Rant & Rave Without Repercussion s 5 continued [book spoilers]

[A Ghost of Someone]

Even if they, somehow, wanted to keep the marriage (for whatever reason), they could have made Sansa a bit less freaked about the sex.

 

One thing is to make the "virgin" a shy maiden and another one, make her terrified, which is what they wanted.

Yeah, Sophie really sold that episode and that scene in particular. They wanted what they got.

[Le Cygne]

This tells you just what they were going for (Weiss this time):

"She can see the logic behind what [Littlefinger is] saying and realize that this is an unpleasant but probably necessary step in getting back what was taken from her.

"She's going into this dangerous, difficult situation where she thinks she's going to guide the situation. The only thing she doesn't know, that even Littlefinger doesn't know, is exactly what Ramsay is."

1. Note he keeps saying she, he is putting this all on her. SHE decided to do this, SHE thought she could sexually manipulate Ramsay. SHE miscalculated.

2. Note he says she thinks LF's plan is logical, even though he didn't tell her his plan. And just a few episodes ago, she didn't trust him at all, he was "the devil" she knows, but no big whoop.

3. Note he calls a teenage virgin who dreams of love sleeping with the enemy "unpleasant." Whatever, marry, have sex with, likely bear a child, likely be killed after they get what they want, mere quibbles.

It's not like she burned her mattress because she dreaded marrying Joffrey, or bawled her eyes out because she dreaded marrying Tyrion. Let's pretend that never happened and move on to his next point.

4. Note he lets LF off the hook. It's a logical plan. He didn't know it would fail. He is not to blame, in any way. She's making choices here. It's not like LF killed her father, betrayed her mother, kidnapped her, and paws all over her.

Also, it's not like he gets anything out of this. No, best not mention that.

5. Note he also makes it seem like what they knew Ramsay to be, the enemy, the son of Roose Bolton, the one who makes no secret of murdering and flaying people while occupying her home, was just "unpleasant" and no cause to be unduly alarmed.

[Bobby b's bobby]

This tells you just what they were going for (Weiss this time):


1. Note he keeps saying she, he is putting this all on her. SHE decided to do this, SHE thought she could sexually manipulate Ramsay. SHE miscalculated.

2. Note he says she thinks LF's plan is logical, even though he didn't tell her his plan. And just a few episodes ago, she didn't trust him at all, he was "the devil" she knows, but no big whoop.

3. Note he calls a teenage virgin who dreams of love sleeping with the enemy "unpleasant." Whatever, marry, have sex with, likely bear a child, likely be killed after they get what they want, mere quibbles.

It's not like she burned her mattress because she dreaded marrying Joffrey, or bawled her eyes out, because she dreaded marrying Tyrion. Let's pretend that never happened and move on to his next point.

4. Note he lets LF off the hook. It's a logical plan. He didn't know it would fail. He is not to blame, in any way. She's making choices here. It's not like LF killed her father, betrayed her mother, kidnapped her, and paws all over her.

5. Note he also makes it seem like what they knew Ramsay to be, the enemy, the son of Roose Bolton, the one who makes no secret of murdering and flaying people while occupying her home, was just "unpleasant" and no cause to be unduly alarmed.

Fuck weiss as much as benioff that is all.

[The Northern Scholar]

This tells you just what they were going for (Weiss this time):


1. Note he keeps saying she, he is putting this all on her. SHE decided to do this, SHE thought she could sexually manipulate Ramsay. SHE miscalculated.

2. Note he says she thinks LF's plan is logical, even though he didn't tell her his plan. And just a few episodes ago, she didn't trust him at all, he was "the devil" she knows, but no big whoop.

3. Note he calls a teenage virgin who dreams of love sleeping with the enemy "unpleasant." Whatever, marry, have sex with, likely bear a child, likely be killed after they get what they want, mere quibbles.

It's not like she burned her mattress because she dreaded marrying Joffrey, or bawled her eyes out because she dreaded marrying Tyrion. Let's pretend that never happened and move on to his next point.

4. Note he lets LF off the hook. It's a logical plan. He didn't know it would fail. He is not to blame, in any way. She's making choices here. It's not like LF killed her father, betrayed her mother, kidnapped her, and paws all over her.

Also, it's not like he gets anything out of this. No, best not mention that.

5. Note he also makes it seem like what they knew Ramsay to be, the enemy, the son of Roose Bolton, the one who makes no secret of murdering and flaying people while occupying her home, was just "unpleasant" and no cause to be unduly alarmed.

 

Not much to say beyond "great post."

[RGBeyondAsshai]

This tells you just what they were going for (Weiss this time):


1. Note he keeps saying she, he is putting this all on her. SHE decided to do this, SHE thought she could sexually manipulate Ramsay. SHE miscalculated.

2. Note he says she thinks LF's plan is logical, even though he didn't tell her his plan. And just a few episodes ago, she didn't trust him at all, he was "the devil" she knows, but no big whoop.

3. Note he calls a teenage virgin who dreams of love sleeping with the enemy "unpleasant." Whatever, marry, have sex with, likely bear a child, likely be killed after they get what they want, mere quibbles.

