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Good video and good point on how she should not trust the Randyll. I'd add that there is strong evidence the earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to burn King's Landing and the show writers changed it last minute. So if things don't seem fleshed out it is because some things were never the plan and if there was a plan it was not held to. Now sometimes plans aren't that good and need to be changed but it seems like the show writers changed it for the worse.
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It's absolutely wild to me that the same people who insist that this scene (and the one where Danaerys has aristocrats in Mereen crucified) is supposed to be signs of madness, but Arya murdering all Frey's, some of which she ground into pies and had them fed to their relatives, is supposed to be a girlboss moment.
Literally lmao. They act as if she chose to kill them out of the blue. I remember in the books, she specifically asks for the leaders of Meereen, you people who are at the top of the pyramid, who control and engage in the slave trade the most. And who more than likely supported the decision to crucify the little kids they left as signposts to her. It was retaliation, against slave owners. Was it pretty? No, she could have handled it better. But to say it was a sign of madness is a big fucking stretch when Arya the forced cannibaliser exists
@@aaroncohen2700not really Dany asked for there leaders in the books the show made it look like she crucified random slave masters when that wasn't the case
@@thatoneblackdude3333 why would they give her their actual leaders? What’s stopping them from lying and sending a faction that would’ve been favorable to Danny and her take over? We never see Danny actually investigate who ordered it.
@@aaroncohen2700 to save themselves because slavers are cowards and selfish and eat eachother whenever it sutes them ? What about that is hard to understand? Dany literally do see her investigate to get those people in the books the show just glossed over it if Dany just crucified random people or even people who would be allies to her cause she wouldn't have so much support from the former slaves and the slave masters would use that to slander her but they don't because that's not what happened, why is it that you people keep making up made up scenarios not supported by the text to try and twist everything Dany does as villainous ?
Let me remind everyone that this shows opens with Ned Stark, the paragon of virtue and nobility, executing a man who was just some poor bastard scared of ice zombies. So no, the idea that a character is willing to pass death penalty equating "foreshadowing of madness" was not well-established.
I think the key difference between the two of them is in their philosophies. Ned's flaw is being so rigid with his code; He represents a soldier who does what he has to do; This is of course questionable, but what saves him is his attachment to honor and his code; He executes the boy in the first chapter, but he himself is the one who swings the sword. Dany, on the other hand, rides her dragon and its fire executes anyone who crosses the path of its flames; Dany shows a lot of empathy when she is face to face with victims of abuse, but when she is flying on her dragon she disconnects, people are nothing more than ants from the dragon's and Dany's perspective.
@@juanprada4410she was always aware of who she was killing with Drogon. Drogon wasn’t a mindless killing machine. When she saved Jon, Jorah and the crew right before she lost Viz, she and Drogon knew exactly what they were doing. Where’s the disconnect?
@@juanprada4410 of course when she commits mass murder on king's landing she is mad, she maybe worst than Cersei in that moment but there is no foreshadowing it, that's the point of the video, never before that she killed irrationally or in a way different than people not considered mad.
I knew exactly what D&D were trying to do after the Tarly scene and I was so mad because Aegon the Conqueror did the same (and worse) and everyone says he was so merciful but not her. Arya killed an entire house with no consequences and everyone cheered. Cersei killed the pope (basically) and Queen Margaery (who the people loved), and burned their version of the Vatican. All cheered and there was no consequences from the public or the people of the city. Dany is treated differently in the show. And it’s so cynical bc they portrayed her as a hero all this time to flip it on us and pretend that she was a villain all along and we were imagining things. No matter how many years pass, my saltiness about this will never end
Contrasting Dany as a villain against Arya as a heroine annoyed me; Arya's character arc was one of the stupidest things I've ever watched... talk about plot armour and her stupid super powers. The ending just trounced all the other houses and characters to hand everything to the Starks on a silver platter and it felt hollow and shallow as well as forced.
And this couldve been good writing. By gradually highlighting the cumulative effects of betrayal, loss, and the immense pressure of her destiny, viewers could have better understood her descent into madness. It could have added a layer of depth and tragedy to her character, making her storyline even more compelling. Such an ending would have underscored the positive messages of redemption and the power of good leadership. It would have illustrated strength and idealism, making her ultimate success a powerful and memorable part of the series' legacy.
Agreed with all of this, the problem was for too long they made Danaerys sympathetic, likable, reasonable. And then too suddenly and quickly wanted the audience to turn against her. It’s like building up a character as a hero and protagonist of a 1000 page novel and suddenly making them the villain for the last 50 pages. It just doesn’t/didn’t work.
Daenerys was none of those things. She was cold and emotionally detached from the first season. She saw her brother being burned alive and she showed no emotion, neither terror nor relief for being free from his control, nothing. Then it was her obsession of being the good, noble ruler, even if that meant using excessive amounts of violence to get back the throne, believing that a cause is your destiny and that every mean is justified to achieve it is madness too. The arc was executed poorly but it was there from the beginning
@@paolamaria1992her brother was HORRIBLE towards her, but she, as a 13 year old, still thought she had to marry him. She was afraid of him and loved him all at the same time. I can't remember how it's described in the book about how she felt, but my impression was that she was really confused. She was relieved and sad at the same time. But being married to the khal meant she had to be strong. Which in their case meant no emotion. Khal Drogo showed almost no emotion at all throughout the show, but no one thought him mad? In the first part of the show, she always reacts to the best of her abilities, allies and knowledge. The dothraki kills a village, and she stops the raping as soon as she learns of it and is able to do anything about it (I might remember wrongly, but I don't think she had much say at this point as a leader yet). The first sign I saw of "madness" (when taking the world's rules into account) was I think in season 6 or 7 when Tyrion has to advise her about not doing something. But that's it until the king's landing scene in 8🤷
Part of the problem is that you hit on is that people may be mistaking the show writers as people following a plan. The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city but the show writers changed that last minute after season 8 had already started to be made.
@@MARYWTHER No, but I never bought Daenerys as the cool, noble heroine with her dragons and all. There was always something off with her. It started when her brother died by being burned alive. Fire didn't affect her so in that very moment she persuaded herself that it was her destiny to take the throne back, remove the stigma of madness from her family's name and establish a Utopia under the Targaryen rule. Madness comes in many shapes and sizes and becoming obsessed with a cause to the point of excusing excessive amounts of violence and cruelty to achieve it is a form of madness
Tyrion, who killed his father, strangled his ex, and intends to kill his siblings, condemning Daenerys for killing opponents that refuses to bend the knee, or accept banishment is pretty rich...
@@user-op6kt8pg9y And how is executing her defeated enemies that refuse mercy any worse than Ned executing deserters from the wall? Also, you're implying righteousness when you condemn.
@@kristianfagerstrom7011 I never said it was worse but that doesn't make her good, the whole point of as of ice and fire is that the people in power aren't good and the society and it's rules they uphold breeds mad tyrant who will do anything to keep power danaerys being a prime example of that
@@kristianfagerstrom7011 I'm not implying righteousness I'm outright stating that danaerys sees herself as righteous which is why when people disagree with her she goes into childish gits of rage
Dragons aside, there aren't many leaders on the show or in the books who would have done something as controversial as bringing a foreign army to the continent, especially so close to winter. (Cerci is the other one that does that) Dani may oppose unnecessary violence, rape and slavery; but these attributes are typical of the culture of her troops.
@@tsxtina2919Robert Baratheon celebrated rape and child murder yet people claim he was a great ruler. Dany being ruthless against her enemies is hardly worth condemning
Okay and? Just because she's slightly better than bad people doesn't make her good, she's just another powerful tyrant who sends common people into war for her own selfish gains and wants ultimately getting thousands of common folks killed because she's spoilt
Because he did evil things, not mad things. Both are different when it comes to intentions. Joffrey did horrible things to people because it amused him and he got off on it. He knows they are bad and he dosen't care at all. Thats just evil. When somebody does horrible things because they believe its right... thats madness.
Joffrey is the case of bad parenting. Cersei spoiled him so much as she was grooming him to be the next King and ignoring her other children. Jaime as his real father pretending that he's not his real father and mostly busy on being a King's Guard. Also, he's a product of incest, it just makes it worse. The reason why Myrcella and Tommen are nicer is because they mostly out of spotlights as Joffrey is the one who got attention the most and they mostly raised either by hand maiden or maids (remember Tywin in Season One was enjoying his retirement in Casterly Rock) and they both are mostly respect Tyrion and don't make fun of his condition unlike Joffrey.
To those who want to feel sad about Randall's Tarly death: In the books he threatens Brienne with RAPE because she is a fighter and she is not a proper lady. And we all know what he did to Sam.
In the show, it's beyond obvious that he loathes Sam and is a massive racist, too. There's no reason to be sad for Randall Tarley, especially since he could have saved his other son from being burned, but he chose not to.
Books and show are two very different stories. You can’t use the books to your convenience when it pleases you. Tyrion does a lot more evil shit in the books that didn’t make to the show
@@tsxtina2919It was just an extra info from the books to those who might be interested. If this annoys you, for your convenience you can forget what he did in the show and mourn for his death freely, fine by me. This doesn't change the fact that he was a piece of sh*t
You don’t need the books to know Tarly deserved what happened to him. The books just point out Dany giving him a choice of life or death is standard operating procedure in Westeros
The Tarlys betrayed and conspired against the Tyrells and killed their lords and queen, meanwhile the Tyrells were already Daenerys allies, so it makes even more sense in the world of Westeros and war to kill them. Saying that Targeryens went mad was foreshadowed is just wrong, since keep in mind most Targeryens weren’t mad but in fact good (or some simply lazy/disinterest).
The actual number of mad Targaryens was quite low, Danys dad Aerys and Maester Aemons brother Aerion were the two. Baelor the Blessed wasn’t mad, he was just fanatically religious and Maegor was just cruel also not mad
"No they weren't. What's the quotation about the Targeryens? When one is born, the God flip a coin whether they are going to be great or mad." This doesn't match the actual math. It was also partly Cersei doing propaganda in season 7 that the show writers jumped on in to try to give themselves an excuse for their nonsense and contradictions.
@@joanmilton9986 Exceeeept, when you actually look into the Targaryens, you know it's false narrative. Even in HOTD, "mad characters" like Daemon, Aemond, Aegon, are not portrayed as mad/crazy in the show.
Here's the major issue- they didn't tell Emilia Clarke what was actually happening internally with her character, so it's not onscreen. Clarke said that it wasn't until she read the last scripts that their directions to her in earlier episodes made sense. If you say to an actor "Do it more like this" without following that up with "Because your character is feeling like this because of this thing", your foreshadowing is going to fail for a big segment of the audience. And this also goes to the feeling of disconnection from Daenerys that was mentioned in the video. We can't see any real depth to her feelings, because there is none. Clarke was denied the opportunity to give her that depth. I'm sure people remember the speculation on how the men in charge of this show really feel about women, and frankly? The way they handled this storyline and Clarke as an actor is another strike against them.
Can you please tell me about those speculations? Or share a link or something, please. I haven't heard any of it. PS: I'm one of the millions of people who 5 years later is still beyond furious with that lazy finale.
@@bravassSubswell, DnD (The show runners) got royally pissed at Emilia when she put a nudity clause in her contract after season 5. They eveb considered recasting a more "agreeable" actor. The scripted scene of the bells had Cersei blowing the caches of wildfire when the bells ring. The cast didn't even know they changed the end of the episode until it was screened for them.
@@yorgivon-schmourgeussborgi Well that part I hadn't heard before. I do remember reading or hearing that Emilia thought Daenerys destroyed the Red Keep, not the whole city and she realizes what will air when they have a screening party for the episode or something. Now, I don't know how true that is, as Masie Williams had to film scenes of collapses all over the place, etc. One thing doesn't add up with the other.
Daenerys's madness arc makes less sense when you read about how her ancestors conquered Westeros, Aegon the conqueror burned entire castles and armies for not submitting to him, the things Daenerys did aren't even the worst a Targaryen has ever done in Westeros 😂
The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city but the show writers changed that last minute after season 8 had already started to be made. There is no "arc". Also 1 of the show writers flat out said Daenerys is "not insane" nor "her father" in an Inside the Episode back in season six. So their failure to stick to plans resulted in them contradicting themselve-both in what the story portrayed and even what they literally said themselves.
I agree! There was a rumor that George actually planned on ending Dany's story this way in the books. This is where the writers got the idea of turning her into a tyrant in the final season. The problem is it was all just too abrupt. They didn't have enough time to flesh out this type of ending. Geroge has all the time in the world to do this as he writing a novel. Dany's descent into madness happened so fast you blink and miss it. Her character deserved more... If they wanted this arc to be her end there should have been at least 2 more seasons!!
@@Trustyzaney There is also a rumor that GRRM was planning on her not becoming a tyrant but sacrificing herself to help Jon make a magic sword to help deal with "the Others"-the Whitewalkers in the books. Like I pointed out before, the earlier plan for season 8 itself was wildfire burning the city, so what we got in terms of the version of season 8 that actually aired may just be something D and D slapped together and thus very different from what GRRM was thinking. Not just "rushed" but different. If D and D decided to have 1 dragon suddenly burn down they city then the fact that they made the decision late into the process of making season 8 that would explain why things feel "rushed". Yes GRRM wanted more seasons but even without them making sudden changes late into things means there is little to no time to create a things building to that change. It also means ignoring the things that were already there that were building to something else. We don't know what GRRM will do because he has not finished the books. He could do something different from either rumor.
Once again you’ve blown my mind 5:40. The way we no longer see things from Danny’s perspective after they decided they wanted her to be evil( aside from the final tipping point I guess). How disingenuous can this show get even now all these years later.
It's a book about how the only truly good people are dumber than a bag of hammers and as useful as a wet towel written by a near nihilist guy who is obsessed with hyper portrayals of the morally bleak nature of his own world perspective. She was always going to go evil. The only question was by how much.
Stannis fans? The book, hence Stannis's fate succeeding Robert to the Iron throne was already sealed, at least until he regroups to try a different pathway. I would not use Stannis as a comparison to Daeny's story.
And yet Stannis downfall was way more organic and felt by the audience than this one. When he decided to kill his own daughter in desperate attempt to change tides of war we're shocked but understand what led him to it and we feel he just chose a path of no return.
@@m.williams4971 I'm a Mannis fan all the way, but you're coping big time if you think Stannis is gonna get the throne at this point and not gonna sacrifice himself or become a lord commander of the nghts watch
She also gave Cersei multiple chances to surrender and for all he efforts she lost a dragon and they killed her best friend. So then Dany was like "fuck it, no more Mr Nice Guy we'll do it the old fashioned way." They ruined Dany, they ruined Jon, the ruined Stannis, Jaime (especially Jaime), Tyrion...the only ones with a good final season were Theon and the Hound.
Not even Hound, in my opinion. His rebirth arc was all about letting his hatred for his brother go and that was forgotten about. Cleganebowl felt like purely fanservice.
@Tony-ih1pg LOL a very dangerous individual who had posed a threat to literally no one for 4 seasons except a couple sparrows and, ironically, Qyburn?
I’m so glad someone is calling this out. Machiavelli himself would’ve argued that letting Randyll and Dickon live after that would only serve to provide inspiration and figures for a resistance to rise and rally behind. Varys was explicitly warned he’d be toast if he betrayed her yet when he’s caught doing exactly that everyone is horrified she’s punishing the guy for plotting to kill her? No conqueror could’ve allowed that kind of insolence to stand. But when it’s a woman suddenly these actions are emotional and unhinged. And of course, the erasure of her perspective altogether for those of Tyrion and Varys’s conveniently aids this character assassination. The misogyny the show suddenly adopts in order to try and justify The Bells is beyond insulting. This was the worst aspect of the final seasons for me: the writers deciding xenophobia is noble and a conqueror is crazy for doing what a conqueror does.
👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 Preach! The Tarly argument as you point out is insanely goofy - and if they wanted a mad queen direction on it, all they had to do was have her NOT offer them The Wall (considering that's exactly the ultimatum any leader in her shoes would have given). And The Bells forever ring for horror... not because she COULDN'T have done what she did, but because THEY HAD ALREADY SURRENDERED 🤣🙈 I may never get over the lazy pain of it lol.
@@a.p.2019 let’s just pray for at least WoW. I read that the Mereen plot line will be crucial is setting Dany down a darker path instead of just killing Selmy in a hallway while Tyrion makes jokes. At some point the Sons of the Harpy will show her that some societies have to be toppled in order to change and her tolerance of collateral damage will increase. My bet is that after the battle of Slavers bay she and Drogon torch all of Old Volantis behind the black walls to crush the slave trade for good. If the show had included something like this it would at least make some sense why people like Sansa don’t trust the woman coming to save their asses or Randyll would stand by dimwit Cersei in the face of her proven incompetence. A spiral from there as more and more people you came to liberate reject you would feel earned instead of Bells = DRACARYS!
Have you ever considered that one greater evil doesn't outweigh the lesser, One of the biggest themes of A song of ice and fire is literally that there are no good rulers, so saying "people might rise up against dany" isn't really a valid point because she's not a good ruler she's just better than the ones on the throne
Thank you, especially for the part about the Tarleys. It made me so angry when Sam is upset after Dany tells him she killed his dad, who openly LOATHED HIM, and his brother, who chose to die when he had no good reason to do so. Randall could have saved Dickon by surrendering, and he chose not to. That's on them. Her actions are not any worse than those of other leaders in this show.
so what? Did you expect Sam to smile with happiness when he found out that his father and his younger brother were executed? Their relationship wasn't the best, but they were family.
Yeah the fact they really tried to make Sam a Daddy’s boy suddenly when it became convenient for their mangled plot was downright bonkers. It’s not like they even had a complicated relationship. Randyll straight up threatened to kill him (and enjoy doing it) after subjecting him to a lifetime of nothing but brutal abuse. He is the reason Sam spent his life thinking he was a useless coward until Jon saw value in him. Book Sam would kiss Dany’s feet for ridding him of his tormentor. Maybe he’d mourn Dickson, but Sam is reasonable enough to understand he made his choice. If they actually tried to make this make sense, they could’ve had Randyll be impressed upon learning Sam killed a white walker (a stretch that Randyll would even believe in “snarks and grumpkins,” but let’s just say for sake of argument he can be convinced) and offer Sam the first begrudging kernel of approval he’s ever gotten from his dad before he leaves for Oldtown. Maybe then I could believe Sam would be conflicted if he loses his dad right after getting a taste of the validation he’s always wanted. But no, that would add exactly one extra scene and we need that screen time for more dick jokes!
