Kaka

The dragon ride is epic, the scene with the eye is dark. It's got a bit better "substance" and better character work, but I really could have done without the first 20 minutes of over-exposure of the funeral, where we get clouds of views/pulses, but the poor image work makes everything cruelly dark and often cluttered. Just because the picture needs to be dark doesn't necessarily mean the film should be.

Jump 10 years and the dark world of Game of Thrones suddenly looks and feels like a mix with the Twilight saga. Lots of talk about nothing, extremely unlikeable main protagonists and lots of twists that don't make much sense and don't hold the dramatic arc together. A fatal downward plunge.

Decent standard. Every cut, shot, look and gesture has its own meaning and importance in the whole mosaic of the story, but it only manages to pull the viewer in once, as is usual in the Game of Thrones universe, at a wedding.

An unnecessarily complicated script full of intrigue. We have a bunch of more or less interesting main characters who dive deeper and deeper into trouble that in some cases is literally pulled out of thin air, without a very strong grounding in an otherwise decently written epic series. Game of Thrones had more juice and creative finesse in this respect.

Too long. The plot and the pulling of strings doesn't have the necessary grace that, for example, Baelish or Tywin Lannister gave it in Game of Thrones; there is no such refined figure here (yet). In addition, there is an oddly crafted crab battle, which is very reminiscent of the Battle of Bastards in its structure, but from a tactical point of view, it is completely upside down.

Average intrigue and machinations, typical GoT atmosphere and only one really gripping scene, the one with the dragons on Dragonstone. A bit short for one of only 10 episodes, but I want to believe it won't slow down and stagnate unnecessarily after the fresh looking one.

It's like there hasn't even been a hiatus, let alone another show. The first episode of House of the Dragon follows in the footsteps of Game of Thrones. A spectacular opening, strong direction, polished visuals that the creators play with in a similar way to the last series of its more famous predecessor, and the characters are well defined and memorable. The first episode is undoubtedly engaging and offers a variety of powerful and often typically controversial scenes.

A piece of extremely well done work. For the creators, The Crown must have meant years of intense thinking and shaping of the overall concept, and getting it right on all sides and angles was certainly an exceedingly difficult task, which was accomplished to perfection. The mix of pop watchability, historical accuracy, richness of thought and at the same time absolute detachment of opinion is impressive and perfectly thought out. The pinnacle of Netflix's output. Claire Foy is the best.

It's probably the weakest series so far, but it's not far behind the previous ones. Technically, it's still the polished, refined ride we're used to. Also, casting-wise, I didn't find the transition as dramatic as from the second to third series. The biggest weakness will probably be the themes that were addressed in the 1990s and which The Crown is again reconstructing with great precision. Unfortunately it is those themes around royal family relations, love affairs and similar other scandals that become repetitive and rather tiresome after a while. However, for how variably it could have been handled and what a soap opera it could have been under any less rigid directorial baton, I think the creators of the fifth series came out of it with a clean slate and quite classy.

The finale of the whole series, which actually seems to be only a transition station to the next, probably last series, which will chart the late 1990s, thus probably the fateful event of Princess Diana, which perhaps every other viewer expected as an imaginary dramatic climax. Here, apart from a few get-togethers with old friends, nothing much actually happens. The events surrounding the Queen are rather conciliatory, almost melancholic, and Diana forges plots and plans to free herself from the clutches of the aristocratic system.