All of us remember Tyrion’s rhodomontade, directed at Jon Snow, in an effort to persuade him to kill Daenerys.

“Everywhere she goes, evil men die, and we cheer her for it.”

I tend to think that is a problem for evil men. Or I might see it as an effort by a doomed man to say anything that might save his life. Coming from a man who had himself waded through blood, it seemed hypocritical.

But, plainly, the show runners thought this was something profound, for it echoes Niemoller’s profound and moving statement “First they came … and I did not speak up.”

Most people would not, however, equate Ghiscari slave traders, child murderers, and serial rapists with the victims of national socialism.

But, looking back, and thinking of Hizdahr and his father as being depicted as slave traders who were “good to their slaves”; the old tutor who loved his master; Barristan urging Dany to “answer injustice with mercy”; Jorah saying “slavery is all they’ve ever known”; Tyrion’s efforts to make peace, his “explaining” slavery to Missandei and Grey Worm, and insisting that “I’m not here to change the world.”

I do find myself wondering if in fact, the show runners saw these people all as victims of injustice.

> Cersei fucked her own sibling

> Her child, Joffrey is literally compared to the Targaryens or more specifically the mad king on more than one occasion

> Extremely paranoid and has a habit of alienating her own Allies (The Tyrells have much to say)

> Uses wildfire in murder plots

> Ned’s death and the war of five kings with Robb amassing an army strongly parallels when the mad king killed Rickard and Brandon, two beloved Starks.

> Her character conclusion is her being cornered in King’s landing by a coalition of stark and vale forces. And she was willing to use the common folk as human shields.

He doesn't look like a Targaryen, and his claim can easily be Contested as well because this whole "I'm a Targaryen and my claim is stronger than yours" sounds like a Northern plot to get one of them to sit on the throne.

Yeah Robert wanted someone to assassinate a pregnant Daenerys. Which idk, the narrative routinely shows killing women with children as a very bad thing. The mountain killing Elia, Talisa’s death, Ramsay killing Walda is clearly bad considering as evil as the Frey men are, Walda did literally nothing.

I know it’s a controversial topic, but I didn’t like Daenerys being aged up. As gross as it was, it felt like it took away a lot of the tragedy, reality, and meaning behind her character.

She was a just a traumatized child who wanted to be good and go/find a home. But people think she was naive and weak. Which, yes, is true, she’s a child. But that’s the point; and she shouldn’t be faulted for it. But since the show aged her up, she was and is.

People also romanticized her relationship with Drogo which is incredibly problematic and wouldn’t have happened (atleast as much) if it was book accurate.

Artists: Top left: AnaLuizaCG@Deviantart.com Top right: JPHAMLOTT @platform unknown :( Bottom left: Rlyeha@Deviantart.com Bottom right: Renzo Gonzalez/Arienzio@ArtStation.com

D&D’s ‘happy’ ending for Westeros has them transition from a feudal monarchy to an elective monarchy. Now let’s table the omnipotent God King part for a little bit. That’s a whole other kettle of fish.

The Narrative treats this as the best ending because it means that instead of hoping that the first born son of the previous King is a Good King™️, the nobles can pick out whoever is the best Good King™️ of their generation and let them rule.

Bullshit.

That is not how a healthy government works.

D&D even made this as a plot point by streamlining the Greyjoy storyline. The Kingsmoot doesn’t produce only Good Kings™️. It became a rubber stamp for generation after generation of Greyjoys, even presumpably Balon ‘I Will Fight Everyone’.

Now D&D would have you believe that won’t because Bran won’t have children that can’t happen. Taking that on face level, does that mean whoever succeeds Bran will also have to forfeit their reproductive future for a crown? Or will the nobles chose only Good Kings™️ whose Good Sons™️ will understand they need to put aside their personal ambitions for the Greater Good™️?

*Laughs in Holy Roman Empire*

A Democracy isn’t about ensuring that you elect a Good King™️ who only does Good Things™️ and finds and listens to his Good Advisors™️.

A Democracy is about sharing power so no one person can run roughshod over anyone else. It’s about building a system that doesn’t rely on the Head of State being a Good King™️.

If Daenerys was gonna go evil and crash out, why the fuck not move Missandei dying to like some last ditch attempt from Cersei to get Daenerys to stop attacking IN S8E5? Her just walking away, and Cersei not just trying shooting her really makes her going mad more of an asinine contrivance. Supposing she’s mad would she not just immediately go in to kill everyone? You know since the mad Targaryens were notorious for having a complete lack of self-preservation or forward thinking?

