In a spoiler-filled rant, Green Bay Packers star Aaron Rodgers – who had a cameo in the show's finale season – says that he was bitterly disappointed in how show-runners handled the climax to hugely popular series Game of Thrones.
**SPOILERS BELOW**
The long-running TV show aired its final episode in the United States on Sunday night, drawing the curtain on a near-decade's worth of backstabbing, dragons and beheadings which enthralled TV audiences across the globe.
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The finale, though, didn't leave everyone particularly satisfied. Bran Stark's unveiling as the new king of Westeros was seen as something of a damp squib by many fans of the show, who were expecting a more dramatic conclusion to the show which aired its first episode in 2011.
One of those who wasn't pleased was Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers. The 35-year-old, seven-time Pro Bowler was featured in a cameo appearance in the penultimate episode of the show but even that didn't soften the blow of the disappointment at the show's ending.
“You come down to the end and Tyrion says the person with the best story is Bran?” Rodgers said to the media at a training session this week.
“Who, by the way, three episodes ago said he wasn’t Bran Stark anymore.
“No. Jon had a better story. Dany had a better story. Arya had a better story. Sansa had a better story. Tyrion had a better story. Varys had a better story. Bronn, a lot better story. Jaime, better story. Cersei, probably a better story. Any Baratheon, better story.
“I think Dany should have been on the throne,” he added.
Game of Thrones has received huge praise from critics and fans alike in its first six seasons, though the praise has cooled somewhat in the last two with many questioning the show's pacing and storytelling as it appeared to rush towards its conclusion.
An incredible 19.3 million people watched the last episode in the United States alone, with more than one billion people across 170 countries expected to watch it when it airs in various markets, or on demand.
Rodgers says that if he were in charge, it is likely that things would have ended differently even suggesting that the show's writers “might have been a little busy” to properly craft the ending due to their involvement in an upcoming Star Wars movie.
“Here’s the thing, though,” Rodgers said.“Here’s my last theory about it. Bran – the Three-Eyed Raven, who's all about the health of the realm – let’s think about what he did: He basically wanted the throne the whole time because he’s the one who told the Starks, knowing that Sansa would tell Tyrion, knowing that Tyrion would talk to Varys, knowing that he’d scheme for Dany’s death, knowing that would piss her off, which led her to be the Mad Queen.
“So he, the entire time, set the whole thing up and then at the end goes ‘Oh yeah, I don’t want to be king. Oh, but why did I travel all this way to be here?’
“No. Look, I love the opportunity to be in the show, which most people probably don’t think I was, but I was there. I love the show, but the writers are also doing Star Wars, so I think they might have been a little busy,” he concluded.
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