#got meta

[babylonfelldown]

I saw a tiktok about Jon and Theon and it made me remember how fuking insane their dynamic is

They're broken mirrors of each other: both of them just want the starks to see them as family, they want to feel wanted, they envy and hate each other.

Theon is a trueborn son of a great house, an heir even, but at the same time he's treated as a squire and a ward when convenient, (he helps Ned and Robb), he's also seen as a hostage and a threat, never quite trustworthy. He says repeatedly that he never felt wellcome by the Starks and that the only one to have any affection for him was Robb. Theon dreams to be wed to Sansa, not because he loves her, but because them he would be a son for Ned. He envies Jon because even being a bastard he's loved by Ned (ln a way neither Ned or his actual father loved him), his sibilings (all of them) love him, even if Lady Stark doesn't like him, he is family in Theon's eyes.

Jon is a bastard, he's a shame that must remain hidden, it doesn't matter how much Ned or his sibilings love him, he will never be a true Stark in the eyes of westerosi society. He is trusted but his loyality is always at question, Jon is a threat to Robb's claim in many peoples eyes, like he wants his brothers birthright, and the worst of it all is: he does. He desperately wants to be a trueborn son, but he loves Robb deeply, more than he could ever wish to be legitimate. He envies Theon because he is a trueborn son, he is an heir, he will get to have a wife and children of his own, legitimate children that won't be called names.

Truely insane dynamic of hatred and envy that culminates with both of them trying to one up each other on everything.

#a song of ice and fire #asoiaf #asoiaf meta #game of thrones #got meta #theon greyjoy #jon snow #theonblogging #jonblogging #im just rambling

[bbygirl-aemond]

When Dragons Disobey Their Riders

Hi all! I wanted to comment on something that recurs in both Fire and Blood and A Song of Ice and Fire: Instances of dragons blatantly disobeying their riders, often even after multiple attempts by their riders to correct them. If you look at the context of the scenes where this occurs, I think it actually does a lot to show us the level of intelligence and agency that dragons have. Most importantly, in all of the scenes I'm about to discuss, the dragon is not disobeying their rider out of malevolent intent. They are actually trying to protect their rider, and think that their rider is making a request that would put them in danger.

Our first mention of this is with Alysanne Targaryen and her dragon Silverwing, in Fire and Blood. Alysanne is up North, by the Wall, and attempts three separate times to direct Silverwing north of the wall, but Silverwing refuses each time. Some people think Silverwing was wary of the cold, but I think this is unlikely since otherwise she would have refused to come that far north entirely. I think it's much more likely that Silverwing knew some freaky magic was going on beyond the Wall, and that it could be very dangerous for her rider.

Our second mention of this is with Area Targaryen and her dragon Balerion, in Fire and Blood. On her first ride with Balerion, Aerea disappeared for over a year, and both rider and dragon returned severely injured. Aerea's illness in particular was just straight up terrifying and very gorey, and she eventually died from it. Because of this, it's suspected that Balerion actually took Aerea to Old Valyria and that they encountered some freaky magic there. At this point in time, Aerea was trying to escape and go home, and there's a popular theory that Balerion, doing his best to obey her request, took her to the place he thought of as his home.

Our third mention of this is with Lucerys Velaryon and his dragon Arrax, in Season 1 Episode 10 of HotD. When dragon and rider are being pursued by a much bigger dragon, Lucerys is unable to calm Arrax down, and he attacks, which eventually leads to both of their deaths. Arrax is quite young, and he very obviously did this because he was feeling cornered and threatened, and felt like he had to defend himself and his rider.

Our fourth mention of this is with Aemond Targaryen and his dragon Vhagar, in the same episode, right after Arrax's attack. If you go back and look at GIFs of what this attack actually presented as, note the side the attack came from. Arrax flames Vhagar's entire head, and he does it from her left side-- the same side where her rider is blind, specifically because Arrax's rider blinded her rider. It's no wonder Vhagar retaliated; she felt that her rider had been attacked in a very vulnerable place by the same person who made her rider vulnerable and never demonstrated remorse for doing so.

Our fifth and final mention of this is with Daenerys Targaryen and her dragon Drogon, in the A Song of Ice and Fire series. For those of you who watched Game of Thrones, I'm talking about the scene in Mereen where Drogon rescues her from the assassination attempt in the fighting pits. Daenerys wants to remain in Mereen and continue to try to handle the conflict there, but Drogon ignores her commands and flies far off into the wilderness. As far as Drogon's concerned, Mereen isn't safe for Daenerys, so why should she want to stay there?

I think these instances all point to dragons being intelligent, but not enough to really understand politics--that, or they don't care. Vhagar doesn't understand or care that killing Arrax and Lucerys will cause a war; just as Drogon doesn't understand or care that Daenerys wants to remain in Mereen to rule. They prioritize their riders' wellbeing and demonstrate that they don't always think their riders know best. This makes a ton of sense especially for the older, more experienced dragons, who probably had to make more decisions during combat in order to keep their riders alive rather than just waiting for commands.

#hotd meta #asoiaf meta #got meta #got #hotd #asoiaf #game of thrones #house of the dragon #vhagar #arrax #silverwing #balerion #drogon #alysanne targaryen #aerea targaryen #aemond targaryen #lucerys velaryon #lucerys strong #luke velaryon #luke strong #aemond #luke #lucerys #alysanne #aerea #aemond one eye #daenerys targaryen #daenerys

[ansheofthevalley]

Cersei and Dany have more parallels than Cersei and Sansa yet Sansa always gets compared to Cersei whilst Dany gets to stand on her own :/

(Sorry for taking ages to answer this.)

The way I see it, GRRM actually wants us to see and compare the three. To see them, in a way, as a triad:

It's no secret that George loves to use the rule of three (I talk about it a little bit here.) The way I see it when it comes to Cersei/Dæny/Sansa is to compare their ruling styles, especially since they're the strongest candidates to wield power by the end of the series (I'm talking exclusively about book canon, but we can take show canon into consideration since they are the last three big female characters wielding power by the final season.)

At first, Cersei and Dæny are foils, in a way. Cersei calls herself Queen (which she is, first Queen Regent/Dowager Queen, by being Robert's wife, then Queen Mother by being Joffrey and Tommen's mother). Dæny, however, in the beginning, rejects the title of Queen, saying that she's a Khaleesi. As the series progresses (specifically since she's -at least to her knowledge- the last Targaryen), she uses both titles: rightful Queen of the Seven Kingdoms and Khaleesi. So, this would be where the contrast stops working when it comes to these two ladies: they both call themselves Queen, but most importantly, they seek that title because they're motivated by power and the desire to have the Iron Throne. Sure, their motivations are not exactly the same, but they can be boiled down to one word: survival.

(I've spoken about characters motivated by power in the quest for the Iron Throne and what the narrative does to them in show canon, but I can't find the posts, so I'm sorry.)

Now, what part does Sansa play in all of this? Well, we're told in the first book that she's meant to be Queen. After all, she was promised to the prince of the Seven Kingdoms. And she wants to be Queen... until Joffrey orders the execution of Ned. Then, we notice a change in Sansa: she's not interested in the games of intrigue, in the subterfuge. It can all be encapsulated in this quote: "If I am ever Queen, I'll make them love me."

Cersei thinks the best way to rule is to make the people fear you more than they could ever fear the enemy. And that's precisely what she does during her time in power. So, she rules by fear.

Dæny is benevolent to those suffering injustice. But she's also severe regarding those she disagrees with or thinks have interests that go against hers. She is not forgiving. In my eyes, she also has a fatal flaw - she's not interested in the day-to-day tasks that come with being a ruler, as shown in her stint in Meereen. She also relies on her dragons and the Targaryen legacy to instill fear in those who don't want to submit to her. She rules by good faith when it comes to the marginalized and outpowering the powerful with her dragons and armies. So, she rules by power and, to some extent, fear.

Sansa is benevolent with people. She knows what is expected of her as a Lady while in King's Landing. In the Eyrie, she learns to run a household and the day-to-day tasks that come with running a Great Keep like the Eyrie. But that's not all she learns throughout the series. She understands the importance of politics and how to exercise that power. She also understands people's importance; let them be Lords, Ladies, Common Folk, or bastards. She sees their value regarding of station. Also, since the end of the first book, she doesn't get fooled by the nobility; she's more distrustful of their true intentions, and that distrust makes her read each person she encounters more carefully, which, in time, will make her a keen politician (all in all, and this is what sets her apart from Cersei and Dæny, she's not actively seeking to rule. And, when it comes to the rule of three, the last link is the one that differs from the other two and, for that reason, is the successful one.) Sansa is compassionate with those deserving of compassion and sometimes with those who are not, but she's never cruel like Dæny can be or vengeful like Cersei is. This is not to say that she bends to the will of others because she doesn't. She stopped doing it back in King's Landing, starting with small acts of defiance. In the Eyrie, she's on a journey to finding her voice. So, she rules by compassion and observation.

Now, how does the rule of three apply in this instance? Let's first define what the "rule of three" is:

The rule of threes is a writing principle that suggests that three elements, such as events or characters, are more humorous, satisfying, and effective than other numbers. Audiences of texts in this format are also more likely to retain the information conveyed to them. This is because having three entities minimizes the amount of information needed to create the pattern, combining both brevity and rhythm.

By giving us different styles of ruling/approaches to power in threes, GRRM is making sure those ways stick with the readers. He's making it known that the approaches to power and ruling are important for the endgame: this factor will contribute to who ends up in power at the end of the story.

One could argue that the use of the rule of three in comparing Cersei, Dæny, and Sansa is rhetoric: he's comparing three different ruling styles, and we, as the readers, can decide who might be better suited for the title of Queen based on the rhetoric the characters present. (I speak about the difference between Dæny and Sansa - and Jon - as figures of authority here and here. Keep in mind that those metas explore the dynamics of the characters in the show.)

Cersei doesn't give a shit about anyone but herself and her family. She rules with an iron fist and doesn't hesitate to annihilate anyone threatening her power. She rules alone.

Dæny cares about people and uses her power (her dragons) to achieve some of her more altruistic goals, but at the end of the day, those goals are not entirely altruistic since they also serve her. She also uses that power to intimidate and cause fear. To top it all off, she relies heavily on the power that her dragons represent, even though she tries to use politics as a more subtle way to solve problems, but she realizes that if she wants to change the world as she wishes, she needs brute force. She needs her dragons. She uses both power and fear in any situation, whether it is good or bad. She, too, rules alone, even though she has people giving her counsel. (Though that can be explained with Targaryen exceptionalism, in a way. But that's a whole other thing, and this has gotten too long already)

Sansa, on the other hand, is more surgical in her approach. She sees the value in relationships and working together. She sees the value of people and the importance of day-to-day tasks. She relies on her powers of observation and what she's learned in court to solve problems. She rules by understanding: by understanding that she has to work together with people in areas she's lacking and by understanding the potential of each person around her. She rules by working together with those around her.

In conclusion, Cersei and Sansa have always been foils to each other, and that's been set from the get-go. You could say the same about Cersei and Dæny, too. But, as the series progresses, the lines dividing Cersei's style of ruling from Dæny's start to blur, leaving this triad somewhat like this:

#my asks #my thoughts #my meta #cersei lannister #anti daenerys #(i'm still afraid to use the dany tag sorry) #sansa stark #it's been 84 years since i wrote something resembling meta #so i hope this is coherent at least #asoiaf #asoiaf meta #got #got meta

[musical-chick-13]

I think people who pick one character from AsoIaF/GoT to be The Protagonist are missing the point, because pretty much all of the characters think THEY are The Protagonist™ and that’s ultimately what screws them over.

(I also want to preface this by saying that that’s the reason I find these characters so interesting, and that this is not meant to insult any of them. I LOVE this story, and this is one of the many reasons why.)

Cersei thinks she’s the Villain Protagonist™ of a gritty drama. Even if it doesn’t make sense for things to work out for her, she assumes they will, seeing everyone around her as faceless idiots serving her narrative. Anyone and everyone will betray her because that’s what always happens in stories like this, so she won’t give them a chance to ever get there. People will move the way she assumes they will; everyone is predictable and stupid and shallow and cowardly. And as such, no one possesses the necessary skills to take her down. If she’s more ruthless and ambitious and paranoid than everyone else, she’ll get what she wants. But that’s not how life actually works, so all she does is alienate those around her, even necessary allies. People aren’t always predictable, not all of them are compliant or subservient or easily-frightened or incompetent. And if you prioritize ruthlessness and distrust, the people who aren’t those things aren’t going to see any reason to keep you around or give you aid.

Jaime thinks he’s a Cynical Misunderstood Antihero. He doesn’t need to work on bettering himself or de-internalizing his violent impulses, because he’s not the problem, it’s society, it’s people’s incorrect assessment of him. Look, he made a friend in Brienne, that must mean he’s not all bad, right? He thinks this story ends in a Public Image Rehabilitation, but he still conflates love with violence, and he still has a fucked up relationship with consent, he’s arrogant to a fault, he still insults Brienne (and just about everyone else) when the opportunity presents itself, and he never bothers trying to change that. And it’s all of this that prevents him from every truly becoming a good person. He’s so mired in this idea of being misunderstood that he doesn’t make a concerted effort to prove that he actually is. People think he’s an oath-breaker, that he has too big of an ego, that he doesn’t care about the people he swore to protect, and he thinks that simply going, “Yeah, but they don’t have the whole picture” is enough in and of itself to prove them wrong because, in a lot of stories, it is. But all his behavior does is cement his reputation as these things.

