That said, a lot of the backlash against it has been on the lines of "that's what fanfic is for", and I agree!

cause I've been idly thinking (and throwing out bits of plot at innocent interlocutors) about what I would have done, as a writer, #IfIWroteGOTS8. It's an interesting exercise, at least in my head (who knows how it will look on the page)

(Simple #IfIWroteGOTS8 rules: only rewrite S8 and don't go overboard with the retcons. Have at it if you'd like!)

yeah I'm gonna do a long-ass fanfic thread right here lol sorry not sorry in advance

First: I really liked what I understood to be ASOIAF's original core themes, and I've been watching GOT partly in the hope of a satisfying conclusion to the bloated and unending mess of the books, and partly just to keep up with the massive pop culture event the show has become.

The fundamental themes of ASOIAF, as I understood it, were a critique of epic fantasy's most popular trope: the chosen one who triumphs and brings about the return of the king.

Of course "themes" is fighting words in the GOTverse. (The quote is from http://grantland.com/features/...

Because what was most interesting about ASOIAF/GOT is that it was saying that heroes die and thrones don't matter because climate change is an existential threat.

At it's best it seemed to be saying that all the politicking, betraying, backstabbing, allying, heroic last stands, all of it was besides the point. Unity and resolve *could* save us, maybe, but individual heroes won't, and unity and resolve are all but impossible in its world.

Hence Ned's execution and the Red Wedding: both set up classic squarejaw leading men who in a different story would be aragorning it up on the Iron Throne for a grand finale and handing out medals to their sidekicks. Here they just die.

Meanwhile, the coming of winter is slow and inexorable, like glaciers coming south, to humble all this puffed-up aristocratic infighting over a throne.

These are the strongest themes that GOT has, and they are valuable. The fact that the story lost track of them so easily (apparently out of a distaste for "themes") is its great flaw: the saga turned into the very thing it was once critiquing.

Those themes do suggest to me an ending of hope, though: it suggests that unity and resolve are only impossible *because* of the game of thrones. The entire political system must be overthrown, because it is constitutionally incapable of handling the crisis.

So my S8: it would start off the same, with the battle of Winterfell except not embarrassing.

I.e., the Dothraki are not sacrificed pointlessly for a "cool" visual, the mortal army is not outside the defensible walls for no apparent reason. The ballistae are up on the walls, and so on. The dead still overwhelm the defenses through sheer numbers, of course.

Big differences: the White Walkers take the field immediately after the wights breach the wall and (most importantly) alongside the Night King and his crusty Walker posse are creepy child Walkers of various ages.

These include all those baby sons sacrificed by Craster and turned by the Night King, now growing up blue-eyed. Presumably other babies who were turned as well.

Most of our familiar mortal characters die fighting Walkers or tremendous swarms of wights. No plot armour for anybody.

Everyone gets a nice big heroic death. Jaime and Brienne kill several Walkers together but are overwhelmed. They die side by side, Jaime dropping his sword to take Brienne's hand in his good hand.

Tormund is swamped by Wildling wights. Grey Worm is overwhelmed by Unsullied wights after the Night King raises the dead—which happens constantly during the battle.

The crypt is a retreat of last resort for Sansa, Missandei, Tyrion, Varys, Davos, et al., because only in panic do they forget the obvious problem of hiding in a crypt from the undead. But they do, and are all killed by royal Stark wights. 🤷🏾‍♀️

The Hound and Melisandre fight a wight swarm together, but they are at odds: Melisandre uses fire magic and it keeps fucking up the Hound. Eventually her magic fails under the ice storm, and wights kill them both.

In the air, the Night King kills Jon's dragon when it crash-lands, and raises it from the dead. He sends both ice dragons to fight Dany and Drogon, and walks into Winterfell on foot.

Jon Snow rushes up behind him with a sword. The Night King summons the dead against him. Jon fights them off until he comes face to face with … wight Karsi, who died at Hardhome believing in Jon Snow's promises.

At Hardhome, Karsi died because she couldn't bring herself to raise a weapon against wight children. Today Jon dies because he can't bring himself to fight someone who trusted him in a moment of great crisis and who he feels like he failed.

Wight Jon kills Theon. That one's for Robb, in compensation for his sad afterlife as bodyguard/lover to a British Home Secretary. Pour one out for Spongebob Squarejaw, so unlucky in love.

Bran is alone under the weirwood tree, surrounded by wights and Walkers. The Night King approaches. Meanwhile, escaping on foot, already some distance from Winterfell, Sam and Gilly argue about sacrificing Little Sam.

Sam thinks it was monstrous. Gilly tells him to grow up and smell the apocalypse.

Gilly tells Sam she understood what happened to Craster's babies when she saw the child Walkers. She says she realized they were all wrong about the Walkers. Sam goes quiet, thinking.

In Winterfell: when the Night King touches Bran, they—and we—are thrown into a full-length greenseer flashback. We go back to the origin of the Night King (because I was super disappointed not to get one.)

We learn that he was a mortal greenseer, like Bran, among the First Men. The Children of the Forest weaponized him to use against his own people: the Night King must be still bitter about that because he has used the same tactic with wights ever afterwards.

It seems he likes that irony, that it should always be those who love you that kill you.

On Bran TV, we learn that wights are not mindless. We see the Land of Always Winter come into being, and that there is a civilization of sorts there, even if everyone is silent, nobody eats or sleeps or even moves unnecessarily.

But it's a place where child Walkers grow up into unlife, and nobody suffers. It is peaceful. To the dead, it's a utopia.