Game of Thrones Episode Review: “Breaker of Chains”

“We get it, Cersei should be punished by the Story Gods for being a crappy mother.”

WHAT

No. No. NO.

Not to make the arts of acting and production sound too much like a thoroughbred stud operation, but the need to ‘service’ actors, who in turn must ‘serve’ the story, which in turn must be ‘served well’ by writing and direction, ‘best served’ by enabling a pacing blend in a ten episode season, that deftly combines the extremes of gentle to resolute meandering … all the way up the scale to action/dialogue packed annihilating rhythm …

Well, I’ve barked – partially in jest – before, that the D’s have messed unnecesarily with scenes that didn’t need messing with. What was on the page could be recreated, if not slavishly, at least faithfully.

IMO the whole Jaime timeline cockup was unnecessarily implemented, to capitalise on Coster-Waldau’s bravura performance post hand-lopping, which led to a magnetic chemical sizzle between Jaime and Brienne reaching its slavering payoff in ‘The Bear & Maiden Fair’.

From there though, the mistakes begin, culminating in the unmitigated disaster of turning something that induces discomfort in the books – both expected (Incest? Again? Here? Ewwwwww!) and unexpected (Why am I so moved by Jaime’s all-encompassing love & need for his sister, disgusting though it’s physical manifestation may be, nonetheless expostulating just how ‘unmanned’ and ‘unmoored’ Jaime had felt, thus needing such a moment of unmitigated release?) – to something so skin-crawlingly disgusting in the TV show.

And this comes after Jaime has had pretty much nothing to do of note since being returned early to King’s Landing, at least nothing that wouldn’t have had superior impact later, in a corrected timeline.

But this brings us back to ‘servicing’ the actor in a linear episodic series on a hot streak. Once they hit that annihilating rhythm, producers are loathe to let them resume meandering, especially for the equivalent of half a season (including a season break that makes it almost a year in viewer time).

Yesterday’s disgusting ‘turn’ of events is just the unfortunate, unnecessary culmination of that. For mine, it positively reeked, not just for what it cost the viewer in the moment, but the lost opportunities it signals for Jaime’s occasionally subtle redemption journey, book readers know lies ahead.

What a waste!

grl

Re: The Scene. It’s pretty damn bad in the books, too. Like, really bad. Like “no”, a list of reasons why “no”, Cersei beats on his chest trying to make him stop, and if they’re caught by the wrong people they’ll kill her children, bad. He literally shoves her legs apart and pushes up her skirts while she hits him. What happens next is hazy because it’s in Jaime’s PoV, not hers, and we can’t know how earnest it was and how “get it over with” it was because we know from later events that “get it over with” was Cersei’s normal response to assault when it was Robert.

Can you even imagine if they had all that happen as it began in the book and then had her start moaning yes? “Rape is great, as long as you can make her like it, kids” is the message you risk portraying there. I can see why they made the change, even if it does change the audience’s perception of his “redemption arc” (which I put in scare quotes because despite his change in behavior, he never even expresses remorse for the act that made us hate him in the first place).

Why exactly did they decide to cock up the story timelines in Kings’ Landing, Dragonstone, and the North?

They had Sam slay an Other with NO WITNESSES! Completely ruining an entire story line. Never even explained it was dragon stone. Now that Sam is back to the Wall too early, he’s trying to stash Gilly away somewhere before the battle. Why make this extra work?

Meanwhile, Davos is doing some Bravos banking BEFORE they head North (or is he going to White Harbor?). So they already know about the threat to the Wall but are waiting around for proper funding?

Watching this mess, I have gained a new appreciation for Martin’s elegant and efficient story telling in the books.

The Jaime/Cersei scene was bad IMO, the first really big blub that the show has made. A bad choice, pure and simple. I didn’t have problems with them changing the Dany/Drago scenes to make them more rapey, because in context, it makes sense. It’s very early in their relationship and why wouldn’t a “savage” like Drago take her like a beast? Initially, she’s just a thing to him. But here, it just didn’t make sense at all. They’ve already had three children. I didn’t remember at first that they had done it in front of their son, but now that I remember the scene, it makes no sense to me why they changed it. It was a bad call, but the show is still the best on TV.

Littlefinger has not entered the war openly on anyone’s side yet including his own. That’s part of why he’s so dangerous. Unless Sansa wants to give the throne to Stannis, she has nothing to fear from Littlefinger.

