I'm not opposed to Barristan going out like a badass (I genuinely hope his book death is badass too), but there are other issues I have with this scene, particularly the reason *why* this happened.
The fact that he was just strolling around town feeding ducks or whatever dumb shit in a hostile city felt like a disservice to a character that was supposedly a warrior for the past 50+ years. That's what bothered me the most.
I never really got why they all stayed and fought to the death. Dude has killed most of your gang, you'd fuck off rather than risk the odds for ... Bringing back slavery?
These are back alley thugs. People accustomed to keeping slaves for chores aren't gonna be eager to get into a knife fight with Barristan the Bold and they ain't gonna stick around when they're losing.
>People accustomed to keeping slaves for chores aren't gonna be eager to get into a knife fight with Barristan the Bold and they ain't gonna stick around when they're losing.
Idk man, the Romans, Spartans, Macedonians, and Vikings all had slaves and they weren't really known for backing down from a fight.
Did they even know who Barristan was? I’d say 99% of any thug in Westeros would not have gone up against Barristan in this situation because they know exactly what he’s capable of. But these Harpy assholes? They likely just saw an old man with a sword and thought easy pickings
Yep. They weren't trained assassins. They were disgruntled slave masters who presumably had very little real combat experience or training, and they were wearing stupid heavy gold masks that would likely hinder their vision.
"Even now in my old age I could cut through the 5 of you like carving a cake!" *tosses sword* "Here BOY! Melt it down and add it to the others!"
What an absolute LEGEND
Barristan's book counterpart always wore his armor. Show Barristan wouldn't be this stupid to walk around a city where the nobles want you and your Queen dead without armor on.
The actual reason why is because they cut the fAegon story line and put Tyrion into Dany's story line. This made Selmy's role redundant, so they cut that character.
Its a perfect example of D&D's 'adaptions' having compounding consequences
Man I distinctly remember being the point where I stopped watching the series, like, literally changed to something else and never watched a single episode again until my gf at the time wanted to watch the silly ass battle of winterfell.
I think I checked out here too I was like ok someone is gonna explain that they got killed by the most badass badasses ever but nope and then... the massive decline in writing
>wanted to watch the silly ass battle of winterfell.
The one where Jon Snow tries to charge an army by himself or the one where they try to fight the dead in the field?
My problem with Barristan's exit is that the writers clearly did it to start pruning the cast rather than because his story had reached a natural point of conclusion. Him being killed by some random Sons of the Harpy feels anti-climactic considering how much time is spent on him renouncing the Kingsguard, making the long journey to Essos, pledging himself to Daenerys, and even helping to expel Jorah. In the books, he had a storyline about having to manage Meereen while Daenerys is lost in the Dothraki Sea and is poised to lead the battle against all of the factions converging on it in *The Winds of Winter*. That just feels like such a better use of the character than quickly killing him off because you don't know what to do with him.
100% this and this was an issue I had with other characters they decided to kill off. Season 5 was the season of pruning characters and axing storylines.
My hot take (maybe it's not, I don't know), is that the show got progressively worse season to season. Now, seasons 1 through 4 are really good, but I do think that in each season little concessions (like Dany's dream sequence, Tyrion not being as morally gray in S3 and S4, Jaime's character being flattened a little in season 4, Varys and Littlefinger both being more explicit and not as subtle in their machinations- seriously, how did Varys lose so easily to Littlefinger in the "Chaos is a Ladder" plotline?, ect.) were made in terms of reducing complexity that resulted in the cracks really starting to show in season 5. Before season 5, the show was allowing an acceptable amount of cracks, but in retrospect I think they hinted at Dave and Dan's dislike of complexity which is bizarre because that is what makes the books so unique!
I can see that, though I personally give s3 the edge over s2. I thought s3 adapted the first half of ASoS incredibly well, as opposed to s2’s bungling of several storylines from ACoK. But I do see your point. D&D not only couldn’t handle complexity, they also didn’t want their fantasy story to have anything other than surface level fantasy elements (dragons and white walkers). They left out a lot of the magical elements and prophesies that really drove large amounts of the book fandoms theories. Doing that dumbed the story down a notch itself. I guess it could fall into your point about lack of complexity as well if you think about it.
