8 Things Everyone’s Getting Wrong About Game Of Thrones

7. “There Was No Point Doing The Brienne/Jaime Stuff, Just To Have Him Go Back To Cersei”

The vast majority of fans wanted Jaime to complete his redemption arc and live a happy life free of his past with Brienne of Tarth. He even seemed to want it and she definitely did and it looked nailed on that that’s what was going to happen.

But what became slowly apparent in Season 8, was that Jaime didn’t want that. He survived the dead and finally took Brienne to bed, seeing her for the first time as a woman as well as a knight. But in that singular shot of him staring at her sleeping, his story unravelled brilliantly. He’d finally got his happy-ever-after, only to realise it’s not what he wanted. This wasn’t Cersei, and nothing else matters to him.

That’s the whole point of his story. That he went on this huge journey of self-reflection and redemption, only to realise at the last moment that it’s not who he is. We can all see how much he deserves a happy ending, but crucially he can’t. But without his story with Brienne he wouldn’t have realised this, meaning that it's just as important as the reconciliation with Cersei.