Game of Thrones & the Women of Westeros — another elephant in the room
Or 6 reasons I still have hope for Game of Thrones and the Sansa Stark arc.
Well, here we are again. Last season, this show popped me out of my viewer bubble and into a space where I have to think about whether I could get back into it with that Jaime/Cersei scene. In the end, I could swing it.
The actors, director, and screenwriter all saw that scene as dark and troublesome, but consensual. The terrible lighting and even worse editing didn’t work in favor of what they were going for, but not every member of the audience saw what I did. I truly believe that it was a misstep. I can’t say the same about Dany and Drogo’s honeymoon and the obvious changes to that or the graphic scenes at Craster’s Keep. But I think the reaction that had culminated around that scene made the showrunners think about how things were presented. I actually believe the show has learned since then.
Hear me out…
I’ve noticed some changes this season. There has been less nudity all around and an almost equal number of men parading around in their birthday suits as women similarly clad. I haven’t sat down and made a minute-by-naked-minute score sheet or anything, but the effort to even things out has been duly noted and even a little appreciated.
So, when I saw where the wind was blowing with Sansa Stark, specifically that Jeyne Poole’s arc was being taken on by her character, there was a level of trust for me at that midpoint. I decided to trust that this was a show that had learned that their audience was not eager for graphic depictions of sexual violence, did not find them darkly titillating, and did not want them expanded upon where, in the books, they might only have been hinted at.
Last week, I was pretty angry after that end scene. Sophie Turner’s take on the events didn’t sit well with me, either. I don’t think she ran that response through the filter of her audience, who felt protective of Sansa since we first saw her like this…
I can chalk Sophie Turner’s response up to the idea that she doesn’t feel protective of Sansa the way we do. Maisie Williams’s Arya has a few kills under her belt by now. She is growing into more adult territory and story elements and maybe Sophie thinks playing these darker elements is Sansa’s way of growing up, that she’s just an actress seeing it as an opportunity to play something challenging.
But that doesn’t make it easier to watch for us.
Anyway, I read her thoughts. I read the directors’ thoughts. I read George R.R. Martin’s thoughts:
Two roads diverging in the dark of the woods, I suppose… but all of us are still intending that at the end we will arrive at the same place.
He closed comments, but he did give me hope. The showrunners know the planned endgame and they may take some other roads getting there, but the plan is in place. A rewatch of the episode as well as a re-read of some of the source material relating to it has helped me, too. I have hope that this show has, indeed, learned from the blowback of last season and that they actually did learn to play the sexual violence element down rather than up. There is hope that this will put Sansa in a place of power equal to her lack thereof in that moment.
Hear me out…
While I do understand why so very many are done with the show, I’m not there (yet?) and this was not the thing that got me there for several reasons:
- Sansa being Jeyne, but not Jeyne, puts her in the story, but with more main character armor than Jeyne had. In the books, Sansa is hidden in The Vale under an assumed name, literally a damsel in a tower. In the show, they’ve merged Sansa’s arc with Jeyne Poole’s. What happened to Sansa is terrible, but Jeyne Poole’s struggles, being lower-born and not having the protection of a family name (except in the charade she’s part of), are absolutely horrifying and heart-breaking and her wedding night was much more harrowing to read about than this one was to watch… or not watch as the case thankfully was. I’ve been mentally preparing myself for worse than what we were shown (or not shown) so maybe that’s helping me out with this.
2. There was no way this would not be rape. Once Sansa took Jeyne’s arc, there was no way out of a wedding night to Ramsay and there was also no way to depict it as anything other than rape. Sansa is not freely choosing to wed Ramsay as women have little choice in who they wed in this world (or even in ours a few hundred years back, sadly). Ramsay is a psychopath. If the screen had gone to black, it would have been rape. If Sansa had smiled and pretended and put on the air of a dutiful bride, it would have been rape. If Ramsay had put on a more gentlemanlike manner and shown Theon out of the room, it would have been rape. The fact that it was presented as the absolute tragedy it was shows us it will be treated seriously and as the rape that it was.
3. I think the showrunners have learned what not to show. There was nothing about the scene that could be construed as titillating or exhibitionist. It was grave and it was sad and it was bare in details and depiction. Some people didn’t like that they showed Theon’s face rather than Sansa’s, thinking it a sign that they are making her struggles about his character. I think that was about the only way to show this without scarring us as viewers. As the AV Club puts it:
Game Of Thrones has whiffed with this type of development in the past, failing to treat an established reality within its universe with the proper amount of gravity. In the episode’s one majorly sour note, “Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken,” swings in the opposite direction, as the ominous score, the characters’ reactions, and the involvement of Ramsay all scream “Game Of Thrones does not endorse sexual assault!”
The fact that they showed us Theon’s reaction rather than Sansa’s face during the ordeal was, to me, a sign that Benioff and Weiss listened last season when so many of us objected to the graphic scenes at Craster’s Keep and the less than consensual take on Jaime and Cersei’s scene. I would rather see Theon’s reaction than have to watch Sansa, who we’ve watched grow up on this show, in that moment, so I was relieved not to see her exploited visually.
4. I believe that they will treat this with the gravity it deserves. I think their treatment of the scene means it will be presented as nothing but the tragedy it was. I am waiting to see how they go on from here. Jeyne Poole was broken by Ramsay and rescued by Theon. I don’t think they’ve built up a stronger Sansa than the books gave us just to tear her down. I think we’re looking at a Sansa who will be the one rescuing Theon, if anything.
5. The consequences will be fitting. The worst characters in this show tend to reap what they sow. Theon certainly did. Ramsay might have gotten away with torturing peasants and even Theon, whose own sister left him for dead. What Ramsay has done to all of them will come home to roost and the fact that he’s now raped the person who is, for all the smallfolk know, the last remaining Stark and who they see as the rightful Queen in the North, will be the last straw. I don’t see it as happening at anyone’s hands but Sansa’s at this point and I look forward to the moment she has him at her mercy. There are several characters and their events in the books that have been nixed. One involves Mance Rayder and Winterfell. Another one involves a character they call Lady Stoneheart meting out justice wherever she finds it wanting. With both of those characters truly dead according to the showrunners, maybe their actions (much like Jeyne Poole’s) and their causes and their leadership will be taken over by Sansa Stark.
6. Sansa may be Jeyne, but that doesn’t mean Sansa has to be Jeyne. I hope you get what I mean by that, because that’s where I am. I don’t think that scene was the death of the show for me nor the death of the empowerment of women in Westeros. Sansa has taken a detour through Jeyne Poole’s sad fate, but that does not mean she will not come out stronger than Jeyne did. A lot of my hope and optimism hinges on next week’s episode and how this arc is handled. But I have decided to give this show the benefit of the doubt for now because they are trying.
We’ll see if my hopes are misplaced in the coming weeks. But I do believe they approached this situation as gingerly as was possible under the parameters that were set. I understand if you disagree.
Whether we’re fans of the books or the show, we can all await swift justice for The Once and Forever Bastard of Bolton because it’s coming for him. I hope it hurts.
Now, back to your regularly scheduled recapping here.
Want to follow us closer to get all the latest Legendary Women news? Then sign up for our monthly newsletter and also our Medium collection. Finally, if you’re in the D.C. area, be sure to see us at Awesome Confor our panel and our charity table with Ramona’s Way from May 29th-31st.
