[ADWD Spoilers] Regarding comments on Dany

[GuybrushThreepwood]

I never said it was the best way to spend her time, but Dany is 16. 16 year olds have been doing stupid things for as long as there have been 16 year olds.

And Tyrion gets off the hook for being stupid because he is ugly? I always thought that stereotype went the other way...

I agree totally that it wasn't out of character for her. As you say, she's a teenager, and they do stupid things. And I wouldn't let Tyrion off the hook either. What he did was stupid, and he should have known better. What Dany did was stupider, but she didn't have the experience to know better.

Anyway, I really think the Daario thing is secondary. Her far worse mistakes were the reaction to the dragons, the other slave cities, and the Wise Masters.

[Rangers30]

I think marrying Hizdahr was idiotic. Supposedly her main goal was to get back Westeros. She should be marrying someone who can help her do that.

[O'san'gar's Razor]

I can see the similarities, such as her tantrum over Tyrion leaving the dog and sow for dead. Her contentment to remain a slave though... god I hope not.

Sansa has always shown the desire to escape her circumstances, she just never really does anything about it.

[Lyri]

I've been reading the discussions, and many people seem to express the sentiment that Dany seems rather stupid in this book. I'm not quite sure where this stupidity lies though.

Is it based on her attraction for Daario? Well, she does have a tad bit of weakness for handsome men, but I suppose that's pretty normal at her age. The real stupid thing would be to marry him, which she did not do, unlike a certain other character we know. Marrying Hidzach (spelling?) was actually a fairly decent move, as she could consolidate local support with it. Perhaps Hidzach was plotting behind her back, but she had no way of proving it, and she was suspicious if I remember correctly.

Is it based on the fact that the Yunkai now want war, showing that her peace treaty was a sham? The peace treaty seems to have been real before she got carried off by Drogon though, as the Yunkai presumably were not too keen on fighting three dragons and eight thousand Unsullied.

Is it based on the fact that she sat in Mereen for a long time instead of moving on to Westeros? Well, this argument has some merit, as it's really very unlikely that she could settle the slavery issue in a few years then proceed to Westeros. However, she did feel a strong moral imperative to eradicate slavery and not leave Mereen as Astapor had become, so I really can't fault here there as well. Moreover I think that another strong reason why she has not moved on is that she cannot really control her dragons....

Let's discuss this topic here.

I think the main problem is that Dany was supposed to be in Mereen learning to rule for 5 years while the dragons got bigger, and she unknowingly waited for Victarion, Tyrion, etc to find her. Dany was always going to learn by doing and making mistakes, and better she make those mistakes in Mereen than KL. But scrapping the 5 year gap meant that she had to make 5 years worth of mistakes and learn 5 years worth of lessons in just a few months. End result is that she basically makes every wrong decision imaginable, one right after the other, turning Mereen into a total charlie fox. I can easily see how GRRM painted himself into a bit of a corner in Mereen. And the lack of 5 years seems to have had the biggest impact on her arc. Bran and Arya to lesser degrees, but Dany got screwed. I'm sure she wouldn't come across as quite so stupid if her learning process and mistakes had been spread out over 5 years lol. Perhaps she would have also had time to work on those dragons...or at least Drogon. If a dragon rider can only ever ride ONE dragon, than I think it was inevitable that she would begin to lose control of Viserion and Rhaegal until she either found riders for them or a convenient horn....

[rashtrakut]

I think marrying Hizdahr was idiotic. Supposedly her main goal was to get back Westeros. She should be marrying someone who can help her do that.

Exactly. She ends up marrying a guy who will be unacceptable to Westeros.

The exslaves may love her but pretty much all the free-born Mereenese hate her. She is not of their culture and even though she grew up in Essos her thought processes are largely Westerosi. If Westeros was an abstract feeling for her she needs to stop calling herself the Queen of the place.

The peace was a bit of a sham as well, since the Yunkai were still sitting in force outside the gates waiting for their allies to show up. Her husband seems to be motivated by getting rid of the dragons as well.

Add to that for all the blather of being the dragon she shows weakness almost certain to encourage the son of the Harpy. If you take hostages you better be prepared to kill them if peace is not maintained. Yeah it is sweet that she is kind and tenderhearted and will not kill kids - but the sons of the harpy see that and call her bluff.

[Jon AS]

I agree totally that it wasn't out of character for her. As you say, she's a teenager, and they do stupid things. And I wouldn't let Tyrion off the hook either. What he did was stupid, and he should have known better. What Dany did was stupider, but she didn't have the experience to know better.

Tyrion: hires a whore, gives her explicit instruction about how she has to behave towards him and still falls very much in love with her.

Dany: Has the hots for a guy she knows she can't marry for several reasons. Decides to make the best of it and just sleep with him instead.

