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reviewpri · 4 years

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Beware-Alt Right is claiming GoT

I do not think DnD set out to do that...no, but it is happening.

and I do not think that all the people coming out to give a positive spin on season 8, in particularly, justifying Mad Dany are Alt-Right inserts- but some are.

How is Alt-Right claiming GoT? Well, they are spreading misconceptions about Daenerys solely based on the show in order to convince people that fighting for a more just society is misguided.

(not the same people, but on the same level of those who keep crying over the fact that selfish Dany is going to these places, liberating slaves while ignoring their culture...whatever that means.)

Note those claims are wide enough to convince normies and some leftists also that being a revolutionary equals being a tyrant.

1- Daenerys is a white savior.

Wrong. The trope that we are dealing with is actually “ going native”- a white person embracing and being embraced by other people/culture.

(in this case, Dothraki- and that they were presented as almost irredeemable savages is on GRRM )

Moreover, she rules over a very racially diverse population who had been ruled by a racial elite that Daenerys is no part of- meaning, she does not think her race makes her superior to the underclasses- the Ghiscari, on the other hand..

2- Daenerys is an imperialist.

Wrong.

I am not going to touch on the fact that we are speaking of a 20th-century concept when speaking about a piece of fiction depicting a magical medieval world.

Daenerys' intentions have never been set up an Empire with her as Head. What she wants is to end slavery. Period. This will also explain her taking over the Dothraki, not only because she wants an army, but because the Dothraki are great suppliers of slaves.

She stays in Meereen because first if she leaves before the transition is way underway, they Ghiscari Elites will enslave the people she freed again. And, she wants to learn how to rule.

3- Daenerys is bloodthirsty

Wrong.

This is a show invention. Daenerys first impulse is NEVER to “ burn cities to the ground”, but she is constantly advised to do so.

4- Embracing Fire and Blood is the first sign of her tyranny.

Doubtful.

Daenerys is compared to Aegon, the Conqueror.

Aegon was not a lunatic who kept burning things. Quite the contrary- despite having the obvious advantage of three dragons, Aegon would give his enemies a fair warning before he went to war.

Most probably, Daenerys will repeat the two events that set Aegon to be King: the Field of Fire ( season 7) and burning the Red Keep ( as an analog for Harrenhal)

5- Daenerys going crazy is GRRM ending.

Doubtful.

First, DnD cited the “ she is a Targ and they are crazy” reason for her meltdown, which is bullshit.

Second, they retconned the whole thing in addition to changing the dynamic of Daenerys and her advisors.

SEASON 8 HAS NOT BEEN METICULOUSLY PLANNED SINCE SEASON 5- the retroactively going through scenes, changing their meaning or actually inverting their meaning, show just that.

Examples that impacted the story:

a- Theon did not make fun of Tyrion when they met in season one- it was the opposite- They retconned it because they made Tyrion, who is a bloodthirsty man with daddy issues who cares nothing about the smallfolk ( and was portrayed as that for four seasons) to be a pacifist. In that scene, they wanted to remind us that Tyrion is a nice guy, who can be a bit emotional. A turn for the character who, at season 4 had screamed that the populace of KL should have died during Stannis attack.

b-Daenerys did not force Jon to give up his Crown for her to go North- the one who made this demand was Cersei. But this is the version of the story that is in the mouths of the northern Lords- and neither Daenerys nor Jon rectify the mistake because, voilá---the writers decided that Daenerys IS Cersei now.

c- Targaryens never went North to fight against Starks, like Tyrion said they did, so really, the northerners could not still remember it because the fact never happened. ( and this episode, of the King Who Knelt, is in the History and Lore section- so, it is TV Canon)

d- Jaime had already told Brienne the truth about his actions during Robert´s rebellion when they weer at Harrenhal and why he killed the Mad King, but by season 8, that scene never happened- or Jaime had lied back then for no reason whatsoever.

e- Daenerys and Jon never spent time together during their childhood, but by season 8 she is telling him about when they were young and she could not count till 20...something that would only make sense if the dialogue was written for Jaime and Cersei.

f- The House of Undying vision of Daenerys had already been fulfilled by season 7. Daenerys had literally the chance to take the Iron Throne, but she chooses to go cross the Wall and go North. She gives up her plan to blow up the Red Keep- shown in the vision with a Seven-Pointed Star, meaning it was a “what could have been” they elected to retcon ( which can be attested because Daenerys, in the original version of the scene, mentions it as a difference between her vision and the reality.) to save Jon Snow North of The Wall.

Season 8 they inverted the chronological order of the vision to fit their plot- Daenerys is North and, instead of resting her troops, she goes South and for some reason ( madness) she destroys the whole thing with dragon fire, but miraculously, The Iron Throne remains. Drogon then sets fire on the Throne, which melts? ( why has not melted before? same reason Tyrion manages to find and recognize the corpses of his siblings- because logic does not matter.)

