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comment by kleinbl00
kleinbl00  ·  1799 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What did ya think of the GoT finale?

What We're Reading: And Now Our Watch Has Ended

    Last week, when I was going through my Monday morning stack of reading, I was struck by a newspaper report about the Iranian government’s attempt to stop cafes in Tehran from hosting “Game of Thrones” screenings. What was striking wasn’t the government’s desire to control what people were watching, but the fact that cafes in Tehran were hosting the same kind of watch parties that I was hosting here in my own home in Texas.

    I confess that I don’t know what this means yet, if it even means anything. (I expect some of you will tell me it means nothing and will be mad at me for wasting your time writing about “Game of Thrones.”) But what I do know is that, at least for a brief hour per week over the past several years, millions of people in the world were telling themselves the same story. Even more remarkable, it was a story about the uglier, less savory side of politics, set in a world modeled on medieval Europe, with some dragons added in for good measure, that had so many people from so many different backgrounds similarly enthralled.

    Somehow, this strange world of Westeros managed to strike a deep chord in many of us about some aspect of political life that is universally experienced. But now the heroes are gone, and the government of King’s Landing has gotten back to mundane administrative duties like improving the water cisterns, repaving the roads, importing food – and so must we all, too.