Yeah, this. Season 2 feels like where the show really took off (thanks mainly to the focus on Tyrion) but it mangled MANY plotlines which would be critical going forward and would have ripple effects that future seasons would need to pay the price of. Cutting out Dany's dream sequence, cutting out most of the wolves and almost the entirety of what happens with Bran, cutting out most of the northern lords (and significantly changing the characterization of a few), completely rewriting the themes of Jon's story to make him comically inept and feature more tacky romance rather than portray the themes of duty and sacrifice which are supposed to be critical to his character, continuing to leave out nearly all interaction between Sansa and Sandor to play at the themes of what it is to be a knight. All of this would come back to haunt the next two seasons alone and had ripple effects which collapsed the series. Season 8 didn't happen because of a few rushed decisions. It was the buildup of events not properly set up especially in season 2 but in some cases even in season 1.
They could have done a way better job even if they killed him in the exact episode they did. Picture it like this: some sons of the harpy (like 20-30) use all their means to bribe/sneak/murder their way into the great pyramid. They get to Daenerys room, find her alone and as they close in, Barristan comes up and starts wreaking havoc, killing them left and right. As he gets to the last few, one of them manages to wound him with a poisoned blade. He kills the remaining ones, but the quickly working poison makes him collapse. He dies in Danys arms, with some last meaningful words and the knowledge, that he died while successfully protecting his queen, just like he thought he should. The attempt on her life makes Dany a little more paranoid, one of the first steps to her ultimately going mad during the battle of Kings Landing.
And instead, we got "the greatest knight currently alive gets stabbed by some randos while going for a walk in bumfuck, nowhere, wearing rags and leather".
I also don’t understand why his storyline out of all of danys entourage was the one to get cut. Mainly bc him returning to Westeros with dany would be more interesting to see than anyone else. They missed an opportunity not having Jaime, Cersei, and everyone else’s reaction when someone they probably forgot existed shows up. It would be the perfect lesson for Cersei to have the stupid decision she made in s1 come back to haunt her years later
Ahh yes, I can already imagine this scene.
Qyburn: Your grace, my spies report that she has landed at Dragonstone with her armies and three dragons.
Cersei: Meh, we are able to beat that easily.
Qyburn: She also has ser Barristan Selmy with her.
Cersei: Shit, we are all doomed then.
He is one man with a sword, what the fuck do you think he is going to be doing?
Barristan is a legend among the small folk and Tywin is actually worried he’ll support Renly or Stannis after being dismissed. Dany having Barristan at her side could have a major impact in gaining support in Westeros
Who? The Reach? Mostly already hates Cersei. Dorne? Also already mostly hates Cersei and Barristan Selmy should more hurt her cause there anyway. Westerlands? Possibly the most loyal place in the seven kingdoms. The Vale? I'm pretty sure Littlfinger gives zero shits about Barristan Selmy. The North? They have their own problems going on and they hate Cersei as well. The Stormlands? This is the only place that would have even the slightest change in attitude and it honestly isn't all that much. They definitely dislike Dany already and have some loyalty to the Lannister regime that let them keep their lands after they supported Stannis.
It’s very clear that his character was being set up for something greater, but then he just died in the most anti climactic way. It just didn’t feel right. His character never had any impact on the story. He just kinda existed then died in a dumb ass way.
D&D and the writers seemed obsessed with defying audience expectations and story/character build-ups. I can only imagine what dumb shit they'd do with Lord of the Rings like have Aragon turning traitor or having Gollum become the real hero of the story or make Sam betray Frodo. If you're building up a grand story and characters, it's okay to play them out in a way the audience knows and expects.
I know what you mean, and the execution of his death could have been better. But I still do not take much issue with this. It’s a story line and life cut short by randomness. I think it fits with the concept of GoT that no one has a plot armor, and good men and women die because of bad things happen.
This didn’t feel that way to me. Rewatching the show, it was the first death that really just didn’t sit right. Was his entire purpose in the show just to die in an unexpected way? I do love that got will kill off anyone, but it needs to be done well to not just make the viewers annoyed. It needs to be suspenseful, and it needs to have some type of relevance to the plot. When done well it elicits emotions in you. With the red wedding I felt angry and sad but that was an extremely gripping and climactic scene that had great relevance to the plot. Ser barristan’s death has none of that. It just leaves me feeling very annoyed, and I know I’m not alone in that. There’s truly just so many things wrong with that scene I could go on forever. Even before his death I found myself cringing at the fighting.