As their infamous Austin panel shows, DnD confirmed they were interested in writing scene for scene, not necessarily characters arcs or themes. They also said that they divorced the books since season 5, that they made GoT theirs, that the magical elements were downplayed and finally that they simplified the scope of ASOIAF to a “ Power is everything” mentality.

Power being their concern explains why the series is called “ Game of Thrones”, which is just the name of the first book.

GRRM is often quoted as not believing in heroes...but in fact: he does. What he does not believe in are in perfect, never at fault heroes:

“My own heroes are the dreamers, those men and women who tried to make the world a better place than when they found it, whether in small ways or great ones. Some succeeded, some failed, most had mixed results... but it is the effort that's heroic, as I see it. Win or lose, I admire those who fight the good fight.”

Note that DnD gave this definition of hero- the ones who try to make the world a better place- a sentence that Daenerys repeats at least a couple of times during seasons 6 and 7.

and again..while GRRM gives space for his heroes to “win or lose” ...and admits that most heroes “ had mixed results”...he does qualify them- the dreamers- as heroes nevertheless.

Therefore this vision...this black and white vision of Daenerys as Hitler with Dragons (incidentally- Alt-Right has been known to make claims that nazism- as in national socialism- was, in fact, a far-left movement.) that just because she started out freeing slaves by force, it never meant she was in fact, a hero, but a misguided despot in the making...is not GRRM, but Dave Benioff and Dan Weiss.

To place things in context, the producers of GoT are members of the Elites. Of course, they sympathize with characters like Sansa and Tyrion ( their admitted favorites) who are members of Elite- in case of Sansa, the Starks are what one could call benevolent aristocrats- but aristocrats nevertheless- and to them...it does make incredibly sense that a person who is willing to go as far as to challenge the Elites for the well being of the underclass by using violence ( Daenerys) would be a step away from being a Tyrant.

Am I saying that GRRM does not intend to make Dany crazy? I am not saying that. I cannot say what his intentions are. What I can say is that, in his own words, not only Daenerys, but most of the characters are going to be Darker in the next book. Possibly, keeping with the tone of the series, this means Daenerys will go grey.

Grey could very well choose to go for the Red Keep, as Aegon went to Harrenhal, despite innocents are being held there. Some people will call her crazy...others will see the actions as simply a part of a war.

I think he intends to allow readers to decide.

Personally though...I am not sure I am up to it anymore. By making Daenerys a victim of rape, one who not only survives and thrives, but chooses to fight against such inequalities instead of becoming the abuser ( Cersei) that he might use such character to discuss the limits of being a hero...I find it distasteful.

As of now, ASOIAF is shaping out to be one of many standard fantasy series. It has been sold as nothing of the sort, but as an inclusive, realistic portrayal of a generational saga where the main characters would have to contend with the mistakes of their fathers...but GoT leaves the impression that ASOIAF is, indeed, just white men´s wank.

#anti got #just saying

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occupyvenus · 6 years

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Do you think that maybe the reason why Jon didn't share anything personal with Dany is because he was trying to deny his feelings for her by keeping things less personal as possible? And 7.07 he was finally deciding to love her?

Hi, nonny!

You know what, the first thing I’ll have to admit is that is that’s a valid argument. It’s completely possible and I have no real way to just outright refute it. It would be mostly in character for Jon, I would expect D&D to be more clear about (in the writing itself, not the additional commentary. That’s not a very reliable source for anything in my opinion… Jon snow is dead as dead, y’all) it if it was the case, but that isn’t a very solid argument on it’s own either.

Before I go on to explain why I believe it’s unlikely, at least in my opinion, I would like to point out tree thing considering the “political jon” theory and j0nerys in general. Buckle up, I will go off topic here.

1) While the theory gives a sufficient explanation for Jon’s behaviour in ep6 and ep7 without him having any romantic feelings towards Dany, it does not necessarily mean that he has none at all. It’s plausible that he is at least attracted and/or intrigued with her. He might even have stronger feelings than this. I’ll go into why I personally don’t believe this a bit later, but there’s no way for me to objectively deny it either.

2) I honestly expected Jon and Dany to have some sort of romantic entanglement (unintentional incest is something that grrm would definitely do), but even with this in possibility in mind, it would still be bad storytelling. I’m not talking about the way it was presented per se, but the implications for Dany’s character development in particular. What really bothers me, or rather what makes me question the romance presented by the show, is the fact that both Jon’s newfound political conviction (Dany should rule the seven kingdoms, he gives up Northern independence to Dany freely because he believes in her cause) seems to perfectly align with his personal feelings (he’s genuinely in love with her). It’s too easy. Dany doesn’t has to give up either to gain the other. Her relationship with Jon comes without cost.

