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How do you feel about Cersei?


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I feel like I do sympathize a little. A person who tries to do all she can for her children and does genuinely love them can't be all bad, right? I also don't find her as moronic as some others do when it comes to playing the game. I find that she is adept at playing but more so in matters of gaining the throne, as opposed to keeping it. She isn't an idiot or anything like that. There are just better players out there who happen to have goals that she doesn't fit into.

Now I don't want to excuse her sins. She murdered someone and she lied for years to her husband about who her children's father was. She is manipulative and can be selfish at times. Her hate towards Tyrion is absolutely unjust. She also doesn't have the best idea of the big picture. That said, I think we should give her credit where it's due. I don't like her at all, but she really is a fascinating character. What say you all?

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I won`t lie. I sympathize a lot with her during her walk of penance. And I have to adit I hated more High Sparrow than I hated her at that moment. That wasn`t justice, that was perverse presentation of power orchestrated by High Septon and the reformed Faith. I honestly think she is more tragic than evil character.

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She does what she does with zero leadership training, so any of her accomplishments are noteworthy in that sense. It's also hard not feel a bit sorry for someone who shows genuine potential at being a player, only to be told to go back to making babies.

Of course, she is obsessively paranoid, a narcissist devoid of any compassion, and has absolute shit for honor, so I can't say I'll ever really root for her.Then again, if you had told me in GoT I would be cheering for Jaime, I'd have laughed in your face, so who knows.

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I won`t lie. I sympathize a lot with her during her walk of penance. And I have to adit I hated more High Sparrow than I hated her at that moment. That wasn`t justice, that was perverse presentation of power orchestrated by High Septon and the reformed Faith. I honestly think she is more tragic than evil character.

Agreed. For me, intentions are almost fully what separate good from evil. She almost never seems to have outright malicious intentions in anything that doesn't involve Tyrion
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I won`t lie. I sympathize a lot with her during her walk of penance. And I have to adit I hated more High Sparrow than I hated her at that moment. That wasn`t justice, that was perverse presentation of power orchestrated by High Septon and the reformed Faith. I honestly think she is more tragic than evil character.

I am shocked you think Cersei is tragic? How exactly is she tragic? She committs her first murder as a child. At 15 she ruins her brother's life because she wants to keep on using him. The way she treats Maggy, her abusive of Tyrion. This is all before anything has really gone wrong with her life. Then she marries Robert, but plans to keep having her affair with Jaime. Lies to her brother to keep him away from the children. Kills more babies. Seriously struggling to see where she is tragic more than evil.

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There are occasions when I feel sympathy for her. When Ned confronts her, and she keeps her nerve; when she nearly breaks down as Tommen starts coughing; when she thinks about how she was abused by Robert; when she remembers herself as a child, drawing pictures of her and Rhaegar riding a dragon together; during the Walk of Shame. For reasons set out on another thread, I don't regard her as evil, but I think she comes pretty close to it.

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I totally agree about her intelligence, at least during the first 3 books, before her father and son died. She's no Varys or LF, but she was better than most it seemed like.

However, for some reason, I just cannot sympathize with her, more so when we get her POV's. Her speach to Ned in GOT about her loving her children and doing anything for them makes her seem like a possibly decent human being, but when you get inside her head this image vanishes. I question whether or not she is capable of loving anyone, including her children. I don't recall her ever having a nice thought, ever. I just found it very interesting, and a credit to Martin's skill, that with this POV I actually lost any sympathy for Cersei I may have had. She's one of the few characters who I think deserves to be given to Ramsay or the Mountain.

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I feel like I do sympathize a little. A person who tries to do all she can for her children and does genuinely love them can't be all bad, right? I also don't find her as moronic as some others do when it comes to playing the game. I find that she is adept at playing but more so in matters of gaining the throne, as opposed to keeping it. She isn't an idiot or anything like that. There are just better players out there who happen to have goals that she doesn't fit into.

Now I don't want to excuse her sins. She murdered someone and she lied for years to her husband about who her children's father was. She is manipulative and can be selfish at times. Her hate towards Tyrion is absolutely unjust. She also doesn't have the best idea of the big picture. That said, I think we should give her credit where it's due. I don't like her at all, but she really is a fascinating character. What say you all?

:agree: Pardon the cliche, but reading about Cersei is like watching a train wreck as it happens.

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Agreed. For me, intentions are almost fully what separate good from evil. She almost never seems to have outright malicious intentions in anything that doesn't involve Tyrion

Robert and Ned might disagree, though admittedly her actions against the second are a matter of self-preservation, and the first is hardly an ideal partner himself.

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There's this chapter where she tells Tywin she should be his heir. And i think she has become some of Tywin's characteristics we do not see in Tyrion or Jaime,

IMO we can mostly see it in the ways she cares not only for her children, but also for the whole 'Lannister' clan. Yes, she loves her children and overprotects them (same as with Lysa) but through her politics (being right or wrong thought) you can see how she, as Tywin did, tries to maintain the Lannisters on power.