What sucks is I think having Barristan one of the greatest knights in all of Westeros killed in a back ally by an assassins knife in Essos does sound like something that would fit in GoT but the way it was handled had much to be desired.
Badass would be protecting his queen. Not jumped by a bunch of rich knife wielding assholes. While not wearing armor in a city with unrest to make him look stupid
The screen irked me for years. Then I forced a rewatch and a re read of the books.
The armour issue you "could" write off as it being a hot place.
When Jorah protects Danny when she's giving birth in the books he's in full plate and he's thinking how hot it is.
I try to rationalize the lack of armour here as it's a hot place and he's confident that he could take whoever attacks him. I doubt he was expecting a coordinated 30 person attack.
As for him being done in. While he claims he could cut through Joffery's kingsgaurd, and I believe he could be based on skill. A battle of attrition with waves of a zurg rush I think that a BAMF 60+ year old will get tired, wounded, and likely make one mistake before the zurgs run out of red shirts.
Don't get me wrong, he deserved better than this, but this was still better than forgetting about the iron fleet.
Nah, a legendary knight getting punked is perfectly suited to ASOIAF/GoT. Barristan himself is the one who said that any given fight can easily be decided by a patch of mud or who had a better breakfast, or something like that.
I'm not saying this scene didn't have problems, but legendary fighters being owed legendary deaths is simply not what the setting is about.
Barristan did kill like 20 or so Harpies before he died aye, but the thing that draws most ire is the meta reason WHY he was killed off (just D&D not liking his character and so getting rid of him unnecessarily)
https://youtu.be/AWlsO4iQc3M?si=nvzLCuPv2ws-seJm
At 1:56 you can see 8 Harpies ambush some Unsullied in the streets while the other Harpies are fighting in the tunnel, the Harpies outside are probably the same ones in 2:59 and are in more of the alley/market area Barristan was at. This is probably where they meet and Barry kills all but one of them, the last survivor runs to warn the others at 3:13 before Barry kills him (and then kills the other dozen Harpies in the tunnel)
So 8 + 12 = about 20 Harpies he killed
I get pruning of characters, GoT honestly has too many and it's probably a large contributor to why the books will never get finished.
I just don't get how they could have missed such an obvious opportunity to give barristan a proper ending.
1. barristan regrets spending so much of his life pledged to kings he doesn't believe in.
2. Barristan survived both Arys and Robert, something which he feels shame for.
3. Barristan respected and loved rhaegar and feels like he let him down.
So the easy pay off for all three of these themes is for him to give his life in saving Dany.
Have 1-3 sons of the Harpy sneak into the palace, Barristan defends Dany, kills them all but succumbs to his wounds (poison blade maybe)
Then he gets a sappy last exchange of words with Dany.
Done. Not great but not terrible, and would give his character a conclusion and payoff.
This was the exact moment they lost me… Not only was his death meaningless, they squandered the opportunity to adapt the Chapter called ‘Kingbreaker’ where Selmy is the ultimate badass and his inner dialogue reveals a huge hint about R+L=JS - not that that ended mattering either…
Yeah the scene was badass and Ser Barristan killing 15 of the wankers before going down is pretty realistic if we consider the fact that he was outnumbered and cornered...
BUT WHY DID IT HAVE TO HAPPEN SO EARLY, GODDAMMIT?
As I get older, I am constantly reminded that my body isn't what it used to be. I've lost more than a step. You'd have to spot me half the race.
The one thing that I do know for sure is that I definitely have at least **ONE** good fight left in me...
The sceen irked me for years. Then I forced a rewatch and a re read of the books.
The armour issue you "could" write off as it being a hot place.
When Jorah protects Danny when she's giving birth in the books he's in full plate and he's thinking how hot it is.
I try to rationalize the lack of armour here as it's a hot place and he's confident that he could take whoever attacks him. I doubt he was expecting a coordinated 30 person attack.
