When you play the Game of Thrones . . .
*Warning — Game of Thrones Spoilers Ahead

Game of Thrones is not just the show we thought it was, one that is cruel and where key characters can fall victim to the vicissitudes of an unforgiving world. No, as is becoming more and more clear as the show proceeds to its final season, Game of Thrones seems to have a much more important message to impart.
In Season 2, Tywin Lannister hands his son Jaime a Valyrian steel sword forged from Ned Stark’s greatsword, Ice, noting that there were only three smiths left in the Seven Kingdoms who could still work Valyrian steel. Valyrian steel is central to the plot, but Game of Thrones is more importantly about a different type of steel, one forged not by a blacksmith.
It is the cripples, bastards, and broken things who are forged into the strongest individuals, in the crucible of an unforgiving world, beaten and folded until in the end, their strength is stronger than Valyrian steel. These cripples, bastards, and broken things in fact can achieve greater things than their brothers or sisters who would appear to be more fortunate, more skilled, or who seem destined for greatness. It is Theon, not Yara, and Jon, not Robb, who will decide the fate of Westeros.
Game of Thrones is at its core about hope in the face of seemingly unsurmountable odds, and where that hope comes from. It is, at its core, about how the strongest people in this world are not those who are born into positions of privilege, who have everything handed to them. Rather, the show is about the strength of those who are battered by circumstance, most often not of their own choosing, and how that strength is both innate and learned.
Season seven of Game of Thrones has been perplexing and somewhat disappointing because, throughout the season, characters who were beaten and broken and tested time and time again seemed to do things against their character development, making apparent mistakes and errors in judgment that simply do not seem realistic at this point in the story. Men and women of this mettle did not get this far and survive without learning a few things. For that reason, a good portion of the season left viewers perplexed at the actions and decisions of some characters, especially Arya, Sansa, Jon, and Tyrion.
It was not until the last episode that the season somewhat redeemed itself in two ways.
First, it demonstrated to the viewer that Arya and Sansa were not so naïve as they let on, to the viewers and to Littlefinger. Second, the episode made clear a critical and revelatory aspect of the morality of the world of Game of Thrones that has been only suggested up until now.
The revelation is that Ned Stark is not dead. That is not to say that he is physically alive and well in the world of Westeros. Every viewer saw him executed in the first season. But his spirit was explicitly present this episode, in Jon, Sansa, Arya, and Theon, in the memory of Cersei Lannister in conversing with Jon at the Dragonpit, and he even appeared in person in a flashback to the scene at the Tower of Joy where his dying sister committed to him a trust that he would not ever break, the identity of her son Aegon.
Ned Stark is not dead because, as Jon reminds Theon, Theon is a Stark and a Greyjoy because of Ned Stark and the lessons he taught Theon as a proxy father. Theon learned more lessons from his foster father Ned than he ever did from his own father. In the same way, even though Bran finally reveals to Sam what the viewers have known for at least a season, that Jon is the child of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark, Ned Stark is really still Jon’s father at heart. After all, Jon is no more capable of lying for expedience than Ned was, as evidenced by Jon’s lack of diplomatic acumen in the Dragonpit. Jon is therefore a Targaryen and a Stark by blood, but is Ned Stark’s son in spirit.
Similarly, Arya and Sansa suggest that it is the lessons they learned from their father that allowed them to see through Littlefinger’s plotting, because at the end of the day, they know that their pack is stronger together.
The morality of Game of Thrones, therefore, is not just that the world is a cruel and unforgiving place, where upstanding men like Ned Stark die at the hands of a would-be tyrant. It is not just that characters like Arya, Sansa, Jon, and Theon are broken time and time again only to emerge stronger and capable of changing the world for it. It is both those things to some degree. But the finale of season seven demonstrates that the show will be about how the statement that “in the Game of Thrones, you win or you die,” while making for a great tagline, is not an accurate statement.
Ned Stark dies, but in the end, it is more likely than not that he will win — by his lessons as a father, he has helped his sons and daughters to survive being broken or crippled or beaten by the world. And he didn’t accomplish that by being some overbearing tyrant. Rather, as Arya showed in recalling the time when Ned gave her a chance to practice archery, he did it by allowing his children to grow into their own, giving them subtle encouragement and sometimes a nudge in the right direction.
On the other hand, Cersei’s lessons in ruthlessness from her father may serve her well, even though the lessons were never directed at her but rather were intended for Jaime, but it became more and more clear in season seven that she cannot win at the end. Jaime notes as much before he finally decides that she is beyond salvation and leaves King’s Landing, presumably riding north to deal with existential threat as he pledged. Jaime, after all, either never grasped or never accepted Tywin’s lessons, and perhaps in the end, he’ll be all the better for it. Tyrion, of course, learned more from his father’s loathing of him than any lessons or instructions that Tywin ever game him. Jaime, Cersei, and Tyrion, of course, remain critical players in the Game. But their lessons came despite their father, not from him.
So while it might be oversimplifying, it may also only be a slight stretch to say that Game of Thrones is really about how to be a good parent in a rough world. One way or another, it seems that Ned Stark will end up being the best player in the Game of Thrones after all.