issue 27// vol 45

The short-changed women
of ‘Game of Thrones’

» An argument for women in the writer's room and behind the camera

Bex Peterson
Editor-in-Chief

 

Warning: This article contains spoilers for
the final season of Game of Thrones.

y now, the series finale of HBO
phenomenon Game of Thrones has
been out in the world long enough to
be thoroughly consumed, digested, and
parsed through filter after filter of internet
hot take scrutiny. Whether you loved
it or hated it, it’s definitely a thing that
happened. I’m not here to comment on
the finale itself, however. Instead, I’d like
to take a closer look at a troubling aspect
of production: The lack of women behind
the scenes.

Chief TV critic for Variety Maureen
Ryan broke down the numbers in a
Twitter thread last year, pointing out
some uncomfortable percentages. Out of
19 total directors for the series, only one
was a woman: Vancouver's own Michelle
Maclaren, and she only directed four of the
73 episodes. Only four episodes exist where
women held a full or even partial writing
credit. No women were hired to write or
direct any episodes of the final season. As
Ryan grimly ended her thread, “Number of
Daves writing #GoT: 2. Number of women:
2.

The problems with Game of Thrones’
final season and the lack of women behind
the camera wouldn't have been so glaring
if the series pivoted strictly on men’s
character arcs and decisions (though please
keep in mind I’m not saying that it should
have done that). But because so much of
the final season centred on the complex
inner motivations of women, good and
evil, entire story beats fell entirely flat
because quite frankly the men writing the
story either could not or were not willing to
see their characters as three-dimensional
beings.

In place of time spent developing
complex female characters to drive the plot,
the women at the heart of Game of Thrones’

 

final season just sort of... do things, and say
things, with placeholder reasons relying
on stale tropes as their motivators. Cersei
could have been a formidable foe and is
touted as a tyrant, but we never see what
she’s actually like as a ruler. It’s said time
and time again that her only motivation is
her children (in this case, an unborn child),
but if that were the case, wouldn’t she want
to flee somewhere safe so she can give birth
and bea mother in peace? In previous
seasons, Cersei’s desire for power was far
more evident as a primary motivation. Now
that she has it as queen, the writers couldn't
seem to think of anything interesting
for her to do with her authority beyond
sipping wine and smirking ominously.
Daenerys, of course, was given
arguably the most controversial arc of the
season, if not the entire show. Is it possible
that a woman dedicated to justice and
liberating the downtrodden could flip and
become a tyrannical mass murderer? Of
course. People in favour of Daenerys’ “Mad
Queen’ arc often argue that those critical
of it missed clues and foreshadowing in
previous seasons, but I haven't seen many
people argue that the transition from
liberator to tyrant itself was a terrible
creative choice. Rather, the motivations
behind it and the lead-up to it was what

Masked duo takes us

» Twenty One Pilots concert review

Sonam Kaloti
Arts Editor

 

wenty One Pilots is a band composed

of only two people—Tyler Joseph and
Joshua Dun. Hailing from Columbus, Ohio,
the band has made a huge name for itself
by topping charts with hit singles such as
“Stressed Out.” Their Vancouver concert on
May 12, held at Rogers Arena, was part of
the Bandito Tour, spanning many countries
to promote newest album Trench.

I’ve been to a lot of concerts—in fact,

it’s my favourite place to be. However, I
may never have gotten so into concerts in
the first place had it not been for Twenty
One Pilots. My first concert was in 2014
at the Rio Theatre in Vancouver. Funny,
considering that the Rio is a well-known
movie theatre with a tiny 420-person

capacity, and that only five years later the
ski-masked musicians would be playing in
one of the biggest venues around.

It was the band’s first time playing
their entire new album in one setlist. The
set was composed of 23 songs yet didn’t
run late. I was impressed that their show
started exactly when stated and ended
before 1 pm. At this point there’s nothing
more rock than going hard right before
getting a proper good night’s sleep.

