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kateofthecanals · 6 years

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A Woman’s Worth, According to “Game of Thrones”

The other day I thought to myself, is there a single female character on GoT who has not at some point been encouraged, both on a Watsonian and Doylist level, to resort to violence and/or sex in order to solve all her problems?

I’m honestly at a loss to think of a single female character, past or present, where this hasn’t been the case. Obviously the example frequently referenced around here is Sansa. Here is a young woman who, as written by George R.R. Martin, possesses a keen intellect but also a fair amount of naivete... because, like, both those aspects can exist at the same time. She is not a warrior like her sister, and she is not a seductress like Cersei, and yet she’s managed to survive through FIVE books without having to resort either to violence or sexual manipulation and has relied instead on her intellect and the traditionally feminine pursuits she has been brought up to cultivate. This is something D&D apparently cannot conceive of (even though it’s literally been written out for them in black and white). In their minds, a woman cannot be “strong” unless she’s got blood on her hands and/or a sexually available body. They literally cannot wrap their tiny brains around the concept of nuanced women. Even those who do possess martial prowess, like Brienne, Arya, and Asha, are reduced to shallow stereotypes and have had all their unique qualities stripped away in favor of this almost cartoonish thirst for blood.

D&D have made it quite clear over 7 seasons (yes, the first 4 included) that a woman in this universe is only “worthy” if she is willing to kill people and/or have sex. They cannot possibly serve any other purpose and still be of use to D&D’s narrative. Just look...

Sansa: Revenge Murder. She had been advised in the past, by both Cersei and Littlefinger, to use sex to get want she wants, but then she ended up getting raped. So maybe that “counts” in D&D’s eyes? After all, she did get her all-important “first kill” out of it... That, according to both D&D and Sophie, was what her “entire arc was leading to.”

Arya: Murder. She’s basically a homicidal maniac at this point, and it’s framed not only as a good thing, but “badass”. We’re supposed to be cheering as this lost, damaged child repeatedly stabs people with a cold smirk on her face.

Brienne: Murder. Absolutely no qualms about it either. Shanking dudes is just another day at the office for her! The epic moral dilemma that defines book-Brienne (”no chance, and no choice”) simply does not exist here.

Dany: Murder/Sex/Nudity. The Holy Trifecta! No wonder D&D love her so much! She’ll get naked and jump into bed AND murder entire cities all before Noon! We have seen Dany “struggle” at times with the dilemma of using violence in order to find peace, but in the end, the solution is always the same: YES OF COURSE YOU SHOULD USE VIOLENCE! Never once has she been like, “you know what, the loss is too much of a burden on my conscience, Imma sit this one out” without that being framed as a “wrong” decision. Because we need CGI dragons and massive casualties in order for her to be seen as “strong” and “competent”, dammit! We also need to see dem tittays!!!!

Cersei: Murder & Sex. Another D&D darling, obviously. In the books, Cersei is clearly off her rocker, makes bad decisions constantly, and literally no one likes her. (She’s basically show-Littlefinger.) And yet, on the show, her poor decisions and wisdom are treated as “correct”. When she tells Sansa that love is a sham or that she needs to use her vajayjay to get what she wants in this world, these things are framed as legitimately good advice. Cersei is basically this show’s moral compass. In D&D’s eyes, Cersei is the only character who is playing the game correctly. She is the only one who gets it right. “Kill or be killed, fuck or get fucked.” There is literally nothing else in between these two extremes.

Melisandre: Murder & Sex. Okay, so Mel hasn’t murdered anyone directly, but she’s had her hand in quite a few homicides. She’s utterly willing to see people die to get what she wants, and she’ll happily throw her titties at them along the way. Nevermind that book-Mel honestly believes that everything she’s doing is for the Greater Good, and nevermind that book-Mel doesn’t need to be nude every 5 seconds to get her point across... show-Mel is simply an evil enchantress, period. Oh, but then something horrible happened in Season 6 -- we found out that (a) she’s actually 3,000 years old ewwwwww!! and (b) she finally realized her “powers” aren’t all that reliable and came to regret all the murderin’ she’d done. She basically had her “worth” stripped from her twofold. Also, Carice Van Houten turned 40. And so guess who we BARELY saw in Season 7? Yeah, D&D literally made her LEAVE THE CONTINENT since she’s no longer of use to them.

Yara: Murder & Sex/Queer-Baiting. Yeah, another fun thing about D&D&Co is that they assume all female warriors are lesbians. They outright said as much about Brienne, and with Yara they just went ahead and showed it, and called it “representation” lmao. Even though Asha Greyjoy probably has the most healthy hetero sex life in ASOIAF. Sexuality in Yara’s case is even worse because she is also used in D&D’s massively disturbing depictions/endorsements of toxic masculinity. Her advice to her own brother, who was sexually mutilated, to either “get over it or kill yourself” (all while she’s groping a sex slave IN FRONT OF HIM) was actually framed as GOOD ADVICE. This was already apparent in the narrative but then D&D themselves confirmed it in the ITE!!!