No, I don't see Dany's actions as stupider.

[Sun]

Problem for me is that Mereen is just a silly place full of people with silly names that I just don't care about.

And there it is. In my opinion, the reason Dany has been failing as a character since the end of AGOT, is because ever since then, the environment she inhabits has been has been drawn with crude crayon on a paint by numbers canvas. The characters she interacts with, for the most part, are nothing but black stick figures drawn entirely to serve as foils to her white world view. She's the only figure in focus in a hazy cartoonish world. Her world and her enemies defy belief - the Yunaki deserve a place of honor in the list of all time moronically grotesque baddies - and therefor so does she. She rings as hollow as a bell jar, to me.

All we want is for her to kill, or leave to be killed, her cartoonish children, slaughter those disney bad guys and get the frell out of Essos. i don't care about her conscience or her moral dilemmas because the people she's worrying about are not real to me. They don't matter to me. They're just black shapes meant to be mowed down or ignored on our way to where real people live, to where people matter, to Westeros.

Ultimately, I don;t care because GRRM failed to make me care. I read that he once said that the story is about Westeros and that's why he will never write an Essos POV. That's grand except when the main protagonist is set in this fodder- doesn't-matter world. Unless I care about her world, I really can't care about her or soundly evaluate her decisions.

[ljkeane]

I think marrying Hizdahr was questionable anyway, determining how exactly he'd managed to stop the violence in Meereen would be rather important I'd think.

[Itkovian]

I think its undeniable that Dany made a series of mistakes in this book.

Does that make her stupid? No. It makes her _believable_.

She's not Ender Wiggins, and she is still a teenage girl who was thrust into a situation far beyond anything she has been prepared to handle.

Given that situation, she has done remarkably well, and I doubt any of us could have done half as well as she did under those circumstances. To judge her harshly is uncalled for IMO, and a product of our all-seeing perspective.

Be that as it may, I have a feeling she's getting herself back together at the end. When she does come back, something tells me she won't be alone. :)

Itkovian

[jack88]

I think its undeniable that Dany made a series of mistakes in this book.

Does that make her stupid? No. It makes her _believable_.

She's not Ender Wiggins, and she is still a teenage girl who was thrust into a situation far beyond anything she has been prepared to handle.

Given that situation, she has done remarkably well, and I doubt any of us could have done half as well as she did under those circumstances. To judge her harshly is uncalled for IMO, and a product of our all-seeing perspective.

Be that as it may, I have a feeling she's getting herself back together at the end. When she does come back, something tells me she won't be alone. :)

Itkovian

This doesn't necessarily mean it makes for a good read, though.

I agree with those other guys, Dany's storyline was the one most shafted by removing the 5 year gap, in which all of this boring shit would have been taken care of swimmingly, and yes, she would have come back as mf'ing Ender Wiggin with dragons ready to bend Westeros over.

[GuybrushThreepwood]

Tyrion: hires a whore, gives her explicit instruction about how she has to behave towards him and still falls very much in love with her.

Dany: Has the hots for a guy she knows she can't marry for several reasons. Decides to make the best of it and just sleep with him instead.

No, I don't see Dany's actions as stupider.

That's one way to frame it. Another way would be

Tyrion: Hires a whore, keeps her as discreet as possible (note that Cersei thinks Alayaya is actually Tyrion's whore) grows feelings for her and then is betrayed. And it's not like he told Shae anything that important and she passed it on. She was embarassing to Tyrion, nothing more or less.

Dany: Has the hots for a guy she can't marry, gets engaged to the one person who she thinks can bring peace to her city, has an extremely public affair with the guy she has the hots for, shames the one person who she thinks can bring peace to her city, proves to the Meereenese beyond the shadow of a doubt that she has no respect for them.

Edit: Hey, 100 posts. And it only took me 3 years!

[Leold]

I felt like she was more stupid for all her worrying about Daario and daydreaming about him for the greatest part of her time while her city is being warred upon, her dragons are going wild and marrying Hizdahr is all she can think of to stop the killings when she should have investigated or pressed the slavers for information.

I know she's a teenager but shes got big responsibilities to her people that should come first. If Daario didn't have a sellsword company he'd be just a Tyroshi bravo.

She ws told dragons shouldn't be kept caged but she puts then in one anyway when she should have built some place for them to train them up.

I actually thought in that last chapter that she might die there at the end of sickness or dysentery or whatever and that her dragons might run wild.

[Peasant with No Story Arc]

Ultimately, I don;t care because GRRM failed to make me care. I read that he once said that the story is about Westeros and that's why he will never write an Essos POV. That's grand except when the main protagonist is set in this fodder- doesn't-matter world. Unless I cafe about her world, I really can't care about her.

