"Game of Thrones" Ends It's Eight-Year Run.
CHURCH: It's the day millions of fans dreaded. "Game of Thrones" is over.</s>HOWELL: Its wildly successful eight-year run on HBO came to an end on Sunday as someone new seized power, the iron throne.</s>CHURCH: Among those dissecting the last episode, CNN's senior media and entertainment writer Brian Lowry, who is a huge fan of the show, as am I, and he joins us live from Los Angeles. Great to see you.</s>BRIAN LOWRY, CNN SENIOR MEDIA AND ENTERTAINMENT WRITER: Thank you.</s>CHURCH: Let's repeat again before we begin, spoiler alert to all those "Game of Thrones" fans who have not yet seen the series final, finale, block your ears, close your eyes, walk out of the room, whatever you need to do. We are about to discuss who won the game of thrones. Are you ready? So Brian, not many people saw this one coming, right? And not many fans are happy about the ending. What did you think of that ending and who ended up taking over?</s>LOWRY: Well, I said -- you know, when you think about hot takes, saying it is fine, isn't the hottest of hot takes, but I kind of thought it was fine. I did have a problem with the pacing in the last couple of episodes leading up to it. I thought the first 40 minutes or so of the finale were very strong. And then after the big death, which I guess we are going to talk about, I felt like it was a little bit anti-climactic after that. So it's not -- by no means a one for the ages finale. Not a great finale. But for me it was not an entirely satisfying finale.</s>CHURCH: Right. And of course the storyline of episode six was leaked online last week and fans were furious. That's even before it aired, right? So how will they deal with this surprise ending, do you think, and the demise of Dany?</s>LOWRY: Well, I think some of the fans have not been dealing with any of this very well. Obviously, a lot of people were very upset with sort of the arc of Daenerys's character this season. And there was a speech in this last episode that Peter Dinklage's character delivered, Tyrion, which I really think helped a lot in sort of explaining where she had gone. It's only too bad they didn't do that three or four episodes ago. If they had laid more groundwork for it, I think they would have spared themselves some headaches and some criticism later on.</s>CHURCH: Yeah. That was a powerful speech. And basically you won't be born to power going forward, you will earn it, you will be chosen for that position, right? A real plug for democracy.</s>LOWRY: Right.</s>CHURCH: A lot of fans were so upset last week with episode five when Daenerys went mad and as you said mercilessly burned most of king's landing along with many innocent people. Hundreds of thousands of viewers signed a petition for a do-over of the whole of season eight. They were so angry with the writers and producers. What upset them the most, do you think? And how were they hoping this would end? Were they looking for a Hollywood ending here? I mean, after investing eight years of their lives, they surely realized that was not where this was going.</s>LOWRY: Well, I think you just said the magic word really, which is they'd invested eight years of their lives. And, you know, you see this with some of these big franchises. I think "Star Wars: The Last Jedi" was another example of this where people get very tied up in it. They spend a lot of time coming up with scenarios on the way they think this is going to go. And when it doesn't go the way they anticipate, they get ticked off. In this case, I think it also went back into some issues the show has had throughout its run about the way that it deals with female characters. I think it strengthened those characters dramatically the last couple of seasons. And the arc with Daenerys and Cersei and Brienne also this season, a lot of people were saying oh boy, there they go again.</s>CHURCH: Yeah, I think that was it. I think the demise of Daenerys was the thing that really upset people the most. And therapists are offering their services to "Game of Thrones" fans who need help getting over the show coming to an end, but also the way it ended. How often does that happen with long-running shows like this? And what was it about this show that people got so invested in the characters and the storyline?</s>LOWRY: Well, I think the show -- first off, I think if you need a therapist when a T.V. show ends, there may be more going on than just the T.V. show ending. But as far as the show, I really think the "Game of Thrones" was a show that brought the scope and scale of a theatrical blockbuster to television. So it had the big serialized storyline with dozens of characters that you could get sucked into like "The Sopranos" or "The Wire" or any of the great HBO dramas, and then staged it on a level in this mythical world that really no one had ever seen done quite that way for T.V. before.</s>CHURCH: Right.</s>LOWRY: It set the bar on that level enormously high. And I think a lot of networks and streaming services are going to lose a lot of money trying to come up with something like it.</s>CHURCH: All right. Brian Lowry, great to talk with you. Appreciate it.</s>LOWRY: All right. Thank you.</s>HOWELL: All good things come to an end, right?</s>CHURCH: Yep, they do.</s>HOWELL: And we end this show with one of our colleagues who is ending his career in retirement, Doug McKinney (ph). Doug was a copy editor here for "CNN Newsroom." He was with CNN for 13 years. This is his last day, and we are going to miss him.</s>CHURCH: Yes. Well done, Doug. Thank you for everything you've given us. And thank you for joining us. I'm Rosemary Church.</s>HOWELL: And I'm George Howell. Doug, thank you. Thank you for being with us for "Newsroom." Have a great day.