A (probably) unpopular Game of Thrones opinion …
WARNING: This story has spoilers based on last night’s episode of Game of Thrones Season 8, Episode 5 “Bells.”
When Daenerys Targaryen rose from nothing to be a queen in the East, many people cheered. We saw the character suffer brutally at the hands of men, including her own brother. When we saw her exact revenge, over and over, on people who wronged and betrayed her, it was easy to root for her. She had good intentions, she was a decent young girl who suffered, and the people she fought against were evil. They were rapists, they were slave masters, they were murderers. When her evil brother, who had threatened to stab her in the belly, was brutally murdered in front of her eyes, we understood why she was so cold in that moment. Viserys deserved it. We agreed with her.
When we saw the brutality that Cersei inflicted on people, we didn’t have much context of her as a young girl. We only saw the aftermath, the bitter woman in a loveless marriage, who choose incest with her brother in a world of limited options. Her manipulations and choices were, in her view, justified because of the betrayals she suffered. She loved her children, and raised a monstrous boy in Joffrey. Her other children were kind-hearted, and died anyway, one by poison, the other by suicide after helping empower a religious pogrom in King’s Landing. We despised her…