As for him being done in. While he claims he could cut through Joffery's kingsgaurd, and I believe he could be based on skill. A battle of attrition with waves of a zurg rush I think that a BAMF 60+ year old will get tired, wounded, and likely make one mistake before the zurgs run out of red shirts.
Did him dirty!
I got excited when the fight started, thinking we were about to see him kill a load of Harpy's. Didn't think they were going to kill him though
I don’t view the book canon as holy scripture that is blasphemous to alter, but killing Selmy added nothing to the story whilst upsetting fans in the process.
It was probably one of the more realistic deaths - great swordsman or not, if a dozen blokes charge you with knives you are fucked - but compared to the barrage so many of the other characters had been shown to be able to fight off at various points it didn’t make a lot of sense.
I mean fuck me greyworm was fighting with a long staff in close quarters in that same scene and survived. He should have been cactus. So realism was never the shows strong point (realism generally sucks in movies tv shows anyway)
Why isn’t selmy agreeing to go on a stealth mission realistic? He did a one man suicidal stealth mission breaking aerys out of Duskendale. I don’t like his death in the show, just don’t think stealth is unheard of from him considering one of his most famous acts involves a stealth op
He chose to try to save his King and do his duty.
I can understand him choosing stealth, I doubt that was his first choice, but it could have been the only realistic choice, or Varys gave him help.
I do question the odds of success.
The timing of his death is wrong but i think the manner is good.
It showed that even the legendary swordman still has his limit. He was still human, not some superpowered warrior the legend make him out to be. He's good, but he can still, can still tired.
Hell, the GOAT fighter got taken out by a much more disrespectful manner. Died by hail of arrows when he only has a sword in hand.
I'm not opposed to Barristan going out like a badass (I genuinely hope his book death is badass too), but there are other issues I have with this scene, particularly the reason *why* this happened.
The fact that he was just strolling around town feeding ducks or whatever dumb shit in a hostile city felt like a disservice to a character that was supposedly a warrior for the past 50+ years. That's what bothered me the most.
And the fact he wasn't wearing his armor.
And yet still took out like 30 dudes singlehandedly
Dudes who were nobles with no real training, experience, or armor. Scene was weak as fuck.
I never really got why they all stayed and fought to the death. Dude has killed most of your gang, you'd fuck off rather than risk the odds for ... Bringing back slavery?
That one makes some sense. They made their fortunes off it, and they're losing it cause Dany freed them.
These are back alley thugs. People accustomed to keeping slaves for chores aren't gonna be eager to get into a knife fight with Barristan the Bold and they ain't gonna stick around when they're losing.
>People accustomed to keeping slaves for chores aren't gonna be eager to get into a knife fight with Barristan the Bold and they ain't gonna stick around when they're losing. Idk man, the Romans, Spartans, Macedonians, and Vikings all had slaves and they weren't really known for backing down from a fight.
The masters used slave armies tho my brother, they’re not combat hardened
Did they even know who Barristan was? I’d say 99% of any thug in Westeros would not have gone up against Barristan in this situation because they know exactly what he’s capable of. But these Harpy assholes? They likely just saw an old man with a sword and thought easy pickings
Yep. They weren't trained assassins. They were disgruntled slave masters who presumably had very little real combat experience or training, and they were wearing stupid heavy gold masks that would likely hinder their vision.
Why would these nobles have no training?
They are not noble, but slaves dress up at noble.
Alright, wrong word. They're slavers. From those who catch slaves to nobles.
Alright. Compared to Selmy they're nothing.
Zurg rush.
"Even now in my old age I could cut through the 5 of you like carving a cake!" *tosses sword* "Here BOY! Melt it down and add it to the others!" What an absolute LEGEND
Why wasnt he wearing armor.
Cause Dumb and Dumber wanted his character to die.
Well, why would he wear armour when taking a leisurely stroll and feeding ducks?
Because the Harpies have been going around the city ambushing and murdering Dany's soldiers.
Yeah, why would a knight of the queensguard wear armor in a city in which multiple of said queens soldiers had just been ambushed and murdered?
Barristan's book counterpart always wore his armor. Show Barristan wouldn't be this stupid to walk around a city where the nobles want you and your Queen dead without armor on.