@@myaalexander354 I respect your perspective, but there is nothing unrealistic about Sam's reaction when he finds out that the woman in front of him executed half of his family. You minimize the death of his younger brother a lot, and it is quite normal that the death of a parent provokes some type of reaction on you. If you think about it, the funny thing about that scene was probably to give Dany more reasons to distrust Sam when he revealed that Jhon was the legitimate heir.
@@juanprada4410 We can definitely agree that scene was really solely to eventually plant doubt in Jon’s mind about Dany via Sam. I’m glad we can respect each other’s perspectives without necessarily agreeing. I’m not sure if you are an exclusive show watcher or if you read the books as well (this isn’t book snobbery speaking I’m a television writer/producer), but for context my opinion of Sam’s reaction is primarily influenced by “Book Sam” and “Book Randyll.” Book Randyll is far more cruel not only to Sam, but Brienne and just in general. Book Sam is so traumatized by the years of abuse he actually begs Jon not to send him to Oldtown to study as a maester. Even the thought of being in the same region as his father instantly reduces him to the scared, cowardly boy we met in the beginning of the story. To me, expecting Sam to have the reaction he did in the show to his father’s death would be like expecting Gilly to be pissed enough over Craster’s death to want revenge on the Night’s Watch. Could there be complex feelings there? Sure. But Sam’s reaction in show suggests he felt loyalty towards a man who mercilessly abused and ultimately abandoned him, which simply wasn’t the nature of that relationship. As far as Dickon is concerned, Sam never seemed to harbor ill will towards him, but they barely knew each other (larger age gap in books). Book Dickon (as opposed to Show Dickon) is very quickly becoming his father’s son, which I would imagine could only make Sam weary of him at best. But even if there may be feelings of kinship there, Sam is one of the story’s best characters when it comes to separating reason from emotion. When Jon and everyone else are pissed he wasn’t made a ranger, Sam is able to see further than the immediate disappointment and understand Jon is being groomed for command. When the whytes are being examined at Castle Black, he’s able to put fear and panic aside long enough to observe they’re not rotting. I believe he would understand his brother had agency in this situation and made a choice to die by a terrible man.
@myaalexander354 his brother had some agency. But the person with the most agency was Danny. She was not there in Westeros to save anyone. She wasn't there to fight the White Walkers. She wasn't there to help the North keep it's independence. I think that because she was warring against Cersei, one of the most hated characters in the show, that Danny was the aggressor. She was there to force her leadership onto a people who didn't want her there. She killed thousands because of them because she wanted to rule them. Then, when they still refused to bend the knee, she killed more of them.
Deanery's madness deserve an entire season. We had an entire season where she was sold to Drogo, married and f*cked and fall in love and her husband dies. Her descent to madness needed the same timeframe to convince people.
Yes. It needed the moments that made us go "uh-oh, that cannot be good for her mental health" and "uh... is it just me, but is she getting...?" "Oh shit, is she going mad?!" and then the final "Welp, she went over the edge, it's over".
Yup; the very few tidbits they dropped in here and there (such as the "god's flip a coin" line) were simply not enough to demonstrate a convincing mad queen character arc. Not that it couldn't work it just was not enough and not aligned with here character (especially if you are book reader and are purview to her internal thoughts of empathy especially for 'innocent' people). We are talking about the character that locked up her own 'children' because one accidently killed a simple Shepard's child. a well written subversion should leave you feeling 'oh I should have seen that coming'; not leaving you feeling like it was a twist for the sake of having a twist.
@@Heliz14 I don’t know about that. I would have preferred a more traditional happy or biter sweet finale for sure but I would have been fine with a mad queen arc if they executed it well. I know most people I have talked to don’t take issue with the mad queen arc but take issue with how rushed and contrived it was in execution. Something as simple as no bells sound and the Lannister’s and kings landing refuse to surrender so she burns the whole city. Something as simple as that would be enough to make the mad queen arc easier to swallow.
I'm going to say an uncomfortable truth. I think most people have this opinion because of all the controversy the ending created when it came out. There were those who said it was a bad ending and those who attacked that people, saying the ending was fine and that they only thought it was bad because they wanted a Disney ending. The first group, to justify themselves, claim that the same ending with more development would have been fine, and that's where I disagree. Yes, the ending we got was rushed, but I think with more development people wouldn't have liked it either. Seeing how Daenerys' character slowly transformed into the Mad Queen would have sparked complaints and discontent. The audience already complained a lot about her character when season 7 came out because the directors started giving her a different focus in that season. In the same way, I don't see how more development could have generated any kind of hype so people to want to see Bran sitting on the throne, or Brienne writing like a teenager about Jaime, or Tyrion becoming to the same Tyrion from the beginning who only thought about wh*res. And I won't even talk about Cersei and Jaime... The show with the same ending but with more development would only have made people stop watching (or liking) the show more gradually, that's all.
I never once looked at the Randyl Tarly scene and thought she was crazy. Not even with Varys. She didnt become "crazy" until the shoehorned in burning down Kings Landing scene. And thats just it. It felt forced in. Up until that point, her actions make perfect sense...her burning Tarly is like you say, an act of war. Shes trying to assert her rule. He wont accept it, even though he was a Targaryen supporter prior. He has to go. His son was his own choice. Varys was plotting against her to seat Jon instead of her. He became a traitor to her. She found out. She had him in custody. He had to go. Especially since he managed to orchestrate a lot of chaos in the past. The only things that dont make sense are the ones like how the dragon gets killed by the navy. But again...those are shoehorned problems we didnt see previously. Like had they taken their time, theyd realize that just doesnt make sense that she forgot so much, that they all forgot so much. It was the writers scapegoat...oh they forgot...yea...ok... Those that see her actions as crazy are typically the same people who worshipped Stannis and his burning of his own family to some god he didnt even believe in. And i dont mean Shireen, he burned his own bil in that first sacrifice scene. Or...theyre sexist. Sorry to say, but when you pretend its just an act of war when men do it, but women are crazy for doing the same things, thats literally sexists.
Yup, none of those supposed 'crazy' actions are actually crazy and are completely rational and no more ruthless than what anyone else was doing in similar positions. So her to suddenly flip and burn an entire city just does not work. It could have if set up properly; maybe show some more plotting by Sansa to destabalize her; show more perceptions of betrayal but those that she really trusted. Show her losing more and more interest in 'the people' and only caring about herself. Problem is, stuff like her fighting for the north and fighting to stop the white walkers works in contradiction to her going mad. so her entire arc in the last 2 seasons contradicts the mad queen arc.
@@patrickthomas2119 exactly, agreed. Had they spent more time on the descent, they couldve made it work and enjoyable. Instead, quick and sloppy...just doesnt work.
There is both sexism and another possibility. The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city. The show writers do last minute changes (after season 8 was already in the process of being made) to change why the city burns and because they are willing to disregard the character of their characters it falls flat. I'm not saying sexism isn't at play. The hypocrisy and double standards she is held to compared to others makes it seem likely it was. But major last minute changes can be added to the mix. The 1 positive out of this is that it disproves the notion there was supposedly a grand plan D and D supposedly followed. If they couldn't keep their plan within 1 season then odds are not high they would keep a plan that required going into multiple years.
The only madness in The Bells is how unnecessary it was. She had pretty much won at that point. The Golden Company had been decimated, the Lannister forces had surrendered, Cersei had no more allies. All Daenerys had to do was land and sit upon the Iron Throne. Even having her execute Cersei wouldn't feel out of character after she burnt the healer woman for killing her husband and son. To me, it feels like the culmination of a big problem building up through the seasons; bad things didn't suddenly happen as a natural consequence of actions, but because the story needed to get darker. What I mean by that is that when Ned was betrayed, it was the consequence of trusting Littlefinger and not realising he was a backstabbing slime. Compare that to Stannis sacrificing Shireen, which only happened because Ramsay and his men snuck in and burnt their supplies without anyone noticing.
Exactly her giving them a choice was generous! How they gon fight for her father the mad king & say she has no ties to the land?! They killed her ally & their liege lord’s mother Olenna & sided with their liege lord’s killer! It’s no different than when Jon & Sansa talked to Alys Karstark & Rickard Umber & gave them the same choice to bend the knee & swear fealty to house Stark & they did. If they didn’t Sansa would’ve wanted them beheaded or hanged & wanted to give their castles to other lords after fighting to get her own back because of a reckless family member. But we don’t talk about that contradiction cause it’s Sansa Stark
@@georgeprchal3924 same that look on her face when she saw him alive says it all. She wanted to get there after he died & take the victory for herself not realizing they would’ve had to siege winterfell after Ramsay fled.
@@tytybaby06 yep. All Jon's allies died, then she swoops in last minute with the Vale Knights. Rest assured she did her best to undermine him while he was away at Dragonstone.
You can argue for or against giving the Tarlys mercy, but it's pretty funny comparing what she did to whittling down an invading army at the very onset of battle.
When Tywin send his army to sack the King's Landing at the end of the rebelion, when they opened the gates for him thinking he's here to help them, that is apparently perfectly okay and not mad, but when she adds dragon into it, it's somehow madness
There is this saying that good filmmaking is all about showing, not telling. You were spot on, they told us what to feel and expect of the character but never actually showed what's going on with her, which is absolute reverse of first seasons when we witnessed very closely Dany's journey from a frightened girl to freaking empress.
If GRRM and the show's writers wanted a "Mad Queen Danerys" arc, they should have planted the seeds of it much earlier... They could also have gone the "One of her servants slipped Dany something that made her go beserk" route. Being brutal against enemies was par for the course in this time period, especially for a young queen that needs to force people to take her seriously. It was just out of character of her to just go that type of crazy and destroy a whole city. She was more of the "Make a brutal example of enemies in front of others" type. Which, like I said, Danerys needed to do. Remember how the noble houses fought so hard against Ranerya being on the throne so long ago.... Only brute force would place Danerys on the throne, and keep her there....
She was always evil. She burned an innocent woman alive and promised to take what was “hers” with fire and blood. Her advisors kept having to stop her from doing evil shit. What show did you watch??
@@tsxtina2919how was Miri innocent she may have been justified but she killed her baby over a prophecy that didn’t even come true yet she made it happen because her child drogon ended up being the stallion that mounts the world
@@ACinemafanatic Don't waste your time. The person you're responding to is a rabid Dany hater. They're attacking everyone in the comments section that defends her. If Mirri is innocent for killing a baby, so is Daenerys for killing the kids in KL.
We aren't watching it through Tyrion's eyes. We are watching it through the showrunner's eyes. By season 8, Tyrion and Varys had become little more than mouthpieces for whenever the showrunners wanted their own ideas expressed to the audience. They were no longer the carefully crafted characters of GRRM who had voices of their own separate from the author's. Who did and said things IN CHARACTER.
Cersei has always been foreshadowed as the mad queen what bugs me is that folks bought into this narrative that dany is mad so much they think it’ll happen in the books when there’s no foreshadowing whatsoever. Cersei literally has parallels to Aerys even Jamie is freaked out and after her walk of shame she’s gonna become 10x more ruthless and more paranoid as time goes on.
I would love it if you were right, but this will definitely happen in the books. This is definitely Martin's ending. They even admitted to this in some interview or another. I suggest you don't read the next books while expecting something different. I'm not sure I'm interested in them anymore either.
I think the books will take Dany down a darker path that will eventually end up with her burning KL, but it will actually be a developed arc that makes sense. But we agree that Cersei IS the mad queen for real. Not only was she obsessed watching the tower of the hand burn from wildfire, to the point it gives Jamie Aerys ptsd, but she orders the deaths of a mummers troop who put on a play she deems treason. Brightflame behavior. Blowing up the equivalent of the Vatican in the show is pretty batshit. And of course, the paranoia, cruelty and multiple threats to burn cities to the ground.
@@myaalexander354 To me, the craziest thing she did is burning her in-laws. Those were her allies, the wealtiest family in westeros and the ones with all the food. How insane do you have to be to do that? Daenerys cared for her allies and her people, at least. I think she's just going to rebel against her advisers in the books, being an immature teen. But it'll make sense that the show just lacked. It still won't be a good ending with Bran as king. And Book Dany also deserves better- a home if not the crown. But alas.
@@wrongnumber878 the funny part is, Cersei is convinced her allies are actually her rivals or enemies. Which is exactly the type of upside down paranoia crazy people exhibit.
@@myaalexander354 Agreed! On the other hand, when Daenerys feels her allies are her enemies, it's because they were. Varys and Tyrion were betraying her and the Starks were against her too-it's not paranoia if people are actually out to get you. Cersei was so against Margaery, she didn't realize Marg could make her son happy and give her grandkids- that means Cersei wins. She had to ruin that.
Saying that Mad Queen Dany was “foreshadowed” because she had some morally grey scenes is the equivalent of saying Jon was destined to be a dictator because he executed a man that was begging for mercy and didn’t compromise when the northern lords disagreed with his choices, or that Arya was destined to be a psychopath because she cooked men into pies, or that Sansa was destined to become a sadist because she was fascinated and smiled when she had hounds eat a guy’s face, or that Tyrion was destined to be vicious because he wished he could poison everyone in Kings landing, etc.
Finally! Someone understands and explains the real issue. Well done sir. And also for reminding us that Randall Tarky would have been on Dany's side if he were consistent with his own history. How is the daughter of a dynasty that ruled for centuries a foreign ruler?
The problem was that the show directed Daenerys' story so that she must be in the wrong if Tyrion did not agree with her. They made Tyrion the moral centre in the later seasons, despite him not caring that his father started a war in the Riverlands over his arrest that he talked his way out of, that his family massacred thousands, and he himself using wildfire against Stannis for Joffrey who he new should not be King.
I agree with your overall point, but I would say that Arya's mass killing of the Freys was definitely a mad thing to do. I can't imagine her doing it in the books, it seems more likely that Lady Stoneheart and W. Manderly will fill in for her.
That's because it wasn't supposed to be Arya that did the deed. In the books, it was Lady Stoneheart. But because she didn't exist in the show, Arya was picked to do it instead.
Respectfully I think show Arya killing the Freys was ruthless, but it was fair vengeance. She only kills the Frey men who were involved in the red wedding, (unless she killed that servant girl…I like to image she stole the face from the Hall of Faces on her way out).
I wouldn't have, and didn't use the execution of Tarly's as a prequel to madness. She took a page out of Aegon the Conquerors' book there. Simply put, after Daeny roasts the hired swords from Essos, it made zero sense to haphazardly burn Kings Landing. And then all that crazy talk about the freeing the rest of the world(or something to that effect)? What world beyond Westeros and Essos? The 'Mad Queen' plot departure was simply lazy and confusing!
I definitely agree that seasons 1-6 Daenerys is not the same person as seasons 7-8 Daenerys. And it's not just her character that looks the same, but for some reason behaves quite differently. You see it with other characters like Littlefinger or Varys or Jaime (let's not forget the contrast between him sacrificing his reputation for the sake of saving lives and then in season 8 acting like he never really cared about them)... and the list goes on. It was in season 7 that I really started to have a bad feeling where the show was going, even though there had been earlier signs in seasons 5 and 6. The show was still watchable in season 6, but once season 7 started, it was obvious where they were going... and yet season 8 subverted even the low expectations I had, by being worse and even more illogical than I expected.
What's even more maddening is Tyrion. He joined the other side in a war against his brother and sister. If he's so "smart", he didn't consider the possibility that they would die at any point during the war? There were many people in Danerys' army that had a grudge against the Lannisters. The show ruined it by letting Tyrion plan Danerys' war effort, Olenna saw the strategy was bad from the get go. Tyrion after being the strategist for Battle of Blackwater and Meereen should never been allowed to plan another war effort.
Yup. At one point that doesn't appear in the GoT tv series (which I argue is a different story) she goes outside the city walls herself with medicine and water to help care for people who have been hit by a plague. She has been told they cannot be let in the city or the disease will spread into Meereen so she goes to them to help care for them.
Honestly, the Tarly scene left me so confused. I'm supposed to side with the Tarlys? Those two Tarlys? The ones who threatened and bullied Sam all his life? The ones who led to Margaery's death and Cersei's ascent? The ones we don't even have a single scene that would make us root for them beforehand? Those Tarlys? No. If it was Sam's mom and sister, sure. They were cool. But I distinctly remember his dad being a bastard at the dinner table and his brother laughing at stuff their dad was saying to Sam even if it was hurtful. They could've picked virtually any other house to burn to make us feel sympathy for, and they chose them.
Great video. The absolute lunacy of her "Descent" in episode 5 was that she had already taken KL with very few civilian casualties after swooping down from the sky on Drogon with the sun at her back. It made zero sense to kill anybody after that.
I am not a huge fan of Daenerys but killing the Tarlys was not an act of madness. You can call it brutal or cruel but not crazy. Let's not forget that the Tarlys were already traitors and oathbreakers against their liege lords the Tyrells and that they allied with Cersei (the person who brutally murdered their liege lord and his children) who has absolutely no claim to the Iron Throne and took it over by using force. You can easily make the claim that Daenerys was punishing the Tarlys for betraying their Tyrell overlords because Olenna was allied to Daenerys before she died. Ps. 4:38 While i don't disagree with your opinion about the Stark sisters we can perhaps claim that Arya murdering all the male Freys shows us that she's no longer the young girl we used to know but a professional killer while Sansa brutally killing Ramsay foreshadows her extremely hard and ambitious stance we see in Season 8.
She was ruthless, not mad. And many characters, including the heroes in the story have been ruthless. No one sees Tyrion, Arya, Jon, and Jamie as mad. If they had dragons, one wonders what they'd do. A lot of people love Tywin, but he'd do worse and has done worse. No one says Argon I was mad. Or Visenya or Rhaenys. They burned thousands alive for not "bending the knee" to them.
You forgot one thing: Olenna, Dany’s ally was murderd, and she was given no chances to live (Dany gave the Tarlys at least three choices to survive). So it was also vengence. Another thing, it’s better to kill traitors than when they bend the knee to survive and wait for an opportunity to stab you in the back.
Yes I always thought the scene where Danny kills the Tarleys was way off script from the books & ultimately did a horrible job of trying to paint her in a bad light because anyone who’s read the books, or at least watched a lot of the book reviews, knows that if Danny were to kill the Tarley’s for turning against her it’s definitely for a good reason because they initially plead allegiance to her family as the ruling house….& calling her a foreign invader just adds insult to all the injuries she & her family had to endure. Shit if I were her, I would’ve burned Randall Tarley alive too.
After second episode of season 7 back in 2017 I tweeted “why did they start writing Daenerys as a shortsighted bitch since she landed on Dragonstone?”… oh boy.. did they…. The break is even so much more obvious now but I saw it even back then… but I sure did not expect that shitstorm..
