She is sworn to protect the Stark girls. If she follows after her man instead of doing her job, that really will be an indication that the writers have totally fucked it up.
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Agreed.
More on the writersâ shitty treatment of their âstrong female characters;â
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Itâs particularly inexcusable when we recall that Westeros is not just Fantastic Metaphorical Britain, itâs actually Fantastic Metaphorical Britain-and-Iberia. All the lands south of London Kingâs Landing are supposed to be covered with palm trees and brown people, and I believe Alexander Siddigâs character is still alive and his people are still involved in the plot ⌠in the books 
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Her statement to the hound had me cursing under my breath, and when she told Tyrion I was speechless. I felt like this was the old naĂŻve Sansa again. And I really dislike her inner monologues in the books: sheâs abysmally stupid there, AFAIR. The writers made her different from that - or so I thought âŚ
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The problem is that the showrunners have basically come right out and said that their only motivations now are subverting expectations. Hey, you didnât expect another dragon to get shot out of the sky! There, we did it.
Decisions no longer have any real weight. Outcomes arenât the result of plot machinations. Itâs just about getting Twitter mentions. Itâs twists for the sake of twists (in contrast to, say, killing Ned, which while surprising was the result of a whole season of decisions) while at the same time giving fans what they want (D&D admit they made Lady Mormont a badass because Twitter liked her first appearance, and that they didnât kill off more characters in E3 because the fans would want each one to have their own meaningful death).
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Just realized I forgot to watch GoT last Sunday.
THAT has never happened in 7.3 seasons.
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I havenât seen anything from them stating that. They said in interviews that they made her a more major character because the actress was so fantastic that it inspired them to give her more material.
They have said, indeed, that in writing the show they try to subvert typical fantasy tropes â the fat guyâs the bumbling comic relief, women are weak sex objects, the main male hero gets to save the day â but Iâm not sure where youâre getting this âTwitter mentionsâ thing. Thatâs honestly like saying theyâre writing the show to make MySpace happy.
The things you mention remind me of a simple test that I do when things like this happen: how would it be if the genders were reversed?
Take Sansa: what if it were a boy instead of Sansa who had all this happened to him, and survived to say this to the Hound? It could still work, I suppose, and would just be accepted as âhey, it just made me tough.â As the wannabe Barbie Girl that Sansa was at the beginning of the series, it comes off differently.
And Brienne should have reacted differently, that is true. The writers would never have had, say, Jamie crying like this if Brienne had told him she was leaving to go to the North with Tormund, because she had to. (EDIT: after I wrote this, I actually could imagine it, and when Jamie then decides to go to Kingâs Landing, itâs because it was his heart that was broken by Brienne, so he runs back to his sister. And that would have been more interesting!)
The only, only out I will allow is if the actors themselves suggested those moments. And reading about how Gwendoline Christie reacted to her characterâs fate, it does seem plausible that she herself suggested using that âkick in the gutsâ feeling she had on screen. Have a good cry, but then get back to work.
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One thing that bothered me last season and bothers me even more this season is how nobody uses scouts any more. No recon, no one riding or sailing in advance to make sure the coast is clear. Bron didnât do any warg-scouting until the battle was well underway, and he could be intercepting ravens left and right, or even warging into ravens to listen in. If he canât, then a quick scene between him and Sam where Sam suggests it and Bran says âit doesnât work like thatâ would suffice.
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While I detest the way they wrote Brienne for that scene, I will give them one possible âoutâ â besides the sex (oh, come on, guys, really?), she had been seeing a noble, heroic, humble, transformed Jaime, so to hear him basically give up, admit that heâs a horrible human being deep down, and that he was essentially addicted to Cersei was as much a cause for heartbreak as losing your source of bedtime companionship.
Yeah, itâs too bad they donât have freakinâ soul-linked direwolves to help scout things out. You know, the ones the show made such a huge deal about for the first few seasons and then dropped as if theyâd never existed? The directors say that (in a show that features people riding dragons and fighting zombie giants) that Jon giving Ghost a goodbye pat on the head would be too expensive to film. I guess compassion just isnât in the budget.
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I guess I am generous at heart, because thatâs how I interpreted it.
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Given the things that happened to her, thatâs the problem. Men and boys are sexually assaulted and abused, and basically get told to shut up because âwhat doesnât kill you makes you strongerâ. Itâs toxic as fuck and leaves them feeling that they canât get help or even acknowledge their trauma. The horrificness of that message doesnât change just because you change the gender.
Now, you might argue that this is a swords and magic fantasy world, but I will argue that in fiction the writers can always make different choices. The stories we tell ourselves matter, especially the fiction ones, because those stick in our subconscious and form the filters through which we see the world. And that particular one is made of toxic waste.
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For what itâs worth, while I totally agree that rape as a tool for growth is a fucked-up idea, I took Sansaâs speech to mean that if sheâd gone away with the Hound, she knew heâd have sheltered her and kept her hidden away, whereas as awful as her experiences were, getting away from her sheltered castle life also pushed her out of being the awful person she used to be. Littlefinger was a loathsome person but she learned how to think three steps ahead and think politically from her time with him.
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All valid points from both of you, but out of the (admittedly narrow) scope of my test of whether the scenes themselves were gender-swappable. Whether the authors of this episode were using cliches or not.
And now Iâm thinking about Johnny Cashâs song âA Boy Named Sueâ.
âŚI got all choked up and threw down my gun
Called him my pa and he called me his son
And I came away with a different point of view.
And I think about him now and then
Every time I try and every time I win
And if I ever have a son, I think Iâm gonna name him
Bill or George, anything but Sue! I still hate that name!
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The more I think about it, the more it seems inevitable that nobody will be sitting on the Iron Throne at the end of this show.
Itâs been the MacGuffin for so long that if the series ends with just another ruler sitting on it, well, so what? I feel like the only way this show can end is for the Iron Throne to be destroyed â melted by dragonfire or something â and for things to go off in a whole new direction. No old dynasties being revived, no more Lannisters or Baratheons or whatever in charge. Whether itâs Varys plotting out a whole new government or Bran being a sort of mystic king, thereâs no way the series is going to end with King Jon Snow sitting on that spiky throne looking all sad.
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Bran is the most massive, game-breaking intelligence asset in the entire Game of Thrones universe. Heâs like Sauron if Sauron had gotten his Ring back. Leaving him behind while the rest of Team Dany goes south to be slaughtered makes no rational sense. Probably GRRM would not have left him alive after the Long Night for just this sort of reason.
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Yes. And heâs the most under used. All that power, and he sits there for two plot points?
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Is it even two?
There were never any consequences for Jamie for trying to murder him. Sam independently learned about Jonâs paternity. Arya lived in Essos, she could have gotten a Valyrian steel dagger from anybody.
They could have written Bran out entirely and it wouldnât really change anything.
Except for the whole revealing-the-male-heir-to-the-throne bit.