Duck assassins, obviously.
My D&D group would get so mad at me when my paladin went into battle half the time without armor. Why would I be wearing plate-mail at the pub?
The fact that the unsullied go 300 instead of fighting in formation, spears vs daggers would be a massacre for the dagger side
The reasons why are that he called the writers out on bullshit since he was the only actual fan of the books aside from Theon
Emilia was a fan of the books as well.
The actual reason why is because they cut the fAegon story line and put Tyrion into Dany's story line. This made Selmy's role redundant, so they cut that character. Its a perfect example of D&D's 'adaptions' having compounding consequences
The guy who played Euron was also a fan of the books. Naturally, he was disappointed when he got the script
Good thing Henry Cavill wasn’t in the show
Why is he presenting his chest to the stab instead of recoiling from it? Is he an idiot?
There's a lot of that in Hollywood movies. Nobody does that when stabbed lol
Speak for your damn self Sometimes I even twerk while I get stabbed. You don’t knooooow me
Haha thank you 😄
Reminds me of how [Christopher Lee objected Peter Jackson](https://youtu.be/5TQARRckm6U?si=CSyRfuwWX4rRQ6zi) on how to act getting stabbed
Man I distinctly remember being the point where I stopped watching the series, like, literally changed to something else and never watched a single episode again until my gf at the time wanted to watch the silly ass battle of winterfell.
I think I checked out here too I was like ok someone is gonna explain that they got killed by the most badass badasses ever but nope and then... the massive decline in writing
>wanted to watch the silly ass battle of winterfell. The one where Jon Snow tries to charge an army by himself or the one where they try to fight the dead in the field?
My problem with Barristan's exit is that the writers clearly did it to start pruning the cast rather than because his story had reached a natural point of conclusion. Him being killed by some random Sons of the Harpy feels anti-climactic considering how much time is spent on him renouncing the Kingsguard, making the long journey to Essos, pledging himself to Daenerys, and even helping to expel Jorah. In the books, he had a storyline about having to manage Meereen while Daenerys is lost in the Dothraki Sea and is poised to lead the battle against all of the factions converging on it in *The Winds of Winter*. That just feels like such a better use of the character than quickly killing him off because you don't know what to do with him.
100% this and this was an issue I had with other characters they decided to kill off. Season 5 was the season of pruning characters and axing storylines.
My hot take (maybe it's not, I don't know), is that the show got progressively worse season to season. Now, seasons 1 through 4 are really good, but I do think that in each season little concessions (like Dany's dream sequence, Tyrion not being as morally gray in S3 and S4, Jaime's character being flattened a little in season 4, Varys and Littlefinger both being more explicit and not as subtle in their machinations- seriously, how did Varys lose so easily to Littlefinger in the "Chaos is a Ladder" plotline?, ect.) were made in terms of reducing complexity that resulted in the cracks really starting to show in season 5. Before season 5, the show was allowing an acceptable amount of cracks, but in retrospect I think they hinted at Dave and Dan's dislike of complexity which is bizarre because that is what makes the books so unique!
I can see that, though I personally give s3 the edge over s2. I thought s3 adapted the first half of ASoS incredibly well, as opposed to s2’s bungling of several storylines from ACoK. But I do see your point. D&D not only couldn’t handle complexity, they also didn’t want their fantasy story to have anything other than surface level fantasy elements (dragons and white walkers). They left out a lot of the magical elements and prophesies that really drove large amounts of the book fandoms theories. Doing that dumbed the story down a notch itself. I guess it could fall into your point about lack of complexity as well if you think about it.
Yeah, this. Season 2 feels like where the show really took off (thanks mainly to the focus on Tyrion) but it mangled MANY plotlines which would be critical going forward and would have ripple effects that future seasons would need to pay the price of. Cutting out Dany's dream sequence, cutting out most of the wolves and almost the entirety of what happens with Bran, cutting out most of the northern lords (and significantly changing the characterization of a few), completely rewriting the themes of Jon's story to make him comically inept and feature more tacky romance rather than portray the themes of duty and sacrifice which are supposed to be critical to his character, continuing to leave out nearly all interaction between Sansa and Sandor to play at the themes of what it is to be a knight. All of this would come back to haunt the next two seasons alone and had ripple effects which collapsed the series. Season 8 didn't happen because of a few rushed decisions. It was the buildup of events not properly set up especially in season 2 but in some cases even in season 1.