Very similar character context in both scenes too, two young "new" leaders (Jon as Lord commander and Dany as queen of Westeros) making firm decisions to make those around them well aware that they're in charge. In Jon's scene Stannis even nods approvingly after the beheading
I remember reading in an interview how Emilia Clarke called her family after reading the last script and asking her family what they thought of Dany and if they thought Dany was a good woman and if there was anything Dany could do to make them hate her 😭 DANY THEY COULD NEVER MAKE ME HATE YOU
This is the problem I keep having with people who i have one-way discussions (usually they are not wiling to give on Dany, but you have to give on Sansa, Arya, Jon, Cersei, etc) who flog the "Mad Queen" crap to death. Subverting expectations as D&D thought they were doing, doesn't allot for the inconsistencies in the storytelling these two numpties did with Dany's season seven and eight story. How they convinced themselves this was the course to go is beyond me. The almost mach six way Dany got from what was at the end of season seven to the beginning of season eight is totally nonsensical. And how Cersei and Arya, and Sansa who lied to Jon how many times to his face, got away with things Dany hasn't been allowed to is stupefying. Would you be willing to do a video on the many times Sansa lied to Jon? I would love to see what you would have to say on that. For me, it's amazing Sansa was allowed to get away with that and become "Queen in the North," yet Dany was vilified. Thank you for your time.
I have a theory regarding Sansa’s bullshit. The books are setting up a tense situation in the north that the show just didn’t have the balls to follow through on. So the book Starks all have a counterpart in the previous generation that they mimick in personality. Robb and Jon are versions of Ned, obviously. Arya is just like Lyanna, Bran takes after Benjen. The last two, however, are potential problems. Sansa takes after her mother and in the books she’s the only Stark to treat Jon like a bastard. This is part of the reason Arya resents her. Rickon…he’s showing signs of being wild and temperamental like his uncle Brandon. When Rickon pops back up, he’s going to be the hotheaded heir to Winterfell with the support of the Manderlys, the Umbers and anyone else in on the Grand Northern Conspiracy. Sansa is going to show up with the Vale and probably part of the Riverlands with the Blackfish on the loose and Littlefinger as Lord of Harrenhall. This is going to get sticky when a resurrected Jon Snow shows up with a wildling army right around the time Robb’s will makes it to the North, legitimizing Jon and naming him king in the North. And just for kicks, let’s say this is when Howland Reed finally decides to leave his swamp and reveal Jon as the rightful King of Westeros. Hell, maybe Arya heads home by this time, encounters Lady Stoneheart in the Riverlands as she swings by and shows up at Winterfell with Nymeria, her super pack of wolves and Robb’s crown…but now has to decide whose head to place it on. I don’t think we’re going to have the happy Stark reunion we got in the show. Rickon is still a child, but he won’t be stepping aside for a bastard or a girl. Jon won’t want to take Winterfell from Rickon, but he’s kinda realizing he’s Jesus at this point and has a bigger role to play in the endgame and he’s going to need command of Winterfell to save the North from the WW. I think Sansa will challenge Rickon and Jon for Winterfell at Littlefinger’s urging. Hence, show Sansa lied and almost got Jon killed because they ALMOST had the balls to do a version of this but backed off so the Starks could all be “good” and Dany the clear “baddie” by the end. Just my theory.
@@myaalexander354Hmm interesting my problem is I don’t see book Sansa going against her true born brother, Jon definitely but not Rickon and even then if she went against Jon I don’t think it would be all that sticky because technically rickon would be the king in the North and the one with the power to legitimize Jon. Agree about Arya meeting lady stoneheart, I believe that meeting will be the end of lady stoneheart and close that part of the story off while arya sees for herself what the quest for revenge reduced her mother to
@@DavidCarradinesBelt this is why the books are so great because so many possibilities are in play. From Sansa’s perspective (likely heavily influenced by Littlefinger) Rickon will still be a very young child and probably damn near feral after his time on Skagos. He was three when he left Winterfell with a wilding caretaker. He won’t know the first thing about lordship. She could feel compelled to step in as his “regent” but would be ruling Winterfell in everything but name. By the time he comes of age, if he is still wild like his uncle Brandon, Sansa may be the more capable leader and Littlefinger will be right there whispering exactly that in her ear. The problem is Jon. He doesn’t need Rickon to legitimize him because King Robb already legitimized Jon before he died and named him his heir, unaware Bran and Rickon were still alive. As Catelyn warns Robb before he does this, you can’t delegitimize a bastard once he’s been legitimized. Jon being older than both Bran and Rickon could then theoretically move him ahead of the true born boys in the line of succession. Now the northern lords have a decision to make: name a maybe 7 year old boy King in the North with Winter coming and the white walkers on the march? Or honor King Robb’s wishes and swear fealty to his chosen heir, a proven battle commander with a fierce army at his back who also might just be the savior prophesied to lead them through the long night? As Oberyn would say…”Decisions…”
What gets me about her burning the tarleys. He said “ you have no ties to this land” ? Wasn’t kingslanding built by Targaryens. What about Dragonstone? Last I check he was on land given to him by a Targaryen? And wasn’t she BORN at dragon stone ?
Calling her decision in the series finale foreshadowed or even a "decacent" is a joke within itself. If anyone went through a real descent to madness it was 100% Cersei.
Don't forget the earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to be what wrecked the city. But yes that is a silly thing they threw in for the effects.
A lot of the explosions like the gate probably weren't intended to be wildfire though since they removed wildfire from being what wrecked most of King's Landing it is hard to know what was supposed to explode as what. The scene with Jon calling a retreat was supposed to be all wildfire until changed the writers decisions for season 8. So those buildings were clearly not intended as dragon caused. I can totally believe that dragonfire lit the wildfire that wrecked the city in the earlier plans for season 8. But that would still be wildfire wrecking most of the city on its own with no dragonfire once it got going. In the version of season 8 that aired there were a few puffs of wildfire but those were a few explosions and puffs-something vastly scaled down from the earlier plans for season 8.
No one is Westeros is above mass murder but somehow Dani is the worst. Because Tarly was such a great guy and father, right? Because Cersei is so sane, right? Because Arya killing Walder's sons is awesome, right? And so on.
Calling Daenerys the "Mad Queen" is mental health problem shunning. Fight me. Seriously, how many things can one person take? How many people in GOT have been broken, done heinous things, and people cheered them on? History is written by the victors, and this is what is happening here. The writers wanted Dany dead, so they ultrahyperformed her character. It didn´t completely come from nothing, but to me, it didn´t make sense or feel like Daenerys anymore.
Seeing Daenerys through Tyrion's eyes for two seasons was awful, because Tyrion had become a ruined character himself, (and he was a terrible advisor.) In a short span of time, Daenerys had lost Viserion, Jorah, Rhaegal, and Missandei. Her 'family' and her support system was decimated. What was left? Her huge army that was good at conquering. And they conquered, and she won. So wiping out Kings Landing to demonstrate her new found madness just seemed like lazy writing. Leveling the Red Keep would have been a great revenge move, but there was zero explanation for the abrupt departure from protecting the innocent to razing the entire city. It was a forced/rushed story line, and just didn't work well. As for Tyrion, I don't know how they managed to take the same guy who rocked the speech at his own trial, to the idiot who made the "Bran has the best story" speech. That was a "I just threw up in my mouth a little" kind of moment.
You're wrong to state that she does not experience the betrayals and paranoia of her father. Her story begins with the betrayal of her father by first an uprising, Tywin switching sides and having her siblings killed, and Jamie murdering her father who is sworn to protect. She is betrayed by the man who raised her when he sells her to be the wife of a barbarian, she is betrayed by the old woman she saves who tricks her into losing her child, she is betrayed by her handmaiden and her only perceived friend Xaro when they try and steal her dragons, she is betrayed by Jorah when she finds out he has never told her his original plan was to assasinate her, in the books there's an attempt to poison her while she is watching the gladiatorial fights and one of her generals switches to the other side, she is surrounded by the Sons of the Harpy trying to assassinate her and her supporters, and once she arrives in Westeros she is dealing with people like Varys trying to replace her with Jon Snow. She even gets betrayed by Tyrion when he frees Jamie. Plus she is warned by the mysterious woman that she will be betrayed three times,, once for blood, once for gold and once for love, so spends the entirety of the books then on paranoid about everyone she meets and questioning whether anyone who she is close to will be one of the betrayers.
I’m currently reading A Dance with Dragons and Fire & Blood. I can see how GRRM could make Danny “mad” but the show does such a bad job. Danny in the point of the book has lost herself in the slavers city and her marriage. I can see her losing it due to dragon dreams and seeing threats all around her but what D&D did was terrible.
Dany's story isn't a descent into madness and was never meant to be. That's not how George writes. He's not intending for us to gradually see Daenerys go from good to bad. Daenerys is a grey character who has it in her to do good and evil. She also has three weapons of mass-destruction, so she had the mean to wipe out literally anything, if she wanted to. Her "evil" turn, isn't meant to be a gradual turn, it's meant to be her accepting that in order to get the throne, she'll have to use fear. That's what the show presented. The biggest problem with Dany's arc (other than people thinking it was supposed to be a descent to madness), is that people totally ignore her Meereen's arc. In this video, you mention how Dany was different in S7-8 than she was before. You're right, she was, because of what happened in Meereen. In Meereen, she tries to lock down her dragons (figuratively and literally), she tries to rule with politic and compromises. She hated every seconds of it and it became a shitshow that she got out with her own life. The only reason why she did survive, is because the dragon she didn't lock down came back to save her and take her out. He brought her back to the Dothraki Sea, where she reconnected with her Dothraki persona of being a feared conqueror. (It's pretty clear in her last chapter of ADWD) That's the Dany who returns to Meereen in S6. The Dany who wanted to burn Yunkai, Astapor and Volantis to the ground in S6 and King's Landing in S7. And then, there's everything that happened in S7 and S8 that completely isolated Dany to a point where she couldn't do anything other than choose fear. And she did.
also similar to how Jon tried to do the right thing but gets assassinated, both character try to get things done with minimum damage yet it hasn't worked for any. i think the idea here is it's not only your good intentions matter but how much you are willing to push while keeping yourself aligned with said intentions. it would be bad writing simply to portray characters in "X" ways only to go "Y" direction at end without any meaning behind it.
The problem with her arc is it was lazily written, foreshadowing her ruthlessness was there aplenty, but it was just thrown in like an afterthought taking her from ruthless with her enemies to vaporizing a bunch of innocent civilians.
The problem I had with it was she suddenly went mad. She went from freeing slaves to slaughtering an entire city. It didn't seem like a gradual change. I would have been happier if she took the city properly and reigned as King.
It failed because of the writing… especially in the later seasons. They failed to build her arc to the moment… they simply threw in a few scenes showing some tempers, they said “see! mAdNeSs!”
The earlier plan for season 8 itself had wildfire as what wrecked the city. Hard to build an arc when what is actually happening is last minute changes and then an attempt to shoehorn in excuses for it.
Taking a step back further, I'd say that "Dany goes mad" doesn't work because in general, *Any* main character going mad in a story and then committing an atrocity doesn't work. It's ok enough (if a bit lazy) when it's the denouement of their arc: "X happens, so now Y character is insane. The End". Imagine, "Dany accidentally kills a loved one close to her (or accidentally blows up King's Landing) and can't deal with it (see Shutter Island) and therefore goes insane. I've called it lazy, and I don't find it terribly interesting, but it works. But a character going insane and THEN committing an atrocity is just kind of a big...nothing. They're no longer a character acting on their own biases or rationale, they're just a plot device. Y character killed hundreds of thousands of people because they were no longer capable of lucid, rational (if biased) thought. And as alluded to in the video, we see the perspectives of "villainous" characters like Theon or Jaime in the books. The point of Theon's chapters wasn't to show how "betraying" Winterfell and the Starks, murdering his own men to keep secrets, or doing any of the other acts he does wasn't to show that he had "gone mad" or was "evil all along", but rather to show why someone in his position was committing these evil acts to begin with. The point was to show empathy, even though we are not necessarily supposed to show sympathy. Likewise, we see into the minds of Cersei, Victarion, Pate, and Varamyr (probably the most vile of POVs), also characters who commit a lot of evil acts and we are introduced to why they do the evil things that they do. We're not supposed to see that they're actually good all along, but meant to understand their reasoning and perhaps learn where things went wrong. "Going mad" or the audience "finally understanding that the character was a villain the entire time" doesn't really mesh with that.
Okay, hear me out, I still don't know if it's the right call but I do get it. Dany was not Mad, she was big feelings mad. She acted the way anyone would reasonably act. She didn't know if the bells were a trick, she only knew that she was behind enemy lines and the enemy that essentially took everything good from her was in arms reach. It was a subversion in the way that Even though Dany was one of the most sane, empathetic Targaryns - the world still pushed her to break. John was there too, killing soldiers and leading men in a war that killed innocents. He walked away from men being executed despite his morals. John might be the mad targaryn here in the way he is completely ruled by his ideology. He's the only one that broke his oath. He would have made a horrible King. They wanted us to think Dany was going mad, she wasn't, she was in desperate pain and rage but still acted strategically from a war standpoint.
I can see the books going this way, but in the show it came out of left field. In general though, Daenerys’s goal of ruling the seven kingdoms was always going to necessitate a lot of violence against characters and factions that we’ve liked. That alone would’ve made her a bit unlikable towards the end. Not a mad queen though.
It was a poor villain arc, foreshadowed or not. If it was her fate to be a villain, she deserved a powerful transformation into one, not such a weak finale
Thing is it was not even foreshadowed. The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck King's Landing and they changed an event that big and that important after they had started making season 8. So it is safe to say they didn't plan things out well if at all.
I think Bran warped into Dany’s mind bc she had the city when the bells rang. The look he gave her in Winterfell when her and Jon first arrived (s8e1) was something else. Bran is the villain!
Season 8 does give evidence for "evil Bran theory". For example it was Bran that pushed Sam to tell Jon his linage when Sam was getting cold feet about the topic. And there is a lot more. That said D and D are probably too inept to realize they were putting evidence in season 8 for "evil Bran theory".
If my beloved pet died and came back as an evil zombie and then my boyfriend (who I recently learned was also my nephew) refused to have a direct conversation about our relationship while everyone kept high fiving him for doing a thing I did all the time, and then a guy who said he was my friend and would tell me if he disagreed with me started plotting to kill me so I had to kill him first, and then someone murdered my best friend in front of me… yeah, I mean I might also burn down a city about it 🤷🏻♀️🤷🏻♀️🤷🏻♀️ (whew I hope you enjoyed my run on sentence 😂)
@@tamara.fit doesn't matter what YOU would do. That was not her character, and if they wanted that to BE her character, they needed to properly set up that arc throughout seasons, or preferably the entire show. But the way it is now, we go from the danaerys that we knew since season 1, who refuses to be "queen of the ashes" to her completely losing her shit and burning down a city that has just surrendered and this "transformation" takes place over the course of like 2 episodes. There is a reason the majority of the audience did not buy it, because it just didn't make sense.
Yup. And more importantly it is 1 of the many things contradicted rather than supported by seasons 1-7 of GoT so basically they tried to take a bunch of character build up and turn it on its head for multiple characters only to be surprised people were not impressed.
The problem with the burning of King's Landing is that there has been NO previous signs of her being so far gone as to burn innocent men, women and children who are simply trying to live their lives, removed from the intrigues of war and politics. She spent the entire time fighting, winning, and giving people a choice. She killed all of those innocent people AFTER victory out of nowhere. The execution of the Tarly men does NOT qualify as foreshadowing even if she had enjoyed it. They were political enemies and CHOSE to remain so. Varys CHOSE to oppose her and incited rebellion against here. Another political enemy. Even if, at worst, she had revelled in their deaths, they were REAL enemies. What they needed was for her to start punishing people that had never betrayed her through paranoia and build it from there. They needed another season
By saying they needed another season you are assuming this was part of a plan that was just rushed. The earlier plans for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city-not 1 dragon that had not had a lunch break after winning 2 battles nearly alone. The show writers were just tossing things in or around near the end.
I didn’t know many people didn’t understand danny until the last season, I was so confused when everyone was saying she was already mad since the beginning.
I remember being so confused when Dany suddenly decided to torch King's Landing. It made no sense to me. I needed someone to explain it to me, and even then, it made no sense. And I always felt that she had never been worse than any of the other people in charge in Westeros.
Correct. It made no sense to you because it didn't-not for her character. And to ignore Cersei while doing it too? Nonsense. (Yes Cersei was ignored, notice how long it took Drogon to even get to the Red Keep and he flew off again with most of it still standing.) The earlier plan for season 8 was wildfire wrecking the city but the show writers decided to change that after season 8 was already being made. So instead of large amounts of wildfire wrecking a city after it had been placed in many spots under the city in such a fashion it could do just that they decided to have 1 dragon do it without a lunch break after having won 2 battles (naval and the walls) near singlehandedly.
@@sdzielinski in this scenario the white walkers can’t get around the wall. He’s their only ticket, and if they try anything he’ll just scuttle the boats
@@chrismartin3197 They will kill him before he gets them to his boats. Besides, it is not as though he could reason with them, strike a deal, play on their emotions. They can't talk! Euron would need to subdue them and then secure them. How would he do that?
Its like saying Robb Stark was mad for executing Rickard Karstark. We know it will lead to a bad outcome, he is offered ‘alternatives’ and it is completely in Robbs hands. But obviously it isn’t that simple. We the audience know this and we the audience isn’t stupid. The Tarly’s death was stupid, even more so because the Tarly’s in general was treated in a stupid way. As you rightly pointed out the fact that Randyll even CONSIDERED supporting Cersei was insane on its own but to outright support her AND claim his former king’s daughter is a foreigner is a different kind of wild on D&D’s part. I have no idea why so many people liked the episode “The spoile of war” it was a complete fuckery of logic
I've never seen a villain arc fumbled more awfully than this -- it's astonishingly insulting to the audience. The fact that this show was ever compared to Breaking Bad, in terms of being "the best on television", is wild in retrospect. Vince Gilligan explicitly stated that Season 1 Episode 5 "Grey Matter" was critical to laying the foundation to Walt's turn, because his pride prevented him from accepting a solution to his most significant problems (the cancer and leaving nothing behind for his family), from the very very beginning. Yes, the audience still sympathizes with him for many seasons because plenty of other things are going on in parallel, but there are still scenes like the Walt & Gretchen lunch that show his darker side. He also gets drunk at his post-remission party, yelling at Hank and going berserk, but we can write that off as him being drunk. Those moments are sprinkled across the show to lay the groundwork and they never portray Walt as "yas queen" or any equivalent to "girl boss" like they did with Daenerys. There **are** moments of showing Walt as being a badass, for sure (literally in the same episode where he goes berserk against Hank), but those scenes are never confused with each other. That's how the show succeeds at not gaslighting us. Vince Gilligan adeptly let us believe what we wanted without misleading us along the way. Meanwhile, D&D want to try and tell us what their show is telling us, despite the show showing us something entirely different. They're literally gaslighting us about the show **not** gaslighting us. They didn't trust their actors to play the dual parts the way they trusted Bryan Cranston, and they didn't trust their own writing to support their actors. The fact that they are still delusional about what they "accomplished" and why we're the ones who've misunderstood anything makes me feel that they should have cast themselves as the Mad King.
