Y’know, I can’t answer any of these questions. When I watched the episode, I didn’t really get the impression that it was not consensual, but I wasn’t watching that closely, and given that the scene seems to have struck a lot of people here and elsewhere as a miscalculation at best, I suppose I would be in favor of a reediting for future airings to make it perhaps clearer that (as the director and writer insist but many people say is not what came through) it was a consensual, if tasteless, interlude.
There was a scene in a previous season where Jamie made forceful advances towards her, and she resisted at first, but gave in and returned the advances. It wouldn’t be implausible or unusual if reluctance and forcefulness was a normal part of their relationship. Add to that her wavering between reluctance and aggressively embracing him and returning his advances, her objections being more along the lines of “not here”, and the emotional charging of the situation, and it’s neither out of character for Jamie nor is it likely that either of them will consider it rape.
The irony here is that this is probably the moment where Cersei and Jamie rekindle their relationship - it took the emotional toll of the death of their son and their need for comfort and contact to reignite their relationship. So while some people here will be expecting her to be traumatized and hate Jamie forever, more likely this will warm things back up between them.
And I don’t think that’s inconsistent characterization or storytelling at all. I think a lot of people are so hypersensitive to the subject of rape that they get loopy when there’s something presented without total “Why hello sir, I would like to engage in sexual intercourse with you” clarity.
There’s a cool interactive map of the world over at HBO.com. Never read thew books, so it’s interesting to actually see where everything is taking place.
Also, what’s keeping everything in the North form just crossing that river to the west?
He also killed his cousin, who looked up to him as a leader of their house, in an as part of an escape Rob Stark. For me that was even worse.
When the writers make decisions about changes to the books, they also have to decide how those changes will impact specific scenes as a result. I read comments elsewhere about how the scene was played in the books. It looks like this is a case where they should have realized that the context had changed too much for the scene to work especially since we do not know what is going on in the characters heads.
It’s only Cersei who knows if she felt helpless or if she knew that she could stop it but did not want to. I think it is clear from their comments that the writers intended the later but obviously the scene did not come off as intended.
I’ve sent you a PM.
Agreed. Especially because he could have just had his cousin play dead rather than actually killing him and it would have achieved the same result.
I hear you. I am curious how many more cities are on her list before she makes the crossing - have they spelled that out?
What an odd discussion, this rape discussion. I’m not going to wade into the question whether “woman says no therefore rape” is “true” even in real life, though I agree it’s certainly a necessary short hand compared to the alternatives (“but what did she REALLY want?”); but this scene…I don’t hear her shouting, I don’t see her hitting him, I don’t even see her scratching him even though she’s got her fingers on his cheek. If she’s fighting Jaime, I for one certainly would have thought her to be more violent in her defense of herself. It’s very hard to see if she’s even struggling given the rough handling that Jaime subjects her to (and doesn’t she even wrap her legs around him towards the end?). She says “Stop it!”, but it does seem to me it’s meant to complete to “Stop it, it’s not right”, which seems an odd way of commenting on your own rape. How about “You’re hurting me!” or something?
So, I’m not on board with those who “clearly” see this as rape; and I agree that even if it were, and even if we were inclined to react to it less as a matter of character development and more as a matter of transcendental morals, what a weird thing to get hung up about in a show that’s just randomly murdered the peaceful inhabitants of an entire village.
Well, when falling from a window is inevitable, you should relax and enjoy the flight.
I’m not sure HBO is in the habit of posting rape warnings on their shows. They may warn of nudity or graphic violence, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen one for rape.
You can’t talk to other posters this way outside the Pit. You can offer your opinions on a topic, but you can’t be rude to people and boss them around.
+100
People are being killed, a kid has his parents eaten in front of him, but oh no, there was a rape, how could they?
Also, in terms of literary criticism that what Jaimie did was out of character, that doesn’t hold up at all. Remember that until the 1950’s-60’s (someone correct me on the dates) there was no legal concept of rape within a marriage, and someone forcing his lover to have sex with him wasn’t as frowned upon a mere 50 years ago from today, nevermind in the era that is portrayed in GoT. It’s completely plausible for a man of that era to force himself on his lover and not think that he has done something terribly immoral. It is of course immoral to us, but within the story it is not necessarily out of character.
I get the feeling that this is the last one. It seemed like they were building up to this one as THE slave city. But is she still planning on recruiting the Dothraki? I remember the plan last season was build up an army of force to show the Dothraki her strength and have them rejoin her.
In general, characters I care about/plot lines I enjoy following would have Danny and the Dragons at the top (followed closely by Tyrion, and Arya & The Hound), and anything where people wear piles of fur and trudge through the snow (Jon Snow, The Wall, Sam & Gilly) at the bottom.
I wasn’t talking to other posters, I was essentially saying that to the mainstream news sites who have run away with this headline of “Oh my gosh it’s gone TOO FAR?! Think of the Children?!” On a show that, on the same episode, kills a bunch of innocent folks, including what is the implied rape and consumption of females.
Sorry if that came off as attacking anyone in here.
This is a strawman. People are discussing what happened and asking about the writing, direction, and characterization. I haven’t seen anybody criticize the show for depicting (another) possible rape. I did see a couple of people wonder why they changed a consensual encounter to something that played more ambiguous, since they’ve done that at least once before.
Every scene that’s ever involved Sam has been awful. I’ve rewatched the series a few times, and you can safely skip anything that involves him on the screen. Gilly is actually even more boring and any scene with the two of them seems like it belongs in another show because it’s so incredibly boring in comparison to everything else. Even Jon Snow manages to be compelling in comparison.
So something that hasn’t been discussed - there’s an active effort to frame Tyrion, trying to get Pod to lie against him. Framing Tyrion seemed like an unfortuante coincidence - after all, there’s no way to know for sure that Joffrey would’ve specifically humiliated Tyrion with the cup that held the poison. But then with Sansa’s dissaperaance and the seemingly deliberate effort to leave a crushed stone/vial on the boat, the effort to frame Tyrion and Sansa together seems deliberate. I doubt Olenna is happy about framing Tyrion, so I wonder if the guys trying to buy off Pod are directly reporting to Littlefinger. Or could they even be hired by Tywin, who’s using the opportunity to get rid of Tyrion?
I wonder when Littlefinger had time to plot the assassination with Olenna - I’m assuming that’s what actually happened. What’s Littlefinger’s ultimate plan here? Simply “Chaos is a ladder”? Was Olenna the primary driver, or Littlefinger?
That might be what we are discussing HERE. But it’s not what a lot of articles I’ve read have been saying. They are literally stating, point blank, that the “incestuous rape scene” was too much.
Every scene those two are in drags so much. I can’t fathom how the director doesn’t see that. Is like a 10 minute back and forth between the two about how she’s going to be gang raped by the other members of the watch, really necessary? This could have been a 10 second exchange followed by a smaller scene where he drops her off at the Inn, maybe just the short exchange between sir tubby and the innkeeper.
Whatever, they need to cut the inconsequential/boring stuff down to the bare essentials and concentrate on more Tyrion.
Well he was the one they sent to negotiate the alliance in the first place, i would imagine it was part of the deal.
Not to mention the logistics of planning an assassination, when you can only communicate via raven.