Dany thinks she’s The Chosen One, which means whatever she does is automatically the right decision. People will accept her rule because it’s hers, she deserves it, it’s morally right. All of her enemies are blanketedly wrong on all accounts in all cases. Her goals supersede anyone else’s because those goals are the way to a Happy Ending, and she doesn’t consider that other people might not see it that way. Many people’s gripes with her stem from gross places like misogyny or wanting to continue keeping slaves, but she forgets to acknowledge that some people’s issues with her might actually be valid. And that The Chosen One is actually a terrifying idea to people outside that person’s immediate personal context. She has three sentient WMDs, essentially. And if she thinks that using them is always morally correct, that the fallout from doing so can’t possibly be a problem because she’s using them and it’s for a noble cause, you end up with what happened in Astapor; and you end up with Drogon killing a child in Mereen and, eventually, her demise at the end of the show.

Sansa starts out thinking she’s an Optimistic Child Hero in a fairytale. This leads to her being held captive at court (she trusted that the authority figures were benevolent), writing a letter to her family that almost comes back to bite her to a deadly degree once her sister finds out in the show (she thought she could solve everything herself via a peaceful resolution), and to her trusting a complete monster of a boy until it’s too late (she thought he was Prince Charming). She thinks that being the Soft, Beautiful Heroine means people will love her and everything will end nicely and neatly, but sometimes instead of “love”, people just take advantage of you. And sometimes their reaction to your beauty isn’t innocent appreciation-sometimes you end up with Littlefinger. (Or Tyrion or The Hound who...let’s just leave it at “they have their own issues,” especially book-wise.) This morphs into assuming that a fairytale-esque betrayal will befall her with every new person she meets. It’s why she defends Petyr after his murder of Lysa, and it’s why she doesn’t leave with Brienne; if she’s going to be betrayed anyway, she might as well at least stick with a villain she understands.

Ned thinks he’s the Noble Hero in a typical fantasy series. He doesn’t consider everyone else’s capacity for cruelty or the idea that honor alone might not be enough. Sometimes there are no perfect choices, sometimes mercy does not give you the end goal you envisioned, and sometimes you can try your best and that can all be undone by one impulsive, unforeseeable action. You can’t honor your way out of ruthless political conflict.

Robb thinks he’s a Romantic War Hero, and thus everything will magically work out for him. His ideals and his marriage will conquer everything. But he broke a marriage promise to a powerful family, and that has consequences. The world won’t bend to his will, not even if he is doing the right thing or has noble goals, not even if he’s had war success, not even if the people at home love him, not even if he’s in love (show) or doing the most honorable thing he can (books). He thinks that being the hero means he can make it through Westeros without having to play the game, and he gets murdered for it.

Theon thinks he’s an Underdog Outcast Hero. He’ll come up from behind with an unsuspecting War Victory, and that will earn him respect, the love of his family, and a legacy he can look back on with pride. And that mindset leads him to murder two children, to drive away any allies and good grace he had at Winterfell, and the reason that the War Victory he imagined was so unexpected is because it’s completely untenable. He gets more and more desperate and it’s increasingly harder and harder to hold onto the control he’s managed to obtain. He has reasons for wanting this that make sense, and he’s been dealt a pretty bad hand in life, and he thinks that’s and his determination to overcome his personal identity struggles is enough to not only justify his actions, but ensure that those actions will be successful. And then his plan blows up in his face, he assumes he’s been miraculously saved (probably still having something to do with seeing himself as The Unexpected Hero), and ends up at Ramsay’s mercy.

Arya thinks she’s a Badass Heroine in the making, a skilled swordslady and Rebellious Princess who’s destined for more than this stuffy life of politics and dresses and formalities. But rebelling isn’t always enough. It doesn’t help with the Mycah situation, and she still needs to rely on others’ help in getting out of the city after Ned is executed. When she does try to embrace the “fully self-sufficient sword lady” idea while with the Faceless Men in Braavos, she is told to functionally discard her identity completely. She does an unauthorized kill because she, not her assassin-persona-in-training, wants to (though the victim’s identity differs in books and show), which leads to her being temporarily blinded and prevented from going on assassination missions, and outright forced to beg for food in the show. In the show, after being reinstated as an apprentice, she is tasked with killing an innocent person, refuses (rebels), and realizes that this life is one she can’t handle. She goes home, and her heading straight for her sword is one of the things that almost completely ruins her relationship with Sansa. In the upcoming Winds of Winter release, her chapter excerpt has her prioritizing revenge over her apprentice duties, and she remarks that her new identity is ruined with this rebellious action. When you rebel, there are consequences-this doesn’t change just because your intentions are good or because you are or think you are important.

Jon thinks, similarly to Ned, that he’s The Good Guy, that doing the right thing, that following The Code is paramount. He thinks that, because he’s The Good Guy, that doing the right thing with the maximum amount of good for everyone will always be a workable option, and that the heroic option will always yield the best result. This is why he thinks proclaiming his love to Ygritte in the show will end well (because love is good and conquers everything) and is, instead, shot by her several times. It’s why he doesn’t foresee a mutiny in either medium, which leads to his (temporary) death. (Let’s be real, he’s getting resurrected in the books, too, this is the one thing I’m sure of.) Because yes, everything is tense and he’s on bad terms with the Watch, but surely they wouldn’t go that far. It’s rough going, and he has to juggle the needs of several widely different groups of people, but he’s doing the right thing and that will win out; his conviction will protect him, at least for the time being while he tries to manage the bigger threat of the White Walkers. The real fight is with them, the mysterious overarching enemy, not within his own ranks. This is a story where everyone puts aside their differences to fight a greater threat-except for the times when it isn’t.

Even Catelyn isn’t immune, as she assumes that Petyr, since he’s her childhood friend, is invested in solving the mystery of what happened to Bran when he tells her the dagger used in the attack was Tyrion’s. Lysa is her sister, she can’t possibly be suspicious. She thinks the Lannisters are evil, her instincts tell her that they were behind everything, she’s the Protective Mother Heroine, so she must be right. But although she is to a certain extent correct, that’s not the complete picture. And this slightly-misplaced confidence leads her to arrest Tyrion, the retaliation of which is Tywin siccing his forces on her homeland, one of the major first steps in the upcoming political war. Then, her continued focus on saving her children-something that must take precedence because they are her children, and this is her story-leads her to taking Walder Frey’s supposed offer of a fix-it solution for Robb breaking his marital pledge at face value, despite House Frey’s reputation, and despite this neat resolution seeming far too good to be true. She’s so focused on the Lannisters-the Obvious Endgame Enemy-that she doesn’t consider the possibility of betrayal from the Freys. She thinks that the world is giving her a break-because she is so desperately looking for one, because she deserves one, because her family deserves one, and those are reasons enough for her to have one-that she doesn’t even bother to re-evaluate the situation until it’s too late.

Melisandre thinks she’s a Religious Hero, but she ends up burning a child alive and alienating one of her few remaining allies in the process (and Davos was barely an ally to begin with). She thinks she’s Doing What Needs To Be Done to serve her savior, but it hurts Stannis more than it helps him, and he just ends up being murdered by Brienne. This is obviously in the show only (at least at this point), and I don’t know if Stannis is going to burn Shireen in the books or not. Stannis thinks he’s the Lawful Hero, and thus, because according to law he’s the Rightful Ruler, anything he does is automatically excusable; he’s just righting a wrong. And in the process, he imprisons his closest friend, has a hand in murdering his brother (when kinslaying is one of the most universally hated breaches of conduct in this fictional universe), allies with a dangerous woman that much of his own court despises, and, in the show, murders his only child and drives away most of the rest of his remaining team.

They all think that, since they are the main characters of their own stories, that they’re the main character of the larger, overarching narrative. That having understandable reasons or sympathetic qualities or even just having a clear goal that they desperately want, that’s enough to cement their importance. And they think that means that they’re justified in everything they do, that everything will work out for them, that the consequences will be lesser for them than for others, because that’s what it’s like to be the main character. The whole point is that there is not A Protagonist™ and that maybe we should examine why a story needs A Protagonist™ in the first place and what that narrative tradition tells us. When GRRM said he turned down adaptation offers because they only wanted to focus on Jon and Dany, this is why.

#asoiaf #got #asoiaf meta #got meta #most of this is directly related to everyone deconstructing the archetypes they would represent in other stories #so I'm not sure how much of this is just 'deconstructing tropes' and how much of it is 'Main Character Perception Syndrome' #also obviously this isn't every character I ran out of room and honestly some of them like davos and brienne and maybe even loras #probably don't think they're The Main Character which there's a whole other essay in there about how they're The Good People #I personally think Bran never gave off 'I think I'm the main character' energy but I know haters will disagree with me on that #like...Idk his sense of self-worth kind of went away and he spent a bunch of time trying to get it back and figure out how to get by #in a society that now thought he was worthless. and how to get enjoyment out of life when his goals were no longer reachable #it read less as 'I think I'm more Important™' and more 'I'm just trying to survive man' but also I love bran I might be a little biased lmao #cersei lannister #jaime lannister #dark!dany #sansa stark #arya stark #theon greyjoy #jon snow #catelyn stark #robb stark #ned stark #melisandre #stannis baratheon #I take my life into my own hands by putting actual names in the tags but I talk about these characters and I don't know how else to tag #this to ensure people who don't want to see it won't have to see it #also for anyone wondering where tyrion is on this list: I was too tired to delve into this phenomenon regarding him because it is ESPECIALLY #prominent regarding him. and this post was already so long and talking about tyrion in this context probably would've made it TWICE as long #there genuinely isn't enough space in here to include him but know that I'm counting him too. most definitely #behold! a creation!

[rainhadaenerys]

So apparently they made Rhaenyra say "dracarys" to her dragon. It's the first episode of the show and they're already disrespecting Dany. To make things more clear, this is the origin of the command "dracarys":

"I was not sleeping, ser. Come and watch." She took a chunk of salt pork out of the bowl in her lap and held it up for her dragons to see. All three of them eyed it hungrily. Rhaegal spread green wings and stirred the air, and Viserion's neck swayed back and forth like a long pale snake's as he followed the movement of her hand. "Drogon," Dany said softly, "dracarys." And she tossed the pork in the air.

Drogon moved quicker than a striking cobra. Flame roared from his mouth, orange and scarlet and black, searing the meat before it began to fall. As his sharp black teeth snapped shut around it, Rhaegal's head darted close, as if to steal the prize from his brother's jaws, but Drogon swallowed and screamed, and the smaller green dragon could only hiss in frustration.

"Stop that, Rhaegal," Dany said in annoyance, giving his head a swat. "You had the last one. I'll have no greedy dragons." She smiled at Ser Jorah. "I won't need to char their meat over a brazier any longer."

"So I see. Dracarys?"

All three dragons turned their heads at the sound of that word, and Viserion let loose with a blast of pale gold flame that made Ser Jorah take a hasty step backward. Dany giggled. "Be careful with that word, ser, or they're like to singe your beard off. It means 'dragonfire' in High Valyrian. I wanted to choose a command that no one was like to utter by chance." - Daenerys I ASOS

Dracarys is not a word that every Targaryen used to command their dragons. It was a word specifically chosen by Daenerys to train her dragons, because it's not a word that it's likely to be said by people in their daily lives (people only really speak bastard Valyrian in their daily lives, not High Valyrian), so her dragons won't be breathing fire every time a stranger says something. It's also not some magic word that makes dragons in general breathe fire: Dany has to train the dragons herself to make them respond to the word. So it's a word that shows Dany's intelligence and resourcefulness when training her dragons, it's something that she came up with herself, despite the fact that she had no knowledge of how to train a dragon, it's not something anyone has taught her.

No other Targaryen has used dracarys. It's a word that Daenerys herself chose, it's a way to train dragons that Dany came up with. Making Rhaenyra say it cheapens it, both because it takes away the fact that using dracarys was something Dany came up with, and also because it makes it look like dracarys is just some magic word that makes dragons breathe fire, which takes away from the hard work that Dany must have had to train her dragons to respond and breath fire when they heard the word.

#daenerys targaryen #asoiaf meta #got meta #books vs show #my meta #anti got #anti hotd #this show barely started and i already have things to complain ugh

[hamliet]

Daenerys Targaryen: The Romantic Hero

In which I dissect more thoughts on ASOIAF brought on by House of the Dragon and my reread of Fire & Blood, and in which I make the argument that, despite the flaws of HotD as a show and F&B as a novel, its pure existence backs up this main idea:

Daenerys Targaryen is not and will never be a villain. She's a goddamn romantic hero with a bittersweet--not tragic--ending. In the books. If we ever get the books.

Jon and Tyrion are also Romantic heroes, by the way.

Okay, sure, that's not exactly a new take. But what exactly do these terms mean?

Literary Tropes and Archetypes

Obviously, when you're talking about something as subjective as literature (subjective in the sense that we all bring our outside baggage, experiences, and assumptions to our reading experience), you're going to get some variation on what terms mean. That's even without considering inherent linguistic shifts.

