Why I dislike Daenerys Targaryen

[MDT]

I'm sure this has been mentioned already, but here's my 2 cents.

You're reading a fantasy series, and you're disappointed by a lucky string of events??

Seriously, which lucky string of events begins with "First she has a brother who abuses her for 13 years"?

[7swans]

But doesn't the very fact that she opts for a massive douche rather than a "Nice Guy" suggest that she is a douche herself and not a Nice Girl? I don't think anyone is suggesting that she should be forced to marry a Nice Guy, just that her preference for Twats reflects badly on her as a person. I don't see how this is so frequently turned into an issue of chauvinism.

She is a FOURTEEN-year-old girl!

[DarkAndFullOfTurnips]

I'm sure someone has said this, but the only "Lucky" thing Dany has encountered is dragons hatching, which is like one of the most important events in the book and we wouldn't have this series without it.

[mcb]

She is a FOURTEEN-year-old girl!

No.

[E-Ro]

I'm sure someone has said this, but the only "Lucky" thing Dany has encountered is dragons hatching, which is like one of the most important events in the book and we wouldn't have this series without it.

Why wouldn't we have the series without it? iirc grrm wasn't going to have the dragons in at all. In fact, I seem to recall it saying in one of the books "for someone(dont remember the name) who made me put the dragons in"

[Holdfast]

I've had trouble warming to her post AGOT. At first I thought it was because of her storyline, which seemed the least interesting to me of all the main players - it just seemed to be bogged down with too much filler and many times felt like I was reading a separate book. Later her personality increasingly grated on me, particularly with her sense of self-entitlement in being a ruler. Also too many bad decisions. Sorry to Dany-lovers out there, but when it's all added up, just find it hard to like her.

[TheMysteriousOne]

Why wouldn't we have the series without it? iirc grrm wasn't going to have the dragons in at all. In fact, I seem to recall it saying in one of the books "for someone(dont remember the name) who made me put the dragons in"

Yeah, but that doesn't mean that the dragons aren't very important to the series. For all we know, GRRM could have decided to make House Baratheon the first ruling family, and then make the Targaryens the new rulers. It doesn't really matter because they're in the series now.

[Kittykatknits]

Great OP! I'm a little surprised/disappointed more people didn't pick up on the sarcasm though.

I just want to point that her behavior towards Daario shouldn't be a surprise, especially after she tricked Drogo with sex.

Why wouldn't we have the series without it? iirc grrm wasn't going to have the dragons in at all. In fact, I seem to recall it saying in one of the books "for someone(dont remember the name) who made me put the dragons in"

I know the reference you are talking about but I wouldn't read much in to it. The decision to include dragons in the story was made very early in the planning stages of the series, back when he was still figuring out characters. Dunno what role they will have in the end though.

[ARYa_Nym]

Quentyn is a nice person but he is not a Nice Guy.

He didn't even seem to be that interested in her. He likely would have preferred that Yronwood girl or Gerris' sisters. & he did think/wonder why Dany would even want him.

He was going to marry her for duty but not because he wanted her.

Funny how Jon Snow being in love with Ygritte who murdered an innocent old man like it's nothing and enjoyed raiding, doesn't lead to any complaints about his character, but Dany and Daario is this huge deal.

And even worse there are arguments that Jon needs to be with a good person. Ygritte herself wasn't.

[Cheshire Rat]

-fails to instantly realize the awesomeness of Starks, just because they took part in a rebelion that caused the death of her father, the brutal murder of her nieces and that forced her to live her whole life in exile running from assassins.

I'm completely embarrassed to admit I didn't pick up on the sarcasm until that line. I was totally gearing up to get mad up until that point, then I started laughing.

[DarkAndFullOfTurnips]

Why wouldn't we have the series without it? iirc grrm wasn't going to have the dragons in at all. In fact, I seem to recall it saying in one of the books "for someone(dont remember the name) who made me put the dragons in"

I just listened to the podcast at Chicon where he says he debated using no magic or dragons at all, but then changed his mind. This way before he actually wrote aGoT. So needless to say the dragons are an integral part of the story. Whether the story would exist or not, I suppose I jumped the gun on - but basically the story wouldn't at all be the one we know today had that event not happened.