I really wish they could redo season 5-8. The 1st 4 season were incredible, some of the best tv ever made. 5 was great. 6 was okay. 7 was lame. 8 was terrible. I wish I could just snape my fingers and they could just do season 5-8 with the same care of 1-4. To bad we don't live in that world.
The only reason Dany lost is because she had a disloyal, dum af council. Tyrion mf still loyal to Cersie Jamie, Varys the Delulu disloyal to every single ruler he served and Jon the knower of nothing who was torn between Sansa and Dany! 😂😂 If she stayed with Jorah, Dario, Barristan , Missandei , all would be great. But I blame Jorah for bringing Tyrion to her. That was the start of her downfall.
Randyll Tarly was right, Daenerys is a foreigner! Growing up in a culture is what really makes you part of it and not where you were born. Daenerys grew up in the City of Pentos far away from Dragonstone.
@@DCharles Randyll Tarly chose not to support Dany because she was not his queen, in his eyes she could not order him around. Besides he was a man of honor and tradition, how could he support a queen who brought a foreign army of known savages to Westeros in an attempt to reclaim a title that was usurped from her family decades priors? Additionally, Randyll was capable of some form of personal honor, citing personal loyalty to Olenna, whom he had known since he was a boy, but he was persuaded into fighting against his old friend by Jaime offering him the title of Warden of the South. In Randyll's eyes Olenna betrayed the Kingdom in the search of vengeance. It is all a matter of perspective. Danys ancestor who started their dynasty had no claim to the throne, not at first. He won the throne by right of conquest. The kings and/or queens of the Westorosi kingdoms had no claim anymore because they lost their power to Aegon. Aegon won the war, he gets the crown. He is the only legal claim to the throne now. Skip ahead several generations. Robert’s Rebellion happened. Batherthon’s, Arryn’s Starks and others go to war with the Targaryen dynasty for the right to rule and Robert wins. He won the throne by right of conquest. His claim is now the legal one for the Iron Throne. Any Targaryen no longer has a legal claim, their family lost it in the war, just as many old families lost their crowns to Aegon the Conqueror generations prior. So did Daenerys have a strong claim to the Iron Throne? Well let’s look at it shall we? Her family lost the war for the crown before she was born, so legally, she’s got nothing there. Then if we ignore that and pretend yes, her House is a contender. Is she the only heir left? No. Jon is alive and is a male and is the son of late Crown Prince, Rheagar. Jon’s claim is better under Westorosi law. Did Dany have a strong claim? She had no claim at all. Not legally, as her family lost the throne under right of conquest. And even if that wasn’t at play, her brother, Rheagar, the Crown Prince had a child already. That child was the heir and therefore, Jon had the legal claim to the throne over Dany. Dany’s only claim to the throne was the same as Cersei’s and that was this: ‘I want it’. (And I have 3 Dragons). It's like invading a country with nukes and they only have Elephants against it. Edit: No hate, I just see things differently, and I like to discuss them. I Sill liked your video and respect your opinion.
@@roba165You tried to sound smart but proved yourself stupid. Randyl Tarly betrayed Olenna to follow a queen with zero claim to the throne along with power. Danys claim was always stronger than Cerseis because at least Dany is a Targaryen, Cersei wasn’t a Baratheon hence she had no claim. Nowhere is it stated the living Targaryens (Dany, Viserys & Jon) lost their claims when the targs were deposed, if they had no claim why is Bobby B obsessed with killing all of them?
@@roba165Acting like the Targaryens had no claim is quite a reach. Bobby B love of child murder wouldn’t exist if the living Targaryens lost their claims after he won. This isn’t crusader kings
However valid and thought-provoking the instances foreshadowing a darker nature in Daenerys, there are still some things that bother me about presenting Dany as the Big Bad of the entire story. I mean, look around Westeros at what all the MEN were doing to people. There isn't a single thing Daenerys did at any point that the men of Westeros who held power did not do, and worse, to people subjugated by them on a regular basis. Nobody called Tyrion "mad" for killing his father. Nobody called Tywin "mad" for violating guest rights and wiping out the Starks. Nobody held Cersei to account or called her "mad" for blowing up the Vatican and murdering all her political opponents. Nobody called Ramsay "mad" for being a violent, sadistic psychopath. Nobody called Arya "mad" for murdering all of House Frey and cooking feeding Walder's sons to him in a pie, or Stannis Baratheon and Melisandre "mad" for burning Shireen alive. I could go on and name every single other character of the show that ever held power. And yet Dany was the only one that ever cited a shed of altruism behind her intention to rule. Furthermore, there are enough scenes of her grappling with wanting to be a good, compassionate ruler that makes peoples' lives better to contravene the notion that her motives were just to be another tyrant. In the world that Martin created, "the end justifies the means" is a theme common to every one of the characters, not just Daenerys. So as far as I'm concerned, there is nothing anomalous about her behavior; nothing that makes her stand out as being more violent than any of the men around her and from any of the aristocratic houses of Westeros. Having not read the books, I don't know how Martin builds her arc along the way to strafing all of King's Landing. We can all agree that Dumb and Dumber should never be forgiven for how they ruined the show, and they should not be viewed as the authority on Daenerys' real plot arc by any means. But without sufficient enough examples of violent motivation to outweigh the numerous examples of altruistic motivation in this character, it's not enough to convince me that she is the villain of the entire story. YezenIRL did an excellent video titled, "Tragic Idealism: Why we should pity Daenerys Targaryen" that explores the cognitive dissonance between her apparent altruism and her justifications for executing on her plans of rulership. I recommend it to everyone.
I may have pointed out to you already, in case I didn't I'll repeat it, that the earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to be what wrecks the city. Not 1 dragon. D and D changed things to amp up the character assassination in season 8.
@@sdzielinski so we're just throwing out nuance now? Even Dany spared the slavers under a certain age. Guess Jon should have killed the children of those that betrayal him. Are we saying that we should treat children with the same severity as adults. Then Theon Should have killed Bran and Rickon after all they too were holding him hostage according to your logic I guess
@wisdommanari6701 Olly was a member of the Night's Watch. Olly murdered Jon Snow because he believed Jon betrayed the Night's Watch. Olly also betrayed Jon, who took him as his squire. Olly could no longer be trusted. The only option left to Jon was to send Olly south during a time of war, food insecurity and the other ills produced by war-making. That said, Olly fragged his rightful commander. He personally betrayed his commander. So, he paid the ultimate price. That's the way of things in the world of Westros. Today, a punishment of like severity would be given to a member of a military unit that committed the crimes Olly committed at the Wall.
@@sdzielinskithe first moment of the main story is the unjust execution of a “traitor”. We’re never supposed to think Jon Snow is a bad man but we’re supposed to question his actions as Lord Commander here and there especially in regards to using his authority to decree the deaths of others
Still don't believe that Daenerys going mad at the last minute made any sense. Cersei was more likely to be the Mad Queen, her whole character is built on paranoia, insecurities and cruelty.
Good video! But I think Dany's arc as “the mad queen” started from season 1; I very much agree that the execution was disastrous and hasty but the foundations were there. I would not chosen the execution of Sam's family as an example; the reaction to the death of her brother (whom she had every right to hate). her hard childhood that only improves when she is married to Kal Drogo, their relationship is the definition of Stockholm syndrome, but it is the first good thing in her life and then she loses everything to a witch whose life she saves. The way she punishes this woman is another example of Dany's attitude always being Relentless, a philosophy she only shares with characters like Cerci or tywin, considered antagonists. In the books, when Dany executes the slavers she executes everyone the same age as her; She is 13. (This was omitted from the show) The grounds for Dany to be a tragic figure exists, only it was all executed terribly in the end.
That arc NEVER stared up until the last two episodes Did you ever wonder why we never hear her give the command to Drogon to burn the city? Why we don’t even see her in that scene until she dismounted Drogon?
@@cambelloroxy9420 I repeat, it was poorly executed, but the reasons did exist. Dany seems to have something in the style of a "Savior or messiah complex", this leads her to justify her actions and that "the end justifies the means."
@@cambelloroxy9420 Don't get me wrong, Dany was a very interesting character for most of the series, and the way they ended her arc was disastrous. Personally, I hoped that Dany would lose control of her dragons and they would be the ones to destroy Kingslanding; Even if House Of The Dragon serves as a reference, it is clear here that the rider does not control the Dragon, something Dany deals with at various points in the series. The point is that Dany uses weapons of mass destruction (which she doesn't actually control) that devour human beings, takes control of the Dothraki, executing all of their liders, and leading a good part of this people to die in a war that only concerns with her as a foreign conflict; she "frees" Meereen from slavers for a time and then abandons the city which is again taken over by said slavers; In the 1st book she even orders the execution of people as young as her (she is only 13 at this point). Dany is a girl with genuinely good intentions, but full of trauma, and with too much power at her disposal.
If anybody is worthy to be called the Mad Queen is Cersi look at the atrocities she has committed you can't kill the Queen's best friend in front of and not expect her to retaliate or burn alive the high sparrow and the rest of those innocents including Queen Magarey whom her son Tomon loved dearly . Dany was wrong to burn a whole city but she was pushed by Cersi who in my opinion is the mad queen
This is not the reason this arc failed. Sure, it's not madness...But Aerys wasn't mad either. All his murders had a political rationale, even his public displays of sadism had a political motivation. He was using terror to maintain his de facto power. "The Mad King" is a narrative created by Twyin Lannister, who was Aerys' main opponent. They were clearly trying to show Danaerys doing the same thing, that when negotiation failed, she would be just as tyrannical as her grandfather. It's not madness, it's entitlement. The reason this didn't work, is that they paced it poorly. Had they cut some content in Season 6, they would not have needed to cram all the action at the end of Season 8. The thing with the Tarlys made sense, it showed how Danaerys felt entitled to power. But, then they did this thing where they had Rhaegal and Viserion square off, and Rhaegal just barely survived. Like, ok, that was cool in isolation. But, Rhaegal's death in the very next episode felt like a slap in the face, especially because of the whole Jon can't ride him after they already established Jon could ride dragons. They could have just had him die in the battle with Viserion, which would have honestly made the Battle for Winterfell feel more impactful. Coming out of a major battle losing only one major character (Theon) and a few side characters (Berric and Melisandre), felt weird and wrong. Like, they did a great job making all three characters have deaths which felt appropriate, but it felt like a mid-season episode rather than the big finale after which everything else would just be wrap up. Which is weird, because they succeeded in making the Battle of the Bastards a great season finale. Danaerys DID seem crazy, because in trying to cram a whole season's worth of material into a single episode her actions stopped making sense. We didn't get to see the progression of her grief for Rhaegal, or the mind-games she was playing with Cersei. They just gave us this montage indicating that these things were happening. What ends up happening WAS foreshadowed, it just all happens so quickly that it feels wrong. Plus, I've said it before and I'll say it again, they bungled the sex scene. It was filmed tastefully, but it failed to do the character-building it needed to do. Jon's core character trait is that he puts others before himself, sometimes to a degree that is unhealthy. I mean, that's what got him killed after all. Dany's core character trait is her belief that she is destined to rule. Their toxic traits reinforce each other. That needed to get shown. Only the cute parts of this romance made it into the show, but we needed to be shown the toxic element so that the ending would make sense. Jon's self-effacing nature only reinforces Dany's sense of entitlement: he's not the "perfect person for her" because he doesn't make her a better person. Khal Drogo was the perfect match for her, because he would tell her to stop thinking about crossing the sea. She was a better person when he was around. Then the show would be making a point about the "Targaryen madness": that actually it was really more of a collective and not an individual thing. That all the Targaryens had both positive and negative traits, and that the "madness" (which again, does not mean they are crazy it means they are wielding terror as a tool for some purpose) came from their worst traits being indulged instead of curbed. It seems like that's where they were trying to go, particularly given the conversation Jaime and Bronn have, but they just did not set themselves up for it properly. While that isn't solely because the JonxDany scene was not written very well, it's one reason.
Good analysis of the situation but I may ask the question: why did Danny’s fate had to be that of a mad queen? Yeah I get that whole “when a Targaryen is born the gods flip a coin” shit but why she was destined to be that after all she went through? I would say that his brother viserys was the mad one of the two by his behavior and made sense that the male heir was more susceptible to the madness than a female one as (I believe) there has be more of a lore on mad kings/heirs than female ones. So even the discussion between dang becoming mad vs the need to becoming mad should take more priority because I think people can easily destroy that argument based on the onscreen scenes than the need in creating a unnecessary condition that the writers just decided to write (even if George was there saying “oh yeah she’ll become a mad evil queen after all” 🤦🏻♂️)
They should have better built the tyrant arc rather than try to pass her off as mad. It was far too rushed. And then they let other characters act out of character too.
There are signs of her turning mad back in seasons 2 and 3. Ser Barristan even senses this and explains to her that killing people can make you feel powerful and always right. Her madness is mostly hidden early on because she's killing people that deserve it, and she mostly listens to her council that can stop her doing the wrong things. But later on in the show she starts losing her advisors and she starts to feel powerful and always right. The problem isn't her going mad but how the show handles it. It happens way too quickly because the show should have been at least 10 full seasons, instead it's super rushed and delicate plots like Danny turning mad no longer make sense. I'm sure the books will go the same direction but it will make more sense as it will happen gradually.
No. Actually Sir Barristan was describing the Mad King and told her she was different. Also in a season six Inside the Episode 1 of the show writers flat you said Daenerys is "not insane" nor "her father". Questions of if GoT Daenerys is insane end right right. The earlier plan for season 8 itself was wildfire wrecking King's Landng-late changes made after they had already started making season 8 is what was shown in the aired version. The show writers were playing around with things so much in season 8 that it is contradicted by both seasons 1-7 and the show writers own words. Also the claim about needing her advisors is very misleading and may have been made up as an excuse for season 8 after viewer disappointment was showing. Go back to Meereen and Sir Barristan was basically the good advisro and Daario the the bad. Sir Barristan is encouraging mercy and Daario is encouraging massacres-yes literally. At 1 point Daario suggested Daenerys simply round up and kill all of Meereen's nobles and former slave masters-she refused saying she was not a "butcherer". Heck, Sir Jorah suggested she stop freeing slaves and just attack Westeros after getting the UnSullied and she refused for the sake of the slaves. Daenerys showed she had better morals than her advisors multiple times. Should we be talking about how Daenerys contained her advisors' inner darkness?
She crucified a whole group of people in a city just because some of them where slavers. That while commanding a group that were rapist slavers like 2 month prior.
All of them were slavers, and all of them had something to do with children being crucified as a warning to her. Some did try and stop it, but ultimately stood by and let it happen. While some were more guilty than others, all contributed to children being slowly and horrifically murdered.
@@GrinMonister No, one guy says " My father was not a slaver, he opposed it, and you crucified him anyways." Some people were trying to stop slavery but were not able to do so and I never heard her said a peep when Kal Drogo was raping and murdering villages.
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I'm not hating but people need to get over it.
Good video and good point on how she should not trust the Randyll. I'd add that there is strong evidence the earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to burn King's Landing and the show writers changed it last minute. So if things don't seem fleshed out it is because some things were never the plan and if there was a plan it was not held to. Now sometimes plans aren't that good and need to be changed but it seems like the show writers changed it for the worse.
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It's absolutely wild to me that the same people who insist that this scene (and the one where Danaerys has aristocrats in Mereen crucified) is supposed to be signs of madness, but Arya murdering all Frey's, some of which she ground into pies and had them fed to their relatives, is supposed to be a girlboss moment.
Literally lmao. They act as if she chose to kill them out of the blue. I remember in the books, she specifically asks for the leaders of Meereen, you people who are at the top of the pyramid, who control and engage in the slave trade the most. And who more than likely supported the decision to crucify the little kids they left as signposts to her. It was retaliation, against slave owners. Was it pretty? No, she could have handled it better. But to say it was a sign of madness is a big fucking stretch when Arya the forced cannibaliser exists
I think that Danny’s crucifixions in Mereen were careless but they weren’t particularly insanely cruel.
@@aaroncohen2700not really Dany asked for there leaders in the books the show made it look like she crucified random slave masters when that wasn't the case
@@thatoneblackdude3333 why would they give her their actual leaders? What’s stopping them from lying and sending a faction that would’ve been favorable to Danny and her take over? We never see Danny actually investigate who ordered it.
@@aaroncohen2700 to save themselves because slavers are cowards and selfish and eat eachother whenever it sutes them ? What about that is hard to understand? Dany literally do see her investigate to get those people in the books the show just glossed over it if Dany just crucified random people or even people who would be allies to her cause she wouldn't have so much support from the former slaves and the slave masters would use that to slander her but they don't because that's not what happened, why is it that you people keep making up made up scenarios not supported by the text to try and twist everything Dany does as villainous ?
Let me remind everyone that this shows opens with Ned Stark, the paragon of virtue and nobility, executing a man who was just some poor bastard scared of ice zombies. So no, the idea that a character is willing to pass death penalty equating "foreshadowing of madness" was not well-established.
I think the key difference between the two of them is in their philosophies.
Ned's flaw is being so rigid with his code; He represents a soldier who does what he has to do; This is of course questionable, but what saves him is his attachment to honor and his code; He executes the boy in the first chapter, but he himself is the one who swings the sword.
Dany, on the other hand, rides her dragon and its fire executes anyone who crosses the path of its flames; Dany shows a lot of empathy when she is face to face with victims of abuse, but when she is flying on her dragon she disconnects, people are nothing more than ants from the dragon's and Dany's perspective.
@@juanprada4410 Thats just pure projection on Dany.
@@juanprada4410she was always aware of who she was killing with Drogon. Drogon wasn’t a mindless killing machine. When she saved Jon, Jorah and the crew right before she lost Viz, she and Drogon knew exactly what they were doing. Where’s the disconnect?
@@DavidCarradinesBelttime and time again she gets mad when she doesn't get what she wants, literally the entire show
@@juanprada4410 of course when she commits mass murder on king's landing she is mad, she maybe worst than Cersei in that moment but there is no foreshadowing it, that's the point of the video, never before that she killed irrationally or in a way different than people not considered mad.
