I really wanted to like this. GOT is my favorite TV series of all time. I am even one that read the books back when they came out and thought that HBO did an excellent job of converting them to a visual masterpiece. I love dark fantasy books, movies, and tv shows. For the record I have not read the HOTD series.

I watched HOTD a few times to make sure, buts it's just not for me. No offense to any one that enjoys it. I think HOTD, like many shows, suffers from its own success, (or in this case it's predecessor). A lot of shows decline in later seasons as they become popular. Too many hands in the pot making and writing it. No singular vision. The love and creativity gets lost in trying to please fans and political agendas. Too many themes, build ups, and pandering ideas need to be included in HOTD and it's ugly. No comprehendible story line, unlikable characters, bad acting, and a closed world that seems small in comparison to the original. Mostly just a dark dreary castle with people talking.

GOT had a lot of story lines going with different villains and heros, different locations and landscapes that all hovered around the same theme. IMO HOTD overuses cgi and it seems obvious which takes me out of the story.

If the original never existed, I wouldn't even had made it through all the episodes.

In the GOT, the plot jumped between character perspectives and arcs, weaving in and out of each others stories building towards confrontation.always something new and the characters were interesting and you like them (or loved to hate them), HOTD characters are just too shallow and uncomplicated. This is one long boring political storyline. Cookie cutter trope characters with no depth. The politics in GOT added the story and contributed to the action, in HOTD the politics are the story, the action, sex, and crappy CGI seem tacked on. Seems they add the violence and sex to keep it from being just people talking but that falls flat without the viewer being invested in the character. Some might enjoy the political part of the GOT universe, I don't. Just can't keep interested. The acting is basic and I think that some actors just expected it to be a success and phoned it in. In addition, the time jump and change of characters was a mess. What little interest I had for the characters was lost with the time jump.

I am sure there are fans of this show, and I am thankful for them. Hopefully there are enough fans of this to keep GOT alive for another (better) spin off. But I usually am pretty good barometer representing the average person that watches this type of content and, if so, HOTD is not doing well in the viewership. I really hope they just wrap this and come up with a different spin off similar to the original. But probably not, GOT was a unique and risky investment that happened to pay off. HBO and American entertainment in general just doesn't take risks anymore, they just push agendas and just can't make a movie anymore without politics and pandering. Good writing and acting will always sell. Mediocre writing and acting will give you mediocre ratings.