However, there are general consensuses of what these terms mean. I'm going off the general consensus.

So going forward, before I delve into analysis, let's look at the terms and how they are generally understood, and indeed understood in this meta.

Nihilism and cynicism: Nihilism at its philosophical core is not necessarily hopeless (positive nihilism does exist). However, the colloquial use of "nihilism" does mean hopeless and bleak, and even positive nihilism asserts that nothing exists with meaning, not even concepts like free will. What I'm working off here is the colloquial association of nihilism with grimdark cynicism. That's technically reductive for nihilism, so I'm going to use cynicism more for grimdark pessimism, but nihilism for the literal "nothing matters."

Tragedy: I wrote a long elaboration of what tragedy consists of for RWBY here. The basics apply to this meta, as well. Tragedy is usually not equivalent to nihilism, nor is it pessimistic. There are a million different variations, but the point is to stimulate grief and satisfaction (catharsis) in the audience.

Tragic Hero: Again, this differs depending on the type of tragedy you're writing. I'll just quote what I said in the RWBY piece:

Tragic heroes are great people. They are more than just their worst traits, and yet in the end we, the audience who have access to their complex legacy in ways most characters don’t, are left with the grief that comes with things ending in a sad way when they could have ended so triumphantly. 

In ASOIAF, I've argued before that Arianne and f!Aegon are classic tragic heroes, as is Stannis Baratheon.

Villain: An antagonistic character who, despite how sympathetic they may be, is always destined for destruction and for whom we don't see much other option. We're meant to root against them, unlike tragic heroes, in which we're meant to be torn at worst and rooting for in other sense.

The perfect example here is Cersei Lannister. We care about Cersei, we can see why she became the way she is, but there's no hope for her. A tragic hero can admittedly become a villain (see: RWBY's Ironwood), but their crossing the line completely depends on framing.

Antagonist: A character who opposes the goal of a protagonist. They may be villains, but they are also fairly likely not to be, especially in a morally gray world like ASOIAF. The role is easily slipped in and out of.

Romantic Hero: A Romantic hero is a societal outcast who... yeah I'm just gonna quote Northrop Frye, a literary critic:

[The Romantic Hero is] placed outside the structure of civilization and therefore represents the force of physical nature, amoral or ruthless, yet with a sense of power, and often leadership, that society has impoverished itself by rejecting.

This is very clearly Jon, Dany, and Tyrion, far more so than the other three obvious protagonists (Sansa, Arya, and Bran). A bastard, an exile, a dwarf. All three are leaders with moral different than the society's they're raised in and society is poorer for it. Jon is the most Ned Stark-like of his siblings, but has been rejected. Dany is anti-slavery. Tyrion is practical and actually good at ruling unlike pretty much everyone else in King's Landing.

Of course, their rejection has all three heading for straight amoralism by the end of ADWD. Jon's already taken an infant from his mother, and the baby's probably going to die as a result. Plus, he is not gonna come back from the dead caring about duty anymore. Dany's embracing "fire and blood." Tyrion's full-on plotting savage revenge. When Dany lands on Westeros in The Winds of Winter, she's going to be a literal force of nature (fire).

Romanticism: Romantic doesn't mean romance as in kiss kiss fall in love. I mean, it often does involve that, but when I say romanticism I'm referring to the literary movement. Romanticism focuses on the internal even more so than the external, on the individual development of a character. It focuses on free will, on beauty, which in some ways does indeed make it opposite to nihilism at its most technical. It suggests there is meaning to be found in our experiences and in the world beyond us, too.

A Song of Ice and Fire is a Romantic work. That's not debatable. Why? Well, George RR Martin has said it. Twice. At least.

The human heart against itself is Romanticism at its core.

Also, Martin himself has insisted he is not a nihilist:

My worldview is anything but nihilistic. I was always intensely Romantic, even when I was too young to understand what that meant. But Romanticism has its dark side, as any Romantic soon discovers… which is where the melancholy comes in, I suppose.

I mean, that's explicit. There you go. Thanks George. Fight yourself and finish the books, I beg of you. The events in his story matter, therefore.

Deconstruction: This gets tricky because general consensus does actually differ more so than the other terms (besides maybe nihilism). It's literally defined as:

a philosophical or critical method which asserts that meanings, metaphysical constructs, and hierarchical oppositions (as between key terms in a philosophical or literary work) are always rendered unstable by their dependence on ultimately arbitrary signifiers

Deconstruction can mean the complete and utter decimation of a literary trope to show why what's good is bad and what's bad is good, actually.

Or, it can mean the dismantling of tropes to get to what the core of the trope is, and decide whether or not that trope is worth affirming. As in, maybe as we unravel the various parts of a trope or genre, we uncover a stable foundation.

Hunter x Hunter is a great example of this for shonen manga, as is Attack on Titan. Both ultimately affirm the main cores of friendship and love in shonen, but they do that through taking different angles to look at common tropes. For example, Gon's self-reliance is actually a trauma response that we're supposed to be horrified by as it destroys our plucky protagonist, and Eren becomes a villain protagonist but his core motives never change. He's always wanted to kill the enemy, every last one, from chapter one.

Tragic Heroes and House of the Dragon

House of the Dragon has some interesting ideas, albeit its taking a very flawed approach to them (dare I say, a reactionary approach in which they're leaning too hard in the other direction from what GoT did and whitewashing their female characters... which makes them seem less human, not more so).

Still, despite its flaws, HOTD is carrying the tragic arc that Dany-villain theorists argue she'll have. Rhaenyra and Alicent both go mad, even if not in terms of mental illness, and Rhaenyra is determined to rule whatever the cost. Innocents pay the price. However, I see issues with this argument.

Repeating this arc with Daenerys in the main saga then is cynical and nihilistic, because it renders the entire existence of Fire & Blood pointless.

So then, why did Martin write Fire & Blood? Besides procrastinating on The Winds of Winter, anyways? Regardless of his intent, Rhaenyra's story is Daenerys's if she becomes a tragic hero (arguably a villain, but with a well-written fall from grace that makes her more tragic), give or take a century. Why tell the same story twice, the past story instead of the future?

Yeah, parallels are a thing in literature. I've even talked about how Daenerys does parallel Rhaenyra, and that's intentional. So does Stannis, so does Arianne, so does Cersei. But parallels are not 1=1 copies, or that becomes repetitive writing.

Unless Martin is trying to reinforce that nothing changes and nothing ever will (thanks, D&D, for your discussion of brothels as a priority in the very last five minutes of season 8!), so it doesn't even matter to try, there's got to be a reason for the parallel that isn't just lazy writing. Don't get me wrong, lazy writing exists even for the best of writers, but then why would you write Fire & Blood as a full story and go on to produce a story about it unless you're a cynical nihilist who truly, truly, truly hates women and thinks they can never, ever rule?

Female Leaders Bad: Misogyny in Fire and Blood

Yes, admittedly George RR Martin has issues with how he writes women. There's some subtle sexism in his works. No doubt.

That said, he also seems largely aware of other aspects of misogyny in society, and particularly of societal misogyny driving tragedy. If he hadn't written Cersei's chapters in A Feast for Crows, we might have a different story, but he did write those. Cersei's a villain, but she's so undeniably human and complex in her chapters that we can't help but see her as a person and appreciate her, even if we still want her stopped.

What makes Cersei sympathetic is precisely that misogyny. We see how her father's expectations of Jaime and even Tyrion differ from his of her. She was sold off to the highest bidder, in essence, and subjected to Robert's humiliating and public affairs, marital r*pe, and abuse. Is it any wonder she sought comfort where she could find it? Any other man would have been caught and Cersei executed for betraying the king who's doing the same thing and in public, but her twin brother has plausible deniability for being close to her.

As much as Cersei's actions are "ew" at best, we feel for her. During her walk of shame, we're outraged on her behalf even if we know she's going to plot a revenge that will destroy innocents, and indeed that her ending up having to take that walk is a result of her scheming against an innocent sixteen year old girl (Margaery Tyrell).

Fire & Blood only expounds on the concept of misogyny ruining lives and the realm. Rhaena. Aerea. Rhaenys. Laena. All passed over for the throne on account of their sex, and noted to be upset by it.

In fact, Alysanne, one of the few queens who does maintain equal power with her husband, has her attempts to educate women and protect her daughters from being married off too young (and then dying in childbirth) thwarted, and this thwarting is framed as wrong. Throughout Alysanne and Jaeherys' reign, the question of letting females rule as queens is a major point of contention between Alysanne and Jaeherys. The treatment of female rulers as "lesser" is honestly one of the longest-running motifs in this story, and it's never once held up as positive or justified.

Of course, the most clear "misogyny bad" characters are Rhaenyra and Alicent.

Alicent does everything the realm asks of a woman of good breeding, and she expects a reward for it: power and her legacy of her children sitting on the throne. Her legacy is literally only to arrange the power for the men in her life: her father, her husband, her sons.

And then you have Rhaenyra. She lives like a modern woman. She sleeps with whom she wants when she wants, and upon being forced into marriage with a gay man, lets him pursue men. She has a relationship in the books that is romantic/sexual with Laena as well as with Daemon. In other words, Rhaenyra has a consensual open marriage with poly elements. Laenor loves her sons as his; in fact, they are his, even if not in blood. Very modern indeed.

But society doesn't see it that way. Society, traditional, homophobic, and misogynistic, says Laenor's sons are bastards despite his loving and raising them. It says Rhaenyra pursuing her sexuality far less openly than certain past kings who sat on the Iron Throne makes her unfit. And the tragedy is that it does, but it shouldn't be this way. It's not her actions but her ignorance about how her actions will be perceived, her hubris in assuming she is exempt from society's strict rules for women.

One of the TV show's better decisions was to intercut Rhaenyra and Daemon's first almost-sex scene with Alicent and Viserys. Rhaenyra's pursuing what she wants. It's consensual. They're both into it, aware, and Daemon doesn't have power over her--in fact, that's the point. In Viserys and Alicent's scene, where they're married, Alicent so does not want to be there. Intercutting Daemon and Rhaenyra's passion with Alicent's misery reminds the audience that Rhaenyra doing this is not going to end well.

It's not fair. It's not right. It's tragic.

Tragic Heroes and Fantasy Deconstruction

Okay, so now we're going to discuss fantasy tropes.

Let's start by addressing Martin's statements on fantasy and tropes. A lot of ASOIAF's tropes pull at least in part from exactly what most modern fantasies draw from: The Lord of the Rings, the same work Martin has said he wants to pull apart and explore what its ideals mean.

Ruling is hard. This was maybe my answer to Tolkien, whom, as much as I admire him, I do quibble with. Lord of the Rings had a very medieval philosophy: that if the king was a good man, the land would prosper. We look at real history and it’s not that simple. Tolkien can say that Aragorn became king and reigned for a hundred years, and he was wise and good. But Tolkien doesn’t ask the question: What was Aragorn’s tax policy? Did he maintain a standing army? What did he do in times of flood and famine? And what about all these orcs? By the end of the war, Sauron is gone but all of the orcs aren’t gone – they’re in the mountains. Did Aragorn pursue a policy of systematic genocide and kill them? Even the little baby orcs, in their little orc cradles?

I think this quote gets grotesquely taken out of context, honestly. I really don't think this is Martin saying that he literally wants to explore tax policies or only what happens after someone becomes king. Instead, he's speaking of how he wants the reader to look between the lines, look at how a good person can be a terrible leader precisely because of the goodness (Robb Stark) while a more morally dark person can be a great leader (Tyrion). Martin's saying that his works are messy and ask the questions, not that he literally wants to destroy everything Tolkien upholds because he thinks it's bullshit or because he thinks good people can't be good rulers without going insane.

In other words, he wants to deconstruct it and examine what makes someone a good or a bad ruler, what makes someone a good or a bad fantasy hero. Which he then literally said:

The battle between good and evil is a legitimate theme for a fantasy (or for any work of fiction, for that matter), but in real life that battle is fought chiefly in the individual human heart. Too many contemporary fantasies take the easy way out by externalizing the struggle, so the heroic protagonists need only smite the evil minions of the dark power to win the day. And you can tell the evil minions, because they're inevitably ugly and they all wear black. I wanted to stand much of that on its head. In real life, the hardest aspect of the battle between good and evil is determining which is which.

Okay, yay. Now that's done. Let's look at some actual tropes.

What is Aragorn's? He's the long lost heir coming to claim their throne after their heroic mission. This is the most classic fantasy arc.

It's the same archetype both Daenerys and Aegon are based on.

I talked about this at length here, but in short: Aegon is the stereotype of this trope. But it's deconstructed. How?

Because while Aegon truly believes he's a long-lost prince come to claim his birthright, he's wrong. Being wrong doesn't make him a bad person. It doesn't make him a villain. It just makes him wrong.

This is a far more interesting and thematically rich development than Daenerys finding out she's not the real trope and getting mad about it. She's the one with dragons and she wasn't alone for years (Viserys).

Aegon embodies another trope, too: that of the long-lost secret prince/princess/hero who grew up not knowing that they were special. Think Harry Potter. Also think about Jon Snow, who is Rhaegar's actual son.

But rather than Jon Snow's heritage mattering to him because of a claim to the throne, Jon's heritage will likely matter far more for his internal self-perception. Romanticism, baby. That's what it's all about.