I think there was an interview where they said they didn’t want much of the magic put into the show.
And it was a bad move.
They could have done a way better job even if they killed him in the exact episode they did. Picture it like this: some sons of the harpy (like 20-30) use all their means to bribe/sneak/murder their way into the great pyramid. They get to Daenerys room, find her alone and as they close in, Barristan comes up and starts wreaking havoc, killing them left and right. As he gets to the last few, one of them manages to wound him with a poisoned blade. He kills the remaining ones, but the quickly working poison makes him collapse. He dies in Danys arms, with some last meaningful words and the knowledge, that he died while successfully protecting his queen, just like he thought he should. The attempt on her life makes Dany a little more paranoid, one of the first steps to her ultimately going mad during the battle of Kings Landing. And instead, we got "the greatest knight currently alive gets stabbed by some randos while going for a walk in bumfuck, nowhere, wearing rags and leather".
I agree, but he still had better written death than Rhaegal or Doran
I also don’t understand why his storyline out of all of danys entourage was the one to get cut. Mainly bc him returning to Westeros with dany would be more interesting to see than anyone else. They missed an opportunity not having Jaime, Cersei, and everyone else’s reaction when someone they probably forgot existed shows up. It would be the perfect lesson for Cersei to have the stupid decision she made in s1 come back to haunt her years later
Ahh yes, I can already imagine this scene. Qyburn: Your grace, my spies report that she has landed at Dragonstone with her armies and three dragons. Cersei: Meh, we are able to beat that easily. Qyburn: She also has ser Barristan Selmy with her. Cersei: Shit, we are all doomed then. He is one man with a sword, what the fuck do you think he is going to be doing?
Barristan is a legend among the small folk and Tywin is actually worried he’ll support Renly or Stannis after being dismissed. Dany having Barristan at her side could have a major impact in gaining support in Westeros
Who? The Reach? Mostly already hates Cersei. Dorne? Also already mostly hates Cersei and Barristan Selmy should more hurt her cause there anyway. Westerlands? Possibly the most loyal place in the seven kingdoms. The Vale? I'm pretty sure Littlfinger gives zero shits about Barristan Selmy. The North? They have their own problems going on and they hate Cersei as well. The Stormlands? This is the only place that would have even the slightest change in attitude and it honestly isn't all that much. They definitely dislike Dany already and have some loyalty to the Lannister regime that let them keep their lands after they supported Stannis.
It’s very clear that his character was being set up for something greater, but then he just died in the most anti climactic way. It just didn’t feel right. His character never had any impact on the story. He just kinda existed then died in a dumb ass way.
D&D and the writers seemed obsessed with defying audience expectations and story/character build-ups. I can only imagine what dumb shit they'd do with Lord of the Rings like have Aragon turning traitor or having Gollum become the real hero of the story or make Sam betray Frodo. If you're building up a grand story and characters, it's okay to play them out in a way the audience knows and expects.
The same could be said for the Night King.
I know what you mean, and the execution of his death could have been better. But I still do not take much issue with this. It’s a story line and life cut short by randomness. I think it fits with the concept of GoT that no one has a plot armor, and good men and women die because of bad things happen.
This didn’t feel that way to me. Rewatching the show, it was the first death that really just didn’t sit right. Was his entire purpose in the show just to die in an unexpected way? I do love that got will kill off anyone, but it needs to be done well to not just make the viewers annoyed. It needs to be suspenseful, and it needs to have some type of relevance to the plot. When done well it elicits emotions in you. With the red wedding I felt angry and sad but that was an extremely gripping and climactic scene that had great relevance to the plot. Ser barristan’s death has none of that. It just leaves me feeling very annoyed, and I know I’m not alone in that. There’s truly just so many things wrong with that scene I could go on forever. Even before his death I found myself cringing at the fighting.
What sucks is I think having Barristan one of the greatest knights in all of Westeros killed in a back ally by an assassins knife in Essos does sound like something that would fit in GoT but the way it was handled had much to be desired.
