I have been somewhat vocal in my opinion that, despite liking Game of Thrones, there has been a problem with it maintaining a consistent quality (especially since overtaking George R.R. Martin's material). In particular, I found the end of season 7, though not the low point of the series (Dorne and the death of Meryn Trant stand out to me), to be disappointing. I haven't wanted to explain why on a different platform to avoid spoilers, but I guess that's the joy of this blog: no one reads it anyway, so why not spoil it here?
To understand why the end of season 7 was bad, let's look at a major theme of A Song of Ice and Fire: duty vs. emotion. The series begins with a man being executed for abandoning his duty and with Bran being taught an important lesson about how important doing one's duty is. In fact, there's a strong case that Ned Starks death is a parallel to this deserter: upon arriving home from the execution (in the book at least), Ned tells Catelyn that he needs to raise his banners and ride north, beyond The Wall, to deal with Mance Rayder and restore the peace. Instead, he abandons his duty out of love for Robert and Jon Arryn, and the armies of the North are squandered in the War of the Five Kings (a war started by Catelyn's love for her son and lost Robb's love for his new bride). Ned's neglect of duty may have doomed the world.
Then you look at the Night's Watch. Originally an army supported by all the Seven Kingdoms, a force of 10,000 knights from noble houses that could man The Wall, range effectively to the north, and provide for itself by working lands to the south, the Watch has been reduced to less than a tenth its size, and those who remain are mostly conscripted criminals. Only the North and a few houses in the Vale send any knights or nobles at all of their own will: every southron knight of the Watch was forced into service, mostly because they fought on the losing side of a war (for instance, Ser Alliser Thorne was a Targaryan loyalist). The Seven Kingdoms have neglected their duty to support the Night's Watch out of greed: why waste their best men and resources to fight snarks and grumpkins when they can be better used in the game of thrones?
So, to the final scene of season 7: whose fault is it that the Wall falls? It's not Jon Snow's: as Lord Commander he made unpopular decisions that put the duty of the Night's Watch over prejudice, and as King of the North he puts the Long Night ahead of all other priorities. It's not Daenarys: she flew north not because she loved Jon (in fact, she ends up abandoning him), but to save the mission in order to convince Cersei to join the real fight. It's not even Cersei's: she may be planning betrayal, but she hasn't pulled the trigger on that yet.
So whose fault is it? What grave mistake lead to the Wall falling, the the realms of men being vulnerable for the first time in millenia? What betrayal may have cost the world? It's no one's, really. Who could have predicted the Night King had magical dragon insta-kill spears? Who knew that creatures of fire could be resurrected by magic of the ice-infused Others? Nobody. Nobody knew that by riding north, Daenerys would inadvertently give the White Walkers the tool they needed to bring down the Wall (which, speaking of, does the Night King have pre-cognition? What was his plan before a dragon fell into his lap?).
There was no hamartia, no fatal flaw in the rulers of Westeros that allows you to point a finger and say "This person/these people! They abandoned their duty, they knowingly made a choice and the Wall fell because of it." The dead did not attack a portion of the Wall that was under-manned due to the neglect of the lords of Westeros, they hit it at a point reinforced by wildlings, the Brothers Without Banners, and presumably Northern soldiers and soldiers from the Vale, since they aren't currently engaged militarily with Cersei (who, by the way, is suddenly competent). No one has blown the Horn of Winter for short-term military gain. No one allowed a dark sorcerer promising power to be their confidant despite everyone's pleas to the contrary, leading to dark sorcery that compromised the Wall.
Nope. None of the long running themes or ideas of the show mattered: Daenerys just rode in her dragons, and it turns out that it's super easy for White Walkers to kill and resurrect dragons (despite fire being their greatest weakness and dragons literally being described as "fire made flesh"). A character actively trying to do their duty and save the world ends up being the catalyst for its destruction.
The show became famous for its spectacle, but I think the writers have forgotten that spectacle isn't what kept people watching. Ned Stark's death made sense. The Red Wedding made sense. Oberyn and Tywin's deaths made sense. They were the focus of elaborate paintings, paintings with richly detailed and expertly crafted backgrounds. The more recent spectacles seem more like a cheap comic book panel: an awesome dragon breathing fire with a solid red background behind it. I can get that lots of places other than Game of Thrones.