I knew exactly what D&D were trying to do after the Tarly scene and I was so mad because Aegon the Conqueror did the same (and worse) and everyone says he was so merciful but not her. Arya killed an entire house with no consequences and everyone cheered. Cersei killed the pope (basically) and Queen Margaery (who the people loved), and burned their version of the Vatican. All cheered and there was no consequences from the public or the people of the city. Dany is treated differently in the show. And it’s so cynical bc they portrayed her as a hero all this time to flip it on us and pretend that she was a villain all along and we were imagining things. No matter how many years pass, my saltiness about this will never end
There seems to be a growing fan base that’s buying into this gaslighting technique from the show.
@@DCharles usually people that didn’t read the books, so all they have in their minds is the crappy writing of the show
Contrasting Dany as a villain against Arya as a heroine annoyed me; Arya's character arc was one of the stupidest things I've ever watched... talk about plot armour and her stupid super powers. The ending just trounced all the other houses and characters to hand everything to the Starks on a silver platter and it felt hollow and shallow as well as forced.
I am so with you on this
And this couldve been good writing. By gradually highlighting the cumulative effects of betrayal, loss, and the immense pressure of her destiny, viewers could have better understood her descent into madness. It could have added a layer of depth and tragedy to her character, making her storyline even more compelling. Such an ending would have underscored the positive messages of redemption and the power of good leadership. It would have illustrated strength and idealism, making her ultimate success a powerful and memorable part of the series' legacy.
Agreed with all of this, the problem was for too long they made Danaerys sympathetic, likable, reasonable. And then too suddenly and quickly wanted the audience to turn against her. It’s like building up a character as a hero and protagonist of a 1000 page novel and suddenly making them the villain for the last 50 pages. It just doesn’t/didn’t work.
Daenerys was none of those things. She was cold and emotionally detached from the first season. She saw her brother being burned alive and she showed no emotion, neither terror nor relief for being free from his control, nothing. Then it was her obsession of being the good, noble ruler, even if that meant using excessive amounts of violence to get back the throne, believing that a cause is your destiny and that every mean is justified to achieve it is madness too. The arc was executed poorly but it was there from the beginning
@@paolamaria1992her brother was HORRIBLE towards her, but she, as a 13 year old, still thought she had to marry him. She was afraid of him and loved him all at the same time. I can't remember how it's described in the book about how she felt, but my impression was that she was really confused. She was relieved and sad at the same time. But being married to the khal meant she had to be strong. Which in their case meant no emotion. Khal Drogo showed almost no emotion at all throughout the show, but no one thought him mad?
In the first part of the show, she always reacts to the best of her abilities, allies and knowledge. The dothraki kills a village, and she stops the raping as soon as she learns of it and is able to do anything about it (I might remember wrongly, but I don't think she had much say at this point as a leader yet).
The first sign I saw of "madness" (when taking the world's rules into account) was I think in season 6 or 7 when Tyrion has to advise her about not doing something. But that's it until the king's landing scene in 8🤷
Part of the problem is that you hit on is that people may be mistaking the show writers as people following a plan. The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city but the show writers changed that last minute after season 8 had already started to be made.
@@paolamaria1992 D&D, is that you?
@@MARYWTHER No, but I never bought Daenerys as the cool, noble heroine with her dragons and all. There was always something off with her. It started when her brother died by being burned alive. Fire didn't affect her so in that very moment she persuaded herself that it was her destiny to take the throne back, remove the stigma of madness from her family's name and establish a Utopia under the Targaryen rule. Madness comes in many shapes and sizes and becoming obsessed with a cause to the point of excusing excessive amounts of violence and cruelty to achieve it is a form of madness
Tyrion, who killed his father, strangled his ex, and intends to kill his siblings, condemning Daenerys for killing opponents that refuses to bend the knee, or accept banishment is pretty rich...
Tyrion never claims to be righteous, danaerys the entire show claims to be a righteous saviour
@@user-op6kt8pg9y And how is executing her defeated enemies that refuse mercy any worse than Ned executing deserters from the wall? Also, you're implying righteousness when you condemn.
@@kristianfagerstrom7011 I never said it was worse but that doesn't make her good, the whole point of as of ice and fire is that the people in power aren't good and the society and it's rules they uphold breeds mad tyrant who will do anything to keep power danaerys being a prime example of that
@@kristianfagerstrom7011 just because one person is slightly better than another that doesn't make that person any less tyrannical
@@kristianfagerstrom7011 I'm not implying righteousness I'm outright stating that danaerys sees herself as righteous which is why when people disagree with her she goes into childish gits of rage
Daenarys did nothing that other rulers in this world did or didn't do. I agree whole heartily with this video
But she claimed to be better than all the other rulers. So you just admitted she is a lying hypocrite
Dragons aside, there aren't many leaders on the show or in the books who would have done something as controversial as bringing a foreign army to the continent, especially so close to winter. (Cerci is the other one that does that)
Dani may oppose unnecessary violence, rape and slavery; but these attributes are typical of the culture of her troops.
@@tsxtina2919Robert Baratheon celebrated rape and child murder yet people claim he was a great ruler. Dany being ruthless against her enemies is hardly worth condemning
Okay and? Just because she's slightly better than bad people doesn't make her good, she's just another powerful tyrant who sends common people into war for her own selfish gains and wants ultimately getting thousands of common folks killed because she's spoilt
Even non Targaryens. This was a brutal world. Death by dragon fire would be one of the less painful punishments.
They didn't even call Joffrey mad and he did mad shit all the time. They just called him mean or evil.
Because he did evil things, not mad things. Both are different when it comes to intentions. Joffrey did horrible things to people because it amused him and he got off on it. He knows they are bad and he dosen't care at all. Thats just evil.
When somebody does horrible things because they believe its right... thats madness.
@nixsis5281 I'd say doing things like torturing people for kicks is mad, to me, call me crazy but I just see it that way
Joffrey is the case of bad parenting. Cersei spoiled him so much as she was grooming him to be the next King and ignoring her other children. Jaime as his real father pretending that he's not his real father and mostly busy on being a King's Guard. Also, he's a product of incest, it just makes it worse. The reason why Myrcella and Tommen are nicer is because they mostly out of spotlights as Joffrey is the one who got attention the most and they mostly raised either by hand maiden or maids (remember Tywin in Season One was enjoying his retirement in Casterly Rock) and they both are mostly respect Tyrion and don't make fun of his condition unlike Joffrey.
@@EricGray-zr2esjoff didnt lose his marbles though, he was just a sadistic moron.
To those who want to feel sad about Randall's Tarly death: In the books he threatens Brienne with RAPE because she is a fighter and she is not a proper lady.
And we all know what he did to Sam.
In the show, it's beyond obvious that he loathes Sam and is a massive racist, too. There's no reason to be sad for Randall Tarley, especially since he could have saved his other son from being burned, but he chose not to.
Books and show are two very different stories. You can’t use the books to your convenience when it pleases you. Tyrion does a lot more evil shit in the books that didn’t make to the show
@@tsxtina2919It was just an extra info from the books to those who might be interested. If this annoys you, for your convenience you can forget what he did in the show and mourn for his death freely, fine by me.
This doesn't change the fact that he was a piece of sh*t
@@LegenDaeria so is Tyrion. But you just gonna ignore that huh??
You don’t need the books to know Tarly deserved what happened to him. The books just point out Dany giving him a choice of life or death is standard operating procedure in Westeros
The Tarlys betrayed and conspired against the Tyrells and killed their lords and queen, meanwhile the Tyrells were already Daenerys allies, so it makes even more sense in the world of Westeros and war to kill them.
Saying that Targeryens went mad was foreshadowed is just wrong, since keep in mind most Targeryens weren’t mad but in fact good (or some simply lazy/disinterest).
The actual number of mad Targaryens was quite low, Danys dad Aerys and Maester Aemons brother Aerion were the two. Baelor the Blessed wasn’t mad, he was just fanatically religious and Maegor was just cruel also not mad
No they weren't. What's the quotation about the Targeryens? When one is born, the God flip a coin whether they are going to be great or mad.
"No they weren't. What's the quotation about the Targeryens? When one is born, the God flip a coin whether they are going to be great or mad." This doesn't match the actual math. It was also partly Cersei doing propaganda in season 7 that the show writers jumped on in to try to give themselves an excuse for their nonsense and contradictions.
@@joanmilton9986 Exceeeept, when you actually look into the Targaryens, you know it's false narrative. Even in HOTD, "mad characters" like Daemon, Aemond, Aegon, are not portrayed as mad/crazy in the show.
Here's the major issue- they didn't tell Emilia Clarke what was actually happening internally with her character, so it's not onscreen. Clarke said that it wasn't until she read the last scripts that their directions to her in earlier episodes made sense. If you say to an actor "Do it more like this" without following that up with "Because your character is feeling like this because of this thing", your foreshadowing is going to fail for a big segment of the audience. And this also goes to the feeling of disconnection from Daenerys that was mentioned in the video. We can't see any real depth to her feelings, because there is none. Clarke was denied the opportunity to give her that depth. I'm sure people remember the speculation on how the men in charge of this show really feel about women, and frankly? The way they handled this storyline and Clarke as an actor is another strike against them.
Can you please tell me about those speculations? Or share a link or something, please.
I haven't heard any of it.
PS: I'm one of the millions of people who 5 years later is still beyond furious with that lazy finale.
@@bravassSubswell, DnD (The show runners) got royally pissed at Emilia when she put a nudity clause in her contract after season 5. They eveb considered recasting a more "agreeable" actor.
The scripted scene of the bells had Cersei blowing the caches of wildfire when the bells ring. The cast didn't even know they changed the end of the episode until it was screened for them.
I agree about most of your post, but don’t know what that last bit was about.
@@yorgivon-schmourgeussborgi Well that part I hadn't heard before.
I do remember reading or hearing that Emilia thought Daenerys destroyed the Red Keep, not the whole city and she realizes what will air when they have a screening party for the episode or something. Now, I don't know how true that is, as Masie Williams had to film scenes of collapses all over the place, etc. One thing doesn't add up with the other.
Daenerys's madness arc makes less sense when you read about how her ancestors conquered Westeros, Aegon the conqueror burned entire castles and armies for not submitting to him, the things Daenerys did aren't even the worst a Targaryen has ever done in Westeros 😂
Also Aegon burnt Dorne for 2 years after his favourite sister wife got killed by the dornish defenders
He cooked the inhabitants of a castle by burning it from the outside with dragon fire.
The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city but the show writers changed that last minute after season 8 had already started to be made. There is no "arc". Also 1 of the show writers flat out said Daenerys is "not insane" nor "her father" in an Inside the Episode back in season six. So their failure to stick to plans resulted in them contradicting themselve-both in what the story portrayed and even what they literally said themselves.
I agree! There was a rumor that George actually planned on ending Dany's story this way in the books. This is where the writers got the idea of turning her into a tyrant in the final season. The problem is it was all just too abrupt. They didn't have enough time to flesh out this type of ending. Geroge has all the time in the world to do this as he writing a novel. Dany's descent into madness happened so fast you blink and miss it. Her character deserved more... If they wanted this arc to be her end there should have been at least 2 more seasons!!
@@Trustyzaney There is also a rumor that GRRM was planning on her not becoming a tyrant but sacrificing herself to help Jon make a magic sword to help deal with "the Others"-the Whitewalkers in the books. Like I pointed out before, the earlier plan for season 8 itself was wildfire burning the city, so what we got in terms of the version of season 8 that actually aired may just be something D and D slapped together and thus very different from what GRRM was thinking. Not just "rushed" but different.
If D and D decided to have 1 dragon suddenly burn down they city then the fact that they made the decision late into the process of making season 8 that would explain why things feel "rushed". Yes GRRM wanted more seasons but even without them making sudden changes late into things means there is little to no time to create a things building to that change. It also means ignoring the things that were already there that were building to something else. We don't know what GRRM will do because he has not finished the books. He could do something different from either rumor.
Once again you’ve blown my mind 5:40. The way we no longer see things from Danny’s perspective after they decided they wanted her to be evil( aside from the final tipping point I guess). How disingenuous can this show get even now all these years later.
They didn’t decide , she was evil from the very start
@@curtiszyr ur right bro she was so evil at the start. And then when she killed all those innocent people it was set up so smart. U r so true bro
@@boih0d0r70 yup a psychotic power hungry and obsessed woman with bloated self righteousness and arrogance , 100% deserved what she got.
@@curtiszyr explain how
It's a book about how the only truly good people are dumber than a bag of hammers and as useful as a wet towel written by a near nihilist guy who is obsessed with hyper portrayals of the morally bleak nature of his own world perspective. She was always going to go evil. The only question was by how much.
The real bitter sweet ending that D&D promised us was Daenerys fans feeling what Stannis fans felt back in season 5
Stannis fans? The book, hence Stannis's fate succeeding Robert to the Iron throne was already sealed, at least until he regroups to try a different pathway. I would not use Stannis as a comparison to Daeny's story.
@@m.williams4971i don’t think it was that stannis died it’s the way they handled his character in the season
And yet Stannis downfall was way more organic and felt by the audience than this one. When he decided to kill his own daughter in desperate attempt to change tides of war we're shocked but understand what led him to it and we feel he just chose a path of no return.
@@m.williams4971 I'm a Mannis fan all the way, but you're coping big time if you think Stannis is gonna get the throne at this point and not gonna sacrifice himself or become a lord commander of the nghts watch
And then there's me... I liked both Daenerys and Stannis. 😪🤣
She also gave Cersei multiple chances to surrender and for all he efforts she lost a dragon and they killed her best friend. So then Dany was like "fuck it, no more Mr Nice Guy we'll do it the old fashioned way."
They ruined Dany, they ruined Jon, the ruined Stannis, Jaime (especially Jaime), Tyrion...the only ones with a good final season were Theon and the Hound.
Not even Hound, in my opinion. His rebirth arc was all about letting his hatred for his brother go and that was forgotten about. Cleganebowl felt like purely fanservice.
No, they didnt ruin her at all.
@@LadyDynamitezthe Hound didnt go to get revenge, but to stop a very dangerous individual. The Hound died a hero
@@LadyDynamitez Clegane bowl also sucked.
@Tony-ih1pg LOL a very dangerous individual who had posed a threat to literally no one for 4 seasons except a couple sparrows and, ironically, Qyburn?
I’m so glad someone is calling this out. Machiavelli himself would’ve argued that letting Randyll and Dickon live after that would only serve to provide inspiration and figures for a resistance to rise and rally behind. Varys was explicitly warned he’d be toast if he betrayed her yet when he’s caught doing exactly that everyone is horrified she’s punishing the guy for plotting to kill her? No conqueror could’ve allowed that kind of insolence to stand. But when it’s a woman suddenly these actions are emotional and unhinged. And of course, the erasure of her perspective altogether for those of Tyrion and Varys’s conveniently aids this character assassination. The misogyny the show suddenly adopts in order to try and justify The Bells is beyond insulting. This was the worst aspect of the final seasons for me: the writers deciding xenophobia is noble and a conqueror is crazy for doing what a conqueror does.
👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 Preach! The Tarly argument as you point out is insanely goofy - and if they wanted a mad queen direction on it, all they had to do was have her NOT offer them The Wall (considering that's exactly the ultimatum any leader in her shoes would have given). And The Bells forever ring for horror... not because she COULDN'T have done what she did, but because THEY HAD ALREADY SURRENDERED 🤣🙈
I may never get over the lazy pain of it lol.
@@a.p.2019 let’s just pray for at least WoW. I read that the Mereen plot line will be crucial is setting Dany down a darker path instead of just killing Selmy in a hallway while Tyrion makes jokes. At some point the Sons of the Harpy will show her that some societies have to be toppled in order to change and her tolerance of collateral damage will increase. My bet is that after the battle of Slavers bay she and Drogon torch all of Old Volantis behind the black walls to crush the slave trade for good. If the show had included something like this it would at least make some sense why people like Sansa don’t trust the woman coming to save their asses or Randyll would stand by dimwit Cersei in the face of her proven incompetence. A spiral from there as more and more people you came to liberate reject you would feel earned instead of Bells = DRACARYS!
Colonialism was bad wasn't it ???
Have you ever considered that one greater evil doesn't outweigh the lesser, One of the biggest themes of A song of ice and fire is literally that there are no good rulers, so saying "people might rise up against dany" isn't really a valid point because she's not a good ruler she's just better than the ones on the throne
No, it has nothing to do with being a woman.
Thank you, especially for the part about the Tarleys. It made me so angry when Sam is upset after Dany tells him she killed his dad, who openly LOATHED HIM, and his brother, who chose to die when he had no good reason to do so. Randall could have saved Dickon by surrendering, and he chose not to. That's on them. Her actions are not any worse than those of other leaders in this show.
so what? Did you expect Sam to smile with happiness when he found out that his father and his younger brother were executed?
Their relationship wasn't the best, but they were family.
Yeah the fact they really tried to make Sam a Daddy’s boy suddenly when it became convenient for their mangled plot was downright bonkers. It’s not like they even had a complicated relationship. Randyll straight up threatened to kill him (and enjoy doing it) after subjecting him to a lifetime of nothing but brutal abuse. He is the reason Sam spent his life thinking he was a useless coward until Jon saw value in him. Book Sam would kiss Dany’s feet for ridding him of his tormentor. Maybe he’d mourn Dickson, but Sam is reasonable enough to understand he made his choice. If they actually tried to make this make sense, they could’ve had Randyll be impressed upon learning Sam killed a white walker (a stretch that Randyll would even believe in “snarks and grumpkins,” but let’s just say for sake of argument he can be convinced) and offer Sam the first begrudging kernel of approval he’s ever gotten from his dad before he leaves for Oldtown. Maybe then I could believe Sam would be conflicted if he loses his dad right after getting a taste of the validation he’s always wanted. But no, that would add exactly one extra scene and we need that screen time for more dick jokes!
@@myaalexander354 I respect your perspective, but there is nothing unrealistic about Sam's reaction when he finds out that the woman in front of him executed half of his family.
You minimize the death of his younger brother a lot, and it is quite normal that the death of a parent provokes some type of reaction on you.
If you think about it, the funny thing about that scene was probably to give Dany more reasons to distrust Sam when he revealed that Jhon was the legitimate heir.
