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Game of Thrones!

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Well that's one of the great things about this show. Almost all of the main characters are complex. They all have understandable and human motives (though certainly not always commendable). Off the top of my head, Joeffry and Lysa are two characters that are the most repugnant because of their psychoses. The rest, like Cersei, like most of the Lannisters, stand for principles and uphold them at any cost. The main principle being empowering and propagating the Lion bloodline. Tyrion is the one exception, he's so much softer and kind-hearted than his machiavellian, ice cold family. His cleverness and guile is near genius levels, and it's almost a miracle to me that he's managed to not be singled out and killed by his own family, though that clearly hangs in the balance now.

Jaime seems to be a wild card at this point. His whole getting captured/hand chopped off/Brienne softening, has changed him. And the way Cersei has friend-zoned him (for whatever reason) has also caused him to rethink his position. I'm interested to see what path he goes. I don't think he's ever really cared about the legacy of his family line, just his own personal legacy, the Kingslayer. Well that, and Cersei. But now that he's been dumped by his sister and lost his legendary warrior identity with the missing hand and all, I think he's struggling to re-define himself.

I agree with Jaime, he lost most of what was precious to him, now he has to find his own self again, he's the classic villain gone good character. The plot about him could be interesting, but I am afraid of him becoming the positive character stereotype. There was some kind of mistery about his persona when he playd the villain role.

On the other hand Tyrion was always the soft part of Lennister family, but he missed his "badass" outlook, which also took away a huge part of his charm. He was nice contradiction between sarcastic intelectual bohemian and soft harted ethical character, while now he's more just a...good dwarf. Such a shame.
 

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Well that's one of the great things about this show. Almost all of the main characters are complex. They all have understandable and human motives (though certainly not always commendable). Off the top of my head, Joeffry and Lysa are two characters that are the most repugnant because of their psychoses. The rest, like Cersei, like most of the Lannisters, stand for principles and uphold them at any cost. The main principle being empowering and propagating the Lion bloodline. Tyrion is the one exception, he's so much softer and kind-hearted than his machiavellian, ice cold family. His cleverness and guile is near genius levels, and it's almost a miracle to me that he's managed to not be singled out and killed by his own family, though that clearly hangs in the balance now.

I think the same thing that drives the Lannisters is what protects Tyrion. Despite everything, he's still a Lannister, and they are so inflexible that Tyrion himself is being protected. If his father didn't murder him at birth, he's certainly not going to murder him now. I expect the resolution to Tyrion's "trial" is going to be one that benefits the Lannisters in some ways.

I do see Cersei as somewhat complex, but I don't see her as admirable in the least. She is one of the least self-aware characters on the show, and for me personally that's a huge turn-off; she would rather hurt someone else than deal with her own shit. She is the type of person who feels horribly vulnerable any time she experiences a painful emotion, and to avoid having to explore it and grow stronger, she deflects it and finds an excuse to lash out and hurt someone else. She lives in constant denial moreso than any other non-insane character I can think of. One can try to excuse her because she is a woman in a world of men (although the majority of other women on the show are in worse predicaments and rise to the occasion) or because she's a Lannister (although Tyrion and Jaime are both more self-aware), but the reality is that she personally does not like feelings of vulnerability and so she punishes the people around her so that she doesn't have to deal with what that means. Look at how much she endured during Joffrey's reign of terror, while simply making excuses for him. She is weak, and she is a coward, prone to abuses to protect her own ego. About 80% of what comes out of her mouth is stupid talk.

Note: Obviously I'm referring to the show. I have no idea who she was in the book.

Jaime seems to be a wild card at this point. His whole getting captured/hand chopped off/Brienne softening, has changed him. And the way Cersei has friend-zoned him (for whatever reason) has also caused him to rethink his position. I'm interested to see what path he goes. I don't think he's ever really cared about the legacy of his family line, just his own personal legacy, the Kingslayer. Well that, and Cersei. But now that he's been dumped by his sister and lost his legendary warrior identity with the missing hand and all, I think he's struggling to re-define himself.

That last bit, very much -- he's lost his identity and is now starting to reconstruct it. That's why Oathkeeper was such a big deal. He will likely reclaim both his Lannister-dom and his warrior-ness to some degree as part of his new identity, but it will no longer be "who he is" in totality. He really could go in many directions at this point.
 

