Anxious but cool-headed Dornish King Doran, smarter than the lot of them put together, knew what was going to happen and had his guards ready for action.
All true, except he’s Prince Doran, not King Doran. (“Prince” being the Dornish style for “Lord”)
I watched the new Mad Max yesterday. In a plot defined by male ownership of women, and with limited time away from the action for dialogue, those women talked about seeds, about hope, about practical plans, about grief and loss…
If you imagine there’s nothing for them to talk about other than powerful men, your imagination is stunted.
I think you’re unquestioningly accepting Rob’s weirdly-confusing phrasing of this. It’s completely silly to say that that scene, and the show in general, fail the Bechdel test, when that’s quite demonstrably wrong. (There have been multiple conversations in the past two episodes alone that pass the Bechdel test.)
Yes, the capture of Lady Olenna’s gay grandchild is what sparked their meeting, but their meeting was about far more. It was about power and control, they threatened each other’s alliances, talked about money and wheat, and discussed where the power really lies in the city and in the kingdom.
I believe Rob’s point, wrapped in the blogger-attention-getting reference to the Bechdel test, was that these women were butting up against the limits of their own power. That has nothing to do with the Bechdel test. It’s also soundly wrong. We haven’t yet met any practical limits to either of their power in their current positions due to gender. Cersei clearly rules the kingdom, and will continue to do so until her son grows a spine. (At which point her power will be diminished simply due to her sex, but again that has nothing to do with the Bechdel test.)
Sure, the scene was “because of” Sir Loras, although it was equally, if not more so, “because of” Margaery, and her and Cersei’s own power-struggle.
Sounds awesome! Could you give us a list of these shows?
He was hitting her because the lie was visible on her face. She was supposed to lie, just not get caught. Reference the story the other body washer told.
Tread lightly bathosfear or you’ll end up getting banned for a month for “victim-blaming” by someone donning a dragon mask.
@bathosfear @slickhead I’ll admit I watch the show for the dragons, but even I know that statement is wrong. She had no clue she was going there to marry that nut job.
Got to love confirmation bias bipeds.
Does it still fail the Bechdel test if the women discuss a gay man? Just curious.
The scene didn’t fail the Bechdel test: they were also arguing about the alliance between their houses, i.e., something other than a man.
This makes it (at least) the third time that the show took a strand from the novels and twisted it just so they could work in a rape scene. Why do they keep doing this, especially after being very publicly called out on it the last time? Are they afraid of losing viewership unless they up the ante every season by violating characters in more and more gruesome ways? Unless I’m totally mistaken about how they’ll adapt the book storyline, there’s no plot need for it whatsoever, and it actually undercuts character development. After giving Sansa a bigger role and hinting that she might be able to take charge of her own destiny for once, they just chuck it all away and go “nah, screw it, let’s just have her raped”. It was also hardly necessary for reminding viewers that Ramsay’s a monster and Theon is utterly broken, since the show has already gone out of its way to establish that in plenty of other horrifying scenes. They just seem to have gotten addicted to the emotional gut punch as an all-purpose device.
It never fails to surprise me how when the most obvious forms of sexism are discussed it quickly gets nasty on the comments threads.
I admit to not having read past book 4, but isn’t Sansa already married? To Tyrion? Did they annul that or do they just think he’s dead?
I can’t even remember anymore. I just want more dragons.
Actually I suspected that Sophie Turner’s pay grade would keep Sansa from getting raped like the character she replaces.
That the show fails to pass the Bechdel test, when the novels did (and easily), is yet more evidence of how the show is distinctly more sexist than the novels on which it’s nominally based.
How does the show (at least this episode) not pass the Bechdel test? During the Cersei/Olenna conversation, they talk about the alliances between their houses, i.e., something other than a man. Myrcella and one of the Sand Serpents talk about Myrcella leaving with her, and Myrcella not wanting to go. Even the conversation between Sansa and Miranda, Sansa talks about this being her home and puts down a boundary.
That doesn’t seem to count because it wasn’t consummated, but in the books Sansa is still in hiding and doesn’t marry Ramsay.
I’d even say they were primarily arguing about politics. While Olenna clearly cares for her grandson, she didn’t even talk about him as a person, and only referred to his political significance as the heir to House Tyrell.
Also, Cersei really is bloody stupid to have Loras and Margaery thrown in prison, but leaving the by far most dangerous member of that family free to exact vengeance on her.
Actually I suspect that the main point of it was to be a turning point for Theon. But of course that makes it worse — rape a main female character to provide some development for a male character.
At the very least, I felt that this episode gave the scene the gravity it deserved, instead of trying to pass it off as “consensual by the end” like they did with Cersei last season. And the show is very much about subverting the genre’s expectations, where we always expect the “good guys” to come out on top, only to be dashed down again and again. But this really seemed gratuitous, as it didn’t add anything.
I haven’t seen Mad Max, but the Bechdel Test website posted that it doesn’t pass the test for failing to name any woman other than Furiousa: http://bechdeltest.com/view/6242/mad_max:_fury_road/
In the books, Ramsay Bolton is married to Arya Stark. Except it’s not Arya Stark, it’s someone the Lannisters try to pass off as Arya Stark and someone the Boltons know isn’t Arya Stark, but to make a claim on Winterfell, accept the fiction.
While still having dialog and one or two more characters, Gravity comes close to that description…