[The Dragon has three heads]

Let`s go through what Dany did since AGoT

- She buys the horse lord Khal Drogo and forces him to marry her

- She forces Viserys to come with her to Vaes Dothrak even thought he wanted to stay safe in Pentos where he could spend the rest of his life, not worrying about Westeros

- She steals the Dragon`s eggs from Illyrio

- She punishes a wine merchant because she didn`t like his product

- She orders the sack of Lhazar and then she wants all the slaves for herself

- She poisons Khal Drogo, because she got bored of him and then she blames it on MMD

- She burns down the HotU because it didn`t have a red door

- She steals Illyrio`s boat and takes the crew ( including Barristran and Belwas) hostages

- After she burns two peaceful cities (Astapor and Yunkaii) to the ground leaving nothing behind she takes Meeren and starts killing her own people and blame it on others (Harpy? yeah right)

- She exiles Jorah because he refused to shave his hairy body

- She rapes Daario several times

- She opens a Fighting Pit and forces people to fight to the death for her own amusement

- She makes Drogon attack the innocent crowd and then to avoid being held responsible she runs away

I`m sorry if I missed anything, but there are some many horrible things committed by her, that it`s very hard to keep count

Classic.

[Angmar]

How much time before this gets locked?

[Rheagar Prime]

i agree she is lucky but dang seems like a hate thread and a rant to me

[Lion of Judah]

For the first 3 books her development is unrealistic because she has all luck in the world.

First she has a brother who abuses her for 13 years, then she's sold to someone she doesn't know. I mean really, Drogo is a nice guy? I can't see how it is possible for him to threat her nice just because he's never known defeat and thus doesn't care much for social conventions. And then, when he dies, her child dies and her people decide to drag her back to live as crone at the age of 14 she walks into a pyre and suddenly has dragons? How lucky is that? She even crosses a desert and looses only 1/3 of her people because she gets lucky again and finds an abandoned city!

And it gets even better, when she comes to Quarth the guy who wants to get her dragons by marring her really manages to keep her safe until he realizes he wont get any dragons that way, so she has only to survive ONE single assasination attempt. How can he possibly do that if he's only one of the most powerful people in Quarth? And then instead of just going back to Illyrio, the guy that sold her for personal gain to a barbarian, she goes to Astapor to get an army. AND MANAGES TO GET ONE! How ridiculous is this? And worse, it worked because the slavers there took her for a harmless 14 year old girl they just tricked into selling them one of the 3 most precious items in the world for an army they can easily replace within some years. How can greed possibly overcome common sense?

Yes and than she takes Astapor and despite her abundant experience from not angering her brother with her own opinion and riding on a horse for over a year she can't deduce that her solution to give Astapor to some intelligent people wont work? Then she even decides to ride from city to city and hopes they will just give her what she wants like they do it with the Dothraki? I mean she's only a girl, nobody would see her as a threat!

Ah yes, did I mention the Dragons are only a magical plot device to give her power?

And in book 5 it gets worse. Everything happens so slow and is so hard without any reson beside having no supplys or ships to transport her people. Why can't she just find a magical plot device that transports her and her army to Westeros? But nooooo she decides to learn how to rule and doesn't abandon her people as if something like in Astapor possibly might happen. Also I already pointed out that she is supposed to know everything about ruling at this point. I mean Jon and Robb knew how to rule at her age without making ever any mistakes and their only advantage was that Robb was raised to be Ned's heir and Jon was raised with Robb, she on the other side shows intelligence and intelligence=knowledge. Besides she has Jorah and Barristan as advisors! But she doesn't even trust them, just because one sold her to the guys that wanted to kill her, and continued to do so even after their first attempt, and the second switched sides after RR. On the other hand she allows Daario to come near her just because he only betrayed her opponents...