And then you have Arianne.

Arianne is the princess who wants to rule/fight and is righteously angry at sexism. This is another common fantasy trope (see, Eowyn). Daenerys is also this. However, Arianne finds out she's a pawn. Not so for Dany, who has to struggle and face abuse and numerous betrayals. This isn't to say Arianne doesn't struggle and that her pain isn't valid because it is, but Arianne is the more typical embodiment of these tropes. Daenerys is them pulled apart and looked at from new angles. Dany wants to be a savior when she rules, to set people free, not just because of her birthright (though that's a part of it for sure!) but because she knows what it's like to be bought and sold. Arianne wants to rule because of her birthright. Arianne's motives are far less internally explored; she just doesn't want to bow. Which is valid! But not quite up to Romantic standards.

Lastly, Arianne and Jon both have daddy issues, and I'm not talking about Rhaegar for Jon. Ned's his dad even if not in blood. The "my father's not whom I thought he was!" trope is present in both of them: literally for Jon, and for Arianne, in terms of Doran actually planning for a Targaryen restoration.

But again, Arianne's trope points outwards more than it does inward. Her goal is still simply to rule as queen. Aegon's is to restore the Targaryen dynasty. These are pretty typical goals for characters in fantasies. They're external.

Jon's goal, however, is to save people from the Others, the undead. Daenerys's goal is to save people from slavery. See how there's a difference?

Plus, there's development towards both of Jon and Dany having to take long, hard looks inward in order to accomplish these goals. Now Jon's dead, temporarily. I'm pretty sure that's gonna give him a complex even though he won't be an Other when he's resurrected. Pretty likely she's going to end up killing a lot of people at King's Landing, even if she doesn't intend it to have as far-reaching of consequences as it does, to get her to consider who she is and who she wants to be.

The tragic irony of focusing on restoration and rule without considering what that means is that Arianne and Aegon are likely to go up in flames. Martin's not saying that these tropes are bad, but he is saying that they're shallow (the tropes not the characters) and don't fully capture the human heart against itself struggle. He's not wrong, either.

Hence, you already have characters whose desires to restore Targaryen rule and to be queen of the Seven Kingdoms gets them killed, even if they are good people who do not deserve what happens to them. Why repeat this with Daenerys? That doesn't offer us much of anything in terms of literary parallels.

But, if we want to talk about literary parallels, let's turn again to Fire & Blood, where there's another Princess Daenerys born to Jaeherys and Alysanne. She's described as a loving, kind child who adores her siblings, her parents, animals, and more. She dies of the Shivers, a disease that manifests through symptoms of cold that kill you. Gee, I wonder what that's foreshadowing. It's not like Dany's facing off with an army of the living embodiment of Cold and Ice... oh wait.

Dany's Tropes Deconstructed

It's also true that as the Chosen One, Daenerys fulfills many villain tropes too. She's leading an outside force to invade a kingdom. She's also the daughter of a mad King who terrorized the land years before, come back to seek what is hers with fire and blood. The assumption seems to be that because she has these tropes, she must be a villain.

Listen, Martin does not play tropes straight. Ever.

Think about Sansa, and how her arc is dismantling her fairy tale simplistic ideas of what knights and chivalry and kings are like. However, Sansa maintains compassion at the core of her character in the books. She still loves. Martin's not saying that chivalry and believe in love are stupid little girl ideas. He's critiquing simplistic ideas, while showing that someone can maintain her compassion while being a shrewd politician. Through Sansa, we have cynical knights like Sandor learning how to become the courageous knights of old. That's idealistic more than anything else.

Why would Dany's supposed villain tropes be played straight? What if... the invading force is actually the saving force? I mean, I do think that Daenerys will do Bad Things in Westeros with her dragons and invading forces. But does that make her a villain?

"Everyone is the hero of their own story!" Well, sure. Yes. Very true. Martin even said this. That's not a novel idea, nor is it a terribly interesting deconstruction by itself. "Our hero is actually a villain" already exists in the series, because Martin has zero problem narrating through villains (see, Cersei).

What if that question is precisely what we're supposed to be asking: what makes a hero from a villain? What if the keyword from "everyone is their own hero" isn't the word that's never mentioned--villain--and instead "hero?" As in, the question is how someone can become a hero regardless of perception, rather than how readers' perceptions are actually warped?

In other words, the onus might be on the character's journey, not the reader's perception.

Bittersweet Romanticism

Dany's motives have always been wanting to free people. That's a far cry from Arianne's desire to be queen and an even farer cry from Eren Jaeger's "I want to kill all the enemies." In Daenerys's first chapter, she thinks about how she wants to be home and safe, and how she wants to please people.

Dany giving her all to save the world after burning the people she wanted to help, and doing it knowing that she won't be remembered well except by those who loved her and she'll be thought of as a villain--what could be more heroic in the scheme of the world? To know you will gain absolutely nothing from saving the world, and to do it anyways?

Of course, people in King's Landing who think her a villain for their losses aren't going to be entirely wrong, either. It depends on perspective, indeed.

Still, this gets to the heart of what it means to be a hero in principle, and what makes a hero heroic. It's beautiful, haunting, and cathartic. It doesn't taunt the reader with what they didn't realize, but instead satisfies with Dany achieving her goals: to create a safe-ish world to live in, a world with freedom and possibilities.

Even if she won't be a hero in the eyes of history, she will be in her core, in her heart of hearts. The individual focus, the heart against itself--readers will be privileged to know her story of heroism, even if her world doesn't.

That's Romantic to a T. That sounds like Martin to me. And, it sounds peak "bittersweet," the word Martin used to describe the broad strokes of his planned ending.

There's an additional beautiful aspect here, in that Dany would comment on her ancestor's legacy. Let's not forget that Valyria was a slave society founded upon mass human sacrifice. Daenerys as a liberator who destroys not just slavery, but who leaves room for progress away from feudalism and who saves the world from the Others whose primary value is seeking to destroy human life and turning everyone into a mass army of corpses (sounds like extreme slavery to me)... that means she destroys her family's legacy in all the right ways.

It should burn. But Dany won't be Mirra Maz Duur tied to a pyre for the Starks to ignite like in the show. She'll be doing what she did at the beginning: lighting the pyre. Her beloved won't be lying in the flames to be consumed, but instead supporting her. And this time what emerges from death will be not dragons, but human life.

#daenerys targaryen #jon snow #tyrion lannister #jonerys #rhaenyra targaryen #alicent hightower #daemon targaryen #arianne martell #f!aegon #young griff #aegon vi targaryen #eren jaeger #gon freecs #asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #asoiaf meta #got meta #anti-got #romanticism #asoiaf theory #valyria #cersei lannister #deconstruction

[what-do-1000-swords-look-like]

The Iron Islands Was Never Getting Independence - 6x09 & 8x02 Parallels

So I was rewatching GoT for reasons and I came across this 6x09 scene (love that episode!!!) and I already kind of knew that they were setting up Jon's, Dany's, and Sansa's endgame in this episode, setting them up for their final chapter, but now rewatching it, it blows me away just how obvious it was how things were going to pan out in the end. That Dany would be the final boss. That it was going to revolve around her, Jon, and Sansa. All that.

This scene is one of those obvious instances.

Theon and Yara have always been mirrors for Jon and Sansa since Theon and Yara reunited after Ramsay. For their sibling relationship as well as the power pair they present and represent for their home/family/kingom. In this 6x09 scene, it's no different.

A lot of people have made the point that Dany granted the Iron Islands their independence because Yara/Theon asked while she didn't grant the North to Sansa/Jon because Sansa demanded. They couldn't be more wrong. It's all right here in the dialogue:

Dany: "You've brought us a hundred ships from the Iron Fleet with men to sail them. In return I expect you'll want me to support your claim to the throne of the Iron Islands?" - here nothing about independence is brought up yet but here it makes the dynamic clear: they would need Dany's support for the claim to the Salt Throne, meaning 1) that "kingship" is less than the king/queen of the 7K and it's only allowed to continue for a certain individual if the ruler of the 7K allows it, and 2) she is not coming from a mindset of granting them independence or acquiescing to their request

Theon: "Not my claim. Hers."

Dany: "Oh, what's wrong with you?" - for a woman who wants to rule the 7K in a place she has been told that no other Queen has ruled in (this is right before Cersei takes the IT), it's odd that instead of asking "why is that?" or "oh? interesting" or even being happy about another woman in a ruling position that's granted less than hers, it's an odd question to ask what's wrong with Theon -- I think the writers did this purposely to show a subtle difference between Dany's rhetoric that she consistently sells and how she actually is while also implying she intends to be the only Queen in the 7K, right down to the sub-monarchies (if that's a word)

Theon: "I'm not fit to rule."

Tyrion: "We can agree upon that at least."

Dany: "Has the Iron Islands ever had a queen before?" - oh, suddenly she's interested to hear this fact, why? because it now helps turn up the flames of hope for her destiny so to speak

Yara: "No more than Westeros."

Theon: "Our uncle Euron returned home after a long absence. He murdered our father and took the Salt Throne from Yara. He would've murdered us if we stayed." - what's interesting here is not only are Euron and Dany paralleled this season but also Theon/Yara are the antithesis of Viserys/Dany considering that's what happened to them, the latter two's father was killed in the rebellion/the IT being taken and they would have been killed had they not fled; but it also proves again that Theon/Yara are Jon/Sansa mirrors because Ned was murdered, the North was taken from Bran (aka the future rightful king after the vote in 8x06) by Theon and then it was taken by Ramsay, Bran & Rickon had to flee and then Sansa and Theon had to flee Ramsay

Dany: "Lord Tyrion tells me your father was a terrible king."

Yara: "You and I have that in common." - it's true, they do, but I'm also highlighting this line because it comes back around in 8x02

Dany: "We do. And both murdered by a usurper as well. Will their ships be enough?" - Dany immediately switches gears here - she sees the commonality they have, something she always uses when spreading her rhetoric to gain allies and subjects followers, but switches to "hey, do we have enough or no?" Meaning depending on the answer is what depends on her agreeing to ally with Theon and Yara

Tyrion: "With the former Masters' fleet, possibly. Barely. There are more than a hundred ships in the Iron Fleet." - if this line doesn't have Davos' line from 7x02 "If they break through the wall, do we have enough men to fight them?" & Jon bringing Dany and her dragons North to fight the Night King vibes all over it...

Theon: "There are. And Euron is building more. He's going to offer them to you."

Dany: "So why shouldn't I wait for him?" - this is exactly the same type of attitude we see displayed in 7x03-7x06; after everything she's just heard about Euron so far, no hesitation, "if he's got more ships why shouldn't I wait for him?"; a lot of people defend Dany's reluctance to help the North because of Jon's outrageous claims of the dead walking, she doesn't know who he is right away, and he should bow to her because the North is rightfully hers - but this line right here, it shows she only has one goal in mind and it's not to come to save people from a tyrant or to instill the rightful ruler back on the IT so she can leave the world better than she found it for her people - this is before the reception she gets in Westeros and then the North - it's RIGHT HERE

Theon: "The Iron Fleet isn't all he's bringing. He also wants to give you--"

Yara: "His big cock I think he said. Euron's offer is also an offer of marriage, you see. You won't get one without the other." - we see in 6x10 that Dany is more than well aware that she most likely will have to marry to secure an alliance over in Westeros, the when being the only question besides who - she knew this from what happened in Mereen and how she was going to have to marry to keep the peace before all hell broke loose, she knows this

Dany: "And I imagine your offer is free of any marriage demands?" - so now she's considering their offer, while she says this almost teasingly to Yara, we know that she knows she has to marry at some point and if she can secure the whole Iron Fleet, why wouldn't she? Especially since her single-minded focus is the IT? Because she doesn't want to marry aka she doesn't want to share power (something we see in season 8 after Jon tells her who he really is and how hard she works to keep him in that subservient dynamic by forbidding him from telling anyone) which is also how you can tell that throne room scene dialogue in 8x06 was rewritten in the 11th hour at Emilia's request (something she has gone on record admitting to), it was meant to be Dance of the Dragons 2.0 and it was coming down to one of them prevailing over the other

Yara: "I never demand but I'm up for anything really."

Theon: "He murdered our father and would have murdered us. He'll murder you as soon as he has what he wants." - not only are we getting another Aerys/Viserys/Dany reminder here but now Dany has her justification for not entertaining Euron's would-be proposal and allying herself to Yara and Theon despite their lower number of ships (I don't blame her here, I'm just calling a spade a spade)

Tyrion: "The Seven Kingdoms."

Theon: "All of them."

Dany: "And you don't want the Seven Kingdoms?" - exactly what she has been worried about - she's never wanted to share them so she's making doubly sure

Theon: "Your ancestors defeated ours. They took the Iron Islands, we ask you to give them back." - as Dany will remind us and Jon in 7x03, Torrhen Stark bent the knee to Aegon Targaryen, the original conqueror she's been trying to be the second coming of - this not only has the North vibes due to that parallel but because it also links to 8x02

Dany: "And that's all?" - sounds like here it's simple for Dany, right? Wrong...