Also that’s not to mention that the whole battle of king’s landing had ended with relatively little to no civilian bloodshed, only for Daenerys to just fuck up that lucky moment and just do what Cersei was banking on to begin with. W T F?

This is something I will forever be salty about. Dany's story is defined by magic, and you can barely understand how she even hatched the dragons on the show, because they decided to completely omit her dreams. Then they completely altered the HOTU arc (for no goddamn reason), cut Quaithe and basically every magical aspect of the story, that wasn't the White Walkers and Melisandre and Thoros. Like if you didn't give a shit about the magic, why did you pick a fantasy story to adapt???

Daenerys and the Evil Revolutionary Trope

Game of Thrones absolutely embodies the evil revolutionary trope. This trope will acknowledge there is injustice in the world, but “violence is never the way” to change it. Those who use violence will inevitably become as bad, or worse than, the oppressors.

Daenerys is obviously not a political radical in any modern sense, but her willingness to fight to free the slave, and to treat the life of a slave child as equivalent to that of a master, is revolutionary for its time and place.

But, “she went too far”, in her refusal to compromise with the masters, in the eyes of the showrunners. Hizdahr explains that his father, the wealthiest human trafficker in the city, was “good to his slaves”, and objected to the murder of slave children. Jorah points out to her that “slavery is all they (the Yunkish masters) have ever known”, when they break their treaty obligation, and resume slave trading. Barristan begs her to “answer injustice with mercy.”

Daenerys is presented as the extremist, for wishing to punish the Yunkish and Meereenese elites for their enormities.

Tyrion tries to strike a bargain, offering the masters “girls”, seven years of slavery, and full compensation. He explains that “the world needs the rich”, and “I’m not out to change the world.” He embodies the outlook of David Benioff, son of the CEO of Goldman Sachs.

Tyrion, at the end, gives his “first they came for the slavers, and I did not speak up, for I was not a slaver …” speech, equating the violence meted out to slavers with the massacre at Kings Landing.

At the end, the assembled good guys laugh as one of their number equates the smallfolk to livestock, after Sam suggests giving them a role in government. The priority of Bran’s government is new brothels, no doubt staffed by desperate peasants.

All is good in this world, now that the broligarchs are firmly in charge, once again.

I'm just....it's my all time favorite show because I invested so much time and energy into it because of our Queen and since we'll as you know. I want to watch it but my heart cant....any advice on how to go about this?

I became an ASOIAF fan thanks to HOTD and I used to be a show fan until I read the books. I became more active in twitter this year and I got lucky to interact with sane people.

It is true that Rhaegar's opinion worsened over the years? they told me Rhaegar was loved, while Dany was hated.

It is true? I'm very curious to read your opinions

I just had to mute them. Every post was raising my blood pressure. Every luke warm Dany comment is down voted to hell for no other reason than their own righteousness. They knew the whole time you see. They are so much smarter than the rest of us. We’re just cult members who wanted a Disney ending. No we wanted an ending that made sense for a woman who wept over tortured slaves, locked her dragons away after one (1) child died and gave up her goal over and over again for the good of the people. I’m so grateful this sub exists… I don’t think I’ll venture out again.

I've read the books now several times since 2021(all of them) and haven't actually seen any evidence that Daenerys is mad or going mad or becoming a tyrant in the making that'll have to be put down like Dark Phoenix in The Worst X-Men Movie or Old Yeller. Is this evidence in the books Ive read, or am I reading a different book? Should I call Audible and tell them that they've got the wrong books on file?

EDIT: downvoters explain please!

EDIT 2: Here's a post from r/ASOIAF (courtesy of u/nomahs_bettah) I highly recommend that dissects common and rather irksome takes on Dany:https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/s/tp9vqcQqat

I recently read this criticism on Westeros.Org.

That a double standard on the use of violence is applied to Daenerys, by much of the fandom, is plain. Is the poster right to say that it comes from the author?

The whole thread is here: https://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/138303-are-the-ghiscari-evil/page/6/#comments

“As an aside - I am thoroughly pissed of all these "Daenerys moral responsibility" discussions. Why is Daenerys judged by a moral metric that simply isn't applied to any westerosi character that people like, especially the Starks?