For Instance, when Catelyn takes the Imp to the Valley, she's the first one to accuse Ned in front of Robert (though it's clear she doesn't love Tyrion)

It seems to me that she's truly trying to become the heir her father wanted. And that's another characteristic that humanizes her: she's always tried to make her father proud of her, even over skilled and brilliant Jaime, but only because she's a woman she's only been rejected by Tywin. I think all readers can emphasize on that emotion. Maybe this feeling of rejection has pursued her all her life, to the point she tries to overcompensate it with her children .

And also: i think she's important too, because through her we can get to know Tywin better.

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Robert and Ned might disagree, though admittedly her actions against the second are a matter of self-preservation, and the first is hardly an ideal partner himself.

I really do think her whole sense of self is centered around whether or not those close to her actually love her. I think if Robert, strong as he was until after his rebellion, would have loved her, she'd have found it in herself to be a good wife.
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I am shocked you think Cersei is tragic? How exactly is she tragic? She committs her first murder as a child. At 15 she ruins her brother's life because she wants to keep on using him. The way she treats Maggy, her abusive of Tyrion. This is all before anything has really gone wrong with her life. Then she marries Robert, but plans to keep having her affair with Jaime. Lies to her brother to keep him away from the children. Kills more babies. Seriously struggling to see where she is tragic more than evil.

I didn`t say she is evil, I just said there are so many tragic moments in her life. I believe she once loved Jaime, no matter how perverse and wrong that love is. I think she was never recovered from her mother`s death, or Maegi`s prophecy. Then she was renounced to marry a guy she was childishly in love, then she married Robert who never treated her kindly. Half of her actions in ASOIAF are provoked by bad things that happened to her in that marriage. Also, let we don`t forget that Robert was the first one to destroy that wedding, on the same wedding night. I find her incapability to overcome her fears, doubts tragic. But, I won`t deny she did some really nasty things, and that she can be described as evil.

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Agreed. For me, intentions are almost fully what separate good from evil. She almost never seems to have outright malicious intentions in anything that doesn't involve Tyrion

What she murders Robert's babies bother out of spite. She gets angrier at Lady Stokeworth for failing and sends her to Qyburn. The way she treated Maggy the Frog says it all about her character.

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I really do think her whole sense of self is centered around whether or not those close to her actually love her. I think if Robert, strong as he was until after his rebellion, would have loved her, she'd have found it in herself to be a good wife.

I could not disagree more. Even if Cersei married Rhaegar, she would never have been happy with him. Cersei has always been in love with Jaime, she even thinks after trying to be rough and force herself on Teana that it never felt right with anyone but Jaime.

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Yeah, I sympathize with her a little bit as well. Though she has that aura of godlike-beauty power woman etc. she's weak.

And I don't think she has the worst motivation. I hate all that 'my family must rule' BS, at least she understood that it's all about power and she wants it for her. And she's denied, mainly, because she's a woman.

I really pitied her in her walk. Not only because it was obviously humiliating in any circumstance, but that stuff about the stretch marks, fallen boobs (IIRC) etc. made her look very weak :\

But yeah, I agree, she's borderline evil and deserves it all. Though her punishment was specially cruel, since she was so proud. But yeah... Theon got way worse.

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I didn`t say she is evil, I just said there are so many tragic moments in her life. I believe she once loved Jaime, no matter how perverse and wrong that love is. I think she was never recovered from her mother`s death, or Maegi`s prophecy. Then she was renounced to marry a guy she was childishly in love, then she married Robert who never treated her kindly. Half of her actions in ASOIAF are provoked by bad things that happened to her in that marriage. Also, let we don`t forget that Robert was the first one to destroy that wedding, on the same wedding night. I find her incapability to overcome her fears, doubts tragic. But, I won`t deny she did some really nasty things, and that she can be described as evil.

I don't think she ever did really love Jaime. She used him and always seemed to want him away from Casterly Rock. Where as Jaime dreamt of marrying her and would have given up everything for her, she dreamt of marrying Rhaegar.

The way she was treating Maggy and threatening to have her killed showed he true colours before that.

Robert was not the first one to destroy the wedding. She planned to keep up her affair with Jaime from the start. As for Robert never treating her kinds, I think this is unlikely. Robert may be many things, but he seems courteous and kind to all. The man is desperate to be loved.

Cersei has had a far, far better life than virtually every other character and has messed up all the opportunities she had.

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I see her as someone who thinks she is as good as her father when she isn't and when someone tries to point that out, she just lashes out saying that what they say is bs and the only reason they don't want her to rule is because she is a women and that men are better. That leads her to believe that everything she does is great and no one likes it becasue it wasn't a man who came up with it when she is an ignorant little spoiled brat who doesn't know how to rule or even take care of her children. I do believe she loves her children, but she makes them as twisted as she is (pointing right at Joffery).

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She's got some significant psychological issues. She's vindictive, she rarely focuses on the big picture, and she doesn't know when to play nice. In hindsight, outwitting Ned Stark doesn't seem like much of an accomplishment.

She puts her children first, but, again, doesn't really seem to understand whats best for them.

She uses sex to get what she wants, but she chooses partners very poorly.

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