Ah yes she even chooses Daario (=the bad guy) but doesn't choose Quentin (=the nice guy) just because he can't offer her anything that might help her in her current situation, thats just like school all over again, how can something like this happen? How can she be so selfish? And then she marries this guy from Meereen she doesn't even love for political reasons, how can she be so stupid?

Did I forget something?

Ah yes: Why can't she

-hold court,

-learn to rule,

-deal with intrigues,

-train her dragons,

-lead an army,

-learn everything about Westeros and Essos,

-make plans to return to Westeros

at the same time?

And it is also about time that she reflects more on her happy past instead of always repeating “when I'm looking back I am lost” or something like that. She's clinging on her dragons and her heritage and the claims she can derive from them as if they were the only reasons she is still alive and has power over her future.

This girl is seriously overrated! It is known!

Did I miss any other Dany failures?

Edit: Additional failures pointed out by the community:

-fails to realize that she's a girl and thus shouldn't show behavour that is only appropriate for boys.

-fails to instantly realize the awesomeness of Starks, just because they took part in a rebelion that caused the death of her father, the brutal murder of her nieces and that forced her to live her whole life in exile running from assassins.

-somehow failed to marry out of duty because she hadn't sex with Quentin (I must admit I'm not entirely sure how this argument works, it has something to do with not marriing Quentin while having sex with Daario).

-failed to cage her dragons soon enough.

-caged her dragons.

It gets even worse if you filter the missinformation out we get because we hear everything in her biased POV, if we can believe therealbando:

I like the subtle jab at all the outrageous Dany hate arguments, some of them are so sad that I often wonder if Dany personally did something to some of these posters.

[Selyse's Moustache Rides]

I like Dany but damn, some people act like their mother got insulted.

[Lothar Imbel]

Let`s go through what Dany did since AGoT

- She buys the horse lord Khal Drogo and forces him to marry her

- She forces Viserys to come with her to Vaes Dothrak even thought he wanted to stay safe in Pentos where he could spend the rest of his life, not worrying about Westeros

- She steals the Dragon`s eggs from Illyrio

- She punishes a wine merchant because she didn`t like his product

- She orders the sack of Lhazar and then she wants all the slaves for herself

- She poisons Khal Drogo, because she got bored of him and then she blames it on MMD

- She burns down the HotU because it didn`t have a red door

- She steals Illyrio`s boat and takes the crew ( including Barristran and Belwas) hostages

- After she burns two peaceful cities (Astapor and Yunkaii) to the ground leaving nothing behind she takes Meeren and starts killing her own people and blame it on others (Harpy? yeah right)

- She exiles Jorah because he refused to shave his hairy body

- She rapes Daario several times

- She opens a Fighting Pit and forces people to fight to the death for her own amusement

- She makes Drogon attack the innocent crowd and then to avoid being held responsible she runs away

I`m sorry if I missed anything, but there are some many horrible things committed by her, that it`s very hard to keep count

Literally, I'd love Dany if she actually did these things, especially the bolded ones...

Basically, I'd love Dany if she was a female Viserys.

[Selyse's Moustache Rides]

You'd love Dany if she was a rapist? I suppose that's consistent with this forum, seeing as how she's a female.

[Ser Pollo Loco]

Quentyn is a nice person but he is not a Nice Guy.

He didn't even seem to be that interested in her. He likely would have preferred that Yronwood girl or Gerris' sisters. & he did think/wonder why Dany would even want him.

He was going to marry her for duty but not because he wanted her.

And even worse there are arguments that Jon needs to be with a good person. Ygritte herself wasn't.

people forget that the dornish sold the other sellswords under the bus and said they were to betray dany, when in fact they were to join her side

[aquintus]

She is a FOURTEEN-year-old girl!

No. She's a 16 to 17 year old girl who just forcibly conquered a city state and declared herself ruler. The standards in which we judge her are therfeore justifiably higher because of that (and that's even disregarding the fact that children are expected to be mature decision-makers at a much younger age in Westeros than they are in the modern real world.)