'Game of Thrones' Dialogue Data Twitter Reactions

Last weekend, after eight seasons and almost a decade on the air, Game of Thrones aired its final episode. Not all fans were pleased with the way the show's long-running battle for the Iron Throne was resolved—or with the fates of their favorite characters.

According to data from opensubtitles.org, over the years, the number of words spoken in each episode of Game of Thrones declined sharply, especially in the final seasons of the show.

Fans took to Twitter to react to the data, which served as proof that the changes in the show weren't just in their imagination after all.

Game of Thrones came to an end last week and many fans were, well, less than thrilled with the show's ending. Whatever you happened to think of the ending, the widely-held perception that the show had changed in some real way in the last few years isn't wrong.

According to data from opensubtitles.org, the show's dialogue underwent some major changes over the years. Namely, the number of words spoken per episode plummeted.

Github user mrquart took the data and plotted it into a chart (the code for the chart is available here) and many fans shared the graphic on Twitter. Here's the graph:

The brooding silence in Season 8 wasn’t just in your head.

Twitter

Some fans on Twitter had jokes:

There it is. pic.twitter.com/mTl6iJI9sU
— Joanna Robinson (@jowrotethis) May 24, 2019

Meanwhile, Cersei.... pic.twitter.com/ZrzPyrpLsn
— Trotman's Travels (@TrotmansTravels) May 25, 2019

Confirmed that neither Aaron Sorkin nor Amy Sherman Palladino ghostwrote an episode.
— Danielle Nussbaum (@daniellenuss) May 25, 2019

Here it is in pictorial form pic.twitter.com/ZAURKK0j3q
— Andreas Rotham (@fukdandbombd) May 25, 2019

pic.twitter.com/NyGcLOmwTh
— Olivia🍍 (@hiiolive) May 25, 2019

Does this include dragon roars?
— Ramsay (@Rmmmsy) May 26, 2019

While others defended the declining dialogue stats:

I’m interested to hear your conclusions. To me, this makes a lot of sense - you have to explain the story and characters at the beginning and if you’ve done the job right, by the end all you need is Tyrions facial expressions lol.
— Kevin Harmon (@imadness) May 24, 2019

The S6:E10 opening was one of the best sequences in the entire show, and there was almost no dialogue. Not sure this means anything.
— Probl-o-matic™️ (@David_The_Wavid) May 25, 2019

The medium of film is told cinematically. Why talk when you can show.

The implied Correlation is stupid.
— Oniffe🇯🇲 (@BlackSpaceMagic) May 25, 2019

I was always taught "Show, Don't Tell" but what do I know about good writing? I defer to the Mark Twain's of Twitter and their WPM charts.
— Johnny Malloy (@mistercecil) May 25, 2019

I wish people replying to this would actually look at an actual script and realise there’s far more to it than writing dialogue. Educate yourselves. Action scenes don’t just “happen” somehow by turning up to a set one day with a blank piece of paper *screams internally*
— Guy Lambert (@GRALambo) May 25, 2019

And then there were those who defended the lack of dialogue, but still planted themselves firmly on Team Game of Thrones Took a Nosedive:

I mean, on the one hand, I think the nice thing about film and television is that you can tell a whole lot without dialogue, but just by how you frame the shot, the actor, the music, etc.

On the other hand, Season 8 sucked.
— Miss Scarlett in the library with the candlestick (@khaleesi_britt) May 26, 2019

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