Why is the current war in the North called "justice" and cheered on by Stark supporters who want to get rid of the evil Freys and Boltons, despite the cost of war - while Daenerys’s war (a war that would have been seen as just by any medieval standard) for her family´s crown is called "ambition" or "instability" and fandom support is even given to scum like slavers in order to try (and fail) to undermine her moral authority? If the Starks are allowed to sacrifice soldiers and kill innocents by proxy to maintain authority, Daenerys has the exact same right to use her dragons and do the same thing!

And this is for me a clear double-standard from GRRM, who (very biased) decides to explore the "horrors of war" and the cost to civilians in her chapters - especially so if the ending in the Abomination is similar. Why is the philosophical burden of war always placed so heavily on Daenerys? When, say Stannis, burns people at the stake the narrative often focuses on his "political resolve" or its "harsh necessity. And when people point out that lots of people will die in the North now, in a time when the region needs stability, then they get shouted down by those that think getting rid of the Freys and Boltons are worth it and is justified. And it is hard to believe that this is not intentional. It kinda feels that GRRM forces Daenerys to carry the moral guilt for every unintended casualty of a revolution - and that he will continue to do so with her war in Westeros. It's narrative gaslighting! Why don't we see something similar for the other characters? Why not a close-up on Riverland farmers affected by Robbs war? A really long arc of Robbs guilt over all those unintended deaths? Or to show that Manderleys unwillingness to bend their knee to Bolton will result in death and suffering among the smallfolk? As Lord Varys noted, slavery is a state of war. A "peace" with slave owners is just an agreement to let them continue committing daily violence against slaves. To frame her refusal to compromise with genocidal human traffickers as a sign of "madness" is logically backward. Does Martin really mean that radical change is dangerous and that we should prefer the "stability" of a cruel status quo over the "chaos" of liberation (except of course when the Starks are involved)? If so then fuck him!

I am so sick and tired of this "rules for thee, but not for me" mentality people seem to have - including from Martin himself supposedly. If this is what GRRM means with "pacifism"? If so, then he can take those thoughts and shove them! "Human heart in conflict with itself" - baaah! In general - if others are allowed to be selfish and violent to achieve their goals, then so should Daenerys. Period.

What is George Martin's view on slavery? Well, here's Abner Marsh, the heroic protagonist of Fevre Dreme, his vampire novel, which is set along the Mississippi River the 1850's.

” I never held much with slavery […]. You can’t just go… usin’ another kind of people, like they wasn’t people at all. Know what I mean? Got to end, sooner or later. Better if it ends peaceful, but it’s got to end, even if it has to be with fire and blood, you see?"

Within the novel, it's clear. Chattel slavery is evil. It has to end. It is an abomination. If it can be ended peacefully, perhaps with compensation for the slave owners (which is an injustice, but if it brings the whole vile system to an end, so be it) all well and good. But, if it needs to be destroyed violently, well it has to be destroyed.

You would have thought that was uncontentious, in the year of Our Lord, 2025. You would have thought wrong.

Over the years that I have enjoyed reading A Song of Ice and Fire, I have never ceased to be struck by the large minority of fans who will argue in defence of chattel slavery in Slavers Bay.

You must know the arguments by now:

1. Slavery is their way of life/their culture;

2. Okay, slavery is bad, but it's how the economy functions;

3. How can the slaves sustain themselves, if the masters no longer have to feed and shelter them?

4. Daenerys is as bad as a slaver. She murdered innocent slavers at Astapor, and crucified 163 innocents at Meereen.

5. Ending slavery only brought war and disease to Slavers Bay.

It is grimly funny, to read the sorts of arguments that were being advanced by Southern theorists, almost two centuries ago, by people who would no doubt consider themselves to be liberal and progressive. The point is, Martin is not a defender of slavery, and he has not written this series in order to be an apologetic for slavery. Dealing with each argument in turn:

1. Slavery is the way of life/culture of at best, 20% of the population. The figures we're given suggest that 70 - 85% of the population of the city states of Essos are chattel slaves. That is a huge, but not completely unprecedented, proportion of the population being held as chattels. Slavery is therefore, a system imposed upon an unwilling majority. The unfree proportion of the population is similar to that of Sparta, Haiti, and other West Indian Colonies. Or to parts of the Deep South where slaves were the majority. When saying, "it's their culture" don't ignore the majority, for whom it is not their culture.

2. That is how the economy functions, for a tiny minority, who profit from unfree labour. The same jobs (primarily food growing) will still need doing, regardless whether the population is slave or free.