Yara: "We'd like you to help us murder an uncle or two who don't think a woman's fit to rule." - another line echoed in 8x02

Dany: "Reasonable." - about killing the uncle

Tyrion: "What if everyone starts demanding their independence?" - not only should Tyrion not be asking Dany this in the presence of Yara/Theon who have not been made allies officially yet, it's obvious they're having him point this out because it's going to lead to what happens in 8x02

Dany: "She's not demanding. She's asking. The others are free to ask as well." - 'which doesn't mean they'll get it' is the end of that sentence

Dany: "Our fathers were evil men. All of us here. They left the world worse than they found it. We're not going to do that. We're going to leave the world better than we found it." - more Dany rhetoric

Dany: "You will support my claim as Queen of the Seven Kingdoms and respect the integrity of the Seven Kingdoms." THIS IS HER ANSWER RIGHT HERE - no independence for you Iron Islands, you're still a sub-monarchy but part of my 7K so no you don't get them back

Dany: "No more reaving, roving, raiding, or raping." - she reaffirms that with these conditions (which I agree with her here but the point is she's making it clear what she expects aka no independence)

Yara: "That's our way of life." - you mean like Dany is about to uproot Westerosi life as we know it in 8x05 and want to continue to do?

Dany: "No more." - "We can't build the new world with men loyal to the one we have." - 8x06

Yara: "No more." - having no choice, Yara agrees because at this point the other Lannisters don't care who sits on the Salt Throne (since they still have Tommen at this point) as long as they get any ships they need so it won't matter if Theon and Yara get murdered while Euron takes over/rules the Iron Islands - Yara knows they're not getting independence which is exactly why this little nugget isn't mentioned in her speech in 8x06 before Arya tells her to shut up about killing Jon

*Yara lifts her arm to Dany, after some confusion, Dany embraces her arm and they shake on it* (aka Yara and Theon get to live another day and hopefully have some dragon power backing them and they have a new 7K Queen)

And then, 8x02:

Dany: "I thought you and I were on the verge of agreement before. About Ser Jaime."

Sansa: "Brienne has been loyal to me. Always. I trust her more than anyone."

Dany: "I wish I could have that kind of faith in my advisors."

Sansa: "Tyrion is a good man. He was never anything but decent towards me."

Dany: "I didn't ask him to be my Hand simply because he was good. I asked him to be my Hand because he was good and intelligent and ruthless when he had to be. He never should've trusted Cersei."

Sansa: "You never should've either."

Dany: "I thought he knew his sister."

Sansa: "Families are complicated." (and here come the parallels to the 6x09 conversation)

Dany: "Ours certainly have been."

Sansa: "A sad thing to have in common."

Dany: "We have other things in common. We've both known what it is to lead people who aren't inclined to accept a woman's rule. And we've both done a damn good job of it from what I can tell."

(I skipped the whole Jon part of the convo)

Sansa: "I should have thanked you, the moment you arrived. That was a mistake." *she leans forward*

Dany *leans forward and covers Sansa's hand with hers*: "I'm here because I love your brother. And I trust him. And I know he's true to his word."

(skipping more Jon stuff)

Sansa: "What happens afterwards? We defeat the dead, we destroy Cersei...what happens then?" - Sansa is mentioning the agreement being honored on both sides, both of their enemies defeated, meaning they've given her her terms at that point

Dany: "I take the Iron Throne." - there's that single-minded goal again and what she really plans (she does not intend for any kingdom to secede from her 7K)

Sansa: "What about the North? It was taken from us and we took it back and we said we'd never bow to anyone else again. What about the North?" - here Sansa asks but she also lays down the line on what hers and Jon's mindset is when it comes to the North (and it's made clear by Arya in 8x04 why Jon really bent the knee to Dany in 7x06) and while it's in reference to the Boltons, it was also Theon who took the North first, and of course Aegon back in the day forcing them to bend the knee - so more parallels and just the thing Dany doesn't want to hear

And sure enough:

*Dany doesn't answer but removes her hand* - answer enough which is cemented by Sansa's expression and her sitting back away from Dany when the Maester interrupts them

And the very next scene, they literally have Theon showing up to ask Sansa if he can fight for Winterfell in the Great War. But first:

Theon turns to face Dany as expected, sees Sansa, and then looks at Dany, bending the knee (aka no independence for you Iron Islands)

Theon: "My queen." (aka no independence for you Iron Islands)

Dany: "Your sister?" - basically her saying 'oh crap, did your sister die? I know she was taken captive but did your murderous big cock uncle kill her? Crap, where are my ships? Why am I dealing with you?'

Theon: "She only has a few ships and she couldn't sail them here. So she's sailing them to the Iron Islands instead to take them back in your name." (aka NO INDEPENDENCE FOR YOU, IRON ISLANDS)

Dany: "But why aren't you with her?" (aka my dude, why are you bothering me? Go get me my land back like your faithful sister)

And then Theon gives us the answer we're expecting when he turns to look at Sansa and then asks if he can fight for her home/family. And we know Sansa is grateful, happy, and speechless. We know Dany is shocked, dismayed, sad, and angry that she's not getting that same type of loyalty/love on this side of the Narrow Sea (8x04 convo with Jon).

So basically, anytime someone says "but Dany was going to give the Iron Islands independence, she agreed to it, Sansa was rude", etc, just point them to these two scenes. Back in 6x09 "Battle of the Bastards" (aptly named and not just for the battle or Jon vs Ramsay) where Jon's, Dany's, and Sansa's endgame are all being set up. 6x10 sets up Cersei's, Tyrion's, and even Jaime's (but that's another post).

#dark!dany #dark!dany meta #metaposts #gotposts #got #game of thrones #daenerys critical #dany critical #dark!daenerys #dark!danyposts #got meta #Youtube

[hellsbellschime]

Why Everyone Hates Sansa, & Why They're All Wrong

Despite the fact that A Song of Ice and Fire is a tale about creeps, weirdos, and literal mass murderers, somehow one of the most controversial and widely disliked characters in the entire series is Sansa Stark.

Sansa is undeniably not a flawless character, but her transgressions and unappealing traits pale in comparison to the vast majority of her compatriots in the world of Westeros. So, in a fictional world populated with some of the worst characters imaginable, how did a tweenage girl who spends most of her time languishing in captivity barely doing anything at all become such a reviled character? And more importantly, how did so many readers and viewers so dramatically misinterpret her character?

There are many reasons that Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire fans seem to dislike Sansa, but honestly, a great deal of the criticisms levied towards her character seem to be driven by massive misinterpretations of her characterization and choices. So what is it that people hate, and why are they totally wrong about it?

Sansa's A Bully

First off, one of the most common criticisms of Sansa Stark is simply that she's a mean girl. A great deal of fans seem to project whatever image they have of a classic tweenage Regina George bully onto her character, and the fact that she seems to fit so perfectly into the societal expectations that she was raised in is used as irrefutable proof that she must be a total nightmare. But this seems to fundamentally misunderstand Sansa as a character.

Although Game of Thrones did a pretty poor job of adapting this element of her characterization from the book to the screen, it's interesting that the A Song of Ice and Fire Fandom tends to see Sansa in much the same way, despite the fact that it seems to be a total misrepresentation of her personality.

Sure, Sansa conforms to the standards of Westerosi society when many of the other point of view characters do not, but it doesn't seem to be put on or an active choice on her part. The aspects of her personality that make her the so-called perfect lady do seem to be inherent, and her individual interests don't seem forced or faked. She is undeniably a product of her environment, but so is every other character in one way or another.

However, even beyond that, there is a pretty obvious facet to her characterization that should theoretically make her appeal to almost all of the readers of George RR Martin's epic fantasy story. And that is the fact that she is obsessed with fantasy stories.

Sansa is an interesting character in a meta-analytical sense because she feels like she is both a part of the story and an observer within the story. Because of the nature of her situation, she spends a lot of time hanging in the background and watching the action unfold. But her character is also fascinating in a meta sense because she is a character in a fantasy story who wishes that she was a character in a fantasy story. And therefore, it is incredibly ironic that a bunch of people reading a fantasy story and likely imagining themselves within that story find Sansa so viscerally unappealing, or that they presume that she is meant to be the mean popular girl of the story.

And therein lies one of the significant differences between those who seem to like Sansa and those who seem to hate her. The people who dislike her seem to imagine her the popular girl who bullied everyone in school, while the people who like her see her as essentially a relatable super fan. Everyone else might be a main character of the story, but she is the one who is a part of the story who wants to memorize every minute detail of every house and every sigil. She is literally the A Song of Ice and Fire fangirl within the world of ice and fire. Ergo, while she might not be the most powerful or magical or interesting character in the narrative, she is actually one of the most relatable, especially for anyone who considers themselves a fan of Game of Thrones or A Song of Ice and Fire.

Sansa's Stupid

Another one of the most interesting critiques of Sansa as a character is that she's unintelligent. It's not entirely shocking that readers and fans have come to the conclusion that she's not that clever, as quite a few characters literally call her stupid in the books, oftentimes straight to her face, and Sansa seems to internalize this insult and assumes that they must be correct. However, the reality of the situation seemingly couldn't be more different.

One thing that so many readers and watchers seem to lose track of in the story is simply who knows what and when. Given that the books are written from a multitude of points of view, the reader themselves constructs their own narrative and is privy to far more information than any one single character is. That typically means that the reader is confused or frustrated because characters aren't acting based on information that they literally do not know, and that seems to be especially true for Sansa.

People who dislike her drag her for a lot, but arguably the largest critique of Sansa when it comes to her lack of intelligence is the role that she played in Ned's death. While the notion that she even had much of an impact one way or another is a bit dubious, the fact of the matter is that she knew almost nothing about what was actually going on while it was happening and was therefore unaware of what kind of impact her actions might be having. Obviously all of the Lannisters were intentionally misleading her, and Ned specifically went out of his way to withhold vital information from Sansa about the danger that they were in. He largely pretended that everything was fine even at the point where it was becoming a literal life-or-death situation, and Sansa acted accordingly.

Strangely, a lot of fans seem to once again accuse Sansa of attempted murder when it comes to her cousin, Sweetrobin. Robert Arryn is a sickly child who seems to at the very least be calmed by sweetsleep, which is administered to him by a variety of people including Sansa. And while the danger of sweetsleep is directly mentioned within the narrative, the notion that Sansa would even know how much dangerous medicine is appropriate for a child or that she, a girl who has spent her entire life being socialized to know her place and occupy it, would question Littlefinger or an actual Maester about the legitimacy of his treatments, is absurd.

And unsurprisingly, this actually goes for a great deal of what Sansa experiences and what people seem to dislike her for throughout the story. She does play a role in some massive events, but in nearly every instance where she does something that yields a negative outcome, she didn't have any of the necessary information to actually make a good decision. And ignorance is not stupidity.

But even beyond that, one of the most interesting but frustrating aspects of Sansa as a character is that she is actually incredibly astute in many instances. She does have good instincts about who people are and when something is wrong, but the issue is that she actively tries to talk herself out of them. There are obvious situations where she very quickly recognizes that there is something off with someone else like Joffrey or Littlefinger, oftentimes she'll pick up on it before many other people sense that there's something wrong, but because her life circumstances are almost completely out of her control, she convinces herself that the scary people she meets aren't that scary until it's too late.

Interestingly, this is also incredibly revealing about the inherent biases that a lot of readers have against characters like Sansa, as Sansa's means of handling the uglier sides of life that she doesn't want to see is nearly identical to Ned. They both ignore really obvious problems that they know exist but that they don't want to acknowledge, and by the time the actually come around to dealing with it, it's already far too late.

However, the broader interpretation of Ned seems to be that he was an honorable man who was simply too good for the world that he lived in, while the literal child who makes the same mistakes that he does is seen as a malicious half-wit for those errors.

Sansa's Thirst For Power

A particularly fascinating criticism of Sansa as a character is that she's thirsty for power. It's primarily interesting because pretty much every character in A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones seeks out some kind of power, and yet Sansa seems to yield the most blowback for it, so it's worth asking why. There are likely some gendered and stereotype-driven elements that are making people react poorly to Sansa's behavior, i.e. many people in the broader fandom may dislike Sansa's desire for status or power specifically because she seems like the kind of person who shouldn't want power and should willingly and constantly defer to someone else.

But aside from those likely biased perceptions, what this notion of Sansa the greedy queen seems to fundamentally misunderstand is that Sansa is not actually seeking any power. She already has it. The vast majority of Sansa's storyline is driven by horrendous people who are using her as a tool to exploit her power. She's been betrothed to Joffrey, she's been forcibly wed to Tyrion, she's nearly been engaged to Willas Tyrell, she was allegedly going to marry Robin Arryn, and now Littlefinger is attempting to broker some kind of marriage pact with Harry Hardyng. Or, in Game of Thrones' even more horrifying twist, she was married off to Ramsay Bolton.

And even aside from that, in many smaller, more nuanced ways aside from marriage, literally everything that has happened to her from the start of the story has been about someone else using her value for their own gains, almost always at her expense.

But even if it can be manipulated by other people, her value is hers alone, and simply claiming the power that already belongs to her does not make her power hungry, it makes her a responsible leader.

Obviously the Sansa of the books hasn't even begun to step into her power as of yet, but it seems clear that her storyline is going in this direction, and Sansa's journey towards becoming Queen in the North in Game of Thrones is undeniably one of the most criticized and disliked aspects of her character arc. However, the negative perception of Sansa's behavior in this instance is absolutely absurd.

