Game of Thrones Season Five! No Spoilers Please!

It gets a bit ridiculous the way people react to rape storylines as if the producers really raped someone. It's fiction. There were the same outcries when Anna was raped on Downton Abbey, or back when Dr. Melfi was raped on The Sopranos. Just because some people find any depiction of rape upsetting shouldn't mean it can't happen in a story, any more than other awful things that are unfortunately a part of human existence.

 

You mean......... DEATH BLOW!

 

I think the media are just looking for something "controversial" they can report on. Everyone I've talked to knows that Ramsay isn't going to get away with it.

They're making it sound like Game of Thrones is just endless scenes of violence and rape for our entertainment. I think all of us are intelligent enough to know that in the REAL LIFE middle ages, Ramsay probably would get away with it, but this is a TV show that is produced for entertainment and people expect evil to be punished.

 

You'd think that with all the attention to the horror of rape these days that people would perhaps try to understand that dramatic depictions of rape don't somehow make it more palatable or acceptable. The first ever dramatic depiction of a rape that I ever saw was on a miniseries called The Holocaust back in the 70's. In the miniseries, a Jewish girl is stalked and raped by a bunch of brownshirts. I was 14 when I saw it, and I've only seen the miniseries that one time, but the scene is burned into my memory. It was the single most terrifying thing I'd ever seen in a drama. The event and the aftermath of it was just crushingly painful to watch.

 

The show runners may be in control more than Martin at this point, so maybe Ramsay will meet a quick end, but I kinda hope not. It's taken a long time for evil-doers to get their comeuppance in the past and I don't want to see the show change in that respect. It's a good lesson that bad deeds aren't always balanced by swift justice meted out by the hands of the victim. Joffrey used to be the most hated in GoT, but he didn't get taken down for quite awhile after beheading Eddard Stark, and it wasn't by one of his victims, though Sansa got used and implicated in the plot. Jamie pushed a kid out of a window and crippled him. But he lost a hand and is now a "good guy", so people are off his back. Walder Frey is still kicking, presumably planning his next annual wedding. Robb never got to avenge his father. Cateleyn never got to avenge her husband. Arya has only managed one name on her list. So Ramsay could be around for awhile. I won't mourn his passing when it comes, but I don't need it to be right away. I don't want the show to get to the point that anytime someone does something bad, we know that they will be swiftly and appropriately punished so everyone can feel good. No thanks. I like watching this world just the way it is.

 

Arya did mention in the last episode that she left the Hound to die, so maybe he'll come back and she'll get to cross another name off of her list - or was he the name she crossed off?

 

But, as I said before, that's exactly the expectation that Martin has been pushing against from the start (at least when it comes to particular lines of plot--who knows what his ending will entail). And the TV show hasn't pushed against that so far. Why should it do so now? I don't know Ramsay's fate in either the novels or the show. It hasn't been written or aired yet, but I see no reason to expect that our desire to see a quick comeuppance for Ramsay to be fulfilled. It was risk putting Sanza in this position instead of Jeyne Poole, but I think they knew the risk and are prepared to do what the story needs, not necessarily what viewers want to see in the short term.

L.

 

Yeah, that's the thing about this series - you can wait with bated breath for your favorite baddie to take it in the neck, but the fallout from Joffrey's death has caused so many problems for so many sympathetic characters that one might wish it had never happened.

 

Bring back Joffrey! I miss the little hell-spawn.

 

Zombie Joffrey for the win! He could eat Ramsay's brain!

 

Tommen with Tywin Lanniter around to council him probably would have been a pretty good king. He's too timid to be on his own, but not wanting to take action that will require violence isn't the worst instinct in the world for a leader to have. Tyrion's crossbow in the craphouse has doomed many a more Westerosi citizens.

Another thing I'm curious about is the financial state of the Lannisters. Tywin told Cersei that their last gold mine went dry a few years ago, right? So are they as broke as that big guy Dany locked in his empty vault, living on credit, or do they still have a lot of actual amassed wealth. How has this news not gotten out? Do they have miners pretending to go to work to keep up the pretense that they are still replenishing their stores? We know they are getting money and supplies from the Tyrell's. I'm sure this is a storyline most wouldn't care about, but I'd like to see how quickly the Lannister name goes to pot if this is discovered.

 

The word is out. That's why the Iron Bank is backing Stannis financially. The financial help of the Tyrell's is key to the maintenance of Lannister power--such as it is right now--not really all that much power at all. To say more would lead to spoilers, though.

L.

 

Not to mention that with Cersei's latest scheme with having the queen and Loras arrested I can't see the Tyrell's being willing to back the Lannisters much longer.

 

or white walker Joffrey, that would be cool, then Sansa could kill them both with dragonglass…..

 

Like I said, to say more would involve spoilers.....

L.

 

I wonder if its really out or if some are just starting to suspect. Ser Davos convinced the Iron Bank to bankroll Stannis as a hedge that the Lannisters aren't around enough to repay their debts. And the Iron Bank recently sent notice that they were calling in some % of their loans. That may be them feeling out to see what the Lannister capacity to pay is. But if people really knew they were broke, you'd think there would be wider repercussions, like upheaval in Lannisport or other families starting to take them on more openly.

I can't remember, did Davos commit Stanis to repaying the Iron Bank all the debts of "the crown", meaning the money the bank had lent Robert Baratheon and Joffrey Baratheon? I wonder if he could even keep that promise. King's Landing could be like Greece.

Yeah, with the "Baratheon Regime" which is at this point the Lannisters so dependant on the Tyrell's, Cersei is really being reckless. Tywin would puke on himself if he saw how she was risking everything. I wouldn't have been surprised to find Tywin was part of the plot to kill Joffrey, knowing that he could make a much better king out of Tommen. One that, along with Margaery, would actually be popular and liked by the people and make their station more secure.

But thank you for being sensitive to spoilers, I don't want to know. I just like thinking out loud about this stuff.

 

Unfortunately, I overheard a comment elsewhere so I know where the book goes. I also heard someone going on at length about how much had changed, so there's that too.

 

Man, how many shows feature dragons and economic policy?

 

I'm sure HBO is loving the free publicity from outrage media.

 

I find it hysterical that ppl can get pissed off at the happening on a friggin TV Show!
the power of the media control is incredible...BUT some have the power to laugh them off...

 

I'm still waiting for Dragon episode!

 

Good read about last week's episode finale and the reactions to it.

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/05/all...ut-rape-on-game-of-thrones-debunked/comments/

 

I wonder if much of the controversy is due to the way TV is viewed now, with each episode analyzed immediately after it is aired, with no waiting for the rest of the story to be told. If it were buried in one of the books, it wouldn't merit a comment other than "there are some disturbing scenes in there, but is mostly turns out OK".

 

I think a lot of it has to do with how our society/culture is hypersensitive to certain issues, namely the mistreatment of women and/or minorities. Look at the reaction after the one season finale where Dany was carried around by the slave people with them chanting "Mhyssa!" All the bloggers were saying how racist it was do have darker-complexion people following around a pale white blonde girl calling her mother.

I'm not saying it's not justified at times, but the PC police have really seemed to brainwash a lot of the masses.

 

I think it's perfectly fair and valid to criticize GoT or any other story for using rape as cheap plot device.
I don't think it's fair to criticize GoT for doing it so NOW, in season 5, when the first damn episode had marital rape.

Exploitation of this sort is part of the franchise's DNA.