Missandei: Nudity. Here’s a female character who is actually allowed to have a brain, but even then she is constantly undermined by the far superior intellect of Saint Tyrion. But it doesn’t really matter either way, because Missandei’s true purpose on the show is to look hot.

Olenna: Murder. Lady Tyrell is far too old to be sexy, so naturally she has to be out for blood at all times, and advising other people to murder as well (”Be a dragon!!!”).

Ellaria/Sand Snakes: Murder & Nudity/Sex. We can just go ahead and lump all these together. In addition to being the poster children for D&D’s insistence that all females, including sisters, must be catty to each other at all times, they are, of course, overly-sexualized and obsessed with Revenge™. It wasn’t enough that Ellaria was canonically bisexual, but D&D felt that her appeals for peace in the books were literally unworthy of proper adaptation. “We reconceived the role to make it worthy of the actor’s talents.” For them, Ellaria doesn’t deserve to even exist unless she’s vowing bloody vengeance on literally everyone for Oberyn’s death... including Oberyn’s own family(???). And the Sand Snakes? Well, one of y’all better get nekkid to keep it interesting! Who cares if the term “bad pussy” is apocryphal to this universe???

Margaery: Sex. From the moment Marg first popped up on screen, her titties popped out. She’s been a sexual character from the beginning and has repeatedly used sex as a tool for manipulation. She’s the protege that Cersei’s been looking for! Nevermind that, in the books, Marg, like Sansa, actually uses her wits to scheme and manipulate instead of her vagina. Luckily for D&D, they had room to age up Marg just enough that we could see her naked IMMEDIATELY, and once she traded in her low-cut dresses for Silent Sister gowns, guess what happened to her?

Myrcella: Neither, #RIP. Though, to be “fair”, they did re-cast the role with an older actress so that she could wear skimpier dresses and get groped by Trystane...

Gilly: ????? I mean, she’s just been reduced to Sam’s nagging girlfriend at this point. She did offer him sex (5 minutes after almost being raped) but she hasn’t threatened to murder anyone YET... But she’s also dumb as a post, so I guess D&D keep her around to make Sam look smarter?

Lyanna Mormont: Faux-Feminism! Lyanna is too young to be sexy or physically intimidating, so obviously the only other options for her are to re-affirm Sansa's idiocy (”Lyanna Mormont wouldn’t have been dumb enough to write that letter, so age is no excuse!”) and to further the faux-feminism agenda where crucial, life-preserving activities like knitting are ridiculed simply because they are “girl things”.

Meera: Murder. Honestly Meera was unusual in that she didn’t seem to possess the thirst for blood that the rest of the weapons-capable women on GoT did, nor any overt sexuality. But it’s okay, cuz D&D found other ways to undermine her! Like having her almost raped (a rite of passage for all true GoT Ladies I guess), and her constantly squabbling with Osha was a given according to the unwritten rule that if there’s more than one woman in the same scene at any time, they HAVE to be catty to each other, NO EXCEPTIONS!!! Anyway, without anyone left to kill or any way to be sexually available to Bran, she’s useless and no longer on the show. I’m sure we’ll find out next season that she was raped and murdered on her way back to the Neck (which Bran will have no reaction to).

The Waif: Murder. Just pure, unadulterated, completely incomprehensible murder. Did we ever really find out WHY she was so pathologically out to get Arya, other than the above-mentioned Rule of Cattiness?? Like, gods forbid she be an ACTUAL mentor to Arya...

Shireen: Neither, #RIP. Shireen was #tooprecioustoopure for this world, and that was entirely the point, wasn’t it? Nobody that sweet, kind, smart [shudder], and innocent [double-shudder] has any place in Weissteroff. She was only there for the maximum #feels when she was ruthlessly (and inexplicably) murdered and then immediately forgotten about once she served her purpose.

Selyse: Murder. She kind of suffered the same treatment as Lysa, in that her sexuality was used against her and she basically turned to murder to compensate for what she lacked.

Walda: Neither, #RIP. This one still infuriates me. In the books, Walda, although described to be rather overweight, still manages to enjoy a very healthy sex life with a husband not known for expressing more than a pointed stare. In fact, she’s so into it that even Roose Fucking Bolton finds it (and her) charming!! NONE of this made it into the show. No, instead, we have Ramsay making tasteless fat jokes (”OMG HOW DO YOU EVEN FIND HER VAGINA?!??!”) because lulz fat women enjoying sex don’t be ridiculous!! Ultimately she’s just there to be laughed at and then killed off for plot. Imagine if D&D were actually as progressive as they think they are and used this as an opportunity to depict and endorse body positivity on their Emmy Award-winning prestige drama watched by millions of people around the world..... NAAAAHHHH MORE FAT JOKES PLEASE!!!

Those are just some of the more recent crop of female characters, but this applies to past ones as well...