I mean, just consider what Sansa's options are in these situations. She's a hostage of the Lannisters, then of Littlefinger, then of the Boltons. Throughout the vast majority of her journey, the most villainous characters in the entire story are attempting to control her so they can use her for her power. If Sansa doesn't fight for her own claim and take her power back from those people, then she is ceding that control and influence to the evilest characters in the entire series. If she just let any person who wanted to abuse her power do it without resistance, she would not only be suffering horrendously herself, but the thousands of people affected by her status would suffer horrendously as well.

Objectively speaking, Sansa would be doing an enormous favor to every person that her claim has influence over by wresting control of it away from these horrifically cruel and exploitative people. But honestly, she doesn't even need that excuse. Again, it is her power that she's claiming, nothing more and nothing less. Even if the people that were abusing her weren't trying to abuse her claim as well, she would be equally as justified as anyone else who is attempting to take control of a claim that they were born with.

There is of course a great deal of criticism that can be levied against the governing system of Westeros as a whole, but if Sansa is the bad guy for staking a claim that she inherited and suffered a great deal for, then so is everyone else who is doing the exact same thing.

Sansa Is The New Littlefinger/Cersei/Insert Villain Here

Sansa has learned a great deal from pretty much every person she has been held hostage by, but it seems obvious that the two characters who are poised to have more impact on her than anyone are Cersei Lannister and Petyr Baelish. But the notion that Sansa is going to learn from them by becoming like them is absolutely ridiculous.

Again, despite many people's beliefs otherwise, Sansa is actually a quite intelligent person. And considering the fact that she actually still seems to retain a great deal of kindness and empathy after everything that she's gone through, it seems safe to assume that no one is going to be able to abuse her to the point of her becoming an outright villain anyway. But, even if Sansa was as inherently cruel or uncaring as people like Cersei and Baelish, she'd have to be an absolute idiot in order to follow in their footsteps.

As the saying goes, when you play the game of thrones, you win or you die. And after being treated horrendously by Cersei and Littlefinger, Sansa is likely going to play a key hand in their ultimate demises. So with that in mind, why would Sansa ever want to replace them?

Sansa has fully experienced what it's like to be in the disadvantaged position in these kinds of dynamics. She will ultimately come to know that no matter what happens, when people use manipulation and cruelty to get what they want, the people that they're using will always want to see them destroyed, and that they will likely have an opportunity to unravel them at some point or another.

Therefore, Sansa is clearly meant to learn from these characters more than anyone else, but she is largely meant to learn exactly what not to do when she's in a position of leadership. It's not even about her personal feelings, it is quite literally about what will or won't be effective in terms of maintaining a stable structure of power. And, if Sansa wants to be a leader and stay a leader, she will inevitably realize that maintaining control or gaining influence using the methods of Cersei and Littlefinger simply will not work. However, when Sansa's actual feelings are taken into account, it seems incredibly obvious that not only is she too smart to lead in this way, but that she also would never want to.

One particular common complaint about Sansa is her lack of empathy at the start of the story. But what makes her an incredibly compelling character is that, in contrast to almost every other significant player in A Song of Ice and Fire, the more terrible things happen to her, the nicer and more empathetic that she becomes. She grew up in an outragerously privileged life, but once she knows what it's like to be treated poorly, she goes out of her way to be even kinder to others, and in some instances like with Margaery Tyrell or Dontos Hollard, she even puts herself at great personal risk to prevent them from suffering. Essentially, she learns exactly the kind of lessons that she needs to in order to be the polar opposite of a Littlefinger or a Cersei.

And, while Cersei and Petyr have both attempted to ingratiate themselves with Sansa as some kind of deranged political tutor, Sansa has already directly rejected their darker, crueler instructions. As Cersei directly states to Sansa, "The only way to keep your people loyal is to make certain they fear you more than they do the enemy. "And as Sansa thinks to herself, "she had always heard that love was a surer route to the people's loyalty than fear. If I am ever a queen, I'll make them love me."

Clearly, George RR Martin isn't trying to conclude his story by telling the audience that people like Cersei and Littlefinger will always emerge victorious, so Sansa's job isn't to become the new version of these people, it's to outright rebuke their outlook on life and choose a better way.

Sansa's Traditionally Feminine

Traditional femininity occupies a very strange space in nearly every corner of media, and it is painfully common to see the classic girly girls in fiction to be at best disregarded, and at worst outright hated by the general audience. But George RR Martin has seemingly made Sansa into a kind of litmus test for these kinds of biases in his viewers and readers, and she is a test that most people seem to fail. What makes Sansa so interesting is that according to both in-canon story rules of Westerosi society, and in the external misogynistic world that we all exist in, Sansa shouldn't be who she is or be capable of accomplishing what she does. Nearly every female character in the story goes one of two ways.

Firstly, there are the women who embrace something more traditionally masculine in order to get by. The Arya's and Brienne's of the world have essentially abandoned or outright rejected the Westerosi woman ideal because it's something they can't adhere to. Then there are the Cersei's, the women who can embody many idealized aspects of Westerosi womanhood, but who weaponize their femininity and seemingly hate women in general. But Sansa is an outlier because she embraces her femininity, seems to have a deep appreciation for other women, and she doesn't change her behavior or outlook in a way where she can use her femininity in order to manipulate or exploit others. A girly girl is simply what she is and wants to be, and there isn't an ulterior motive behind it.

Frankly, characters that are shamelessly feminine tend to be more widely rejected and discounted by audiences regardless of their more nuanced characterization. Female characters are only supposed to be feminine if they're not strong or intelligent or talented enough to choose another path for themselves. But Sansa is exceptionally frustrating to many viewers and readers because, despite the fact that she is meant to be the weakest member of her societal structure, and despite the fact that everyone around her presumes that she is weak and stupid, she repeatedly outsmarts and outplays people who should in theory be much cleverer than she is, and she does so without ever abanoning or changing her traditional feminity.

Although it's beginning to change, this type of characterization was rare in fiction, and it understandably throws a lot of people off. But the notion that the only strong woman is a tough, aggressive, and hardened woman who has learned every lesson in the most difficult way is so ingrained in audience expectation that the writers for Game of Thrones quite literally transformed Sansa into the character archetype that she was expected to be rather than letting her retain her personality in spite of what she's gone through.

Sansa is interesting because, like every character that George RR Martin has ever created, she subverts expectations. But she tends to subvert those expectations in a way that can be very irritating for people who believe that Sansa should never be capable of outwitting characters like Tyrion or Littlefinger. And to put in bluntly, Sansa is also the kind of character who would traditionally be exploited sexually in incredibly brutal ways, so the fact that Sansa is constantly threatened with some form of untoward assault but manages to evade all out violation based on her wits and ability to persuade people alone doesn't fit the narrative that people believe should belong to someone like Sansa.

And again, this belief is so strong and so ingrained that Game of Thrones completely altered her trajectory specifically so she could become one of those feminine girls who is treated abhorrently and learns to be a supposed badass because of it, despite the fact that George RR Martin outright stated that this was not in his game plan, and despite the fact that it seems incredibly unlikely that he repeatedly had Sansa escape sexual encounters she didn't want to have just so that she could ultimately have most nightmarish character in the series force himself on her in the end.

So, it's not without irony that many of the general audience came around to Sansa in the later years of the series, although it is pretty depressing. In order for her to become a likable character in the eyes of many, she had to have her softness abused out of her and become a character entirely unlike her former self. As she repulsively said to the Hound towards the end of the series, if it weren't for all of the people who exploited her, she would have stayed a little bird all her life. And that isn't just a horrific take on what Sansa actually went through, it truly seems to be exactly what George RR Martin wasn't trying to say with her character.

Sansa Is Not A Fantasy Character

One element of Sansa's characterization that makes her unappealing to most but incredibly interesting within the context of the story is that essentially, she's not really a fantasy character. She certainly had the potential to be at the start, but because her entire trajectory seems to revolve around lonely captivity, she doesn't get to do anything that the typical fantasy character does, and she doesn't have many character traits that the traditional fantasy character would.

Sure, she's probably above average in terms of intelligence, and she is clearly stated to be an exceptional beauty, but in comparison to nearly every other major player in the story, she looks incredibly pedestrian. So in that sense, her lack of popularity actually is somewhat understandable and to be expected. In a world where dragons are being born and kids are becoming kings and commanders, reading the story of a girl who has to gray rock her way through life in order to avoid as much mistreatment as possible isn't quite as appealing. But that also completely misses the depth, complexity, and interest of Sansa as a character.

Although nearly everyone who enjoys fantasy likes to envision themselves as the strong warrior or the magical prince who is capable of anything and everything, Sansa is a dose of realism that both feels out of place in the story but is a necessary component of it.

Everyone wants to be the dragon queen or the warrior princess, but this is a story that is largely about traumatized children attempting to navigate a terrifying world. And although most people like to fantasize that they would fight their way to freedom and rebel against their captors were they in the same situation as Sansa, realistically, they almost certainly would and could not.

Therefore, Sansa's presence within the narrative is an uncomfortable reflection of reality that most readers don't want to acknowledge. It's much easier to castigate her as weak and ineffectual rather than recognizing that sometimes you simply do not have the option to fight back. It's not only possible, but probable that most people would be too weak or too disadvantaged to ever act out were they in the same situation as her, and the notion of being a captive whose best option is to simply endure whatever abuse her captors choose to heap on her is an awful one, but a very real one as well.

However, the rejection of Sansa's victimhood is a tragedy in its own right, as nearly every person who has been abused has intentionally been manipulated into a position where it was borderline impossible for them to escape. And she is truly one of the most inspirational characters in the sense that she suffers helplessly for a great deal of her character arc, but she doesn't let that change her into a bad person, and her future in Westeros shows that she can move beyond the bad things that have happened to her.

Sure, she's not inspiring in the sense that she can stick a knife in the gut of all those who wronged her, but she's inspiring in a much more grounded and aspirational way, because her ultimate revenge will be to break the cycle of violence that she was pulled into and to simply not become the kind of person who abused her. And although the reflexive rejection of her character is somewhat understandable because her experience likely hits way too close to home for a lot of people, her development is also incredibly heartwarming, as most members of the audience will see a greater reflection of themselves in a character who simply experiences the cycle of abuse and then chooses to break it rather than becoming some mystical badass to wreak vengeance on all that have wronged her.

Sansa Exposes Fan Faves

It should actually come as no surprise that Sansa is one of the most widely disliked characters in both the Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire audiences, but that is not necessarily because she's an unlikable character.

Sansa is a fascinating element of the story at large, because her character has a tendency of exposing the unappealing underbellies of a lot of fan favorite characters. She comes into conflict with or is on the opposing side of many situations with a lot of really beloved characters, and because she's not so overtly coded as a hero or mastermind, it's much easier to reduce the interactions that she has with characters like Tyrion, Arya, or even Ned as Sansa being the bad guy and everyone else being the good guy rather than acknowledging the nuance that could exist between them.

For instance, Tyrion is obviously a character whose popularity outshines Sansa's by a wide margin, and it's bizarrely common for some fans to act as if Sansa should be Tyrion's reward for being so clever and so underappreciated, or even worse, that Sansa needs to learn some sort of life lesson by being forcibly married to but ultimately falling in love with Tyrion. These ideas are repulsive, but honestly not that surprising considering what the other option is.

Because in reality, Tyrion is an adult man who willingly married a child hostage in the hopes of stealing the claim to her home. He is an adult man who is bitter that his 13 year old wife who has basically been kidnapped, abused, and forced to marry into the family that slaughtered her own doesn't like him and isn't happy to be married to him. He's twice her age, and he's angry that the tween he's attracted to does not want to be intimate with him.

When taking that point of view into account, it's not at all shocking that people like to besmirch Sansa, because to acknowledge the reality of what is happening makes Tyrion an undeniably repugnant villain, and makes Sansa his helpless hostage. It is much harder to admit that a likable character could not only treat a literal child so horribly, but would be angry that she doesn't appreciate him for it, rather than just blaming Sansa for being a spoiled, superficial brat.

And although obviously her interactions with most other characters aren't taken to quite this extreme, Sansa's presence has a real knack for bringing other characters' less appealing qualities into the light, and therefore rejecting Sansa and acting as if she deserves all of the horrid things that happens to her allows fans of many characters to avoid truly examining what kind of people George RR Martin actually created.

However, by doing so the audience and readership miss a great deal of what makes the other characters so interesting, and miss a great deal of what makes Sansa interesting as well.

She's A Subject, Not An Object

Every character in A Song of Ice and Fire both embodies a specific fantasy archetype and subverts that archetype, and ironically, the archetype that Sansa both is and isn't makes her a somewhat inherently unappealing character. But, that's not because of the character herself, it's largely because of what the audience expects of a character like her, and because those expectations are confronted and deconstructed in a really unsettling and disturbing way.

Sansa is very much the damsel in distress, princess in the tower kind of character, and she does quite literally spend a great deal of her time imprisoned, waiting to be saved by a fabled hero. There is an interesting meta-textual angle to this aspect of Sansa's character as well, because her inner fantasies revolve around magical fairy tales, but she is also quite literally living out a classic fairy tale in her reality.