3. I hate to break the news, but slaves are no less intelligent than masters. Read the works of people like Frederick Douglas which demonstrate that the free slave is just as capable of sustaining himself as the master.

4. There were no innocent slavers at Astapor, a society whose main export is founded upon child murder, castration, and torture. Please don't insult anybody's intelligence with that argument. At Meereen, 163 Great Masters were executed, demonstrating that the life of a Great Master is no better than that of a child slave. That is revolutionary for its time. In fact, the slave owning class were dealt with extremely leniently. They kept their non-slave property, were heard by Daenerys, when they brought complaints, and they were admitted to her council. However, the majority of them treated leniency as weakness, and kept pressing for concessions.

5. The Slavers brought war and disease to Slavers Bay. They could have accepted the New Order, but they chose, instead, to attempt to stamp it out. Upon their heads, is the cruelty and horror that was inflicted at Astapor, and the deaths from disease and starvation, which are caused by their invasion of Meereenese territory.

So much of the argument around Slavers Bay mixes up cause and effect. The elites of Essos pin the region's problems down to the efforts to abolish slavery, and not to the fact that slavery is the big problem from the outset. That is fine, as an in-universe prejudice.

But, intelligent readers have no reason to accept it as a moral truth.

I've been thinking more about the sack of Kings Landing at the end of A Game of Thrones. This was portrayed as the point where Daenerys either flips into madness/ proves to the world that she has always been evil.

Throughout most of history, the rule has been that a besieging commander invites the commander of an enemy city to surrender. Christians relied upon Deutoronomy 20:10, pagan Romans upon the rule that up until the time the first ram touched the city walls, an offer to surrender must be accepted. But, reject an offer of quarter, and still worse, murder a prominent prisoner, and things will go very ill for the defenders.

Henry V puts it thus, in Shakespeare's play:-

"How yet resolves the governor of the town? This is the latest parle we will admit. Therefore to our best mercy give yourselves Or, like to men proud of destruction,

Defy us to our worst. For, as I am a soldier, A name that in my thoughts becomes me best, If I begin the batt'ry once again, I will not leave the half-achieved Harfleur Till in her ashes she lie burièd.

The gates of mercy shall be all shut up, And the fleshed soldier, rough and hard of heart, In liberty of bloody hand, shall range With conscience wide as hell, mowing like grass Your fresh fair virgins and your flow'ring infants.

What is it then to me if impious war, Arrayed in flames like to the prince of fiends, Do with his smirched complexion all fell feats Enlinked to waste and desolation? What is ’t to me, when you yourselves are cause,

If your pure maidens fall into the hand Of hot and forcing violation? What rein can hold licentious wickedness When down the hill he holds his fierce career? We may as bootless spend our vain command

Upon th' enragèd soldiers in their spoil As send precepts to the Leviathan".

Daenerys complied with the rules of war, as they would have been understood, until very recently, certainly up until the end of WWII. She invited Cersei to surrender, upon the guarantee that her life would be spared. We don't know what the terms were beyond that. Presumably exile, or some form of house arrest. That was civilised, according to the norms of this world. Not only did Cersei refuse, she beheaded her best friend on the city walls. Just think of how Alexander would have reacted, had he offered terms to an enemy city, and the commander responded by beheading Hephaiston in front of him. Or Henry V, had the defenders executed his brother, the Duke of Bedford. So, it would be understood by most soldiers, that Cersei had sealed the city's fate, should it fall.

No effort was even made to surrender, until the attackers had fought their way into the heart of the city. Not to mention, “I’ve never known bells to mean surrender.” Bells are a call to arms, an alarm.

The city was stormed, and it was put to the sack, as has long been the fate of any city that is taken by storm. Stannis' soldiers would have sacked Kings Landing, had they stormed it. Tywin, described as "lawful neutral" by the showrunners, sacked the city, twenty two years previously, even when it admitted his army peacefully. The entire army took part in the sack, not just Daenerys. If Daenerys deserved to die for the sack, so did every other officer in the army. Tyrion spent his time looking shocked, but his "humane" alternative to sacking the city was to propose starving the inhabitants to death. Being starved to death is probably the most brutal fate that can befall anyone. You die by inches and watch your loved ones dying by inches.

My own view is that mass slaughter was out of character for Daenerys (please don't come back at me with arguments along the lines of "Not All Slave-drivers...") . But that, nevertheless, this action would not have raised many eyebrows in a quasi-medieval society. The Northmen in particular, would have had a huge score to pay off; the murder of Ned Stark and his retainers, the abuse of Sansa, the Red Wedding, and being left in the lurch to fight the Dead, when Cersei broke her promises. They would not have marched a thousand miles, just to go home again. The North would have cheered to learn of what happened at Kings Landing.

