How Avengers: Endgame Delivered A Satisfying Ending (But Game Of Thrones Failed)
6. (Successfully) Subverting Expectations
How Endgame Delivered: Endgame had plenty of shocks and surprises, and while not all were successful (like Thor's depression being played for laughs), they mostly worked in service of the story.
The reveal of Professor Hulk was a pleasant surprise, while the return of Mjolnir and Cap being able to wield it were awe-inspiring. Natasha sacrificing herself was a huge shock, and Tony making the ultimate sacrifice in the end instead of Steve was a brilliant twist of what many of us expected, especially given how impactful Tony's death was.
And Thanos "dying" in the first twenty minutes was actually a brilliant way of subverting expectations, unlike Game of Thrones' "big bads".
How Thrones Failed: Defenders of season 8 - and the showrunners themselves - have shoved "subverting expectations" into our faces to try and justify the bad writing decisions. Here's the thing: the show certainly didn't go as expected, but that doesn't mean what they actually delivered was any good.
The White Walkers' defeat halfway through the season was an epic fail. The Night King ended up being a poor villain in the end as he was never a fully-developed character (and they didn't fully explore his backstory or motivations) nor as strong as we were led to believe. Thanos may have technically died in the beginning of Endgame, but that wasn't the end of the conflict with the character (who, remember, had already won), unlike the White Walkers.
Daenerys becoming the mad queen would have been a great twist, but the show didn't convincingly show how she got to that point. She jumped from point A (not mad) to point B (mad) in the space of one episode, and it didn't work at all.
How Cersei died was unexpected, but it was very underwhelming, and for such an evil character to just die by way of falling bricks didn't satisfy on a narrative level.
And Bran becoming king... well, it's unconventional for sure, but it's also illogical. There's nothing that qualifies Bran to be king, and Westeros is probably doomed because of it.