But what makes Sansa such a unique character in a way that is a bit of an affront to the typical narrative expectations is that the traditional damsel in distress is not meant to be a subject within the narrative that they're a part of, they're supposed to be an object.

The princess in the tower who needs to be saved by another is essentially meant to be the end goal of the actual characters in traditional storytelling. She's meant to be a metaphorical flag that needs to be captured from beyond enemy lines, but the real story is about the hero saving her, not the woman who actually needs to be saved.

The damsel in distress is typically a plot device that only exists through the eyes of the real characters, and when she is not in their presence or on their minds, she essentially ceases to exist. But what George RR Martin fascinatingly does with Sansa is truly reveals how deranged and dehumanizing this kind of classic fantasy is.

Because, by letting the audience see through Sansa's eyes, it truly illuminates how nightmarish it is to be that damsel. She's not a porcelain doll without any thoughts, feelings, or relevance outside of the prince who is meant to be her savior. She doesn't exist in some kind of neutral stasis while waiting to be saved. She's a real person who is in a real hostage situation, and she experiences a great deal of misery, pain, and even boredom as a result of her imprisonment.

Being that damsel leads her through a harrowing journey of manipulation and exploitation, and her distress is literal and horrifying abuse. There is nothing charming or fantastical about it.

But, audiences are not used to characters like this being humanized, and they don't expect them to have a rich inner life or acknowledge the brutality of what they've experienced, so to have a character like Sansa whose life as a captive princess is revolting and sad is a shock to the system that a lot of people don't enjoy.

However, it is an incredibly astute insight into classic fantasy, and George RR Martin has crafted a truly interesting and unique character with Sansa Stark that the vast majority of the audience apparently dislikes or is seemingly completely disinterested in purely based on their superficial interpretations of the character.

Ultimately, people are allowed to dislike whatever they dislike for whatever reason under the sun. Hating something because you hate it is entirely valid. However, when it comes to Sansa Stark, it's painfully obvious that a great deal of readers and viewers loathed her character because they completely misunderstood the points that George RR Martin was trying to make by including a character like her in A Song of Ice and Fire.

Sansa is undoubtedly a bit of an odd man out in the broader narrative, but that is largely what makes her such an interesting and worthwhile character. Her characterization is exceptionally rich in subtext, and she has one of the most realistic and relatable development arcs in the entire story.

The likelihood that she will be a fan favorite by the end of A Song of Ice and Fire is unfortunately even lower than it was in Game of Thrones, as the writers of the TV adaptation radically changed the character in a way that would fulfill expectations and appeal more broadly to the entire audience. However, Sansa is as richly complex and compelling as any other character in the series, and although many may not like her, they likely have more in common with her than any other character in A Song of Ice and Fire.

#sansa stark #sansamonth2022 #asoiaf #got #anti got #my videos #be forewarned this is a ridiculously long beast #asoiaf meta #got meta #sansa stark meta #meta #Youtube

[eruherdiriel]

Dedra Meero and D*enerys T: Fandom Reactions to Female Villains

Note: This post assumes Dedra and D*ny are villainous characters. You've been warned (twice now). GOT critical, minor spoilers for both shows ahead (characterizations more than plot points). I am not discussing anyone's enjoyment of a character, rather, I'm examining interpretations of villainy and who we root for in a narrative.

I've watched Andor twice, and both times I was struck by how similar Dedra Meero feels to D*ny. So far, however, Dedra's arc is more coherent and the audience seems more united in how it views her, which fascinates me. (I know some are rooting for a redemption arc for Dedra, which I will discuss more later. By definition, that means there's something about her that needs to be redeemed, so I am assuming those folks generally accept her as a villain in her current state.)

Both Dedra and D*ny are women in a man's world who, in order to rise within a corrupt and oppressive system, adopt the brutal tactics of that system. They believe in said system even if it treats them unjustly for being women. Dedra believes that the Empire should be the ultimate power in the universe, that rebels should be rooted out and crushed, and that horrifying torture and manipulation are acceptable actions to achieve the outcome of keeping the Empire in power. D*ny believes in the Targaryen dynasty, that they are rightful rulers of Westeros despite being colonizers, and that dragons (a weapon no one else has, nevermind that the narrative tells us over and over that burning people alive is Not Good) are an acceptable way to achieve her goal of sitting on the Iron Throne.

The fact that they face obstacles and encounter misogyny everywhere rightly stirs in the audience sympathy for them. Syril's obsession with Dedra is terrifying to me, as is Viserys's assault of D*ny. With Dedra, the sympathy generated from these circumstances doesn't seem to outweigh all the heinous things we see her do and make people actively root for her. Meanwhile, D*ny made it through 8 seasons of Thrones with a large cheering squad intact. There's a few reasons why that could be.

Even on a show like Andor, where characters are allowed to be morally messy, Star Wars is an inherently binary, good vs. evil universe. The Rebellion vs. the Empire. The light side of the force vs. the dark side. Thrones lives in the gray. Sometimes that's not the right term, but it's how the audience is told it should see characters. At its worst, Thrones sanitized more villainous characters and dumbed down more heroic ones to keep everyone "gray," thereby oversimplifying and misrepresenting what it means for a character or action to be morally gray. Character motivations were buried to preserve plot twists, which led to confusion among some of the audience over who the ultimate heroes were. Andor shows us Luthen instigating an Empire crackdown and asks audience members to question his methods while also making the case for them. Cassian's trigger finger is ruthless, but how many times does that save his life? Save the life of someone he loves or someone else who will play a key role in the Rebellion?

Andor is also 12 episodes in (of 24 planned); characters are going to complete their arcs a lot faster than characters did on Thrones. That accelerated time line has an effect on fandom engagement, how much time people spend with a character (potentially allowing them to build more sympathy for said character), and how much time they have to transform that character in their mind (headcanons, fanfic, etc., all things I love but can convolute discussions about the original text). We also know less about Dedra than we did about D*ny, and very little about her personal life. Still, Dedra feels human, so don't mistake this for thinking she is a poorly drawn character. She's not.

A word on redemption: For me, Star Wars doesn't have a great track record with successfully completing redemption arcs. I know some people feel differently. But given the quality of Andor season 1, I think this show could do a villain redemption and do it well, but I don't want it to (please hold your tomatoes). It's enough for me that our good guys are doing shady things on behalf of the Rebellion. It's enough for me that the villains have sympathetic qualities. I still want them to be villains. Especially with Andor, the themes and plotlines are so resonant of the challenges we face in the real world that one of the few ways the show maintains the catharsis of entertainment is through good defeating evil. And it's important to me that Dedra stays a villain because there are villainous women in the real world and we need to remember that. It's part of why I was never bothered by the idea that D*ny would be a villain as well.

(I want to acknowledge the role actor's external comments might have had on viewing these two women as villains. I won't go into it too much because it feels a little icky saying I agree with one person's comments about a character they played and not another's, and also because I wish actor/writer/director etc. comments weren't taken so seriously in fandom. Also, I have not combed through every interview the actors have given so I only know the highlights, and I want to be fair to them that maybe their views have changed or they've said contradictory things elsewhere. /Disclaimer. To sum up, Emilia Clarke emphatically stated in post-S8 interviews that she stood by D*ny and "never saw [the ending] coming." Maybe this gives some fans "permission" to feel that way as well. Meanwhile, Denise Gough called her character a fascist [I know almost nothing else about Denise but I LOVE her for this comment.])

#women as villains #anti daenerys targaryen #andor show #andor series #dedra meero #andor #andor meta #got critical #this has been in my drafts too long #it just ... ends but i needed to kick it out #long post #got meta #ish

[la-pheacienne]

For all that they talk about GRRM being anti-war, anti-monarchy and anti-feudalism, they love neglecting to mention that he’s anti-Catholicism.

Disclaimer: if in any way I come across as agressive, it's not at all directed at you anon, I'm speaking very generally here, thank you for your ask💖

Listen. The sheer notion of "anti-war" is the stupidest of the stupidest political/moral/ethical attitudes that someone could have. I know this is an unpopular opinion, but someone needs to say it. "Anti-war" doesn't mean ANYTHING. Anti-which war exactly? You need to be specific. Not all wars are the same, not all wars are created equal, there are some wars that need to happen, that are fair, and some wars that shouldn't happen. Yes of course, it depends on where you're standing. But it always does, that's life. And of course in every war there are people suffering, but that's life again. If the enemy comes at your doorstep and wants to destroy you and everything you love or if you have been violently evicted from your homeland, what will you say exactly? Hunie I ain't doin' anything about dat cause I'm anti-war? Lol. No. The "anti-war" agenda is only relevant for privileged, white Americans and Europeans thinking they are Americans, who haven't felt threatened once in their life, who haven't lost anything, who don't know anything about human history and think that the solution to every problem on planet earth is peace and love. No.

GRRM definitely isn't anti war. There is no way a person that dedicates decades of his life reading and writing about brave warriors is anti war. Sure he's "anti- war" in the sense that he doesn't particularly fancy going out with a sword decapitating people, but he's not anti war in any fundamental way. And newsflash, none of the fans of these shows/books are. We're literally dedicating years of our lives reading about war and watching war happen and supporting aristocrats that lead their people to war. That's literally the plot of the story. So no, in real life I'm not anti war, and in the ASOIAF universe I'm definitely not anti war. All of my favourite characters are warriors and/or leaders to battle, Jon, Jaime, Dany, Stanis, Brienne. It's exactly the same thing in any fantasy story. Watching a fantasy story about warriors and being anti war is the most idiotic thing you can do. Go watch Gilmore Girls. Unfortunately, people who should have stuck to Gilmore Girls ended up watching GoT because of its popularity, and that's the very reason we have the Anti-Targaryen phenomenon.

The same for anti monarchy. Like, I don't particularly approve of monarchy, my country has no monarchy because we literally chased the monarch away, thank god, and I don't think it's a good model of political structure in any country. That doesn't mean that I don't acknowledge that Europeans lived with that for centuries. Some monarchs/emperors literally changed history for the better. They conquered, they educated, they revolutionised, they made progress, they broke centuries of tradition. I don't see monarchy, again, through the lense of the privileged American who thinks their country discovered democracy and scorns any other political system because they just know better. No honey you don't, and you didn't discover shit. Magna Carta was created under Monarchy. The Catholicism received it's fatal blow because of a Monarch. Women and bastards gained power and legitimacy because one day a female bastard decided that she could be a better Queen than her brother or her perfect religious female cousin. Cities and schools were created by monarchs. Scientific progress that changed the world was funded by Monarchs. They also did terrible things, they are also responsible for destruction, slavery, misery. But perfectly democratic leaders side eyeing literally every single President of the USA ever also did all of the above. My whole point is, you can be "anti monarchy" if you don't like the way it works, that's fine, I am as well, but if you think that every single Monarch in history was just a "bad person" and you don't acknowledge the value and impact of certain rulers and certain periods of human history then you're simply illiterate. Again, people who think that way somehow ended up watching Game of Thrones, a show about Monarchs, and again, that explains the Targaryen hate. Watching a show that tells the story of Monarchs and Aristocrats doing vile and great/heroic deeds and being "Anti-monarchy"? Sure, you can be, but what is the point of that observation in that context exactly? It makes you look like a fool.

About anti Catholicism. Sure the faith of the seven has clear parallels to the Catholicism, the Great Sparrow was a character that came straight from the Inquisition, the Hightowers are pious little hypocrites that hate women and demonize sex and bastards. The parallel is there. In that particular aspect I do think GRRM consistently shows obsessing over religion as something inherently bad in his universe but it's really not that important because religion is not the focus of the story. Power is. The Hightowers' problem is not that they are religious, even though that makes them even more unlikeable. Their problem is that they are greedy MFs that started a war for nothing and they destroyed an entire realm because they preferred that than to see a ruler with a vagina on the Iron Throne. So it's not about religion exactly, it's about a unfair war (a war motivated by greed and treason) versus a fair war (a war motivated by the need to reclaim what has been taken from you by force and treachery). GRRM is definitely anti Catholicism though, that much is certain, but religion has a secondary role in his universe any way.

#I feel that i will get hate for this #if I do oh well that's on the internet I should have expected it #but I believe I won't get any hate because the text is so long not a single soul is gonna read it #so we're good #hotd meta #got meta #house of Targaryen #house of Hightower #no I'm not putting the anti tag because I'm stating facts #house of the dragon #anonymous #anti war agenda #aspa rambles

[teenagecriminalmastermind]

this thread is excellent and also gave me so many more thoughts

first off, it's a great example that easily described how people who have been abused are at a higher risk of becoming offenders because they have a low set point to begin with - especially aegon.

it was a throwaway line in a later episode, but when Aemond mentions the disgust of his brother taking him to a brothel when he was a pre-teen, there is no way Aegon did that without being introduced to it by someone older and in a position of authority (most likely his father or grandfather).

more likely his father because otto is more religiously conservative, while viserys openly claimed at a point that he and daemon "fucked their way through Flea Bottom" when they were younger.

so while he is an offender, he is very much a victim of sexual abuse himself and is enacting what he has been taught as not just accepted but expected of him - his depravity is absolutely not excusable but it is also learned and not innate, and the way aegon and aemond grow up shows the diathesis stress theory in action.

the theory that mental and physical disorders develop from a genetic or biological predisposition for that illness (diathesis) combined with stressful conditions that play a precipitating or facilitating role.

while aegon may have had a predisposition for sadism that his brother does not, he probably would not have offended had he grown up in a healthy, balanced environment that wasn't physically, emotionally and psychologically abusive and neglectful.

aemond, despite growing up in the same kind of environment, was subject to less abuse by both parents and also most likely did not possess the predisposition to be a sexual sadist. instead, he grew up behaving in a manner that directly fed into his mother's approval, becoming more religiously and socially conservative.

