Yes, the final season of Game of Thrones was a chaotic mess, and it was glorious

III. A song of ice and fire, then consensus-building and incrementalism

The ending for Westeros is also instructive in that it is often after such cataclysmic disasters as the destruction of King’s Landing, presumably the most populated city in Westeros, that substantive change actually happens. It was after the cataclysmic Thirty Years War and other Protestant-Catholic religious bloodletting from Ireland to Scandinavia that led to the emergence in 1648 of the Westphalian interstate system, the root of the current international order. It was from the ashes and graveyards of two world wars that today’s United Nations and Geneva Conventions became driving forces in international law, contributing to the longest relative peace in recorded history since the Pax Romana of ancient Rome (my paper and book chapter delve into the latter), a peace building on the Westphalian system to include human rights and conflict prevention/mitigation alongside Westphalian state sovereignty. Today, we are among the luckiest humans who have ever lived to be living under such a “neoliberal” system (even as that imperfect system is under stress and assault like no time since its WWII-era birthing).

Global battle deaths, from WWII to c. 2015, Neil Halloran/YouTube, The Fallen of WWII

Why, then, should we be surprised that an oligarchic federal elected monarchy, even if a feudal one, formed over most of Westeros after the War of the Five Kings, the Great War against the Night King and final conflict between Team Dany and Team Cersei? While the entertaining Seinfeld-ish Small Council meeting at the end of the series was odd (“’Star Wars Christmas Special’-style fan fiction,” in the words of one critic) and the way Tyrion’s speech led to a resolution of an elected federal monarchy seemed kind of random (isn’t so much of life, politics, and history, though?), this final result for the series as to how to reshape the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros was one of the few natural options left and one of the most realistic, as everyone seemed wary and wearied, having lost so much, and it was obvious to these less bold, more cautious, less accomplished-than-their-forbears survivors that some change had to be made going forward.

While leaders like Tywin Lannister, Olenna Tyrell, Robert Baratheon, Ned Stark, and Doran Martell all seemed to have been leading their regions stably and ably for years, amassing sizable armies, power, and influence over time, those left standing at the end of the series were all left weak, depleted, and exhausted, all too aware of their limits (that’s why Edmure sits down when Sansa tells him to). Just as most of Germany was devastated after the Thirty Years War and most of Europe was devastated after World War II, it took similar apocalyptic conflict in Westeros to humble competing leaders enough to remake the system in a way that allowed for more restraint and that made them recognize their weaknesses and inability to keep fighting as they had centuries. While hardly the crowning glory many expected to cap off the series (more like a crowning shrug), after so much bloodshed and buildup, it is refreshing that the series ended on a realistic and realistically hopeful-within-its-context note (Sam Tarly’s suggestion of democracy was laughed off, lest you think the episode got carried away).

I have noted here the stupidity of man and war, but so too must we credit the ability of at least some humans to learn from the past and their own and others’ mistakes. It might debatably and sadly take something like the leveling of the Holy Roman Empire or the hellish battle for Berlin in 1945 or the firebombing of Tokyo or atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, also in 1945, in the real world for societies to collectively learn the necessary lessons, but better late than never. In fictional Westeros, it took the apocalyptic Battle of Winterfell and genocidal massacre at King’s Landing.  And that is not to say that all these uses of force were necessary or necessarily justified, but far better aftermaths were the results of those extreme denouements, even if similar aftermaths were possible with less extreme final acts.

Would medieval Europe have been better off without the bloodshed of the seventeenth century, which led to the Westphalian system? Today, Germany and Japan are among the most peaceful and prosperous nations in the world; would later generations of Japanese or Germans have been better with some less apocalyptic past that left in place in one form or another the Nazi and State Shinto regimes that had initiated war? Would Westeros and other realms have been better off with a new Targaryen dynasty, however long that would or would not have lasted, and with whatever would have come after? Conversely, the lenient peace in the American South after the Civil War and during Reconstruction allowed its people to hold fast onto an ugly, racist white nationalist ideology to the degree that the rebel “Confederates” are said to have lost the war but won the peace.  And today, that white nationalist ideology is very much making a comeback (not just in the U.S.), terrifying many. Is the U.S. better off with the lenient terms the South got after the Civil War and having never really defeated the South’s “Confederate” ideology?  These questions are tough to answer but certainly worth considering.

In the end, Game of Thrones flirted with talk of a revolution and tearing the system down, but settled for an incremental change to the existing system. In that sense, it seems to be saying, “Don’t expect a Bernie Sanders/High Sparrow/Daenerys Targaryen or even a Jon Snow-type savior, but put faith in institutions and processes and go more with a Hillary Clinton/Bran Stark-style, more modest, but more workable and palatable, solution.”

Fans might have wanted something more “exciting,” but for a history and policy guy like me, this outcome for Westeros was both unexpected and exciting, a lesson in reality for an era increasingly plagued by a lack of acceptance of reality. Again, that wasn’t exactly what many fans wanted, but we don’t really get what we want in life all the time, do we? Especially when we are talking about a (fictional) geopolitical outcome, sometimes appreciating a choice that is not the option that makes you personally the most excited is the very definition of maturity and wisdom. Just like the council that picked Bran as king picked a result that wasn’t anyone’s first choice (except maybe Bran’s, and even that’s doubtful), it’s hard to imagine some objectively good real-world historical outcomes that were anyone’s most desired outcome. Even so, they were the outcomes that worked best (or at least quite well) overall for the lands and peoples in conflict in a world confined by harsh limitations. For all its flaws, then, even for a show involving dragons and White Walkers, the final season and final episode of Game of Thrones stayed true to the show’s overall genre-defying realism.

Much like today’s Bernie Sanders fans—whose expectations far exceed reality and whose vitriol far exceeds what is warranted, especially those who did not eventually support Clinton in 2016—many Game of Thrones fans and professional critics might have “shrugged” or been less than enthused (or worse) about this particular final geopolitical outcome in the finale, but, like a kid who doesn’t want to eat his vegetables, perhaps over time their views will mature into appreciation, in this case, of the unique realism that helped Game of Thrones transcend the fantasy genre.

Having addressed season 8’s stupidity and geopolitical settlement, there still remains one final elephant—or, more appropriately, dragon—in the room…