This actually halts Dany’s character development. Or at least, it doesn’t actively further it. She gets everything she wants, both another kingdom’s allegiance and the man she has feelings for. There is no lesson for her to be learned by entering this relationship. She doesn’t have to make a hard choice, there’s no more interpersonal tension for her. No tension means no drama. No drama means no arc. No arc means no story. No story means no point. In the end, she doesn’t even have to decide between fighting the dead or fighting for the Throne. Though this will mostly likely be an issue next season. It all adds up too nicely. Dany should have to make some hard decisions, because that is how a character grows. This should also apply to her relationship with Jon, something that should be of foremost significance to her overall character development. That’s just something I would expect from a romantic relationship between two main characters. Dany should either remain unrelenting on her position on Northern Independence, straining her personal relationship with Jon, or she should be willing to enter a personal relationship with Jon, without also gaining his political support as a subject. Jon saying something like “I love you, but I can’t bend the knee because my people and all.” and Dany being all “I don’t care and stuff” or “I’ll bend the knee, but just so you know I’m not happy about it. I hate that you force me to do this.” and Dany being “I’m sorry you feel that way, but I’ve been working towards this goal half my life and I can’t give you a pass because I’m into you and stuff”.

Some people might accuse me of thinking so because I begrudge her both political and personal happiness, but it simply doesn’t make for a compelling character arc or story. These issues could/should be resolved at the end of the series, not when we still have 6 feature-film long episodes ahead of us. Even if you could explain the, in my opinion unsatisfying development of their romance by saying Jon was simply denying his feelings, this is a critique that remains. Even the revelation of r+l=j would be a rather weak source of conflict if Dany and Jon are in a mutual, deep, sincere relationship AND agree on her being the rightful queen of the seven kingdoms.The romantic relationship between two major characters having no real personal tension during the entire finale season … just sounds implausible to me. Even if their relationship was later hindered by external sources, there should be internal sources of conflict as well, something that they have to resolve in the course of the next season. This is something from a pure story-telling perspective that bugs me about the j0nerys romance in season 7. In my opinion, the marge!Jon theory builds a compelling case in remediating this little problem (in addition to explaining some of the other ooc moments of the season). Don’t get me wrong, all these things can line up … all conflict should be resolved eventually, but not before the conclusion of the story. Not this soon into Jon and Dany’s shared arc.

3) My opinions about all this are of course influenced by my other ideas about the series’s final conclusion. I’m trying to stay as unbiased as possible when talking about the actual direction the series could take (compared to my personal preferences), but my opinion on something as important as the relationship between two major characters is not going to be unaffected by my other opinions, expectations, speculations, theories, conclusions, etc. I do not believe that Dany will win the Iron Throne (a believe I already explained in other posts, and I won’t go into more detail here. This is already long enough), I actually believe her to take an antagonistic role at some point before the finale (I will refer you to the grrm approved “Untying the meereenese knot” essays, or anything on my blog tagged as dark!dany. But be warned: there’s probably an equal amount of warranted critique and salty wank in there.) I obviously believe Jonsa to be a thing by the end of the series (again there are many, many posts and metas on why I believe this on my blog), and while I don’t believe that a romance between Dany and Jon would necessarily forecloses the possibility of my ship happening, which means I’m not desperate enough to oppose “the other ship” by all means, it obviously makes me more critical and suspicious. Claiming anything else would be dishonest. But since believing in the ship, or at least seeing it as a foregone conclusion, makes you less critical and suspicious… you know what I’m getting at. There’s no escape from confirmation bias.

Now, back to the original topic (and this is probably the most biased thing about this entire answer): My biggest argument against this (beside from the one mentioned in point 2) is that Jon has no reason to be in love with her. He certainly has reasons to be attracted to her or intrigued. But I can’t find something that would lead him to develop deeper feelings.

Other than saving him from a suicide mission he only went on because she wouldn’t help him without proof for either herself or Cersei, Jon hasn’t really seen anything that would endear her to him. She does not leave a good impression at their first meeting, she later basically makes him her prisoner, refuses to form an alliance on any other basis than him bending the knee (in contrast to the one she formed with Asha and Theon), he does not seem too happy about her decision to use her dragons (even if she burned an army instead of a city) and as I already mentioned in my political Jon posts, her prioritizing her position in the south over the survival of his people should not exactly make him like her better either. It should be really hard for her to redeem herself for all this in Jon’s eyes, especially to the point where he develops genuine romantic feelings for her.