The Jaime Cercei scene was cut before its time. If they included the lines that Theresa expounded upon it would have come off very differently to the audience. Even in this form what Robert did to Cercei was more horrible than what Jaime did.Cercei’s objections are to time and place and Jaime isn’t drunk when he forces her. She’s still attracted to him sexually but is mad at him for taking so long to get back to her. Whoever thought an incestuous relationship could not get more controversial is obviously very wrong.

Why wait as long as AFFC?

A direct contradiction to what Aeryl @26 postulates, occurs before ASOS is over.

Someone can indeed say No. That someone is Jaime. Both Cersei’s initiation of sex in that encounter and her reaction after Jaime’s reaction clearly indicate what the author is trying to illustrate here.

Until that point, there had only been one person with the power in the relationship. Cersei. Jaime was in love, helplessly so. Whatever one may think of the circumstance, the emotion was true, held only in check by Jaime acquiescing to Cersei’s will in abandoning ANY claims to their children, in order to maintain their status as heirs to the throne.

There is nothing ‘acceptable’ about the situation, as it is presented in story. But it’s pretty basic. And definitely not as convoluted as is being portrayed here.

I used to love ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ books as a kid, but ‘Create Your Own Subtext’ is a game I’m not smart enough to play.

@20/@30 – For someone who has read the books but only watched Season One of the TV Show, I find it interesting how uncannily accurate your grasp of the TV Show’s thematic tilt is, as diametrically opposed to the books in this area.

The total internal logic of what you write is spot on, as it relates to the TV Show. The books though are entirely different and comprehensively consistent.

Jaime LUUUUUURVS Cersei. Completely. Utterly. Till death them do part. As messed up as it may seem – and IT IS to any reasonable minded observer – when it comes to his love for Cersei, Jaime is entirely unreasonable … To the extent that he’ll kill a child to protect it, however much he may loathe himself for doing so.

Some have postulated above that Jaime’s redemptive arc is not so redemptive, because of his lack of ‘remorse’ for what he did to Bran. I think such remorse is impossible for someone as self-aware as Jaime is.

Unless it’s a narrative misstep from GRRM, Bran’s instinctive – IMO wholly correct – assessment of Jaime’s emotional state just before he pushed him out of the window, demonstrates this best of all.

Trying to disguise his depth of emotion with a glib quip – ‘The things I do for love’ – Jaime comes unmasked to Bran’s childish receptiveness – ‘… he said with loathing.’ – completely opposite to Ned’s closed-minded recounting of discovering Jaime sitting on the Iron Throne, after killing Aerys.

As readers we now know the depth of emotion that undercut yet another glib quip – ‘… I was only keeping the seat warm for our friend Robert …’ (or words to that effect) – and we thus can find the capacity to realise that although Jaime erects a screen of sorts to others, he is brutally honest with himself … except in one area – his love for Cersei.

IMO, this is the redemptive arc Jaime undergoes in the books. He doesn’t suddenly become a ‘good-guy’. He just opens his eyes to something his normally brutal introspection in the moment, refused to countenance – that Cersei doesn’t love him like he loves her.

@22
The scene in the sept as depicted in the books doesn’t ring false at all. Most especially given what comes after. We have two people who are tied as close as people can be, coming together after having lost someone (Cersei, her son; Jaime, himself).

As it turns out, it is for the last time, because Jaime starts to learn what we as readers already knew. While his love for Cersei is unequivocal, hers is a means to an end, entirely substitutable, entirely transferrable. Jaime’s need of Cersei is absolute. Hers is entirely equivocal.

Obviously the TV show has long been taking a different road here. Given what has come before, there was no way that scene could stay true to the books. It would have rung as false as it was disgusting, as ultimately presented.

It’s a case of the TV Producers servicing different needs in the show.

If indeed GRRM wanted to slow the redemption, or reverse the popularisation of Jaime, as presented in ASOS, he had eleven years to explicate such a desire. Instead, Jaime’s appearances in the books post ASOS are all about him achieving the self-realisation regarding Cersei, he had long denied.

IMO that is his redemptive path. Not some sort of ‘abrupt’ discovery that he really is a good bloke, a heroic companion, a faithful friend. He always had the capacity to be all those things within. His journey with Brienne just brought them to the surface, giving him the opportunity to demonstrate them more clearly, more often.

grl

The text in the book is ambiguous but kinda-rapey, and generally my stance on these things is, if it’s ambiguous, it’s rape. Consent is not ambiguous. I think it’s rape in the book too.

