‘Game of Thrones’ season 5, episode 9 reaction: Show boss on Stannis, Shireen, and Melisandre

Tonight, “Game of Thrones” delivered what is one of the most emotionally raw and messed-up moments of the entire season. For the first time, we’ve really seen a ton of threats from people who claim that they don’t want to watch anymore. Do we think that this will actually happen? We’re not entirely sure of that, but it was very hard to watch what happened with Stannis Baratheon. (SPOILERS ahead.)

So what do we think about what he decided to do to his own daughter Shireen? Burning her to death is a shocking, heartbreaking move, and one that showed how much he believes in what Melisandre is telling him. After all, he is letting his own flesh and blood die for the sake of a cause that he happens to believe in. We’re still struggling to wrap our head around it.

Obviously, the show knew there would be some negative reaction, and executive producer D.B. Weiss offers up his explanation on what happened to Entertainment Weekly:

“People who watch Game of Thrones don’t see the same world as Stannis and Melisandre … To those characters, magic is real and it works. That’s something fun about this genre because when magic is real and you can see it with your own eyes in the show, it gives you a window into the heads of people who believe irrational things on faith. I can’t really get my head around how those people operate in our world, as they’re so completely disconnected from the way I process the world. So in a strange way, fantasy is a cock-eyed window into the heads of people who would do something terrible for an irrational reason.”

It’s going to take a long period of time for us to digest what happened in this episode, but for the time being we simply feel uneasy about the decision.

If you missed our review of tonight’s “Game of Thrones,” head over to the link here right away. Also, sign up now if you want to get some other TV updates on all we cover, courtesy of our CarterMatt Newsletter. (Photo: HBO.)