@@juanprada4410 We can definitely agree that scene was really solely to eventually plant doubt in Jon’s mind about Dany via Sam. I’m glad we can respect each other’s perspectives without necessarily agreeing. I’m not sure if you are an exclusive show watcher or if you read the books as well (this isn’t book snobbery speaking I’m a television writer/producer), but for context my opinion of Sam’s reaction is primarily influenced by “Book Sam” and “Book Randyll.” Book Randyll is far more cruel not only to Sam, but Brienne and just in general. Book Sam is so traumatized by the years of abuse he actually begs Jon not to send him to Oldtown to study as a maester. Even the thought of being in the same region as his father instantly reduces him to the scared, cowardly boy we met in the beginning of the story. To me, expecting Sam to have the reaction he did in the show to his father’s death would be like expecting Gilly to be pissed enough over Craster’s death to want revenge on the Night’s Watch. Could there be complex feelings there? Sure. But Sam’s reaction in show suggests he felt loyalty towards a man who mercilessly abused and ultimately abandoned him, which simply wasn’t the nature of that relationship. As far as Dickon is concerned, Sam never seemed to harbor ill will towards him, but they barely knew each other (larger age gap in books). Book Dickon (as opposed to Show Dickon) is very quickly becoming his father’s son, which I would imagine could only make Sam weary of him at best. But even if there may be feelings of kinship there, Sam is one of the story’s best characters when it comes to separating reason from emotion. When Jon and everyone else are pissed he wasn’t made a ranger, Sam is able to see further than the immediate disappointment and understand Jon is being groomed for command. When the whytes are being examined at Castle Black, he’s able to put fear and panic aside long enough to observe they’re not rotting. I believe he would understand his brother had agency in this situation and made a choice to die by a terrible man.
@myaalexander354 his brother had some agency. But the person with the most agency was Danny. She was not there in Westeros to save anyone. She wasn't there to fight the White Walkers. She wasn't there to help the North keep it's independence. I think that because she was warring against Cersei, one of the most hated characters in the show, that Danny was the aggressor. She was there to force her leadership onto a people who didn't want her there. She killed thousands because of them because she wanted to rule them. Then, when they still refused to bend the knee, she killed more of them.
Deanery's madness deserve an entire season. We had an entire season where she was sold to Drogo, married and f*cked and fall in love and her husband dies. Her descent to madness needed the same timeframe to convince people.
Yes. It needed the moments that made us go "uh-oh, that cannot be good for her mental health" and "uh... is it just me, but is she getting...?" "Oh shit, is she going mad?!" and then the final "Welp, she went over the edge, it's over".
Yup; the very few tidbits they dropped in here and there (such as the "god's flip a coin" line) were simply not enough to demonstrate a convincing mad queen character arc. Not that it couldn't work it just was not enough and not aligned with here character (especially if you are book reader and are purview to her internal thoughts of empathy especially for 'innocent' people). We are talking about the character that locked up her own 'children' because one accidently killed a simple Shepard's child.
a well written subversion should leave you feeling 'oh I should have seen that coming'; not leaving you feeling like it was a twist for the sake of having a twist.
To be honest, no. It would be better, sure; but most people probably wouldn't like a mad Danny anyways.
@@Heliz14 I don’t know about that. I would have preferred a more traditional happy or biter sweet finale for sure but I would have been fine with a mad queen arc if they executed it well. I know most people I have talked to don’t take issue with the mad queen arc but take issue with how rushed and contrived it was in execution.
Something as simple as no bells sound and the Lannister’s and kings landing refuse to surrender so she burns the whole city. Something as simple as that would be enough to make the mad queen arc easier to swallow.
I'm going to say an uncomfortable truth. I think most people have this opinion because of all the controversy the ending created when it came out. There were those who said it was a bad ending and those who attacked that people, saying the ending was fine and that they only thought it was bad because they wanted a Disney ending. The first group, to justify themselves, claim that the same ending with more development would have been fine, and that's where I disagree.
Yes, the ending we got was rushed, but I think with more development people wouldn't have liked it either. Seeing how Daenerys' character slowly transformed into the Mad Queen would have sparked complaints and discontent. The audience already complained a lot about her character when season 7 came out because the directors started giving her a different focus in that season.
In the same way, I don't see how more development could have generated any kind of hype so people to want to see Bran sitting on the throne, or Brienne writing like a teenager about Jaime, or Tyrion becoming to the same Tyrion from the beginning who only thought about wh*res. And I won't even talk about Cersei and Jaime...
The show with the same ending but with more development would only have made people stop watching (or liking) the show more gradually, that's all.
I never once looked at the Randyl Tarly scene and thought she was crazy. Not even with Varys. She didnt become "crazy" until the shoehorned in burning down Kings Landing scene. And thats just it. It felt forced in. Up until that point, her actions make perfect sense...her burning Tarly is like you say, an act of war. Shes trying to assert her rule. He wont accept it, even though he was a Targaryen supporter prior. He has to go. His son was his own choice.
Varys was plotting against her to seat Jon instead of her. He became a traitor to her. She found out. She had him in custody. He had to go. Especially since he managed to orchestrate a lot of chaos in the past.
The only things that dont make sense are the ones like how the dragon gets killed by the navy. But again...those are shoehorned problems we didnt see previously. Like had they taken their time, theyd realize that just doesnt make sense that she forgot so much, that they all forgot so much. It was the writers scapegoat...oh they forgot...yea...ok...
Those that see her actions as crazy are typically the same people who worshipped Stannis and his burning of his own family to some god he didnt even believe in. And i dont mean Shireen, he burned his own bil in that first sacrifice scene. Or...theyre sexist. Sorry to say, but when you pretend its just an act of war when men do it, but women are crazy for doing the same things, thats literally sexists.
Yup, none of those supposed 'crazy' actions are actually crazy and are completely rational and no more ruthless than what anyone else was doing in similar positions. So her to suddenly flip and burn an entire city just does not work. It could have if set up properly; maybe show some more plotting by Sansa to destabalize her; show more perceptions of betrayal but those that she really trusted. Show her losing more and more interest in 'the people' and only caring about herself. Problem is, stuff like her fighting for the north and fighting to stop the white walkers works in contradiction to her going mad. so her entire arc in the last 2 seasons contradicts the mad queen arc.
@@patrickthomas2119 exactly, agreed. Had they spent more time on the descent, they couldve made it work and enjoyable. Instead, quick and sloppy...just doesnt work.
I agree and I don’t like to point to sexism when it’s not necessary but we can actually eliminate all the other possibilities here
There is both sexism and another possibility. The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city. The show writers do last minute changes (after season 8 was already in the process of being made) to change why the city burns and because they are willing to disregard the character of their characters it falls flat. I'm not saying sexism isn't at play. The hypocrisy and double standards she is held to compared to others makes it seem likely it was. But major last minute changes can be added to the mix.
The 1 positive out of this is that it disproves the notion there was supposedly a grand plan D and D supposedly followed. If they couldn't keep their plan within 1 season then odds are not high they would keep a plan that required going into multiple years.
The only madness in The Bells is how unnecessary it was. She had pretty much won at that point. The Golden Company had been decimated, the Lannister forces had surrendered, Cersei had no more allies. All Daenerys had to do was land and sit upon the Iron Throne. Even having her execute Cersei wouldn't feel out of character after she burnt the healer woman for killing her husband and son.
To me, it feels like the culmination of a big problem building up through the seasons; bad things didn't suddenly happen as a natural consequence of actions, but because the story needed to get darker. What I mean by that is that when Ned was betrayed, it was the consequence of trusting Littlefinger and not realising he was a backstabbing slime. Compare that to Stannis sacrificing Shireen, which only happened because Ramsay and his men snuck in and burnt their supplies without anyone noticing.
Exactly her giving them a choice was generous! How they gon fight for her father the mad king & say she has no ties to the land?! They killed her ally & their liege lord’s mother Olenna & sided with their liege lord’s killer!
It’s no different than when Jon & Sansa talked to Alys Karstark & Rickard Umber & gave them the same choice to bend the knee & swear fealty to house Stark & they did. If they didn’t Sansa would’ve wanted them beheaded or hanged & wanted to give their castles to other lords after fighting to get her own back because of a reckless family member. But we don’t talk about that contradiction cause it’s Sansa Stark
Also Sansa promptly betrayed Jon the first chance she got.
@@georgeprchal3924 facts smh
@@tytybaby06 I sincerely believe she was trying to get him killed at the Battle of the Bastards too.
@@georgeprchal3924 same that look on her face when she saw him alive says it all. She wanted to get there after he died & take the victory for herself not realizing they would’ve had to siege winterfell after Ramsay fled.
@@tytybaby06 yep. All Jon's allies died, then she swoops in last minute with the Vale Knights. Rest assured she did her best to undermine him while he was away at Dragonstone.
Why was the act of burning people alive with Wildfire, (as Tyrion did) acceptable, but Daenerys using dragonfire frowned upon?
You can argue for or against giving the Tarlys mercy, but it's pretty funny comparing what she did to whittling down an invading army at the very onset of battle.
When Tywin send his army to sack the King's Landing at the end of the rebelion, when they opened the gates for him thinking he's here to help them, that is apparently perfectly okay and not mad, but when she adds dragon into it, it's somehow madness
There is this saying that good filmmaking is all about showing, not telling. You were spot on, they told us what to feel and expect of the character but never actually showed what's going on with her, which is absolute reverse of first seasons when we witnessed very closely Dany's journey from a frightened girl to freaking empress.
They made the grey/black characters in the books so bright in the show that I'm now blind
If GRRM and the show's writers wanted a "Mad Queen Danerys" arc, they should have planted the seeds of it much earlier... They could also have gone the "One of her servants slipped Dany something that made her go beserk" route. Being brutal against enemies was par for the course in this time period, especially for a young queen that needs to force people to take her seriously.
It was just out of character of her to just go that type of crazy and destroy a whole city. She was more of the "Make a brutal example of enemies in front of others" type. Which, like I said, Danerys needed to do. Remember how the noble houses fought so hard against Ranerya being on the throne so long ago.... Only brute force would place Danerys on the throne, and keep her there....
She was always evil. She burned an innocent woman alive and promised to take what was “hers” with fire and blood. Her advisors kept having to stop her from doing evil shit. What show did you watch??
@@tsxtina2919how was Miri innocent she may have been justified but she killed her baby over a prophecy that didn’t even come true yet she made it happen because her child drogon ended up being the stallion that mounts the world
@@ACinemafanatic they slaughtered all the men in her village, they raped the women, and enslaved everyone who was kept alive.
@@ACinemafanatic Don't waste your time. The person you're responding to is a rabid Dany hater. They're attacking everyone in the comments section that defends her. If Mirri is innocent for killing a baby, so is Daenerys for killing the kids in KL.
Mirri warned Danaerys that saving Drogo would cost a life. She told her not to enter the tent but Jorah brought her in
We aren't watching it through Tyrion's eyes. We are watching it through the showrunner's eyes.
By season 8, Tyrion and Varys had become little more than mouthpieces for whenever the showrunners wanted their own ideas expressed to the audience.
They were no longer the carefully crafted characters of GRRM who had voices of their own separate from the author's. Who did and said things IN CHARACTER.
Nailed it. L these characters started talking directly to the audience at the end of the show. It was embarrassing
Cersei has always been foreshadowed as the mad queen what bugs me is that folks bought into this narrative that dany is mad so much they think it’ll happen in the books when there’s no foreshadowing whatsoever. Cersei literally has parallels to Aerys even Jamie is freaked out and after her walk of shame she’s gonna become 10x more ruthless and more paranoid as time goes on.
I would love it if you were right, but this will definitely happen in the books. This is definitely Martin's ending. They even admitted to this in some interview or another.
I suggest you don't read the next books while expecting something different. I'm not sure I'm interested in them anymore either.
I think the books will take Dany down a darker path that will eventually end up with her burning KL, but it will actually be a developed arc that makes sense. But we agree that Cersei IS the mad queen for real. Not only was she obsessed watching the tower of the hand burn from wildfire, to the point it gives Jamie Aerys ptsd, but she orders the deaths of a mummers troop who put on a play she deems treason. Brightflame behavior. Blowing up the equivalent of the Vatican in the show is pretty batshit. And of course, the paranoia, cruelty and multiple threats to burn cities to the ground.
@@myaalexander354 To me, the craziest thing she did is burning her in-laws. Those were her allies, the wealtiest family in westeros and the ones with all the food. How insane do you have to be to do that? Daenerys cared for her allies and her people, at least.
I think she's just going to rebel against her advisers in the books, being an immature teen. But it'll make sense that the show just lacked.
It still won't be a good ending with Bran as king. And Book Dany also deserves better- a home if not the crown. But alas.
@@wrongnumber878 the funny part is, Cersei is convinced her allies are actually her rivals or enemies. Which is exactly the type of upside down paranoia crazy people exhibit.
@@myaalexander354 Agreed! On the other hand, when Daenerys feels her allies are her enemies, it's because they were. Varys and Tyrion were betraying her and the Starks were against her too-it's not paranoia if people are actually out to get you.
Cersei was so against Margaery, she didn't realize Marg could make her son happy and give her grandkids- that means Cersei wins. She had to ruin that.
Saying that Mad Queen Dany was “foreshadowed” because she had some morally grey scenes is the equivalent of saying Jon was destined to be a dictator because he executed a man that was begging for mercy and didn’t compromise when the northern lords disagreed with his choices, or that Arya was destined to be a psychopath because she cooked men into pies, or that Sansa was destined to become a sadist because she was fascinated and smiled when she had hounds eat a guy’s face, or that Tyrion was destined to be vicious because he wished he could poison everyone in Kings landing, etc.
Finally! Someone understands and explains the real issue. Well done sir. And also for reminding us that Randall Tarky would have been on Dany's side if he were consistent with his own history. How is the daughter of a dynasty that ruled for centuries a foreign ruler?
The problem was that the show directed Daenerys' story so that she must be in the wrong if Tyrion did not agree with her. They made Tyrion the moral centre in the later seasons, despite him not caring that his father started a war in the Riverlands over his arrest that he talked his way out of, that his family massacred thousands, and he himself using wildfire against Stannis for Joffrey who he new should not be King.
I agree with your overall point, but I would say that Arya's mass killing of the Freys was definitely a mad thing to do. I can't imagine her doing it in the books, it seems more likely that Lady Stoneheart and W. Manderly will fill in for her.
Yeah. Don't forget the serving girl whose face she was wearing when she killed walder.... I'm assuming she murdered her too??
That's because it wasn't supposed to be Arya that did the deed. In the books, it was Lady Stoneheart. But because she didn't exist in the show, Arya was picked to do it instead.
Respectfully I think show Arya killing the Freys was ruthless, but it was fair vengeance. She only kills the Frey men who were involved in the red wedding, (unless she killed that servant girl…I like to image she stole the face from the Hall of Faces on her way out).
I wouldn't have, and didn't use the execution of Tarly's as a prequel to madness. She took a page out of Aegon the Conquerors' book there. Simply put, after Daeny roasts the hired swords from Essos, it made zero sense to haphazardly burn Kings Landing. And then all that crazy talk about the freeing the rest of the world(or something to that effect)? What world beyond Westeros and Essos? The 'Mad Queen' plot departure was simply lazy and confusing!
I definitely agree that seasons 1-6 Daenerys is not the same person as seasons 7-8 Daenerys. And it's not just her character that looks the same, but for some reason behaves quite differently. You see it with other characters like Littlefinger or Varys or Jaime (let's not forget the contrast between him sacrificing his reputation for the sake of saving lives and then in season 8 acting like he never really cared about them)... and the list goes on. It was in season 7 that I really started to have a bad feeling where the show was going, even though there had been earlier signs in seasons 5 and 6. The show was still watchable in season 6, but once season 7 started, it was obvious where they were going... and yet season 8 subverted even the low expectations I had, by being worse and even more illogical than I expected.
What's even more maddening is Tyrion. He joined the other side in a war against his brother and sister. If he's so "smart", he didn't consider the possibility that they would die at any point during the war? There were many people in Danerys' army that had a grudge against the Lannisters. The show ruined it by letting Tyrion plan Danerys' war effort, Olenna saw the strategy was bad from the get go. Tyrion after being the strategist for Battle of Blackwater and Meereen should never been allowed to plan another war effort.
There was no foreshadowing she was always cruel/ruthless to her enemies but had compassion with innocent people
Not really though. In the books she's resentful of the civilians (who need food and protection) that follow her city to city
Reall?
Yup. At one point that doesn't appear in the GoT tv series (which I argue is a different story) she goes outside the city walls herself with medicine and water to help care for people who have been hit by a plague. She has been told they cannot be let in the city or the disease will spread into Meereen so she goes to them to help care for them.
@@katiePetsyTalk about something that didn’t happen
She never harmed the undeserving. That was her main trait and they canned it because they wanted to anger people.
Honestly, the Tarly scene left me so confused. I'm supposed to side with the Tarlys? Those two Tarlys? The ones who threatened and bullied Sam all his life? The ones who led to Margaery's death and Cersei's ascent? The ones we don't even have a single scene that would make us root for them beforehand? Those Tarlys? No.
If it was Sam's mom and sister, sure. They were cool. But I distinctly remember his dad being a bastard at the dinner table and his brother laughing at stuff their dad was saying to Sam even if it was hurtful. They could've picked virtually any other house to burn to make us feel sympathy for, and they chose them.
Great video. The absolute lunacy of her "Descent" in episode 5 was that she had already taken KL with very few civilian casualties after swooping down from the sky on Drogon with the sun at her back. It made zero sense to kill anybody after that.
I am not a huge fan of Daenerys but killing the Tarlys was not an act of madness. You can call it brutal or cruel but not crazy. Let's not forget that the Tarlys were already traitors and oathbreakers against their liege lords the Tyrells and that they allied with Cersei (the person who brutally murdered their liege lord and his children) who has absolutely no claim to the Iron Throne and took it over by using force. You can easily make the claim that Daenerys was punishing the Tarlys for betraying their Tyrell overlords because Olenna was allied to Daenerys before she died.
Ps. 4:38 While i don't disagree with your opinion about the Stark sisters we can perhaps claim that Arya murdering all the male Freys shows us that she's no longer the young girl we used to know but a professional killer while Sansa brutally killing Ramsay foreshadows her extremely hard and ambitious stance we see in Season 8.
She was ruthless, not mad. And many characters, including the heroes in the story have been ruthless. No one sees Tyrion, Arya, Jon, and Jamie as mad. If they had dragons, one wonders what they'd do. A lot of people love Tywin, but he'd do worse and has done worse. No one says Argon I was mad. Or Visenya or Rhaenys. They burned thousands alive for not "bending the knee" to them.
You forgot one thing: Olenna, Dany’s ally was murderd, and she was given no chances to live (Dany gave the Tarlys at least three choices to survive). So it was also vengence. Another thing, it’s better to kill traitors than when they bend the knee to survive and wait for an opportunity to stab you in the back.