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I agree that Cersei is nuanced and complex. I just don't think she's a sympathetic character. I find her fascinating but repugnant. Same with Jaime, with a lesser degree of repugnance as the show goes on (with a hiccup at his rape of Cersei which at this point I guess I've just decided was mishandled by the showrunners, who couldn't even agree with themselves/each other that it was, in fact, rape). Very much agree that his struggle to re-define himself without his kickass swordsmanship and with the loss of his primary relationship makes him a fascinating and increasingly sympathetic character (again, minus the rape thing). I liked that his hitting "rock bottom," so to speak, allowed him to begin to be vulnerable about things that had bothered him all along (his being known as "kingslayer") but which bravado had helped him ignore until then.
 

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Reading more about the Bran/Hodor thing -- again, a different portrayal in the show than in the books.



... I liked that his hitting "rock bottom," so to speak, allowed him to begin to be vulnerable about things that had bothered him all along (his being known as "kingslayer") but which bravado had helped him ignore until then.

Still love that scene when Brienne calls him Kingslayer and he says in a moment of vulnerability, "Jaime. My name is Jaime." He has embraced his own humanity, he's just a person with his own share of weakness.

And you can see by the look on her face that it really hit her, and she really SEES him as more than just that perjorative label. And it changes how she interacts with him, and leads to that scene with Oathkeeper later.
 
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I do see Cersei as somewhat complex, but I don't see her as admirable in the least. She is one of the least self-aware characters on the show, and for me personally that's a huge turn-off; she would rather hurt someone else than deal with her own shit. She is the type of person who feels horribly vulnerable any time she experiences a painful emotion, and to avoid having to explore it and grow stronger, she deflects it and finds an excuse to lash out and hurt someone else. She lives in constant denial moreso than any other non-insane character I can think of. One can try to excuse her because she is a woman in a world of men (although the majority of other women on the show are in worse predicaments and rise to the occasion) or because she's a Lannister (although Tyrion and Jaime are both more self-aware), but the reality is that she personally does not like feelings of vulnerability and so she punishes the people around her so that she doesn't have to deal with what that means. Look at how much she endured during Joffrey's reign of terror, while simply making excuses for him. She is weak, and she is a coward, prone to abuses to protect her own ego. About 80% of what comes out of her mouth is stupid talk.

You just made me more self-aware of how UNself-aware Cersei is. And the little excuses she always made for Joeffry was what clinched it for me. More so the implications of her excuses. "Robb Stark's head at Sansa's wedding?? Oh you kidder you!" At least have the balls to speak up to that like Tyrion (god how I'm gonna miss all the verbal and physical bitch slaps he gave Joeffry).

And she really is getting pathetically desperate trying to control everything around her, with nothing but pure, blind hatred for Tyrion and Sansa. She's just so.....cunty.
 

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In a past episodes I actually start to sympathize with Cersei very much. I think she's one of the most misunderstood GOT characters. She's a woman born into family where values are strongly held and the keeping the blood pure and clean is more important than anything else. She's a Lennister so she must adhere this basic standard. Though she would do anything for her family and everything she does is for keeping it together even when it's falling apart right infront of her eyes. I admire her independency and strong will...I actually think she's strong and intelligent woman born into the corrupted family
Are we watching the same show/reading the same books?

The Lannisters have no interest in 'keeping the blood clean'; Voldemort and the Targaryens do. Cersei cares, first and foremost, about power and prestige, about getting her own will, and (in the beginning) about Jamie. She is selfish and vain. Her only redeeming quality, as Tyrion rightly notes, is her love for her children, though they are important to her simply because they are hers.
 
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Are we watching the same show/reading the same books?

The Lannisters have no interest in 'keeping the blood clean'; Voldemort and the Targaryens do. Cersei cares, first and foremost, about power and prestige, about getting her own will, and (in the beginning) about Jamie. She is selfish and vain. Her only redeeming quality, as Tyrion rightly notes, is her love for her children, though they are important to her simply because they are hers.

Lannisters are more interested in keeping the name.

Sidenote: how are all the kids not mentally retarded inbreds?
 

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Lannisters are more interested in keeping the name.



Sidenote: how are all the kids not mentally retarded inbreds?

Well, I'm sure some are wondering about where Tyrion came from -- not mentally deficient, but people judge him because of his appearance.

Was Tywin a blonde? Or the mother? Interesting the "blondie" twins are part of the family... and the only other family I know of that is typically blonde is the Targaryens.
 
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Well, I'm sure some are wondering about where Tyrion came from -- not mentally deficient, but people judge him because of his appearance.

Was Tywin a blonde? Or the mother? Interesting the "blondie" twins are part of the family... and the only other family I know of that is typically blonde is the Targaryens.

Well, could have just been a dormant gene (or whatever). Regular sized couples occasionally give birth to dwarves, even with other regular sized kids.

But specifically, Ned Stark found that all past Baratheon offspring were dark haired dominate genes. So that's where he first realized Cersei's kids were not Robert Baratheon's.
 

