Hey guys, Pete here. Picking up with my Game of Thrones season 8 problem series
today I'm gonna look at Queen Cersei of House Lannister and the problems I see
with her story. first a reminder that I decided to do this series on problems
because the ending could go so many different ways focusing on problems is a
way to work through it so it's not a series saying Game of Thrones season 8
will be bad or Game of Thrones is so bad now I think there's a good chance at the
end of the series we'll be one of the high points of the show altogether even
though there are such high expectations but when trying to sift through
everything we've learned reading and rereading the books and what we've
learned watching and re watching the show I find it hard to see what a good
ending will look like I'm doing the Cersei video today because I started it
the other day and then I shelved it because those new trailers came out I've
decided that I'm gonna do a general ending of the story problems video next
since a lot of people disagreed with what I said about Jon in that video in
this series I think I could have done a better job explaining my point of view
overall so I think that making the ending video next in the series rather
than at the end will kind of do that either way I want to get through Cersei
today because I think she's a lot less controversial I mean there are probably
some people out there rooting for Cersei to win in the end
but only in the way that they're probably always some people who are
cheering for the villain let's jump into it Cersei Lannister is the current Queen
of the Seven Kingdoms she took the Iron Throne for herself
after blowing up the septa bail or she did that to destroy her enemies the high
Sparrow and Tyrells but it led her son King Tommen to take his own life by
jumping out a window and the red key Cersei swooped in to take his place and
thus far no one has been able to remove her she may end up being the very last
person to ever occupy the throne but she probably won't be allowed to see if
that's what is the case Tommen was the last of her children Joffrey and
Marcella died in season four and season five
respectively at the end of the seventh season she became pregnant again
carrying what would be the fourth child she's had with her twin brother Jaime
Lannister but I don't think that there are many fans out there that expect her
to you know actually have that child I mention all of this because it leads us
into the first problem the number one problem with Cersei is that she is a
true villain it's not to say she isn't a complex character she is and we'll talk
about that some later but she is definitely a bad guy as far as the story
goes her villainy has been somewhat restrained because she was also a mother
who wanted to protect her children but at this point there is nothing holding
her back at all it should be said that she's a good villain a really good
billion in fact and I'm not saying that she's some kind of diabolical mastermind
she's not she actually makes a lot of mistakes what I mean is that even though
there isn't much to like about what she does she's still a likable character or
at least an enjoyable character to watch I've talked about this in plenty of
videos before Cersei is one of my favorite characters in the show a lot of
that is Lina Hetty's performance which is amazing but part of it is also dare I
say the way that they adapted her character for TV last week I was going
through her chapters and a feast for crows and I was reminded about the
differences in the book and show versions usually when you say that the
comparison is how much better the book version is but in Circe's case it's
actually the opposite in the chapters where we get them from Circe's point of
view get insights into why she's doing things most of this is just related to
her paranoia and it makes her a little less sympathetic to me like she's not as
cunning she's just desperate maybe is the way you could say that she has the
same motivations more or less but it comes across better on the screen it's
sort of like when I'm reading I'm thinking I got these you know I'm
reading the chapters I got this voice in my head saying you're bringing this all
on yourself you paranoid idiot but when I watch her on the show I'm just like
damn that's cold you know it's like she just is more
I think is what I would say on the show to earn any pob chapters from Cersei
until the later books though so you actually get to know her through the
other characters perspectives and it's pretty much the same in the beginning of
the books as it is and the first you know seasons of the show anyway so it's
not like they made some big decision to do it that way it just turned out that
way for the most part as far as I can tell but I do think that they've
continued to write her pretty well and like I said Lena Headey does a really
great job of delivering it but yeah I mean after Joffrey dies in the books
more or less you start to get into her head and point-of-view chapters and it's
not a good look if you haven't read the books it's not really that important in
relation to where we are now but the show version the super fun to watch
Cersei is the villain like the villain and she has nothing to hold her back
from doing everything she can to hold on to her power she's a bit of a cornered
animal this is the second problem with Cersei just like I said in my night king
problems video about him she can't possibly win because she's full-on
villian mode and she has nothing to lose there really isn't a path to redemption
I mentioned this in a previous video but it's a good time to bring it back up one
of the biggest things that stood out to me when I watched the first trailer over
and over again was that Cersei had positioned herself to be the real threat
in a world where there is magical night king coming to destroy humanity
she has positioned herself to be the bigger threat in that trailer you see an
existential threat approaching Winterfell we see our heroes getting
ready to fight the Battle of their lives in order to save mankind in the midst of
that we get that shot of Cersei with the satisfied look on her face where she's
standing next to Qyburn and it's just like shit you know some people are worse
than magical armies of the dead some people will use that threat for
their own personal gain her brother Jaime couldn't even get on board with
that idea and he had stuck with her up until that point in the show and the
books they fall out earlier and she's also much
more cruel towards him like I forgot about that a little but show Jamie has
remained loyal until she crossed this line of course this only adds to her not
having anything left to lose or anything to hold her back
she's already done a lot of terrible things I mean she had her husband killed
when she blew up the septa bail or that was not just her enemies inside there
were a lot of innocent people involved as well her dwarves getting their heads
cut off all over the place and her name when she was trying to get hearings head
and that's just to name a few of the things but going back on her word here
his point of no-return territory she's only looking to hold on to her power and