Right. As interesting as any of it could ever be, anything that happens in Essos that doesn't affect Westeros just makes the story feel unfocused to me. It's really ambitious to try to get it all in but if it doesn't have anything to do with the personal development of Dany or Arya why is it in there? It's also frustrating when Dany doesn't have a consistent arc. Repeating past mistakes or making questionable decisions in order to keep her in Essos. Westeros is "more important" than Essos because the Westerosi look like the ones who'll have to fight the Others (who are a threat to the entire world). Plenty of great Essos stories could be told. No argument. I'm just not sure if they belong in what is essentially a Westeros story.

[jack88]

Right. As interesting as any of it could ever be, anything that happens in Essos that doesn't affect Westeros just makes the story feel unfocused to me. It's really ambitious to try to get it all in but if it doesn't have anything to do with the personal development of Dany or Arya why is it in there? It's also frustrating when Dany doesn't have a consistent arc. Repeating past mistakes or making questionable decisions in order to keep her in Essos. Westeros is "more important" than Essos because the Westerosi look like the ones who'll have to fight the Others (who are a threat to the entire world). Plenty of great Essos stories could be told. No argument. I'm just not sure if they belong in what is essentially a Westeros story.

This is the big thing. We all know we are gearing up for End Game with zombie invasion in Westeros, so while we're reading these books, that's what we're keeping in mind.

I wish Martin would save his introspection into the fundamental flaws of slavery and foreign policy for another book series, because I thought this one was about BAMF knights and lords gearing up to prepare for the ice zombie apocalypse.

[cteresa]

I was not going to get dragged into this. Seriously. Particularly since I just found I got major isshoos with GRRM´s female characters and how GRRM is not doing the romance-y stuff convincingly.

But just to point out that Daenerys Targaryen, Stormborn, heir the throne of Westeros and all that, seeming to care more for the welfare of the people around them and wanting to end slavery in the world or in as much of it as she can seems like a much more modern, *right* thing to care about than for her feudal right to be queen of a land where she never set foot. In fact that is one of my problems with this series, I think I now also care for the existence of slavery in the eastern part of that world.

(not that I think GRRM did Dany thought processes at all logical or clear to me, and that portrayal of a 17 year old girl in love, nooo, does not compute).

[Chirios]

I've been reading the discussions, and many people seem to express the sentiment that Dany seems rather stupid in this book. I'm not quite sure where this stupidity lies though.

Is it based on her attraction for Daario? Well, she does have a tad bit of weakness for handsome men, but I suppose that's pretty normal at her age. The real stupid thing would be to marry him, which she did not do, unlike a certain other character we know.

True, but don't forget she was sleeping with Daario for a while.

Marrying Hidzach (spelling?) was actually a fairly decent move, as she could consolidate local support with it. Perhaps Hidzach was plotting behind her back, but she had no way of proving it, and she was suspicious if I remember correctly.

Not sure about whether or not she was suspicious but her consolidating local support was based on Hizdach keeping the peace for 30 days. The only way he could keep that promise would be if he was highly ranking in the Harpies. The mere fact that Hizdach was able to keep the peace meant he was her enemy.

[Itkovian]

This doesn't necessarily mean it makes for a good read, though.

I agree with those other guys, Dany's storyline was the one most shafted by removing the 5 year gap, in which all of this boring shit would have been taken care of swimmingly, and yes, she would have come back as mf'ing Ender Wiggin with dragons ready to bend Westeros over.

Well, that's entirely subjective. I liked her story, and I highly dislike the whole concept of Ender Wiggins-type characters.

She's a teenage girl who is way out of her element and has to learn her lessons the hard way. And she is.

If it helps, something tells me that at the end of the book she HAS learned, at least partly, and is going to come back with quite a lot more spine. And a Khalassar or two. Because if there's one situation where she is most at ease, I think, it's with a horde of horse warriors at her back. :)

I just hope Tyrion turns the Second Sons around quickly enough. :)

Itkovian

[Wulfram]

If Dany just wanted to be Queen and wasn't trying to institute massive social change, marrying Hizdahr would have made sense. But believing it would make everyone settle down and just accept her abolition of slavery seems naive at best.

[JKeats]

If it helps, something tells me that at the end of the book she HAS learned, at least partly, and is going to come back with quite a lot more spine. And a Khalassar or two. Because if there's one situation where she is most at ease, I think, it's with a horde of horse warriors at her back. :)

I just hope Tyrion turns the Second Sons around quickly enough. :)

So basically after making a grand mess, resulting in thousands of deaths, she's going to come back to casually stomp all over a bunch of cardboard enemies. And all of it, every single speck of it, due to dragons that were handed to her on a silver platter. Such a sympathetic character, this Daenerys Targaryen.

Don't worry though, she's learned her lesson. Turns out her big flaw was that she was just too gosh darn good for this cruel, dirty world.

[JKeats]

sorry, double post