Game Of Thrones Ending: Predicting What The Books Will (& Won't) Change
10. Jaime & Cersei's Death
Jaime Lannister's ending was one of the most controversial, since he seemingly had a shot at happiness with Brienne, only to throw that all away to go back to Cersei. It was a brutal, if understandable, decision, and one that, well, will and won't be the same as in the books.
While Show Jaime took until the end of the seventh season to finally walk away from Cersei, it's something he has already done in the books: sick of her lies, deceit, cheating, and treatment of him in general, he refuses to go to her trial by combat and burns the letter she sends asking him for help. But his fate will be intertwined with hers still.
Maggy the Frog's prophecies are a much bigger deal in the books, where Cersei obsesses over them, thinking that Margaery is the younger, more beautiful Queen and that Tyrion will be the valonqar. The show never included the latter, but it's too important to the books for it to be glossed over (Martin doesn't include prophecies just for the sake of it, after all, even if they might mean something different to what we or the characters assume). Jaime is Cersei's younger brother too, just, and it's very likely he'll be the one to fulfil the prophecy by killing his sister - but why?
Cersei's growing paranoia is coupled with a keen interest in wildfire, something she has been shown to be thinking about a lot ever since A Clash of Kings. In the show, this plays out with her destroying the Sept of Baelor, but we hear in Tyrion V from that same book the wildfire under the Sept has been removed. It is, however, still under most of the city. Add to that her fear of the younger Queen. Next up on her list of suspects is likely to be Arianne Martell, the daughter of Doran, who is set to marry Young Griff/Aegon Targaryen (even if he's a pretender).
Aegon looks likely to take the Iron Throne at some point in Martin's story - he's already making good gains in the Stormlands - with Arianne as his Queen. Cersei, then, cast aside, will be set to take her revenge - and kill the person she thinks is the younger Queen - by using the wildfire to destroy King's Landing. Jaime will go back to the city after its fall to Aegon, discover his sister's plot and, much like he did the Mad King, have to kill her to prevent her from carrying it out. She'll die in his arms like in the show, and it'll still be a tragic point for Jaime (who is unlikely to survive too far beyond this either, given destruction WILL be coming), but it won't be them being together in the same way they are on TV.