Some people will argue that saving his life north of the wall was enough, I would argue that since she’s the main reason he even had to put himself in such danger in the first place … it wouldn’t be. So that’s something we could argue about to no end. He says that she has “a good heart”, but we never see Jon witness anything that would bring him to this conclusion. Missandei compliments Dany and tells Jon that “she is the queen we chose”… when Dany is demanding he bends the knee to her … even though his people chose HIM …and not her. He even questions Danys goodness of heart in this very conversation when asking Missandei whether she truly believes that Dany would allow her to leave.

I don’t think that Dany’s wish to be “extraordinary”, her lamenting the confinement and subsequent demise of dragons because it changed her family into “being just like everyone else” after listening to Jorah explaining what makes dragons so dangerous they had to be locked away in the first place, is something that Jon could relate to or appreciate or find particularly attractive. To me, his response “you’re not like everybody else”, sounds like him simply telling her what she wants to hear. Not like him expressing his own thoughts. And despite what some people think Jon is really observant and knows what buttons to push:

Guest right or no, Jon Snow knew he walked on rotten ice here. One false step and he might plunge through, into water cold enough to stop his heart. Weigh every word before you speak it, he told himself. He took a long draught of mead to buy time for his answer. When he set the horn aside he said, “Tell me why you turned your cloak, and I’ll tell you why I turned mine.”

Mance Rayder smiled, as Jon had hoped he would. The king was plainly a man who liked the sound of his own voice. “You will have heard stories of my desertion, I have no doubt.“

ASOS, Jon I

He has appealed to this certain characteristic before, when Dany asks for his opinion on the beach: “The people who follow you know that you made something impossible happen….”. Btw, I don’t think that Dany lashing out against her advisors left a particularly good impression either…. Not that Dany didn’t have a reason to be upset, but despite just coming from their “romantic” cave scene (romantic in lightning, setting, score and some facial expressions. Not so romantic when you think about the topic they talked about… but that’s another issue. Let’s just note this one as a bonding moment), the first real bonding moment between them this is his reaction when Dany tells to him to stay during their little war council:

I don’t know, this doesn’t look like repressed romantic feelings to me. (I actually managed to add both a book quote and a gif.sry about the shitty quality, I made this rather quickly.)

And even if Jon was simply hiding his true feelings, the show could have easily done a better job at showing this. Most notably when he leaves Dragonstone to go beyond the Wall. When Dany is taking another step to close the gap between them and he doesn’t react. When Jorah turns around to take a last look at the woman he loves, only emphasizing the fact that Jon doesn’t. The show could have easily written in a scene to make Jon calling her “Dany” in ep6 more plausible. To make this sudden shift from “I wish you good fortunes in the wars to come your grace” less … random. A scene where she offers to converse on a first-name basis, but he declines because “it wouldn’t be appropriate”, for example. Something to stress that he is fighting against these feelings. They could have written in a scene of Jon sharing something before the dragonpit meeting at the beginning of ep7, after the first time he appears to reciprocate her feelings on the boat, or even at some point between the dragonpit meeting and their journey back north. If this was the grand love story of the series I’m sure they could have sacrificed 1 or 2 minutes of screentime to give them some proper, mutual bonding time before doing the deed. Why not replace the group discussion with both of them having a private conversation about their journey north? They could have discussed the same issues. Instead Jon gets another one-one-one scene with Theon, where they talked about their shared daddy issues. (… btw, Jon saying that he isn’t always as good as it seems … it’s just…) Instead we get Jorah worrying about Dany’s safety, while Jon cares more about how her arrival should look like to the north. Then of course there is the issue about how their sex-scene was filmed (no first kiss, no undressing, etc.), but I’m going to leave this discussion for another time. Other people have already talked about this as well.

Now of course all of this is open to interpretation and different people will have vastly different views on this. This is just my own. I simply can’t refute the possibility of Jon denying his feelings because of that. But in my opinion there are still so many things that don’t add up. For me, there are simply one too many indications for Jon lying about or exaggerating his feelings (though… he never actually said anything about them) and too many missed opportunities to establish an actual romance.

Also, this doesn’t fit into Jon’s theme of learning from his predecessors mistakes. Robb did the same thing, “betraying” his people by giving in to love (at least on the show. Something that was brought up again in s6 for no reason by lord glover … though D&D might just love to use the word “whore”, who knows?). If we consider Jon to be the final big “hero” of this story he should learn a lesson from every “hero” that came before him. Now, if he had decided to love her by the end of the season, while still refusing to “betray” his people and their trust by bending the knee it would be a different story entirely.

I will leave it at that. I’m not sure most of this even makes sense and I let my mind run free about this little innocent question for long enough.

#Anonymous #ask #marge!Jon #undercover jon #political jon #the northern fool #anti-jonerys #i suppose #my stuff #meta #ish #got #long post

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