Ok, more detailed thoughts on the provisional issue I have with the last episode *if* the winter is coming/mysticism/religion side of the show is finished and the last 3 episodes are all about the battle for which human(s) get to rule Westeros.
Firstly, to reiterate some points i've made a number of times already, a key theme of both the books AND the show has always been that fighting over who rules is in the grand scheme of things a petty squabble, and not only ignores bigger threats but actively harms the ability to address them because it weakens everyone. This isn't just a plot point, GRRM has said that this is ultimately what the books are about, and the show has definitely embraced it including during the current season. The implied direction of the rest of the season scraps and arguably even reverses this theme, as I said before.
Another important point is about prophecy. Do prophecies need to always come true? No. But again the show has very much established that prophecies do come true (Cersei's 3 children being blonde and dying, Dany being unable to conceive, etc) even if they've left some out from the books. And while it may not have come up very often and casual viewers might not even recognise it, prophecies about the Lord of Light, Azor Ahai, balance between ice and fire, etc. have been covered in the show. It's therefore a reasonable expectation that these should mean something, given that other prophecies have meant something. *If* the rest of the season is as speculated in my opening paragrpah, then none of these mean anything. The Lord of Light didn't do anything particularly special (he allowed Melisandre to bring Jon Snow back but he wasn't that important in the end), and the concept of balance is irrelevant.
Cersei announced last season she didn't plan to help out in the North, and I think it's been clear for at least a full season that they're attacking the undead army first before Cersei.
Indeed, but precisely because she didn't offer proper support, and given the key theme of the show as explained above, I and many others did not expect that to be the end of this story arc. I certainly expected it to fail in some way. Now, as I said before, I'm increasingly open to some of the interesting ways this could go, and there are some good theories about how although this particular fight didn't fail, actually the bigger and/or real threat is something else (and no I don't mean Cersei).
I think we all just assumed there was 'more to come' re: Night King and white walkers but again we were told literally everything about them already.
Just to clarify: That's not my issue. I also have no problem with things that some have complained about like "how did Arya even get there?". Stuff like that is explained and set up well enough IMO.
I guess I'm just not really understanding the beef with Cersei being the final obstacle to conquer. To me it fits like a glove...
Why is Cersei the big bad? She's just the latest in a long line of nasty rulers. And she's only recently become the ruler. If that's the big endgame to the story then it's just really not very interesting to me. If they defeat her, cool, but there'll be another nasty ruler along later on.
And I'll say once again, this is all provisional depending on what they do with the last three episodes.