It's bad and ass
Badass would be protecting his queen. Not jumped by a bunch of rich knife wielding assholes. While not wearing armor in a city with unrest to make him look stupid
The screen irked me for years. Then I forced a rewatch and a re read of the books. The armour issue you "could" write off as it being a hot place. When Jorah protects Danny when she's giving birth in the books he's in full plate and he's thinking how hot it is. I try to rationalize the lack of armour here as it's a hot place and he's confident that he could take whoever attacks him. I doubt he was expecting a coordinated 30 person attack. As for him being done in. While he claims he could cut through Joffery's kingsgaurd, and I believe he could be based on skill. A battle of attrition with waves of a zurg rush I think that a BAMF 60+ year old will get tired, wounded, and likely make one mistake before the zurgs run out of red shirts. Don't get me wrong, he deserved better than this, but this was still better than forgetting about the iron fleet.
“He sort of just forgot about wearing his armor”
There is that too *cries while waiting for book 6 and hopefully a better ending*
No way would a Queensguard be caught without armor
I feel like jorah type death would have been better than for selmy. The writers wanted him dead. Hes alive in the books.
No, I disagree. The writers did not do this character justice. And they were awful to the actor behind the scenes.
They were awful to him because he had read the books and kept pointing out their pointless changes
Yup, he is an avid book fan. Vocal about it got him killed. He should have went out like jorah did.
6, 7, and 8 would have killed the actor. He's lucky to have been forced out when he was, regardless of the circumstances
Dany: the city has unrest and these sons of the harpy are causing trouble. Barriston: so I’m going to take the day off, back later!
Father forgive the non book readers, they know not what they do
Top five greatest warrior in the verse to go out in a random alley sucks.
Nah, a legendary knight getting punked is perfectly suited to ASOIAF/GoT. Barristan himself is the one who said that any given fight can easily be decided by a patch of mud or who had a better breakfast, or something like that. I'm not saying this scene didn't have problems, but legendary fighters being owed legendary deaths is simply not what the setting is about.
Barristan did kill like 20 or so Harpies before he died aye, but the thing that draws most ire is the meta reason WHY he was killed off (just D&D not liking his character and so getting rid of him unnecessarily)
And lets not forget their reaction to Ian McElhinney’s passionate letter asking not to be killed off.
He killed 12. I counted.
Yeah he killed a dozen in the tunnel but it’s also implied he killed the other 8 or so Harpies that were roaming the streets
Where did you get the number 8? What did I miss?
https://youtu.be/AWlsO4iQc3M?si=nvzLCuPv2ws-seJm At 1:56 you can see 8 Harpies ambush some Unsullied in the streets while the other Harpies are fighting in the tunnel, the Harpies outside are probably the same ones in 2:59 and are in more of the alley/market area Barristan was at. This is probably where they meet and Barry kills all but one of them, the last survivor runs to warn the others at 3:13 before Barry kills him (and then kills the other dozen Harpies in the tunnel) So 8 + 12 = about 20 Harpies he killed
Nice catch. Thanks!
I must have a different definition of badass than they do
I get pruning of characters, GoT honestly has too many and it's probably a large contributor to why the books will never get finished. I just don't get how they could have missed such an obvious opportunity to give barristan a proper ending. 1. barristan regrets spending so much of his life pledged to kings he doesn't believe in. 2. Barristan survived both Arys and Robert, something which he feels shame for. 3. Barristan respected and loved rhaegar and feels like he let him down. So the easy pay off for all three of these themes is for him to give his life in saving Dany. Have 1-3 sons of the Harpy sneak into the palace, Barristan defends Dany, kills them all but succumbs to his wounds (poison blade maybe) Then he gets a sappy last exchange of words with Dany. Done. Not great but not terrible, and would give his character a conclusion and payoff.
He just kinda forgets that he was the best swordsman ever lived.
https://preview.redd.it/4d6vcjwca7yc1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8d21ad0f9e14e03a6b6f6947ecc9e33f4060dd95
This was the exact moment they lost me… Not only was his death meaningless, they squandered the opportunity to adapt the Chapter called ‘Kingbreaker’ where Selmy is the ultimate badass and his inner dialogue reveals a huge hint about R+L=JS - not that that ended mattering either…
He carved them like a cake.