Yes I always thought the scene where Danny kills the Tarleys was way off script from the books & ultimately did a horrible job of trying to paint her in a bad light because anyone who’s read the books, or at least watched a lot of the book reviews, knows that if Danny were to kill the Tarley’s for turning against her it’s definitely for a good reason because they initially plead allegiance to her family as the ruling house….& calling her a foreign invader just adds insult to all the injuries she & her family had to endure. Shit if I were her, I would’ve burned Randall Tarley alive too.
After second episode of season 7 back in 2017 I tweeted “why did they start writing Daenerys as a shortsighted bitch since she landed on Dragonstone?”… oh boy.. did they…. The break is even so much more obvious now but I saw it even back then… but I sure did not expect that shitstorm..
Cersci blowing up the huge section of the city was MAD QUEEN not Dany taking out the Tarley pair.
This is absolutely spot on.
Jon decapitated Janos simply for disobeying an order. What Dany did in this scene was more than justified.
Very similar character context in both scenes too, two young "new" leaders (Jon as Lord commander and Dany as queen of Westeros) making firm decisions to make those around them well aware that they're in charge. In Jon's scene Stannis even nods approvingly after the beheading
I remember reading in an interview how Emilia Clarke called her family after reading the last script and asking her family what they thought of Dany and if they thought Dany was a good woman and if there was anything Dany could do to make them hate her 😭 DANY THEY COULD NEVER MAKE ME HATE YOU
This is the problem I keep having with people who i have one-way discussions (usually they are not wiling to give on Dany, but you have to give on Sansa, Arya, Jon, Cersei, etc) who flog the "Mad Queen" crap to death. Subverting expectations as D&D thought they were doing, doesn't allot for the inconsistencies in the storytelling these two numpties did with Dany's season seven and eight story. How they convinced themselves this was the course to go is beyond me. The almost mach six way Dany got from what was at the end of season seven to the beginning of season eight is totally nonsensical. And how Cersei and Arya, and Sansa who lied to Jon how many times to his face, got away with things Dany hasn't been allowed to is stupefying.
Would you be willing to do a video on the many times Sansa lied to Jon? I would love to see what you would have to say on that. For me, it's amazing Sansa was allowed to get away with that and become "Queen in the North," yet Dany was vilified. Thank you for your time.
I have a theory regarding Sansa’s bullshit. The books are setting up a tense situation in the north that the show just didn’t have the balls to follow through on. So the book Starks all have a counterpart in the previous generation that they mimick in personality. Robb and Jon are versions of Ned, obviously. Arya is just like Lyanna, Bran takes after Benjen. The last two, however, are potential problems. Sansa takes after her mother and in the books she’s the only Stark to treat Jon like a bastard. This is part of the reason Arya resents her. Rickon…he’s showing signs of being wild and temperamental like his uncle Brandon. When Rickon pops back up, he’s going to be the hotheaded heir to Winterfell with the support of the Manderlys, the Umbers and anyone else in on the Grand Northern Conspiracy. Sansa is going to show up with the Vale and probably part of the Riverlands with the Blackfish on the loose and Littlefinger as Lord of Harrenhall. This is going to get sticky when a resurrected Jon Snow shows up with a wildling army right around the time Robb’s will makes it to the North, legitimizing Jon and naming him king in the North. And just for kicks, let’s say this is when Howland Reed finally decides to leave his swamp and reveal Jon as the rightful King of Westeros. Hell, maybe Arya heads home by this time, encounters Lady Stoneheart in the Riverlands as she swings by and shows up at Winterfell with Nymeria, her super pack of wolves and Robb’s crown…but now has to decide whose head to place it on. I don’t think we’re going to have the happy Stark reunion we got in the show. Rickon is still a child, but he won’t be stepping aside for a bastard or a girl. Jon won’t want to take Winterfell from Rickon, but he’s kinda realizing he’s Jesus at this point and has a bigger role to play in the endgame and he’s going to need command of Winterfell to save the North from the WW. I think Sansa will challenge Rickon and Jon for Winterfell at Littlefinger’s urging. Hence, show Sansa lied and almost got Jon killed because they ALMOST had the balls to do a version of this but backed off so the Starks could all be “good” and Dany the clear “baddie” by the end. Just my theory.
@@myaalexander354Hmm interesting my problem is I don’t see book Sansa going against her true born brother, Jon definitely but not Rickon and even then if she went against Jon I don’t think it would be all that sticky because technically rickon would be the king in the North and the one with the power to legitimize Jon. Agree about Arya meeting lady stoneheart, I believe that meeting will be the end of lady stoneheart and close that part of the story off while arya sees for herself what the quest for revenge reduced her mother to
@@DavidCarradinesBelt this is why the books are so great because so many possibilities are in play. From Sansa’s perspective (likely heavily influenced by Littlefinger) Rickon will still be a very young child and probably damn near feral after his time on Skagos. He was three when he left Winterfell with a wilding caretaker. He won’t know the first thing about lordship. She could feel compelled to step in as his “regent” but would be ruling Winterfell in everything but name. By the time he comes of age, if he is still wild like his uncle Brandon, Sansa may be the more capable leader and Littlefinger will be right there whispering exactly that in her ear. The problem is Jon. He doesn’t need Rickon to legitimize him because King Robb already legitimized Jon before he died and named him his heir, unaware Bran and Rickon were still alive. As Catelyn warns Robb before he does this, you can’t delegitimize a bastard once he’s been legitimized. Jon being older than both Bran and Rickon could then theoretically move him ahead of the true born boys in the line of succession. Now the northern lords have a decision to make: name a maybe 7 year old boy King in the North with Winter coming and the white walkers on the march? Or honor King Robb’s wishes and swear fealty to his chosen heir, a proven battle commander with a fierce army at his back who also might just be the savior prophesied to lead them through the long night? As Oberyn would say…”Decisions…”
What gets me about her burning the tarleys. He said “ you have no ties to this land” ? Wasn’t kingslanding built by Targaryens. What about Dragonstone? Last I check he was on land given to him by a Targaryen? And wasn’t she BORN at dragon stone ?
✅
Calling her decision in the series finale foreshadowed or even a "decacent" is a joke within itself. If anyone went through a real descent to madness it was 100% Cersei.
The thing that bothers me, is that dragon fire makes buildings explode.
Don't forget the earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to be what wrecked the city. But yes that is a silly thing they threw in for the effects.
I think the explosions were supposed to be the dragon fire igniting the caches of wildfire still stashed around KL.
A lot of the explosions like the gate probably weren't intended to be wildfire though since they removed wildfire from being what wrecked most of King's Landing it is hard to know what was supposed to explode as what. The scene with Jon calling a retreat was supposed to be all wildfire until changed the writers decisions for season 8. So those buildings were clearly not intended as dragon caused.
I can totally believe that dragonfire lit the wildfire that wrecked the city in the earlier plans for season 8. But that would still be wildfire wrecking most of the city on its own with no dragonfire once it got going. In the version of season 8 that aired there were a few puffs of wildfire but those were a few explosions and puffs-something vastly scaled down from the earlier plans for season 8.
No one is Westeros is above mass murder but somehow Dani is the worst. Because Tarly was such a great guy and father, right? Because Cersei is so sane, right? Because Arya killing Walder's sons is awesome, right? And so on.
Calling Daenerys the "Mad Queen" is mental health problem shunning. Fight me.
Seriously, how many things can one person take? How many people in GOT have been broken, done heinous things, and people cheered them on?
History is written by the victors, and this is what is happening here. The writers wanted Dany dead, so they ultrahyperformed her character. It didn´t completely come from nothing, but to me, it didn´t make sense or feel like Daenerys anymore.
She never went mad. Selfcontrol is her realm. Killing inocent ppl is not her style.
Ned stark who killed an innocent, arya who killed everyone, jon who justified his every kill , tyrion who killed his father, i mean..............
Seeing Daenerys through Tyrion's eyes for two seasons was awful, because Tyrion had become a ruined character himself, (and he was a terrible advisor.)
In a short span of time, Daenerys had lost Viserion, Jorah, Rhaegal, and Missandei. Her 'family' and her support system was decimated. What was left? Her huge army that was good at conquering. And they conquered, and she won. So wiping out Kings Landing to demonstrate her new found madness just seemed like lazy writing. Leveling the Red Keep would have been a great revenge move, but there was zero explanation for the abrupt departure from protecting the innocent to razing the entire city. It was a forced/rushed story line, and just didn't work well.
As for Tyrion, I don't know how they managed to take the same guy who rocked the speech at his own trial, to the idiot who made the "Bran has the best story" speech. That was a "I just threw up in my mouth a little" kind of moment.
2:34 EXACTLY IT DROVE ME CRAZY
I never saw foreshadowing of Daenerys going mad in the show. Or read it in the books.
I hated how they ended this show with the dragon queen was “crazy”. It was so dumb
If D&D need to tell us that Darnerys was on a mad queen arc, then they've failed to show it to us.
You're wrong to state that she does not experience the betrayals and paranoia of her father. Her story begins with the betrayal of her father by first an uprising, Tywin switching sides and having her siblings killed, and Jamie murdering her father who is sworn to protect.
She is betrayed by the man who raised her when he sells her to be the wife of a barbarian, she is betrayed by the old woman she saves who tricks her into losing her child, she is betrayed by her handmaiden and her only perceived friend Xaro when they try and steal her dragons, she is betrayed by Jorah when she finds out he has never told her his original plan was to assasinate her, in the books there's an attempt to poison her while she is watching the gladiatorial fights and one of her generals switches to the other side, she is surrounded by the Sons of the Harpy trying to assassinate her and her supporters, and once she arrives in Westeros she is dealing with people like Varys trying to replace her with Jon Snow. She even gets betrayed by Tyrion when he frees Jamie.
Plus she is warned by the mysterious woman that she will be betrayed three times,, once for blood, once for gold and once for love, so spends the entirety of the books then on paranoid about everyone she meets and questioning whether anyone who she is close to will be one of the betrayers.
I’m currently reading A Dance with Dragons and Fire & Blood. I can see how GRRM could make Danny “mad” but the show does such a bad job. Danny in the point of the book has lost herself in the slavers city and her marriage. I can see her losing it due to dragon dreams and seeing threats all around her but what D&D did was terrible.
I really feel sorry for some of the actors, and you could clearly see how unhappy they were with the last seasons of GOT.
Dany's story isn't a descent into madness and was never meant to be. That's not how George writes. He's not intending for us to gradually see Daenerys go from good to bad. Daenerys is a grey character who has it in her to do good and evil. She also has three weapons of mass-destruction, so she had the mean to wipe out literally anything, if she wanted to. Her "evil" turn, isn't meant to be a gradual turn, it's meant to be her accepting that in order to get the throne, she'll have to use fear. That's what the show presented.
The biggest problem with Dany's arc (other than people thinking it was supposed to be a descent to madness), is that people totally ignore her Meereen's arc. In this video, you mention how Dany was different in S7-8 than she was before. You're right, she was, because of what happened in Meereen. In Meereen, she tries to lock down her dragons (figuratively and literally), she tries to rule with politic and compromises. She hated every seconds of it and it became a shitshow that she got out with her own life. The only reason why she did survive, is because the dragon she didn't lock down came back to save her and take her out. He brought her back to the Dothraki Sea, where she reconnected with her Dothraki persona of being a feared conqueror. (It's pretty clear in her last chapter of ADWD) That's the Dany who returns to Meereen in S6. The Dany who wanted to burn Yunkai, Astapor and Volantis to the ground in S6 and King's Landing in S7. And then, there's everything that happened in S7 and S8 that completely isolated Dany to a point where she couldn't do anything other than choose fear. And she did.
also similar to how Jon tried to do the right thing but gets assassinated, both character try to get things done with minimum damage yet it hasn't worked for any. i think the idea here is it's not only your good intentions matter but how much you are willing to push while keeping yourself aligned with said intentions.
it would be bad writing simply to portray characters in "X" ways only to go "Y" direction at end without any meaning behind it.
For me the madness has sense knowing Arya is cursed.
It wasn’t a clinical progression, was just Arya’s curse.
The problem with her arc is it was lazily written, foreshadowing her ruthlessness was there aplenty, but it was just thrown in like an afterthought taking her from ruthless with her enemies to vaporizing a bunch of innocent civilians.
Madness? This. Is. Westeros!
* kicks rival through the moon door *
The problem I had with it was she suddenly went mad. She went from freeing slaves to slaughtering an entire city. It didn't seem like a gradual change. I would have been happier if she took the city properly and reigned as King.
It failed because of the writing… especially in the later seasons. They failed to build her arc to the moment… they simply threw in a few scenes showing some tempers, they said “see! mAdNeSs!”
The earlier plan for season 8 itself had wildfire as what wrecked the city. Hard to build an arc when what is actually happening is last minute changes and then an attempt to shoehorn in excuses for it.
Taking a step back further, I'd say that "Dany goes mad" doesn't work because in general, *Any* main character going mad in a story and then committing an atrocity doesn't work. It's ok enough (if a bit lazy) when it's the denouement of their arc: "X happens, so now Y character is insane. The End". Imagine, "Dany accidentally kills a loved one close to her (or accidentally blows up King's Landing) and can't deal with it (see Shutter Island) and therefore goes insane. I've called it lazy, and I don't find it terribly interesting, but it works.
But a character going insane and THEN committing an atrocity is just kind of a big...nothing. They're no longer a character acting on their own biases or rationale, they're just a plot device. Y character killed hundreds of thousands of people because they were no longer capable of lucid, rational (if biased) thought.
And as alluded to in the video, we see the perspectives of "villainous" characters like Theon or Jaime in the books. The point of Theon's chapters wasn't to show how "betraying" Winterfell and the Starks, murdering his own men to keep secrets, or doing any of the other acts he does wasn't to show that he had "gone mad" or was "evil all along", but rather to show why someone in his position was committing these evil acts to begin with. The point was to show empathy, even though we are not necessarily supposed to show sympathy. Likewise, we see into the minds of Cersei, Victarion, Pate, and Varamyr (probably the most vile of POVs), also characters who commit a lot of evil acts and we are introduced to why they do the evil things that they do. We're not supposed to see that they're actually good all along, but meant to understand their reasoning and perhaps learn where things went wrong. "Going mad" or the audience "finally understanding that the character was a villain the entire time" doesn't really mesh with that.
If Eddard Stark killed slavers and or crucified them.
Nobody would call him a mad Stark.
Okay, hear me out, I still don't know if it's the right call but I do get it. Dany was not Mad, she was big feelings mad. She acted the way anyone would reasonably act. She didn't know if the bells were a trick, she only knew that she was behind enemy lines and the enemy that essentially took everything good from her was in arms reach. It was a subversion in the way that Even though Dany was one of the most sane, empathetic Targaryns - the world still pushed her to break. John was there too, killing soldiers and leading men in a war that killed innocents. He walked away from men being executed despite his morals. John might be the mad targaryn here in the way he is completely ruled by his ideology. He's the only one that broke his oath. He would have made a horrible King. They wanted us to think Dany was going mad, she wasn't, she was in desperate pain and rage but still acted strategically from a war standpoint.
I can see the books going this way, but in the show it came out of left field.
In general though, Daenerys’s goal of ruling the seven kingdoms was always going to necessitate a lot of violence against characters and factions that we’ve liked. That alone would’ve made her a bit unlikable towards the end. Not a mad queen though.
It was a poor villain arc, foreshadowed or not. If it was her fate to be a villain, she deserved a powerful transformation into one, not such a weak finale
Thing is it was not even foreshadowed. The earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck King's Landing and they changed an event that big and that important after they had started making season 8. So it is safe to say they didn't plan things out well if at all.
I think Bran warped into Dany’s mind bc she had the city when the bells rang. The look he gave her in Winterfell when her and Jon first arrived (s8e1) was something else. Bran is the villain!
Season 8 does give evidence for "evil Bran theory". For example it was Bran that pushed Sam to tell Jon his linage when Sam was getting cold feet about the topic. And there is a lot more. That said D and D are probably too inept to realize they were putting evidence in season 8 for "evil Bran theory".
She didn't go mad. She was heartbroken grieving and betrayed. That can cause a lot
Someone created that to sabotage her leadership. Tyrion / blond bother wants to rule. It set against women
Cool motive, still murder
If my beloved pet died and came back as an evil zombie and then my boyfriend (who I recently learned was also my nephew) refused to have a direct conversation about our relationship while everyone kept high fiving him for doing a thing I did all the time, and then a guy who said he was my friend and would tell me if he disagreed with me started plotting to kill me so I had to kill him first, and then someone murdered my best friend in front of me… yeah, I mean I might also burn down a city about it 🤷🏻♀️🤷🏻♀️🤷🏻♀️
(whew I hope you enjoyed my run on sentence 😂)
@@tamara.f I fully agree
@@tamara.fit doesn't matter what YOU would do. That was not her character, and if they wanted that to BE her character, they needed to properly set up that arc throughout seasons, or preferably the entire show. But the way it is now, we go from the danaerys that we knew since season 1, who refuses to be "queen of the ashes" to her completely losing her shit and burning down a city that has just surrendered and this "transformation" takes place over the course of like 2 episodes. There is a reason the majority of the audience did not buy it, because it just didn't make sense.
Turning a fan favorite into a doomed despot was an unpopular decision. Shocking!
Yup. And more importantly it is 1 of the many things contradicted rather than supported by seasons 1-7 of GoT so basically they tried to take a bunch of character build up and turn it on its head for multiple characters only to be surprised people were not impressed.
The problem with the burning of King's Landing is that there has been NO previous signs of her being so far gone as to burn innocent men, women and children who are simply trying to live their lives, removed from the intrigues of war and politics. She spent the entire time fighting, winning, and giving people a choice. She killed all of those innocent people AFTER victory out of nowhere. The execution of the Tarly men does NOT qualify as foreshadowing even if she had enjoyed it. They were political enemies and CHOSE to remain so. Varys CHOSE to oppose her and incited rebellion against here. Another political enemy. Even if, at worst, she had revelled in their deaths, they were REAL enemies.
What they needed was for her to start punishing people that had never betrayed her through paranoia and build it from there. They needed another season
By saying they needed another season you are assuming this was part of a plan that was just rushed. The earlier plans for season 8 itself was for wildfire to wreck the city-not 1 dragon that had not had a lunch break after winning 2 battles nearly alone. The show writers were just tossing things in or around near the end.
Tarlys kinda forgot they were sworn to house Targaryen
There were a lot more wrong with the latter seasons than this..
I didn’t know many people didn’t understand danny until the last season, I was so confused when everyone was saying she was already mad since the beginning.
Tyrion secretly hates her
I remember being so confused when Dany suddenly decided to torch King's Landing. It made no sense to me. I needed someone to explain it to me, and even then, it made no sense. And I always felt that she had never been worse than any of the other people in charge in Westeros.