there is no version of an ending that can have her keep that power and still
be a good ending and this leads us to the biggest problem of Cersei story how
does she get a fitting ending she is the villain and she has to lose and I think
that means she has to die but there is some complexity lurking in her story at
the same time on the one hand Shore she was born into a rich family and she's
universally described as beautiful in the books which makes her situation a
lot better than most of the other inhabitants of Westeros I mean she is
born at the top of the food chain for the most part that also meant that her
primary function was to be married off to another family in order to improve
the standing of House Lannister in the system that they live in that's the way
things are in that world and even highborn women are unable to escape that
part of her conflict lies in that you know she's aware that she isn't treated
as an equal because she's born female she brings this up several times and
story and it drives some of her decision-making but what really drives
Cersei is prophecy she grows up thinking she's going to marry Prince Rhaegar like
her father tells us her this at a very early age and that's kind of interesting
when you think about it because Rhaegar is another character who was driven by
prophecy and he did all sorts of things that caused a lot of other stuff to
happen in the idea that he was trying to follow a prophecy but she never ended up
marrying Rhaegar because tenaris is dead king aerys aka the mad
king he started to get him in Thailand Circe's father were friends for a very
long time since childhood and they had this weird power dynamic as Aerys got
older and got weirder and matter so he wouldn't let it happen
but you know when she initially goes the see Maggie the Frog that's who she's
talking about when she asked one why Wed the Prince it's not really clear when
the prophecy took over her life but we do know that Maggie said one of the two
girls didn't have a future and that Melara her companion there that was the
other girl died that night just as Maggie predicted this could either be
when Cersei started to worry about the prophecy turning out to be true or she
may have played a part in Melara falling into the well in an effort to stop her
from repeating what they heard so either way it had an effect on her fright from
the start but it's interesting because everything maggie has said turned out to
be right as far as we can tell her paranoia has had a natural progression
as each new part comes true and by the time we get inside her head she is
consumed by it and the decisions that she makes are all influenced by it she's
sure Tyrion is the balan car she saw margery is the younger more beautiful
Queen and this causes her to set things in motion with the sparrows she's trying
to get rid of Margery because she thinks if she can stop that part of the
prophecy then everything else will be done so that's pretty tragic right and
her mind she's making all these decisions because she wants to protect
her remaining son she thinks this I mean she even says it out loud you know she's
going around doing things and she's saying I'm doing it to protect Tommen
and she's been through a lot at this point she's married off to Robert and
doesn't go well by the time we meet them in the show we can tell it's a loveless
marriage but we also learned that he was pretty abusive in the bedroom especially
in the early years of their marriage from the books she has a child that she
clings on to as her one good thing and he turns out to be a sadistic psycho he
dies her father gets killed by her brother I mean it's not nothing like
there's a lot of bad stuff that happens to her she does all sorts
terrible things in a paranoid response that gets her locked up by the zealous
that she gave power to she has to do a walk of shame naked in front of everyone
I mean there is actual complexity here right and she's terrible like I said
she's done what she's done in that true sense of everyone is the hero in their
own story she had her reasons she did what she thought she had to do
based on her situation but none of what she suffered really makes any of that
stuff okay in the walk of atonement sequence in the books she thinks about
Ned when you know she's out in the front of the septa bail or she thinks about
how if Joffrey just hadn't followed through with his beheading you know how
different the story would have turned out when she dreams of the trip to see
Maggy the Frog she tells herself to turn around to not listen to him Aggie has to
say you know it's sort of like she is an actual victim like stuff happens to her
but she also embodies it to the sense that she turns an outward and she just
brings destruction you know what I mean like it's not she doesn't work on these
things constructively so I guess you know on one hand you think you kind of
feel bad for because like I said she's a compelling character and bad stuff has
happened to her but at the same time like she's ruthlessly evil and there's
no chance that she's going to do the right thing like you just know that
there's no way she's gonna walk away you know I mean she's not gonna give up
power she's not gonna go out without a fight
she'll take everyone down if that's what is the only option so you know how do we
get a fitting ending to that like I want to see at least a nod to the complexity
of who she was but I mean for me like I would almost like to see her recognize
the folly of the way that she's done the things that she's done you understand
like I think if she realizes that yeah you know all this bad stuff happened to
her and then she went out and did all this other terrible stuff but you know
she did that it's sort of like you know she she kind of thinks of herself as not
responsible because of things that have happened to her so it'd be really cool
if there's some kind of dialogue or her ending where she realizes you
know what I did this because I mean she kind of had that point a bit whenever
she turned the tables on septa unella but I don't know it would be nice to see
her have some kind of a coming home inside before she has to actually pass
on I mean I just don't think that she can live I don't think she's gonna turn
anything around nobody would trust her if she did at this point so what do you
guys think do you care do you see her as a tragic complex character or you just
see her as pure evil and you want to see her go because it'll be fun to watch the
bill and die I don't know I'm really interested to
see what you think I will definitely be sad whenever i watch the character pass
on like it will be a strange moment because I mean I want it to happen like
I definitely don't want her story to go any other way but it'll be interesting
because it's someone that you've followed and thought about and really
liked even though they were terrible for so many years now and you know and she's
gonna have to go and it's gonna be interesting so like the video if you
enjoyed it like I said I am going to do a general problem with the endings video
next I'm gonna try to get that out real soon so if you want to follow along you
can subscribe you know what to do there thanks for watching guys I will talk to
you soon