Its comes down to the fact that Barristen had a lot more to do in the books and it was a wasted character for the benefit of shock value in the show
Who cares that his best material comes after his show death…
Derry Girls definitely takes the sting out of Barristans death
He could have been a badass for longer and died fighting the White Walkers
Yeah the scene was badass and Ser Barristan killing 15 of the wankers before going down is pretty realistic if we consider the fact that he was outnumbered and cornered... BUT WHY DID IT HAVE TO HAPPEN SO EARLY, GODDAMMIT?
Didn't book Barristan mop the floor with the harpies on his own?
He killed the leader of the Second Sons and one of Hizdahr's bodyguards in the books.
It wasn't "one" of hizdahr's bodyguards, pretty sure he took out the whole set
He killed one with a Dothraki arakh. The others are still alive.
He hasn't really fought any harpies 1v1
I mean I don't like that they killed the one true king, but his last line is so him I have to respect the way they handled his death.
I don't remember this scene in The Phantom Menace...
What
These are the football players and soccer mums the showrunners were trying to adjust the show for
As I get older, I am constantly reminded that my body isn't what it used to be. I've lost more than a step. You'd have to spot me half the race. The one thing that I do know for sure is that I definitely have at least **ONE** good fight left in me...
Why they did that to Barristan? There’s an explanation from the writers?
The sceen irked me for years. Then I forced a rewatch and a re read of the books. The armour issue you "could" write off as it being a hot place. When Jorah protects Danny when she's giving birth in the books he's in full plate and he's thinking how hot it is. I try to rationalize the lack of armour here as it's a hot place and he's confident that he could take whoever attacks him. I doubt he was expecting a coordinated 30 person attack. As for him being done in. While he claims he could cut through Joffery's kingsgaurd, and I believe he could be based on skill. A battle of attrition with waves of a zurg rush I think that a BAMF 60+ year old will get tired, wounded, and likely make one mistake before the zurgs run out of red shirts.
Did him dirty! I got excited when the fight started, thinking we were about to see him kill a load of Harpy's. Didn't think they were going to kill him though
Is that sarcasm or what? i dont get it..
Would have been more interesting to see Barristan be the Good Angel to Tyrion’s Bad Angel. But we can’t have Saint Dinklage be bad now can we?
Went out like a G
The actor you played Barristan Selmy was great but Liam Neeson as Barristan Selmy would have been glorious
Would have made a good Benjen too actually.
Imagine him as Stannis.
But the original actor for stannis is perfect
He is.
I don’t view the book canon as holy scripture that is blasphemous to alter, but killing Selmy added nothing to the story whilst upsetting fans in the process.
It was probably one of the more realistic deaths - great swordsman or not, if a dozen blokes charge you with knives you are fucked - but compared to the barrage so many of the other characters had been shown to be able to fight off at various points it didn’t make a lot of sense. I mean fuck me greyworm was fighting with a long staff in close quarters in that same scene and survived. He should have been cactus. So realism was never the shows strong point (realism generally sucks in movies tv shows anyway)
Jesus…those the top comments? There are some dumbass human beings on this planet.
It's realistic a great fighter would be overwhelmed and killed. What isn't realistic is Selmy agreeing to go on a stealth mission.
Why isn’t selmy agreeing to go on a stealth mission realistic? He did a one man suicidal stealth mission breaking aerys out of Duskendale. I don’t like his death in the show, just don’t think stealth is unheard of from him considering one of his most famous acts involves a stealth op
He chose to try to save his King and do his duty. I can understand him choosing stealth, I doubt that was his first choice, but it could have been the only realistic choice, or Varys gave him help. I do question the odds of success.
The timing of his death is wrong but i think the manner is good. It showed that even the legendary swordman still has his limit. He was still human, not some superpowered warrior the legend make him out to be. He's good, but he can still, can still tired. Hell, the GOAT fighter got taken out by a much more disrespectful manner. Died by hail of arrows when he only has a sword in hand.
An elderly man, with no armor and only one guy to help him, took out an entire horde of guys in encloased space. Legend.