Correct. It made no sense to you because it didn't-not for her character. And to ignore Cersei while doing it too? Nonsense. (Yes Cersei was ignored, notice how long it took Drogon to even get to the Red Keep and he flew off again with most of it still standing.) The earlier plan for season 8 was wildfire wrecking the city but the show writers decided to change that after season 8 was already being made. So instead of large amounts of wildfire wrecking a city after it had been placed in many spots under the city in such a fashion it could do just that they decided to have 1 dragon do it without a lunch break after having won 2 battles (naval and the walls) near singlehandedly.
Plausibility check: Euron ferries the white walkers from Hardhome to defend King’s Landing from Dany and Jon
How would he accomplish this without the White Walkers killing him?
@@sdzielinski in this scenario the white walkers can’t get around the wall. He’s their only ticket, and if they try anything he’ll just scuttle the boats
@@chrismartin3197 They will kill him before he gets them to his boats. Besides, it is not as though he could reason with them, strike a deal, play on their emotions. They can't talk! Euron would need to subdue them and then secure them. How would he do that?
Very well stated. Great video, mate.
Its like saying Robb Stark was mad for executing Rickard Karstark. We know it will lead to a bad outcome, he is offered ‘alternatives’ and it is completely in Robbs hands. But obviously it isn’t that simple. We the audience know this and we the audience isn’t stupid.
The Tarly’s death was stupid, even more so because the Tarly’s in general was treated in a stupid way. As you rightly pointed out the fact that Randyll even CONSIDERED supporting Cersei was insane on its own but to outright support her AND claim his former king’s daughter is a foreigner is a different kind of wild on D&D’s part. I have no idea why so many people liked the episode “The spoile of war” it was a complete fuckery of logic
I've never seen a villain arc fumbled more awfully than this -- it's astonishingly insulting to the audience. The fact that this show was ever compared to Breaking Bad, in terms of being "the best on television", is wild in retrospect. Vince Gilligan explicitly stated that Season 1 Episode 5 "Grey Matter" was critical to laying the foundation to Walt's turn, because his pride prevented him from accepting a solution to his most significant problems (the cancer and leaving nothing behind for his family), from the very very beginning. Yes, the audience still sympathizes with him for many seasons because plenty of other things are going on in parallel, but there are still scenes like the Walt & Gretchen lunch that show his darker side. He also gets drunk at his post-remission party, yelling at Hank and going berserk, but we can write that off as him being drunk. Those moments are sprinkled across the show to lay the groundwork and they never portray Walt as "yas queen" or any equivalent to "girl boss" like they did with Daenerys. There **are** moments of showing Walt as being a badass, for sure (literally in the same episode where he goes berserk against Hank), but those scenes are never confused with each other. That's how the show succeeds at not gaslighting us. Vince Gilligan adeptly let us believe what we wanted without misleading us along the way.
Meanwhile, D&D want to try and tell us what their show is telling us, despite the show showing us something entirely different. They're literally gaslighting us about the show **not** gaslighting us. They didn't trust their actors to play the dual parts the way they trusted Bryan Cranston, and they didn't trust their own writing to support their actors. The fact that they are still delusional about what they "accomplished" and why we're the ones who've misunderstood anything makes me feel that they should have cast themselves as the Mad King.
I really wish they could redo season 5-8. The 1st 4 season were incredible, some of the best tv ever made. 5 was great. 6 was okay. 7 was lame. 8 was terrible. I wish I could just snape my fingers and they could just do season 5-8 with the same care of 1-4. To bad we don't live in that world.
Get rid of Dorne entirely.
When Dany lost D’orne and Reach, she should fire Tyrion
The only reason Dany lost is because she had a disloyal, dum af council. Tyrion mf still loyal to Cersie Jamie, Varys the Delulu disloyal to every single ruler he served and Jon the knower of nothing who was torn between Sansa and Dany! 😂😂 If she stayed with Jorah, Dario, Barristan , Missandei , all would be great. But I blame Jorah for bringing Tyrion to her. That was the start of her downfall.
Randyll Tarly was right, Daenerys is a foreigner! Growing up in a culture is what really makes you part of it and not where you were born. Daenerys grew up in the City of Pentos far away from Dragonstone.
Like living your whole life sworn to serve the Tyrells only to betray them? That culture?
@@DCharles Randyll Tarly chose not to support Dany because she was not his queen, in his eyes she could not order him around. Besides he was a man of honor and tradition, how could he support a queen who brought a foreign army of known savages to Westeros in an attempt to reclaim a title that was usurped from her family decades priors?
Additionally, Randyll was capable of some form of personal honor, citing personal loyalty to Olenna, whom he had known since he was a boy, but he was persuaded into fighting against his old friend by Jaime offering him the title of Warden of the South. In Randyll's eyes Olenna betrayed the Kingdom in the search of vengeance. It is all a matter of perspective.
Danys ancestor who started their dynasty had no claim to the throne, not at first. He won the throne by right of conquest. The kings and/or queens of the Westorosi kingdoms had no claim anymore because they lost their power to Aegon. Aegon won the war, he gets the crown. He is the only legal claim to the throne now.
Skip ahead several generations. Robert’s Rebellion happened. Batherthon’s, Arryn’s Starks and others go to war with the Targaryen dynasty for the right to rule and Robert wins. He won the throne by right of conquest. His claim is now the legal one for the Iron Throne. Any Targaryen no longer has a legal claim, their family lost it in the war, just as many old families lost their crowns to Aegon the Conqueror generations prior.
So did Daenerys have a strong claim to the Iron Throne? Well let’s look at it shall we?
Her family lost the war for the crown before she was born, so legally, she’s got nothing there. Then if we ignore that and pretend yes, her House is a contender. Is she the only heir left? No. Jon is alive and is a male and is the son of late Crown Prince, Rheagar. Jon’s claim is better under Westorosi law.
Did Dany have a strong claim? She had no claim at all. Not legally, as her family lost the throne under right of conquest. And even if that wasn’t at play, her brother, Rheagar, the Crown Prince had a child already. That child was the heir and therefore, Jon had the legal claim to the throne over Dany.
Dany’s only claim to the throne was the same as Cersei’s and that was this: ‘I want it’. (And I have 3 Dragons).
It's like invading a country with nukes and they only have Elephants against it.
Edit: No hate, I just see things differently, and I like to discuss them. I Sill liked your video and respect your opinion.
@@roba165You tried to sound smart but proved yourself stupid. Randyl Tarly betrayed Olenna to follow a queen with zero claim to the throne along with power. Danys claim was always stronger than Cerseis because at least Dany is a Targaryen, Cersei wasn’t a Baratheon hence she had no claim. Nowhere is it stated the living Targaryens (Dany, Viserys & Jon) lost their claims when the targs were deposed, if they had no claim why is Bobby B obsessed with killing all of them?
@@roba165 A man of honor who threatens to take his son out into the woods and kill him?
@@roba165Acting like the Targaryens had no claim is quite a reach. Bobby B love of child murder wouldn’t exist if the living Targaryens lost their claims after he won. This isn’t crusader kings
However valid and thought-provoking the instances foreshadowing a darker nature in Daenerys, there are still some things that bother me about presenting Dany as the Big Bad of the entire story. I mean, look around Westeros at what all the MEN were doing to people. There isn't a single thing Daenerys did at any point that the men of Westeros who held power did not do, and worse, to people subjugated by them on a regular basis.
Nobody called Tyrion "mad" for killing his father. Nobody called Tywin "mad" for violating guest rights and wiping out the Starks. Nobody held Cersei to account or called her "mad" for blowing up the Vatican and murdering all her political opponents. Nobody called Ramsay "mad" for being a violent, sadistic psychopath. Nobody called Arya "mad" for murdering all of House Frey and cooking feeding Walder's sons to him in a pie, or Stannis Baratheon and Melisandre "mad" for burning Shireen alive.
I could go on and name every single other character of the show that ever held power. And yet Dany was the only one that ever cited a shed of altruism behind her intention to rule. Furthermore, there are enough scenes of her grappling with wanting to be a good, compassionate ruler that makes peoples' lives better to contravene the notion that her motives were just to be another tyrant.
In the world that Martin created, "the end justifies the means" is a theme common to every one of the characters, not just Daenerys. So as far as I'm concerned, there is nothing anomalous about her behavior; nothing that makes her stand out as being more violent than any of the men around her and from any of the aristocratic houses of Westeros.
Having not read the books, I don't know how Martin builds her arc along the way to strafing all of King's Landing. We can all agree that Dumb and Dumber should never be forgiven for how they ruined the show, and they should not be viewed as the authority on Daenerys' real plot arc by any means. But without sufficient enough examples of violent motivation to outweigh the numerous examples of altruistic motivation in this character, it's not enough to convince me that she is the villain of the entire story.
YezenIRL did an excellent video titled, "Tragic Idealism: Why we should pity Daenerys Targaryen" that explores the cognitive dissonance between her apparent altruism and her justifications for executing on her plans of rulership. I recommend it to everyone.
I may have pointed out to you already, in case I didn't I'll repeat it, that the earlier plan for season 8 itself was for wildfire to be what wrecks the city. Not 1 dragon. D and D changed things to amp up the character assassination in season 8.
Ollys a foookin child. Under the influence of adults that he'd never be able to resist. Idk man
That child became a traitor. How should Jon have treated him?
@@sdzielinski so we're just throwing out nuance now? Even Dany spared the slavers under a certain age. Guess Jon should have killed the children of those that betrayal him.
Are we saying that we should treat children with the same severity as adults. Then Theon Should have killed Bran and Rickon after all they too were holding him hostage according to your logic I guess
@wisdommanari6701 Olly was a member of the Night's Watch. Olly murdered Jon Snow because he believed Jon betrayed the Night's Watch. Olly also betrayed Jon, who took him as his squire. Olly could no longer be trusted. The only option left to Jon was to send Olly south during a time of war, food insecurity and the other ills produced by war-making. That said, Olly fragged his rightful commander. He personally betrayed his commander. So, he paid the ultimate price. That's the way of things in the world of Westros. Today, a punishment of like severity would be given to a member of a military unit that committed the crimes Olly committed at the Wall.
@@sdzielinskithe first moment of the main story is the unjust execution of a “traitor”. We’re never supposed to think Jon Snow is a bad man but we’re supposed to question his actions as Lord Commander here and there especially in regards to using his authority to decree the deaths of others
@@thunderturtle1615 True.
Still don't believe that Daenerys going mad at the last minute made any sense. Cersei was more likely to be the Mad Queen, her whole character is built on paranoia, insecurities and cruelty.
Good video!
But I think Dany's arc as “the mad queen” started from season 1; I very much agree that the execution was disastrous and hasty but the foundations were there.
I would not chosen the execution of Sam's family as an example; the reaction to the death of her brother (whom she had every right to hate).
her hard childhood that only improves when she is married to Kal Drogo, their relationship is the definition of Stockholm syndrome, but it is the first good thing in her life and then she loses everything to a witch whose life she saves.
The way she punishes this woman is another example of Dany's attitude always being Relentless, a philosophy she only shares with characters like Cerci or tywin, considered antagonists.
In the books, when Dany executes the slavers she executes everyone the same age as her; She is 13. (This was omitted from the show)
The grounds for Dany to be a tragic figure exists, only it was all executed terribly in the end.
That arc NEVER stared up until the last two episodes
Did you ever wonder why we never hear her give the command to Drogon to burn the city? Why we don’t even see her in that scene until she dismounted Drogon?
@@cambelloroxy9420 I repeat, it was poorly executed, but the reasons did exist.
Dany seems to have something in the style of a "Savior or messiah complex", this leads her to justify her actions and that "the end justifies the means."
@@cambelloroxy9420 Don't get me wrong, Dany was a very interesting character for most of the series, and the way they ended her arc was disastrous.
Personally, I hoped that Dany would lose control of her dragons and they would be the ones to destroy Kingslanding; Even if House Of The Dragon serves as a reference, it is clear here that the rider does not control the Dragon, something Dany deals with at various points in the series.
The point is that Dany uses weapons of mass destruction (which she doesn't actually control) that devour human beings, takes control of the Dothraki, executing all of their liders, and leading a good part of this people to die in a war that only concerns with her as a foreign conflict; she "frees" Meereen from slavers for a time and then abandons the city which is again taken over by said slavers; In the 1st book she even orders the execution of people as young as her (she is only 13 at this point).
Dany is a girl with genuinely good intentions, but full of trauma, and with too much power at her disposal.
If anybody is worthy to be called the Mad Queen is Cersi look at the atrocities she has committed you can't kill the Queen's best friend in front of and not expect her to retaliate or burn alive the high sparrow and the rest of those innocents including Queen Magarey whom her son Tomon loved dearly . Dany was wrong to burn a whole city but she was pushed by Cersi who in my opinion is the mad queen
See my latest community post
This is not the reason this arc failed. Sure, it's not madness...But Aerys wasn't mad either. All his murders had a political rationale, even his public displays of sadism had a political motivation. He was using terror to maintain his de facto power. "The Mad King" is a narrative created by Twyin Lannister, who was Aerys' main opponent. They were clearly trying to show Danaerys doing the same thing, that when negotiation failed, she would be just as tyrannical as her grandfather. It's not madness, it's entitlement.
The reason this didn't work, is that they paced it poorly. Had they cut some content in Season 6, they would not have needed to cram all the action at the end of Season 8. The thing with the Tarlys made sense, it showed how Danaerys felt entitled to power. But, then they did this thing where they had Rhaegal and Viserion square off, and Rhaegal just barely survived. Like, ok, that was cool in isolation. But, Rhaegal's death in the very next episode felt like a slap in the face, especially because of the whole Jon can't ride him after they already established Jon could ride dragons. They could have just had him die in the battle with Viserion, which would have honestly made the Battle for Winterfell feel more impactful. Coming out of a major battle losing only one major character (Theon) and a few side characters (Berric and Melisandre), felt weird and wrong. Like, they did a great job making all three characters have deaths which felt appropriate, but it felt like a mid-season episode rather than the big finale after which everything else would just be wrap up. Which is weird, because they succeeded in making the Battle of the Bastards a great season finale. Danaerys DID seem crazy, because in trying to cram a whole season's worth of material into a single episode her actions stopped making sense. We didn't get to see the progression of her grief for Rhaegal, or the mind-games she was playing with Cersei. They just gave us this montage indicating that these things were happening. What ends up happening WAS foreshadowed, it just all happens so quickly that it feels wrong. Plus, I've said it before and I'll say it again, they bungled the sex scene. It was filmed tastefully, but it failed to do the character-building it needed to do. Jon's core character trait is that he puts others before himself, sometimes to a degree that is unhealthy. I mean, that's what got him killed after all. Dany's core character trait is her belief that she is destined to rule. Their toxic traits reinforce each other. That needed to get shown. Only the cute parts of this romance made it into the show, but we needed to be shown the toxic element so that the ending would make sense. Jon's self-effacing nature only reinforces Dany's sense of entitlement: he's not the "perfect person for her" because he doesn't make her a better person. Khal Drogo was the perfect match for her, because he would tell her to stop thinking about crossing the sea. She was a better person when he was around. Then the show would be making a point about the "Targaryen madness": that actually it was really more of a collective and not an individual thing. That all the Targaryens had both positive and negative traits, and that the "madness" (which again, does not mean they are crazy it means they are wielding terror as a tool for some purpose) came from their worst traits being indulged instead of curbed. It seems like that's where they were trying to go, particularly given the conversation Jaime and Bronn have, but they just did not set themselves up for it properly. While that isn't solely because the JonxDany scene was not written very well, it's one reason.
Good analysis of the situation but I may ask the question: why did Danny’s fate had to be that of a mad queen? Yeah I get that whole “when a Targaryen is born the gods flip a coin” shit but why she was destined to be that after all she went through? I would say that his brother viserys was the mad one of the two by his behavior and made sense that the male heir was more susceptible to the madness than a female one as (I believe) there has be more of a lore on mad kings/heirs than female ones. So even the discussion between dang becoming mad vs the need to becoming mad should take more priority because I think people can easily destroy that argument based on the onscreen scenes than the need in creating a unnecessary condition that the writers just decided to write (even if George was there saying “oh yeah she’ll become a mad evil queen after all” 🤦🏻♂️)
They should have better built the tyrant arc rather than try to pass her off as mad. It was far too rushed. And then they let other characters act out of character too.
There are signs of her turning mad back in seasons 2 and 3. Ser Barristan even senses this and explains to her that killing people can make you feel powerful and always right.
Her madness is mostly hidden early on because she's killing people that deserve it, and she mostly listens to her council that can stop her doing the wrong things. But later on in the show she starts losing her advisors and she starts to feel powerful and always right.
The problem isn't her going mad but how the show handles it. It happens way too quickly because the show should have been at least 10 full seasons, instead it's super rushed and delicate plots like Danny turning mad no longer make sense. I'm sure the books will go the same direction but it will make more sense as it will happen gradually.
No. Actually Sir Barristan was describing the Mad King and told her she was different. Also in a season six Inside the Episode 1 of the show writers flat you said Daenerys is "not insane" nor "her father". Questions of if GoT Daenerys is insane end right right.
The earlier plan for season 8 itself was wildfire wrecking King's Landng-late changes made after they had already started making season 8 is what was shown in the aired version. The show writers were playing around with things so much in season 8 that it is contradicted by both seasons 1-7 and the show writers own words.
Also the claim about needing her advisors is very misleading and may have been made up as an excuse for season 8 after viewer disappointment was showing. Go back to Meereen and Sir Barristan was basically the good advisro and Daario the the bad. Sir Barristan is encouraging mercy and Daario is encouraging massacres-yes literally. At 1 point Daario suggested Daenerys simply round up and kill all of Meereen's nobles and former slave masters-she refused saying she was not a "butcherer". Heck, Sir Jorah suggested she stop freeing slaves and just attack Westeros after getting the UnSullied and she refused for the sake of the slaves. Daenerys showed she had better morals than her advisors multiple times. Should we be talking about how Daenerys contained her advisors' inner darkness?
What's the piano music in the background?
She crucified a whole group of people in a city just because some of them where slavers. That while commanding a group that were rapist slavers like 2 month prior.
All of them were slavers, and all of them had something to do with children being crucified as a warning to her. Some did try and stop it, but ultimately stood by and let it happen. While some were more guilty than others, all contributed to children being slowly and horrifically murdered.
@@GrinMonister No, one guy says " My father was not a slaver, he opposed it, and you crucified him anyways." Some people were trying to stop slavery but were not able to do so and I never heard her said a peep when Kal Drogo was raping and murdering villages.
@@ramonserna8089But she did when, she claimed half a village so they dont get raped.
they were all slavers.
@@danyul8578 They explicitly said otherwise.
This video has a very well thought out explanation.