If you’ve ever faced the social embarrassment of having to admit that you’ve never seen Game of Thrones (Sky Atlantic, Monday), then imagine what it’s like when you’re a TV reviewer. The customary excuse of ‘There really isn’t time to keep up with everything on telly’ might work for most series. But now that GoT is officially a programme that everybody watches (apart from all the people who don’t), it’s beginning to feel a bit feeble for this one. So it was that, after swotting up as best I could on the scores of backstories over the weekend, I decided to give the final series a go.
I was, of course, expecting the show to have an epic feel. Nonetheless, it was something of a surprise to discover just how thoroughly GoT embraces the traditional trappings of the genre: not merely the castles lit by flaming torches, the randomly medieval names, the frank fetishisation of swords and so on, but also the distinct air of self-importance and the often comically po-faced dialogue.
Monday’s episode duly began with a huge CGI army on the march, as Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen headed for Winterfell, the northern part of the Seven Kingdoms, to help defend the local forces against the evil White Walkers, who are no less threatening for all being dead.
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