Catelyn: Murder. Poor Cat couldn’t even have a book-canon sex scene because no woman over the age of 40 is allowed to be naked on-screen (see: Melisandre) unless it’s for comedic effect or to deliberately make us cringe. So, that’s when D&D decided they had to amp up the Thirst for Vengeance quotient on her! Even though Cat was a POV character, and Robb’s entire war was seen through her eyes, they never allowed her any sort of meaningful introspection, either about the war or her family. Like Sansa, it was more important to highlight all the “mean” things she did to the Heroes of the story (”Maybe if I had loved Jon, this war wouldn’t have happened!!”) and retool the timeline so that she looks as dumb as possible (letting Jaime go before she ever found out about Bran & Rickon). The Red Wedding couldn’t have come sooner, amirite??

Lysa: Murder & Sex. Here’s an example of an “older” woman’s sex life being played for laughs. She was never meant to be taken seriously as a sexual being, so let’s make her wedding night with Littlefinger as outrageously ridiculous as possible. Yes, I know, it was presented this way in the books as well, but the difference is, we had way more backstory on Lysa and so it came off as more sad and pathetic than just outright comical. She was also the one who poisoned Jon Arryn, thereby kicking off the WoT5K, but that (extremely crucial mystery that hung in the air for 5 books and 4 seasons) has since been rendered meaningless because “Robert’s Rebellion was built on a lie”...

Shae: Sex/Nudity. And here’s a classic example of D&D seemingly making a GOOD decision to “improve” a character but having it ultimately blow up in their faces. Having Shae be a confidante/protector of sorts for Sansa ALMOST worked. It certainly gave her something to do than have sex with Tyrion constantly. But in the end, that just made Shae look all the more like a shitperson when she threw Sansa under the bus at Tyrion’s trial. It was an actual betrayal, as opposed to a calculated maneuver by someone who ultimately never gave a shit about Sansa OR Tyrion. It ultimately made Shae look even WORSE than her book-counterpart, imo. Book-Shae was just doing her job; show-Shae actively fucked over 2 people she seemed to genuinely care about. It was a more nuanced character, but at the end of the day, they did it to serve Tyrion. It probably never even occurred to them that someone couldn’t genuinely love him (and those who don’t pay for it dearly; see: Sansa), and it was out of the question to make Saint Tyrion look like a FOOL for deluding himself into thinking a prostitute loved him. So she had to be the real deal, and her murder by Tyrion had to be 100% justified.

Osha: Murder & Sex/Nudity. It wasn’t enough for Osha to become a surrogate mother to Bran and Rickon; mothers are SO BORING after all. And it wasn’t enough that she was a wildling woman capable of killing a man a hundred different ways. Best throw in some gratuitous nude scenes just because. As far as D&D are concerned, the only way she can kill a man is by fucking him first. It works the first time, but when she tries the same ruse with Ramsay, she is killed for it. I mean, OF COURSE. The Great Ramsay Sue would never fall for such a thing, pffft!

Ygritte: Murder & Sex. She was already a little firecracker in the books, but leave it to D&D to give her the Cersei treatment by basically blackmailing Jon into sleeping with her. Some could argue dub-con for the books, but the show was outright non-con. But because she’s a hot lady and he’s a dude, it’s not looked at or framed that way at all. Instead we’re made to think “JACKPOT, JON! woooot!”

Talisa: Sex. When the “not like the other girls” trope goes too far, you get Talisa. Yes, she was presented as a strong, smart, capable woman, but in the context that they put her in, it didn’t make sense. Because D&D don’t know how to write a female character like this within the context of ASOIAF. And the re-working of this arc in Robb’s plot went from “doing it for honor” to “doing it for dat bootay!!” So, of course, it wasn’t enough that she was “not like the other girls”; it was CRUCIAL that we got to see her naked too, lest she be taken TOO seriously...!

Ros: Sex/Nudity. Like, literally, that was her one and only function. There’s that well-known rumor that she was killed off in the show because the actress didn’t wanna do any more nude scenes, but she has denied this was the case, but who knows, really? Knowing D&D as we do, would we REALLY be surprised if the rumor was true? I mean, why else would they get rid of her? If she was still game to throw her rack around and perform pornologues, why would they willingly give that up??

Karsi: Murder. This gal has the distinction of proving D&D’s claim that no one would have cared about Jeyne Poole utterly wrong, null, and void. Karsi had a cumulative screen time of about 10 minutes total, and I remember watching the live-tweets come in during “Hardhome” and people, including myself, being really excited by her character almost immediately. But surely there had to be a catch -- ah yes, The Worst Crime In Westeros: being a mother. That was her ultimate undoing. Of course, we learned soon after the episode that the character was originally written to be a man, but it was changed to a woman because OBVIOUSLY only a woman -- only a mother -- would be THAT opposed to killing children, even undead ones.

Maggy The Frog: Sex. Well, kinda... Look, fact is, Maggy the Frog was supposed to be some old, gross witch, and D&D turned her into a Burning Man groupie.

That about covers it, I think, feel free to add more if I’ve forgotten anyone. But basically you can see the pattern here loud and clear. It amazes me that so-called feminists who watch the show religiously haven’t picked up on this... or, if they have, don’t seem to have a problem with it??

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