They pulled gimmicks throughout
the entire show, from their 2014 vocal host
Nigel presenting the band, to walking
over the entire pit on a suspended metal
walkway. At one point a masked figure
appeared onstage who we presumed to
be Joseph, yet a light shone to the balcony
and to everyone's shock, the real him was
standing there.

Photos of Daenerys, Sansa, and Cersei
in 'Game of Thrones' via Glamour

made the moment feel flat and sour for so
many.

A writer who could conceive of
Daenerys and Cersei as individuals driven
by obsessive ideals and a rich inner world
might have written a conflict between the
two that highlighted not only the very
worst of the characters themselves, but the
very worst of human nature. What might
have happened if the unstoppable force of
Daenerys Targaryen met the immovable
object of a Cersei Lannister that would
rather watch her city burn than give up her
rule? A city in ashes and a brutal, gritty
conflict in which there are no winners, only
broken people. I would have killed fora
Daenerys that breaks not because of some
genetic madness, not because “women be
crazy,’ not because the boy she likes feels
weird about banging his aunt, but because
she has absolutely become the monster she
always sought to destroy and is consumed
by despair—not put down like a rabid dog
because we needed Jon to do something
relevant this season. Would that kind of
self-destruction not have been more in line
with the kind of “no heroes, no villains,
no victories” writing Game of Thrones was
once lauded for?

Am I saying that a woman would have
automatically written these arcs better

to Trench

Their energy was high as usual and
both Joseph and Dun’s stage presence was
phenomenal. As a duo they must do all
they can to capture the audience, a feat
they continue to achieve.

Though the entire show was amazing,
there were a few moments that stood out
in the show. One was the performance
of “Legend,” an emotional ballad about
the passing of Joseph's late grandfather.
Having suffered a similar tragedy this year,
this performance’s raw lyrics and acoustic
sound struck a chord with me.

Another magical moment was
the song “Truce” played on tape. The
instrumentals played while the band
disappeared. During this, the audience
sang “Stay alive, stay alive for me” together
and the chorus of thousands of voices
pleading to each other sounded so

Eh Rw AA CO

by virtue of being a woman? No, but the
presence of women in the writers’ rooms
and behind the camera would have added
some much-needed dimension and, God
help us, empathy. A woman might have
seen the draft of the script where Sansa
proudly states that being brutalized and
assaulted made her a stronger, better
person and pointed out that the scene was
lacking some serious nuance. It’s not that
some assault victims haven't chosen to
internalize their experience as a growing
point, but it’s rarely discussed with the coy,
tough girl smirk that Sansa delivered the
lines with. Growing from sexual trauma is a
cold comfort, not avictory. A woman might
have known that.

A-woman might have questioned
Daenerys’ mad-eyed desperation for
someone to love her and her complete
inability to read the mood when Jon
entered the ash-coated throne room of
the Red Keep with a hangdog “time to put
down the family pet” look on his face. A
woman might have wanted to know more
about Cersei’s rule as queen. A woman
might have blinked a few times at Tyrion’s
proclamation that “no one” had a better
story of survival and growth than Bran
Stark, waved at nearly every other woman
present for the Great Council, and marked
a few giant red question marks on the page.

The presence of women in primary
creative roles could have challenged
assumptions of women’s behaviours,
motivations, and weaknesses, and might
have added some much-needed complexity
to the final arcs of the series. We'll never
know what Game of Thrones could have
looked like with a deeper and more
empathetic understanding of women at the
heart of it, but I can only hope that future
creative teams learn the right lesson from
all this. The centring of women’s choices
in the Game of Thrones finale wasn’t the
wrong angle to take. The lack of women
involved in its creation, however, ended up
being its downfall.

  

Photo by Sonam Kaloti

beautiful.

Lastly, their ending performance of
“Trees” was powerful as always. Both Dun
and Joseph had drumming platforms
set up in the crowd where they gave the
last hurrah of the show. The energetic
performance left a bittersweet feeling—sad
that the show was over, but joyous of the
experience and ready to live.