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Was Tywin a blonde? Or the mother? Interesting the "blondie" twins are part of the family... and the only other family I know of that is typically blonde is the Targaryens.
All Lannisters are blonde. It's Martin's special brand of genetics. Targaryen hair is supposed to be silver or white.
 

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Reading more about the Bran/Hodor thing -- again, a different portrayal in the show than in the books.


 

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That last bit you mention -- horrible. That was hard to watch.

Well, I think it's to the degree, and i don't think the viewers "feel" that it was wrong. Yes, he looks confused; but when I've read reviews and comments, people seem to gloss over it, just focus on you-know-who getting what was coming to him, etc. From my understanding in the books, the actions are much more comparable to what everyone was complaining about with episode 3 this season; but I see few people having that kind of emotional response to it, since the ends justifies the means and we're not really shown the TOTAL depth of how such a things impacts the target.
 
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That last bit you mention -- horrible. That was hard to watch.

Well, I think it's to the degree, and i don't think the viewers "feel" that it was wrong. Yes, he looks confused; but when I've read reviews and comments, people seem to gloss over it, just focus on you-know-who getting what was coming to him, etc. From my understanding in the books, the actions are much more comparable to what everyone was complaining about with episode 3 this season; but I see few people having that kind of emotional response to it, since the ends justifies the means and we're not really shown the TOTAL depth of how such a things impacts the target.

So from what you've read or heard, is Bran acting a bit cruelly or sadistically to sweet Hodor (HODOR!!) like a kid plucking wings off a butterfly? Or is he using him when he needs, and Hodor being super sensitive, mentally handicapped Hodor just feeling violated? In the show, it was obvious to me that he was NOT ok with that, but yeah, that didn't make too big a deal of it, and in THAT situation, it seemed reasonable to me, considering the consequences of Bran doing nothing.
 

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So from what you've read or heard, is Bran acting a bit cruelly or sadistically to sweet Hodor (HODOR!!) like a kid plucking wings off a butterfly? Or is he using him when he needs, and Hodor being super sensitive, mentally handicapped Hodor just feeling violated? In the show, it was obvious to me that he was NOT ok with that, but yeah, that didn't make too big a deal of it, and in THAT situation, it seemed reasonable to me, considering the consequences of Bran doing nothing.

Yeah, pretty much this. It really didn't seem quite as benign as
. But since they were pretty much going to die I get why Bran had to do it.
 

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So from what you've read or heard, is Bran acting a bit cruelly or sadistically to sweet Hodor (HODOR!!) like a kid plucking wings off a butterfly? Or is he using him when he needs, and Hodor being super sensitive, mentally handicapped Hodor just feeling violated? In the show, it was obvious to me that he was NOT ok with that, but yeah, that didn't make too big a deal of it, and in THAT situation, it seemed reasonable to me, considering the consequences of Bran doing nothing.

I didn't read the books, I just saw an excerpt where how Hodor's internal experience sounds very much like what a rape victim will do inside her head in the middle of a rape, so it seems clear to me in that one paragraph that Martin was drawing a parallel experience. And there's a reason why Christianity handles demonic possession as it does, and how psychologically "possession" of another person is usually a twisted mess -- violations of privacy and autonomy combined, imposing yourself on another and taking what is theirs for your own use.

I'm a pragmatic person, and I "get" that he felt he had no other options at least as presented on the show. I didn't think much of it until I saw a review where it described Hodor's experience in more detail. I definitely think the show treated it much more sympathetically to Bran and justified that choice to the audience. I'm not sure how the books treat Bran in the large scale. i'm not sure why you're putting words in my mouth about Bran in terms of him "pulling wings off butterflies," etc. The act of possession itself is a form of rape, regardless of intent, so I guess that's where the article writer was coming from; it's not whether Bran feels malice towards Hodor or wants to hurt him, it's the nature of the act itself.

... which of course leads to, does this apply only to other humans? Why isn't anyone complaining about the wolves? ;) Or is it basically that the wolves are complicit/agreeing in some way.
 

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Oh, and HODOR!!!! (1) As a side note, he's 7" taller than Brienne.

The only taller character is likely The Mountain, Gregor Clegane. (Brother to our favorite Hound, friend of Arya.) In the books, he's like 8'2". The TV show has done well to get 7'+ actors to play him, especially in Season 1, but he's still tiny compared to the book Mountain.
 
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i'm not sure why you're putting words in my mouth about Bran in terms of him "pulling wings off butterflies," etc.

"So from what you've read or heard, is Bran acting a bit cruelly or sadistically to sweet Hodor (HODOR!!) like a kid plucking wings off a butterfly?"

Twas a question.
 
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