It's not like she burned her mattress because she dreaded marrying Joffrey, or bawled her eyes out because she dreaded marrying Tyrion. Let's pretend that never happened and move on to his next point.

4. Note he lets LF off the hook. It's a logical plan. He didn't know it would fail. He is not to blame, in any way. She's making choices here. It's not like LF killed her father, betrayed her mother, kidnapped her, and paws all over her.

5. Note he also makes it seem like what they knew Ramsay to be, the enemy, the son of Roose Bolton, the one who makes no secret of murdering and flaying people while occupying her home, was just "unpleasant" and no cause to be unduly alarmed.

 God how can they be so--that?! It kind of makes me sick to my stomach.

ETA-you are spot on though.

[Le Cygne]

They taught her a lesson. She thought it would be easy to be a femme fatale, since all she had to do was wear a fug dress before. They said she was a "hardened woman" (they don't need to show things, they can just say them in post-rape interviews, it's the same thing). So what's next, good girl or "bad pussy"... has to be one or the other, heaven forbid she could just be a woman.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

They taught her a lesson. She thought it would be easy to be a femme fatale, since all she had to do was wear a fug dress before. They said she was a "hardened woman" (they don't need to show things, they can just say them in post-rape interviews, it's the same thing). So what's next, good girl or "bad pussy"... has to be one or the other, heaven forbid she could just be a woman.

BookSansa is hardened. She says it, almost literally: "my skin has turned into steel". And that's because she has learned to not let things got into her, because she has now made herself strong by telling others, with her actions, that her feelings matter: refusing to open up to Tyrion, not kneeling, etc.

How do they have the nerve to say showSansa is hardened when she has been stripped from all of what made her hardened? Just because a person has been object of abuse doesn't mean that person has become stronger. Some of them are, some are completely broken. Sansa is not broken in the books. She is a survivor. How many others, in her situation, wouldn't have chosen to jump from a tower? Heck, Ashara Dayne did it.

There is a reason why the episode in which she's raped is called as it was. Because they broke her, both figuratively and literally. Because they believe she, a "hardened woman", would survive. Maybe Sansa from the books could. Sansa from the books could end up marry Harry and having unpleasant sex with him and still be her and show him her courtesy armour. Show Sansa is not in the same page at all.

[Le Cygne]

By hardened, they meant she gave up her dreams. No one could understand why she would want to marry a Bolton, and that was their justification.

[Marcus Agrippa]

That was depressing. Did I metion I hate hollywood people?

[Bobby b's bobby]

That was depressing. Did I metion I hate hollywood people?

You are not alone

[JonCon's Red Beard]

By hardened, they meant she gave up her dreams. No one could understand why she would want to marry a Bolton, and that was their justification.

They believe "hardened" means "resigned to fatality"?

Assholes.

[Le Cygne]

They believe "hardened" means "resigned to fatality"?Assholes.

Yes. That's often used in terms of bitterness, someone who is past feeling, who gave up, and doesn't give a shit anymore.

[Le Cygne]

GRRM touches on that here, but he's being subtle, something they can't seem to grasp, about Arya:

"He saw Sansa crying herself to sleep at night, and he saw Arya watching in silence and holding her secrets hard in her heart."

He doesn't mean it in the way they do. He shows Arya's vulnerability, like when tears come to her eyes when she can't part with Needle. We know she is trying to have a hard heart, but she doesn't really, because he shows us the tender spots.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Yes. That's often used in terms of bitterness, someone who is past feeling, who gave up, and doesn't give a shit anymore.

The thing is that, this "hardening" of Sansa's heart is seen in a negative light. She's a bit resigned to a marriage towards HtH, yet, we know she is going to find a way to get her way. We're not supposed to look at her arc and say "oh, great! she has given up in life! Go Sansa!".

This reminds me a bit of the people who say that Sarah Connor going to kill Miles Dyson is cool and badass. The movie makes a point on her actions being going contrary to what her human side is meant to do. She's acting like the machine, doing what "logic" requires, even if it means murdering a human being who is not even aware he's making something wrong. We're not meant to root for that nor for the fact she's distant to John either.

[Le Cygne]

I don't think I saw that movie, I saw the first Terminator.

 

There's an element of sexism in the expression "hardened woman," too. A woman is supposed to be soft, so she's failed if she's become hardened.

 

That expression is often used to describe prostitutes, or "women scorned" ("hell hath no fury like a woman scorned"). Or women like Lady Macbeth.

 

On Macbeth's arrival home, soon after his wife hears of the royal visit, she congratulates him on his new dignity and promised royalty, immediately suggesting to his agitated, unwilling mind the murder of their guest and sovereign.3 She is a thoroughly hardened, ambitious woman, resolute and utterly unscrupulous.

 

http://www.shakespeare-online.com/plays/macbeth/ladymacbeth.html

 

Here's another:

 

Ultimately, she fails the test of her own hardened ruthlessness. Having upbraided her husband one last time during the banquet (Act III, Scene 4), the pace of events becomes too much even for her: She becomes mentally deranged, a mere shadow of her former commanding self, gibbering in Act V, Scene 1 as she "confesses" her part in the murder.

