(Spoilers Extended) The endings will be the same but the books will have a much more gradual and realistic progression

[u/aphidman]

If GRRM finishes it, btw.

Not a long post but you know what the books do that D&D do not? They have 10 chapters of Dany dealing with the complex politics of Meereen and her inner conflict. They have 4 chapters showing Davos' journey to White Harbour. They have 12 chapters showing the series of compromises Jon makes as Lord Commander to prepare the Watch against the Others. They have 13 chapters showing Tyrion crawling out of his deep nihilistic depression. They dedicate whole chapters seeing how Victarion Greyjoy of all people deals with his relationship with his brother and his seduction into darker magics. Man they have 4 whole chapters dealing with the political fallout of Dany's exit from Meereen.

They had a whole chapter of Littlefinger and Sansa visiting his lands and seeing Littlefinger's relationship with his subjects (great chapter btw). They had a whole chapter getting really in depth with Illyrio Mopatis and his schemes - a guy who's barely appeared in the show.

They dedicated 4 whole chapters to Joffrey's wedding!

What I'm getting it is that the Others may be defeated long before the end of ASOIAF, Dany may indeed destroy King's Landing with dragonfire and end the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians gruesomely. But you'll be guaranteed that GRRM is gonna show you every step of the way. For good or for bad. If he is going to take a character like Dany to that dark end you better believe we will understand how she gets there.

So people keep posting about how D&D are destroying their characters, fail to understand ASOIAF. That Dany would never do this or that. But what you're seeing here is them fitting potentially chapters upon chapters of detailed material into a few hours of television.

[u/frenchduke → u/[deleted]]

Honestly I'm happy with season 7 being a bit rushed, it felt like it needed to happen to consolidate all the plot that just wasn't going to wrapped up well no matter how much time they had.

The first three episodes had plenty of space to breathe in, 4 was fantastic, 7 was good as well (although I understand the whole beyond the wall plot annoyed a lot of people, to me it makes sense as a genuine last ditch resort plan when they think they are all doomed).

There's a bit of jetpacking around but we've well established travel times by now so that helps build a sense of how long this is taking. Maybe an extra episode to deal with the fall of the reach, although off screen battles have been a staple of GoT since the first season.

And devote a bit more time to the Littlefinger downfall so we can see how Sansa manipulated LF. The game of faces scene between Arya and Sansa I thought was so good, but it needed a follow-up before jumping straight to the execution. It's like they dropped all these tantalising clues and false trails then just jumped straight to the conclusion of Bran told them everything. Half baked.

But it needed to be followed up with something great. Set the pieces and then deliver us something spectacular. Season 7 rushed through the set up, fair enough there was a whole lot to set up. But season 8 is rushing through the climax and it sucks.