The most germaine objection I’ve seen to this scene in the show is that in the books, Jaime is pretty skeeved out by rape–to the point that he kind of sacrificed his hand saving Brienne from rape. I think the complicating factor is that in Westeros, a lot of rape is normalized. Spousal rape isn’t really an acknowledged thing, even though it’s clearly a fact–Danaerys and Cersei were both definitely raped by their spouses, and everyone was basically disappointed that Tyrion didn’t rape Sansa.

Anyway, the point I was getting at was that Jaime basically considered Cersei his wife in all but name. Cersei might not have objected to having sex with Jaime in general, but she did in that time and place–a crime to us, but Jaime feels entitled like a husband. So that seems like proper context as to why he would do it.

I don’t think the power dynamic between Jaime and Cersei was ever as solid as it was presented. They were largely lying to themselves–Jaime moreso than Cersei. Their private romance is a fantasy they spun, because their public lives were so painful. This scene is one of the places where that lie really breaks down, in both media.

td – they could have done the strong belwas scene just fine. i saw just such a scene on “oz” once between tobias beecher and vern schillinger. not outside hbo’s standards at all. (the daario scene would have been that much more epic with o.g. in it)

dany’s war music sounds a lot like the thenn’s music.

going back to craster’s is stupid. by the time they get their the others will likely have slaughtered everyone.

Why are obviously intelligent people insistently conflating invented socio-normative behaviour with contemporary expectations?

@colin R – ‘rapey’? What kind of adjective is that? Or, is it an adverb?

Actions speak louder than words. In the case of Cersei & Jamie, the equivocation, as depicted in the books comes from one person – Cersei, in a less than convincing nod to established Westerosi socio-normative behaviour.

In the TV show, right from the beginning, the power dynamic between the two of them is much different, starting with their sexual position when Bran stumbles upon them.

Given the acute departure from Jaime’s established book timeline, especially after staying so thematically faithful throughout the ‘release’, all the way through the hand-lopping (even if certain characters were changed/excised), it would be easy to accept the scene at the sept being replaced.

However, regardless of how hard it is to reconcile such a diametrically opposed theme on TV to what is presented in the books, viewers would have to objectively recognise two things.

It works. It is utterly disgusting but it works. Secondly it was signposted from Season 1. Cersei has always been portrayed more sympathetically on TV than in the books. Jaime with greater variance in shades of black & white.

Both however, join Dany in adhering to the preferred parabolic path established since Season 1, as the TV Show’s signature style. Yes the story is about confounding twists. But unlike the books, the TV Show established that for some of the characters, steeper curves were required to highlight their journey.

Thus Dany goes from being sold & raped, to ‘mounting’ & ‘dominating’ (however briefly), her nominal defiler. I say nominal because we are talking invented historical setting, from which no accurate contemporary resonance can be drawn.

Thus we can have Jaime as a flailing desperado raping Cersei, right where their secret son lies in post-mortem repose. We may not like it – it disgusts me and I think it is a nonsensical departure from what is established in the books – but we can’t argue it is thematically inconsistent with what has happened on the TV Show so far.

The reason many – me included – are reacting negatively, is because the rape IS thematically inconsistent with what is presented in the books.

As I noted at the beginning, actions speak louder than words in Jaime & Cersei’s relationship, as depicted in the books. They continue to do so – overriding Westerosi socio-normative protests (that appear to me to be a kind of coy pre-coital pro-forma) – until the moment they don’t …

… When Jaime refuses Cersei in his chambers AND then has his ‘manhood’ insulted by her when she realises she can’t override his verbal refusal, no matter what she does OR says.

And thus, the truth will out. Book readers know Jaime is now finally prepared to accept that, while Cersei’s initial disdain is replaced as a result of later finding herself in desperate straits.

My biggest disappointment over the acute thematic changes is the likelihood all the above (IMO easily reproducible) undeniably engaging interaction and nuance will be lost, in deference to the TV Show’s preference for thematic rollercoasters.

Lest we forget, Qyburn’s ‘experiments’ are there to be used, at Cersei’s insistence. Plus she namechecked him at Pycelle’s expense last episode.

Winter may be coming but Frankenstein is almost here. Well not almost. Maybe in a couple of years’ time.

GRRM would certainly hope so.

grl

I enjoy reading about the show, even though I don’t watch it (don’t have HBO, can’t afford to buy the DVDs right now.) My impression is that the show has mostly improved on the books–I think they’ve correctly intuited the books strengths. Whenever there is a thread of the story that looks like it should work out in a conventional way–be it redemption, or nobility triumphing over wickedness, romance over perfidy–we should be suspicious.