 

http://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/m/macbeth/character-analysis/lady-macbeth

[Crixus]

I am trying to wrap my head around the show doing all the DwD plotlines first, and then FFC (as it seems from casting calls etc.).

 

It's the epitome of laziness and lack of creativity. I mean, GRRM is heavily criticised for dividing characters/;book, but now that both books are available, many readers have realised that reading themin tandem makes for an excellent mid-series story (well, in my view anyway). Hell, readers managed to lay out parallel reading lists all by themselves with little effort.

 

But this team that gets paid millions of dollars couldn't adapt both together?? Really? They didn't even have the interest to check out such examples online to suss out how AFFC and DWD could be brought together by timeline, for example. 

 

Instead, they rushed headlong into the EPIC moments of DwD, simultaneously discarding the 'boring' bits (most of Feast) and making shit up. 

 

Now, we will return to a slower pace, a retro fitting introduction of the Iron Islands and Bran, and more made up shit/hitting EPIC moments for characters like Dany and Jaime and Sansa, whose storylines have been finished or butchered as per the books. 

[Toth]

I was busy indulging myself in childhood memories yesterday evening by watching Slayers, one of my favourite shows when I was a kid. Returning to here and finding the Ramsay-thread having exploded in rage-inducing rape-apology and these analysis here about their 'usage' of Sansa as a character now is just extremely depressing. Having watched a shonen-Anime (so aimed at young boys) that was made in 1995 with a female protagonist and 50% female characters and treats that as if it is the most normal thing in the world, the jarring difference is killing me.

 

But that's not why I have returned. It caused me to write a little essay about camera perspectives and 'Fanservice' in another forum. I can only recommend paying attention to camera perspectives in controversial scenes. GoT's nudity should be Fandisservice (when it comes to abuse) or Character development (like Jon/Ygritte). That's how I saw it in the books. Especially when abuse is portrayed, the camera should either have a neutral focus or show the perspective of the victim (if at all), under no circumstances the perspective of the perpetrator. "Male Gaze" in these situations would mean the direction itself is induldging in the humiliation of the victim and this is the one thing I cannot stand in modern media. There surely are plenty of examples in GoT and I want to see the defenders defend why the camera needed to be positioned like it was for 'gritty realism'.

 

Weird, it all started because I realized the very few 'mild' Fanservice scenes in Slayers were rendered completely and utterly harmless simply through the position of the camera (it's comedy, so naturally it was always focused at where the joke is, not bodyparts of a female). My thinking is strange.

[SoloDolo44]

I really hated how Sansa refused Brienne of Tarths allegiance and stayed with Baelish (probably the biggest sleezeball other than Ramsey) instead. Did she forget that it was Baelish who betrayed her father saying,"I told you not to trust me." Which ultimately led to Neds capture and beheading? All the hype in S.4 about her growing up and finally playing the game, just to see her go right back to being an idiotic little girl was very disappointing.

[AlpenglowMemories]

5. Note he also makes it seem like what they knew Ramsay to be, the enemy, the son of Roose Bolton, the one who makes no secret of murdering and flaying people while occupying her home, was just "unpleasant" and no cause to be unduly alarmed.

 

This one's funny because Sansa at Winterfell relies entirely on the (nonsensical) premise that Baelish would willingly sell off his most prized tool without even consulting and background checking the buyers. There's no reason to think he wouldn't visit, establish a few eyes, and then wait for correspondence from them to see what sort of creature Ramsay is. And when information like "flays people alive" "loves raping" "has a thing for torture" "hangs dead bodies everywhere" comes up...

 

Then again, if memory serves, and this season is quickly fading, when they arrive at Winterfell, Ramsay has strewn flayed bodies up, hasn't he?

 

Or maybe next season we'll learn that the oh-so-powerful Northern Bastard has supernatural psychic powers and can control peoples thoughts! 

[Le Cygne]

Yes, the flaying was blatant, and all they had to do was look at the Bolton banner. Myranda named several women Ramsay killed after what had to have turned to rape, so the one scene where he "hunted" and fed a woman to the dogs was representative of more, and these women would have been seen around him and then disappeared, there would be an air of suspicion at the very least around him. So simply asking about him, like at the inn, would turn up clues.

LF is supposed to know things, but what they knew was enough. It's laughable that finding out Ramsay was super horrible vs. horrible made a difference in the teenage virgin sucessfully sexually manipulating him or not. And it's horrible that LF even asked her to, even had Ramsay been a nice guy and not the enemy. LF is pimping her out, after brutally isolating her via multiple murders. Making excuses for him and throwing it in her lap as a miscalculation that leads to rape is sickening.

There were ways to show she had lost her way without making it look like LF was blameless and they were teaching her a lesson with rape as the consequence. And they seem to be setting up that she will go back to him. I suspect we will see this unfold very differently in the books, no rape, and no going back to him once she's free of him...