Game Of Thrones Season 8: 10 Things Fans HATED

10. The Half-Baked White Walkers & Night King

Introduced in the first few scenes of season 1, the White Walkers were a mix of metaphor and real, physical threat. A walking narrative framing device, they've represented everything from the inevitability of death itself to even something like climate change, forcing former rivals to unite against against a "foe" that affects them equally.

However, once the Night King was introduced in season 4, the Walkers now had a face, a leader, and a purpose. We saw him turn Craster's children into more of his generals, and we'd later find out the Children of the Forest created the Night King to defend against the First Men.

The Night King then rebelled against his creators, only to be defeated as the wall was built, and 8000(ish) years pass until Bran wargs back in time to interact with the King in the present, spurring him to continue fighting southwards, back towards Bran.

Only... the White Walkers were already marching. It was one of the opening mysteries of the show. And yet, the latter point becomes the entirety of their remaining screen time, ending when the Night King pulls a blade on Bran, only to be killed by Arya.

What about all the symbols that were left behind? The original reason for heading south? The methodical displays of corpses on the ground or set alight on the walls? All the weird eye-to-eye showdowns between Jon and the Night King?

Both the White Walkers and the Night King all get taken out in 5 minutes during the Battle of Winterfell, and save one line in the finale about "fighting the army of the dead", are never mentioned again.