That’s not because nobility and romance are bad things, but because they don’t make things true. And because the narrative (and even cultural) norms we expect are based on problems and lies. Marriage for example is not an evil institution, but a lot of its trappings are based on completely medieval notions of women as property–we should be suspicious about stories that romanticize marriage. If ASoIaF is about anything, it’s about making us think twice about jumping to easy narrative conclusions.

So I think it’s troubling that people are concerned about what raping Cersei does to Jaime rather than what it does to her. Cersei isn’t a very likable character, but in her own ways she is just as much a victim of Tywin Lannister as Tyrion is. She has more ambition than either of her brothers, but she is the one peddled off as a trophy, to seal an alliance. She never has a chance at being her own person. And as uninterested as Robert is in governing, it’s not like she ever has a shot at it either–that’s left to Jon Aeryn and the various schemers of the council.

People talk about ‘soft’ power as opposed to the hard power of violence; Varys and Littlefinger use secrets and money as power. But Cersei’s only weapon is sex–and despite what some people say that is ultimately a fragile weapon. The rest of her family has to worry about Roose Bolton and the Baratheons–Cersei has to worry about Margaery Tyrell from seducing her own sons away from her. She doesn’t have the problems that powerful people have.

As difficult as it may be, people should have more sympathy for Cersei than they do for Jaime.

Re: Mance, he’s a former Crow. Do they really think he believes that the Night’s Watch had an explosion in membership since he deserted?

@53

Well, several of the last comments certainly seem to be concerned mostly that this scene somehow spoils Jaime’s redemption.

His encounters with Brienne of Tarth have obviously had an impact on Jaime, but I think we should be pretty suspicious of any reading so pat and easy as redemption.

Here’s a scenario: Next week, we learn that Cersei doesn’t regard the encounter as rape. Perhaps there is even a case for this made by portrayals of Cersei and Jaime interacting amicably or by descriptions of the rest of the encounter, which occurred off-camera. Do we the audience still regard the scene the same way?

I don’t know the answer, I certainly have no idea whether the scenario will happen — the director has stated the intention of the scene (ambiguous), which doesn’t match what appears to be the dominant interpretation from the audience (not ambiguous). And it doesn’t seem the director appears to be persuading much of the audience, either.

And even if Cersei doesn’t believe she was assaulted, members of the audience could conclude she’s operating under a false conciousness, I suppose. Does the character’s interpretation of what happened to her influence ours? Should it?

I haven’t been able to watch this season of AGOT since I don’t have cable or satellite, and have to wait until I can buy the season. While watching seasons 1-3 I’ve noticed that they make Cersei and Tywin more likeable to me than what I experienced in the books.
Reading that the episode last night makes it seem the Jamie raped Cersei, makes me wonder where they are going with this. I know that the director thinks he directed it as consensual, but it doesn’t appear as if the audience agrees.

I can’t wait to read the reaction from people who only watch the show to what Tyrion does to Tywin. Or how they respond to what Cersei does to Margaery (if it happens).

For the book readers out there: Read ASOS, Chapter 11. Although it is from Jaime’s perspective, it details how Cersei manipulates Jaime into joining the Kingsguard and preventing him from marrying and becoming a heir to Casterly Rock.

@68 MDNY; @69Maac
Because of the long gap between when I wrote and when I eventually posted, I missed both your excellent contributions.
Your sharp, succinct analysis puts my long wind to shame.
Great stuff !

grl

@74 Colin R –

Quicksand?

Her eventual missteps may have turned Cersei’s base of power into quicksand, but her power was built on a solid foundation of almost two decades of ‘manipulating within her means’.

When I say unearned, I mean inherited. I agree with what you say about Cersei’s initial lack of agency. However, analogous to what her father did with a Family Name that under his father, had apparently lost a great deal of status, Cersei built up her own base of power in King’s Landing to the point that even Robert – at his most critically self-aware – recognises that should Joffrey become King, Cersei would be the power behind the throne.

As I said before, her failure to control Joffrey’s Ned Stark beheading impulse is absolute. Subsequent to that, just what does Joffrey do that confounds his mother’s wishes, or undermines her base of power? All the sadistic shit he engages in is rightfully considered a pittance wrt government of the realm, by Cersei.

In sending Tyrion to KL, Tywin notes three specific failings.
-The obviously ill-advised, Joffrey inspired beheading.
-The dismissal of Barristan Selmy.
-The raising to lordship and granting of Harrenhal – what Tywin calls ‘the seat of kings’ – to Janos Slynt.

I thought those last two were at Cersei’s orders. Am I remembering it wrong?