(I could do a complete breakdown of the greens personalities as a result of their upbringings from a clinical standpoint but that would turn into an academic essay lmao)

#hotd meta #house of the dragon meta #aemond targaryen #aegon targaryen #aegon ii #aegon ii targaryen #alicent hightower #viserys targaryen #otto hightower #got meta #asoiaf meta

[daenerysstormreborn]

It really grinds my gears when people try to insist that Jon never really loved Dany because he undeniably canonically loved her even after she torched King’s Landing. This isn’t me reading between the lines or theorizing. It’s in the script of episode 8 which is publicly available.

We all know season 8 was shit and hope the books do things dramatically differently. And I personally think that Emilia and Kitt had poor on-screen chemistry, so they struggled to convey love. But it is unquestionably canon that Jon and Dany loved each other to the end. Jon feels he has nothing left worth living for once she’s dead. He really truly did not want the throne. He was ready to die right along with her. He was going to let Drogon kill him. Honestly it could’ve been an incredibly tragic scene had it been better written and had Jon and Dany shared more screen time with better actor chemistry. Always a Jonerys truther here

#asoiaf #got #jonerys #got meta #game of thrones #in my heart Drogon flew her to Asshai where she was resurrected by a red priestess #and Jon will eventually say fuck Westeros and will go searching for the dragon lords of Asshai #and they will meet again and discover that the 3ER had taken control of her the entire time and dying had freed her from that control #and she’s been researching how to defeat him while in the shadowlands #but maybe they just say fuck Westeros together and go explore the shadowlands and Ulthos

[bbygirl-aemond]

Complete Targaryen Bloodline

Hello everyone so a long time ago I made a post comparing what percentage of Targaryen blood all of the characters in HotD relative to each other. But now for Stormbreak I've actually gone all the way back before the Doom of Old Valyria and calculated exactly and objectively how much the Targaryen blood has been diluted. I tracked the Targaryen bloodline all the way down to Daenerys and Jon Snow (if the books eventually go with R+L=J, as the show did). Here's my end product, in case any other writers find it helpful:

Technically this doesn't include every single Targaryen who has ever existed, but I was mostly interested in which bloodlines continue to be relevant later on. So a few Targaryen kids whose bloodlines either died out early on (a la Aegon III), who didn't reproduce at all (a la Vaegon or Aemon), or who intermarried into other families and weren't really mentioned again (a la Rhaena) aren't included in this.

Also, because the Baratheons are descended from Orys Baratheon, who himself was half-Targaryen, and because I wanted to investigate the Targaryen branch that resulted from the intermarriage with Jocelyn Baratheon, I looked into the Baratheon bloodline as well. I tried to go further to find out what percentage Robert, Stannis, and Renly would have been, but unfortunately there were a few times (I'm looking at you, Ormund Baratheon) where a lord passed down his claim to a male descendant of unspecified relation, so it wasn't feasible. Still, here is the Baratheon bloodline at the time of the Dance of Dragons:

I also needed to figure out a few members of House Velaryon, since they intermarried with the main branch a few different times. I didn't include Alyssa Velaryon since I'm only including Velaryons with some percentage of Targaryen blood. Here are the results for the Velaryons:

Lastly, to figure out Rhaenyra Targaryen I needed to figure out her mother. So here are the results for Aemma Arryn, the one member of House Arryn with Targaryen blood:

Between these three additional charts, you should be able to see the justification for the bloodline percentages of any woman mentioned in the first chart who married into the Targaryen family and also had some Targaryen blood: women like Valaena Velaryon, Aemma Arryn, Jocelyn Baratheon, and Laena Velaryon.

There are some really cool things that stood out to me from all this. One is that Borros Baratheon, as seen in HotD, has more Targaryen blood than Daenaerys Targaryen, as seen in GoT, does! Kind of wild to realize that when you watch them both on-screen. Another is how HotD is much closer to GoT era than it is to Old Valyria. We have 11-12 generations between Aenar and Rhaenyra Targaryen, compared to 6-7 generations between Rhaenyra and Daenerys Targaryen. Another is just how drastically marrying outside the bloodline, even once, even to someone who is part Targaryen, impacts all future generations.

Lastly, I used this objective metric to rank all of the characters alive by the time the Dance of Dragons breaks out in HotD based on how concentrated their Targaryen blood is. It's in a separate post here for your reference!

#hotd meta #hotd #asoiaf #asoiaf meta #got #got meta #house of the dragon #game of thrones #fic: stormbreak #fic #stormbreak #fire and blood #meta

[ladysansalannister]

Okay but Cyrano de Bergerac from the musical is *exactly* who Tyrion would be if his childhood hadn’t destroyed his mental health. Brave, proud, witty, intelligent, charming – Tyrion has all of these qualities, but his childhood trauma and subsequent mental health problems as well as substance abuse issues often buries them until he seems like a cruel, hardened shell of a person. But when you get past the exterior, you discover that both Tyrion and Cyrano long to be loved more than they long for anything else in this world.

#tyrion should’ve ended up with sansa #he should’ve gotten a love story #peter would’ve acted the hell out of it #tyrion lannister #cyrano de bergerac #game of thrones #a song of ice and fire #got #asoiaf #peter dinklage #got meta #asoiaf meta #cyrano 2021 #personal

[rainhadaenerys]

A while back, when House of the Dragon came out and people realized that Dany's theme was playing every time they were talking about the prince that was promised, many people tried to claim that it wasn't Dany's theme, it was a Targaryen/dragons theme. So I've been wanting for some time to write about where exactly the "Prince that was promised" theme comes from, and prove that it comes from a Dany theme, not a theme about the Targaryens in general or about the dragons.

To begin, let's clarify which is the dragons/Targaryen theme: it's the theme "Mother of Dragons". More especifically, it's the famous "aa-AAAAHH" that appears almost every time we see the dragons (there's also a version of the aa-AAAH that can be heard very softly every time the dragon eggs appear). You can listen to it from 0:00 to 0:40 in the following video:

Meanwhile, Dany's theme is "Love in the Eyes". There are several little parts in the theme that develop into other themes throughout the show, all about Dany. One of the themes that was derived from Love in the Eyes is the theme "Breaker of Chains". I've been listening to Dany's theme "Love in the Eyes" to find out exactly which part of it Breaker of Chains comes from, and I'm pretty sure I found it.

The part of Love in the Eyes that originates the theme Breaker of Chains is the part from 1:00 to 1:20. Specifically, the wind instrument that is playing (there are also percussion and strings playing, but the part that originates the "Breaker of Chains" theme is the part of the wind instrument). Listen to "Love in the Eyes" from 1:00 to 1:20, and then listen to Breaker of Chains from 1:42 to 2:35.

As you can see, the theme "Breaker of Chains" comes from that specific part of "Love in the Eyes". And given that it comes from "Love in the eyes", this means that "Breaker of Chains" is indeed a theme specific to Dany, not a dragon/Targaryen theme.

Now watch the clips where they talk about Aegon's dream in House of the Dragon: the scene where Viserys talks about Aegon's dream, and the scene where Rhaenyra reads the dagger with the prince that was promised prophecy.

In both scenes, the theme playing is "Breaker of Chains", which is distinct from the theme of the dragons. The theme of the dragons does play together with the "Breaker of Chains" theme in the first scene, but in the second scene, when Rhaenyra reads the dagger ("from my blood come the prince that was promised and his will be the song of ice and fire"), only Dany's theme "Breaker of Chains" plays.

To me, this makes it very clear that the music of both scenes is referring to Dany, not just the Targaryens or the Dragons in general, because it's not just a general dragon/Targaryen theme that plays, it also plays a theme that is specific to Dany, "Breaker of Chains", that comes from "Love in the Eyes".

#got meta #hotd meta #daenerys targaryen #my meta #this has been sitting in my drafts for ages

[daenerysstormborntargaryen]

"Jaime Lannister sends his regards."

What does this line mean? What are the implications, the message it is trying to send? Is it a better line than the changed one in the show?

These are questions I have been asking myself as of late. Initially, I wanted to explain why I liked the show's version better, but as I thought about what the book's version meant, I started to change my mind

To be honest, the reason why I liked the show's version better for so long was because I thought it was more impactful. By saying "The Lannisters send their regards" rather than just Jaime, it made the Lannisters seem like a unified front, a great House that is not to be fucked with and not just a singular great man. It would send the message that it is not the actions of a singular person but something that will set a precedent for the House as a whole when dealing with, ultimately, people getting in their way.

But then I started thinking about why Tywin would have them say Jaime specifically. I came to two major conclusions:

1) Tywin doesn't care that Jaime is a member of the Kingsguard let alone the Lord Commander, he still wants Jaime to inherit Casterly Rock. Cersei is the Queen, just the thing Tywin wanted her to be, thus he wants to keep her right where she is. Tyrion is the heir of Casterly Rock but Tywin would rather bring the Seven Hells upon Westeros than see Tyrion as the Lord of Casterly Rock. He has always seen Jaime as the heir, his heir. When he made his vows, Tywin was pissed as all hell, at Jaime, at Aerys, at everyone. But then Joffrey set the precedent that members Kingsguard don't have to serve for life with the dismissal of Baristan Selmy, thus opening up the path for Tywin to make his wishes come true.

Several time through the series, we see the song "The Rains of Castamere" used as a threat, a reminder to any and all of what Tywin Lannister is capable of. The ruthless destruction of Houses Reyne and Tarbeck solidifies Tywin's fearsome reputation and I believe the Red Wedding is meant to be Jaime's Castamere. By giving him the responsibility, Tywin is securing Jaime's legacy almost. Already Jaime is well-known for being one of the greatest swordsmen alive, but he needs to be more of a threat, more of a foreboding presence at the back of people's minds than just someone who is pretty handy with a sword. If people believe Jaime capable and willing to do something as horrible as the Red Wedding, what else is he willing to do to protect the realm (or just his family)?

However, similar to Castamere, the Red Wedding is a huge, huge, huge political mistake. It is not a show of power, of skill in battle, of cunning or wit. No, it's a demonstration of brutality. It says to everyone else that the Lannisters will do whatever they want in response to slights, minor or otherwise. The Red Wedding especially does this. Sure, you crushed the Northern rebellion and took out a huge threat to your power, congratulations. Now no one trusts you or respects you or will want to be by your side. They may fall in line out of fear, but fear can only hold people for so long and to such lengths. Tywin os still upset, to his dying day, of the perceived failings of his father. He hated how his bannerman laughed at him, hated how a "whore" wore his mother's jewels and clothing, hated the weakness he saw. But I would argue it is better to be underestimated yet respected than feared yet reviled. When the going gets tough, who will come to Lannister aid after this? After this violation of a sacred law, Guest Right, who would ever want to be on the side of Lannister?

2) This is more of a narrative reason, though I certainly believe Tywin may think similarly, but this line is also a twisting of the knife. Cat let Jaime go and everyone and their mother told her what a horrible idea it was. Now, it's come to bite her in the ass. Had she not released Jaime, I am not entirely sure the Red Wedding would have happened but that is a whole different discussion. Fact of the matter is, she did and now she has to watch her son be murdered in front of her. How could she not blame herself? How could she not blame the Lannisters for being cravens wholly lacking honor? How could she not blame the gods for their cruelty? This line is the cherry on top of the tragedy of the Starks.

While (iirc) Tywin did not know Catelyn was the one who let Jaime go, I believe he thinks he somehow escaped on his own, I do think he would also view it in the same way. As consequence of taking his son, and of letting him slip through their fingers, their lives are forfeit. Yes, when they rebelled their lives were forfeit to begin, but I think Jaime's capture pushed Tywin to such a drastic means of dealing with them.

At his core, Tywin is a petty, vindictive person who values getting his revenge more than actually doing what is best for the Lannister name. True, he may believe this is the best course of action, but that just goes to show what an emotionally-driven, lack of forethought moron Tywin truly is. He is not clever, he is cruel. Do not confuse the two. And, much like every other Lannister, Tywin seems to believe because the Targaryens conquered and kept the peace through fire and blood, he can do whatever violent acts he wishes and history will laud him for it, but he is not a Targaryen, it does not work the same way. Targaryens for centuries were viewed as closer to gods than men, Lannisters never were held in that esteem. All he is doing is dragging the Lannister name through the mud.

One of the things that makes Tywin Lannister notorious in Westeros is told about in the song "The Rains of Castamere," which details how Tywin brought about the end of House Reyne and House Tarbeck, serves several times as a reminder and threat of what Tywin Lannister is capable of ie complete ruthless brutality. It is intended to keep people in line and to keep their noses clean. I believe Tywin wanted to give Jaime a similar reputation.

#game of throne #asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #game of thrones meta #asoiaf meta #tywin lannister #jaime lannister #got meta #a song of ice and fire meta