Winning the Game of Thrones: The Host of Characters and their Agendas (11 page)

On a more objective note, if we apply the Bechdel Test, this series is in trouble. The test (named for comic strip creator Alison Bechdel) insists that a story must meet the following criteria:

1.
  
It includes at least two women

2.
  
who have at least one conversation

3.
  
about something other than a man or men

Phrased in such cut and dry terms, it’s hard to think of any in the show. Even Brienne’s plea to fight for Catelyn is a result of King Renly’s death. Sisters Arya and Sansa fight about Joffrey while sisters Catelyn and Lysa fight about Tyrion and little Robin. The book series likely has a few Bechdel-qualifying scenes in that many thousand pages, but offhand, only the sex scene between Daenerys and her handmaid comes to mind (yes, really). And even then, she’s thinking of Drogo.

Too many strong women spend every appearance in show and book relating to, seducing, and otherwise completely consumed with obsession for men. Ygritte’s every scene is teasing Jon Snow, Sansa’s every scene is pacifying Joffrey or worrying about male characters’ plans for her. A strong young woman like Meera Reed who spends all her time fussing over Bran and her brother or furthering
their
quest is is discarding her own agenda to care for her world’s dominant gender.

Further, the extensive nudity on the show is in fact sexist – female characters spend too much time stripping to manipulate the male characters and encourage their gaze. (Gaze is a concept in analyzing visual media—the male directors or cameramen often focus on female body parts, thus encouraging viewers to identify with male characters observing them, while treating female characters as objects.) In a now-famous Saturday Night Live sketch that emphasizes this problem,
Game of Thrones’
creative consultant is revealed to be a thirteen-year-old boy eager to see more. Admittedly, after season one, the amount of naked women contributing nothing but “sexposition” appears to decrease. But only after the show has established itself.

The strongest female characters with the most agency – Brienne, Arya, Yara, Meera Reed, Lady Olenna, and Catelyn – keep their clothes on at all times. (Brienne amends this in the bathtub scene of season three, but she and Jaime make it quite clear to each other that this isn’t that kind of moment. And unlike every other nude female, she isn’t taking off her clothes to please the opposite sex or the cameramen, any more than Jaime is.) However, Catelyn and Brienne, like Meera, Ygritte, and other strong women, spend all their time in service to the males in their life, as counselors, cheerleaders, and nurturers.

Lady Olenna and Yara are wonderfully strong females playing the Game of Thrones in their own right, but compared to Stannis, Robert, Renly, Littlefinger, Varys, Joffrey, Robb,
Tywin, Viserys,
Theon, Illyrio Mopatis, Mance Rayder,
Balon
 
Greyjoy, and Mace Tyrell (who like those two women are playing the game and do not take their clothes off to get power) they’re notably a minority, with limited story arcs.
If sex is how most female leaders like Cersei, Melisandre, and Margaery gain power, it’s no wonder that Arya rejects the entire system.

Further, Brienne, Yara, Meera, and Arya completely reject their femininity – all are determined to be men in a man’s world, from featureless clothing to strength on the battlefield. In one episode, Arya even dismissively comments that “most girls are stupid” (2.7). This hardly marks her as the height of feminist power. Women who loathe being women and spend all their time convincing others they’re not just as good as (or better than!) men, they basically
are
men, are strong. But they make problematic feminist icons.

Besides Lady Olenna (who only has two scenes in the five existing books but fares better on the show), Daenerys seems the only strong, independent female enjoying being female, independent, and strong. However, she begins the show as the exploited rape victim who disturbingly grows to love her rapist and requests sex lessons so she can properly please him. (The book has a shy but curious Daenerys saying “yes” when Drogo asks on their wedding night and avoids this disturbing twist.)

Admittedly, from there, she grows into a liberated khaleesi and conqueror who (mostly) keeps her clothes on, but those first few episodes have done damage. Her triumphs are empowering and wonderful, but occasionally problematic. “Here I am – are you afraid of a little girl?” Daenerys shouts in the House of the Undying before she toasts the sorcerer with dragonfire (2.10). Her favorite phrase in the later books is “I am only a young girl and know nothing of war, but…” Granted, in medieval times, women often pacified and disarmed the patriarchy with such comments, but the khaleesi is establishing herself as a conqueror with an army. Jon Snow, roughly the same age and even less experienced at leading, would never shout, “I’m just a little boy, come and get me!”

Of course, there are great moments of power and agency: Sansa leads the women in prayer during the Battle of Blackwater. Shae beats Tyrion in a drinking game, revealing that she’s nothing like he expected. Catelyn calls on an inn of her father’s bannermen and kidnaps Tyrion. Arya’s every moment sparkles.

But where is the girl who likes being female and takes power for herself rather than devoting every moment to a son or lover? Only in Daenerys, the formerly naked and exploited rape victim or Lady Olenna, whose story arc is limited. An even more severe problem is the many many weak women like Cersei and Shae who believe sex is the only path to power – a disturbing message for male and female fans both.

CHAPTER 4: REFERENCES AND HOMAGES

Rome and the Ancient World

Rome has major correspondences, particularly in Old Valyria, the vanished empire with only roads, ruins, and fragments of lost technology remaining. Its former colonies speak a variant of its language, but much of its culture is gone forever. Since it vanished in a massive explosion, parallels with Atlantis out of classical myth appear. A few other story events particularly reference those from Rome.

     
The Roman politician Crassus, a co-ruler with Caesar and Pompey, dies similarly to Viserys. He fought the Parthian Empire’s enormous cavalry in the lands that had once been Persia. When he lost and was captured, the Parthians acknowledged his status as the richest man of Rome by pouring molten gold down his throat.

     
Tyrion thinks, “His brother never untied a knot when he could slash it in two with his sword” (I:415). This references Alexander the Great who slashed through the ancient puzzle of the Gordian knot rather than meticulously working it out.

     
The Titan of Braavos, a statue straddling the harbor, is a nod to the Colossus of Rhodes.

     
The Spartans echo the Unsullied. In particular, the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae and the 3000 Unsullied at Qoroth.

     
Arya thinks:

“Maester Luwin had taught them about Braavos, but Arya had forgotten much of what he’d said… The city has no walls. But when she said as much to Denyo, he laughed at her. ”Our walls are made of wood and painted purple,” he told her. ”Our galleys are our walls. We need no other.”‘

In the Persian wars, there was a prophecy about the “wooden walls” of Athens protecting the city. The general Themistocles decided this meant a fleet of ships and his navy defeated the Persians during the Battle of Thermopylae. 

     
Wildfire of course is the mysterious and corrosive Greek fire out of history. In the Siege of Constantinople, Emperor Leo III created an immense wooden barrier chain across the Golden Horn as it was called. Combining it with Greek fire created a devastating war weapon: Of the 200,000 troops who laid siege to Constantinople in 717, only 30,000 returned to Syria.