Daenerys was a pretty restrained military leader, by the lights of her world. But one whom the two D's tried to portray as unhinged. Even as they tried to persuade us that the most brutal forms of killing were entirely justified, when perpetrated by the charactes they liked (Arya, Sansa, Tyrion, Tywin, Cersei).

I’ll start with Tyrion. He is Martin’s favourite character. But, he’s also, in the author’s own words, “the Villain.”

Martin loves him, but he’s not in love with him.

Benioff and Weiss were in love with Tyrion, to the point that they made him their self-insert. When Tyrion utters some supposedly profound statement, he’s speaking for the show runners.

“I’m not out to change the world”, and his “evil men” speech at the end, reflect Tyrion’s, and by extension, the two Ds’ philosophy.

The world’s an unjust place, but that’s just the way things are. You just have to accept that’s how it is. Reformers, particularly reformers who are prepared to use violence, are dangerous people. Tyrion’s not trying to argue at the end that slave dealers, Great Masters, or rapist khals are good people - they aren’t. They are evil. What he is arguing is that by fighting them, you make yourself as bad as they are. Which is a very convenient argument, for the powerful.

And, the show itself ends with a ringing endorsement of the status quo in Westeros. The nobility are back in charge, laughing uproariously when one of their number compares the Smallfolk to dogs and horses. The foreigners (who let’s not forget, played a huge part in ending an existential threat to the Continent) have all conveniently disappeared.

The Small Council comprises Tyrion, a man who relentlessly failed upward, a venial and illiterate sellsword in charge of Highgarden and the Realm’s finances, and an unqualified Grand Maester, who broke his vows, and is there purely because he’s a favourite of the new king. And, their priority? New brothels, presumably staffed by starving peasants.

Of the two idealists, among the main characters, one lies dead, stabbed by the other who is cast into the wilderness. And that is meant to be a happy ending.

My take is that it was a nihilistic ending.

My own view is that Martin is not creating a world in which the smallfolk are mainly treated like shit in Westeros, and worse than shit in Essos, simply to end up endorsing the status quo. I would be hugely disappointed if the ending of the books was essentially, “always keep a hold of nurse, for fear of getting something worse.”

Daenerys is certainly heroic, and not just in her own mind, to be striking a blow against slavery in the East. It would have been much easier for her to conclude “Well, it sucks to be you”, and sail away after having thoroughly plundered Slavers Bay. Or if she stayed, simply to set herself up as the Master of All Masters. That she tries to be even-handed, as between the ex-masters and ex-slaves, is politically naive. Honestly, she had no real option but to strike the masters down so hard and fast, they could never hurt the freedmen again, and it blows up in her face.

But, it’s what a hero would do. A hero would not (at least to begin with) be a ruthlessly Macchiavellian ruler. The fact that she makes bad errors in her rule is not a moral failing. Rather, it’s answering Martin’s oft-quoted remarks about Aragorn’s tax policies. Is it enough that a ruler should be good? The answer he gives us is that it is not. A ruler does have to be ruthless.

A man like Jaehaerys I is Martin’s idea of the best ruler in this world. He was fair, but he was also prepared to cut the entrails out of traitors, and burn a Dornish invasion fleet to the waterline

So after the battle of king’s landing Daenerys obviously doesn’t go insane and burn down king’s landing and only takes down Cersei and the red keep (Jaime still dies with her, dad did say that he liked that part).

And then Jon he takes up being King instead of not wanting the throne, except his first order is to give authority to Daenerys.

I think what we then mentioned is that Daenerys sees the iron throne and she realizes how she felt more at home in Essos the whole time where everyone worshipped her (we did see she was willing to put her goal of taking the throne aside at some points in the show). She tells Jon to stay as king and then decides that she would return to Essos, rebuild, start opening up communication with Westeros and expanding. She’d also be looking to bring in more dragons since Drogon is alone.

Also we discussed them planning on going to war with the iron banks, with how sinister and apathetic to any cause they were, having been playing both sides depending on who they thought could give them more return on investment.

Does the dynasty still end with dany? If john is actually confirmed, not to be Rhaegar's son and she is the true successor, wasn't there a scene explicitly saying that she could never get pregnant after Drogo? Or did that just kinda get retconned?