’m biased, but I really do. I also think that, if you really, really love the show, you don’t want it to end. Just the mere fact that it’s ending is p— you off.”
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