As for Tywin re-assuming the mantle of Hand, it would certainly have prevented the war. But how would he have curtailed Cersei’s stable base of power, which ironically enough, created the circumstances through which Tywin could reassume that powerful role.

Sure, Cersei uses sex as a means of control, but I see it as an added supplement to power she already has and exercises. I’m sure Joffrey had absolutely no input into having the Kettleblacks in his Kingsguard. I’m sure Joffrey had no real interest in anything but pulling the wings off the nearest fly.

Unlike you, I see that as a product of a coddled Mama’s boy who cannot reconcile the drunken sot he saw his father become, with the stories of Robert Most Puissant Warrior he grew up hearing … from people other than his mother.

While I suppose Robert exercised an incidental contempt for Cersei, just by being his ravenous, appetite satiating self, I think it was Cersei’s active, vituperative contempt for Robert, most probably both in front of and to Joffrey that created the monster Joffrey fully unleashes when he ascends the throne.

As for Cersei’s power being endangered by Tyrion’s arrival, I see that as the beginnings of a contest between equals. I think Tywin sends Tyrion to act as a counterbalance, he initially didn’t think he would need, given he expected Cersei to do better with the base of power she had cultivated.

I don’t see that as Cersei lacking power, or losing it. I see it as ensuring it is harnessed and exploited correctly, which Tywin initially didn’t think needed to be done.

Just because Cersei didn’t use her power wisely, according to her father, doesn’t mean it wasn’t hers to use.

grl

@80 – agreed. it’s baffling that cersei spent umpteen years as queen and only managed to have a few servants and her own relatives for spies. she should have had her own team ready to step in and oust robert’s. it’s like she never did more than fantasize about having real power. instead she counted on her father for everything, which really shows her shortsightedness. she ought to have known he would take over rather than act as cersei’s puppet. robert’s death was the perfect opportunity to establish herself and also to prove to her father that she really was his strongest child, a true “lion” the way she has always thought of herself.

it would be nice to have a seen where cersei, brienne, asha greyjoy, the mormont girls, ariane martell, etc. all get together and discuss their paths.

I have stated previously that I though the show made Cersie and Tywin more likable than what I felt by reading the book. That also goes for Shae. I just saw on YouTube that Tyrion has made plans to ship Shae off to Pentos. I don’t remember if it was brought up on the show about Tyrion’s other romance with a supposed prostitute. But, if Shae does indeed leave King’s Landing, then when the part between Tyrion and Tywin happens (and I think that has to happen) it loses the impact that the book imparted. This is the part where in reading the books, if I had had any respect for Tywin (I’m not sure about anything other than I didn’t like him), it was totally gone. All I could think what “What a hypocrite”.

Having read the books, I feel that they are not being represented correctly in this forum (or any other one I’ve seen). I’d like to make a point that I haven’t seen elsewhere, and that point is this: what happens in the book is as much a rape as is depicted in the show. She said, “no, not here, the Septons will see,” and never actually says, “ok, fine, let’s do it.” If I tried to have sex with my girlfriend in the Macy’s dressing-room, and she told me “no, not here, someone may see,” and I still proceeded to have sex with her (doesn’t matter if she enjoyed it our not), she would still consider it rape. I know, because I asked her (she has not read or seen GOT). I know that George R. R. Martin doesn’t think it’s rape in the book, but the dialogue speaks for itself, and it clearly is in my opinion.

That being said, the entire Jamie/Cersei relationship is based on rape, and I think the books make this quite clear. Cersei’s goto line is, “no, no, no, this isn’t right…,” which is why I think even G.R.R. Martin doesn’t see it for the rape that it is…it’s just “their thing.” Which is why I actually think what Jamie did was not at all out of character…this is sex to him (and to Cersei), and he doesn’t even realize how depraved it truly is. This is not an excuse for his behavior, it’s only meant to show you that both of these character’s ideas on sex and rape are far different than the norm.

@88 I don’t think you are getting my point. In the books, they seem to always re-create their first sexual experience, which is ‘forbidden’ and both parties seem to ackowledge that it is wrong. ‘No’ is a common theme in each coupling we are witnessed to. I don’t care what court you bring this to, I think any jury would agree it is rape. That is not to say that each participant isn’t ‘willing,’ or that one participant isn’t using the sex for manipulation. It’s simply to say that these two people’s idea of sex is what most people would consider rape.

@88 Where in the books have you read about their first sexual encounter? And the no, that is repeated before or during each time? For me, if the two people involved in the sexaul act are willing then it is not rape. There may be moral laws against what they are doing, but those are separate from laws of rape.