What smart things has Sansa done?

[DanyDayne]

I think she's smart. Not as smart as the episode tried to make it look, but smart enough to know how to survive and learn from her mistakes. She's come a long way. 

[David Selig]

"In the kingdom of the blind the one eyed man is king".

Pretty much every one on this show is an idiot, especially after Season 2.

[Pandean]

Let's see:

--Survived King's Landing by keeping her head down and making sure no one could doubt her loyalty, especially in a place where any wrong word or action could have meant off with her head

--Pleading for her father's life which successfully convinced Cersei to send Ned to the Wall. Joffrey of course fucked that up but that's on Joffrey.

--Calming down the ladies during the Battle of the Blackwater when Cersei was drunk to prevent panic

--Convincing the LotV that Littlefinger was innocent by that amazing lying scene

--I would argue turning away Brienne is a smart move because Sansa didn't know Brienne and at that point she was deeply distrustful 

--Planting the idea in Ramsay's head to kill Roose Bolton and his newborn Son and Walda

--Understanding that their army needed more men and also advising Jon correctly to not fall into Ramsay's traps (which he didn't listen to and did anyway)

--Her managing the Northern Lords when they're on the edge of revolting due to Jon leaving and the like

--Her concerns with food shortages, correct clothing, and preperation for Winter which is sorely needed and kind of an oversight the rest of the characters ignored

 

Sansa makes many smart decisions. The thing is that she's not like Tyrion, who is shown to be smart through his very clever, unsubtle moments in the tv show, and she's not Margaery or Cersei who we see actively seeming. Her decision making and cunning and planning are a lot more subtle and her actions might come off as passive but in reality many of those actions (such as many of her actions in King's Landing) were the right choices to which helped her survive. And now, while she doesn't get big speeches or clever witty lines a la Tyrion to take down castles or battle plans or whatever, we see she's concerned with the logistics that both the war for dawn and the coming winter bring to the Northerners. We also see that she is able to read the emotions of the people and their issues and what they want and need and why they want and need it better than Jon can. Jon may have the big picture and it may be very important but he also doesn't understand the social constructs and complex cultures he ends up at the head of, which has already resulted in his death once. Sansa understands that it's not that easy as 'can everyone just get along because ice zombies are coming'.

 

[Nerevanin]

I'm not trying to pick a fight but I'd argue that:

26 minutes ago, Pandean said:

--Pleading for her father's life which successfully convinced Cersei to send Ned to the Wall. Joffrey of course fucked that up but that's on Joffrey.

--Calming down the ladies during the Battle of the Blackwater when Cersei was drunk to prevent panic

--Convincing the LotV that Littlefinger was innocent by that amazing lying scene

--Her managing the Northern Lords when they're on the edge of revolting due to Jon leaving and the like

This is imo rather her charm than being smart. (and Cersei wouldn't kill Ned anyway, she didn't want a war, it was LF who did) (and saving LF's ass by lying didn't really bring her anything in the end, the lords wouldn't hurt her anyway and if she said the truth, LF wouldn't sell her to the Boltons)

26 minutes ago, Pandean said:

--Understanding that their army needed more men and also advising Jon correctly to not fall into Ramsay's traps (which he didn't listen to and did anyway)

if Jon had 2000 men and Ramsay had 5000, everyone would understand that he needs more men. She rejected LF's offer of more men. If she had brought them along right away, Jon would have lost much less men in the battle => more men to fight the White Walkers.

26 minutes ago, Pandean said:

--I would argue turning away Brienne is a smart move because Sansa didn't know Brienne and at that point she was deeply distrustful

A smart move would be listen to what Brienne has to say and then make a decision instead of sending her away immediately.

26 minutes ago, Pandean said:

--Planting the idea in Ramsay's head to kill Roose Bolton and his newborn Son and Walda

How would that be smart? Roose was the only one who controlled Ramsay at least a bit.

26 minutes ago, Pandean said:

--Her concerns with food shortages, correct clothing, and preperation for Winter which is sorely needed and kind of an oversight the rest of the characters ignored

--Survived King's Landing by keeping her head down and making sure no one could doubt her loyalty, especially in a place where any wrong word or action could have meant off with her head

OK, I'll give you that.

(But they wouldn't kill her anyway (well, until they thought she killed Joffrey), they need her as a hostage against the Starks.)

[Pandean]

7 minutes ago, Nerevanin said:

I'm not trying to pick a fight but I'd argue that:

This is imo rather her charm than being smart. (and Cersei wouldn't kill Ned anyway, she didn't want a war, it was LF who did) (and saving LF's ass by lying didn't really bring her anything in the end, the lords wouldn't hurt her anyway and if she said the truth, LF wouldn't sell her to the Boltons)

if Jon had 2000 men and Ramsay had 5000, everyone would understand that he needs more men. She rejected LF's offer of more men. If she had brought them along right away, Jon would have lost much less men in the battle => more men to fight the White Walkers.

A smart move would be listen to what Brienne has to say and then make a decision instead of sending her away immediately.

How would that be smart? Roose was the only one who controlled Ramsay at least a bit.

OK, I'll give you that.

(But they wouldn't kill her anyway (well, until they thought she killed Joffrey), they need her as a hostage against the Starks.)

I have no clue how to make the quote thing like you did so apologies if this is jumbled a bit:

 

There were calculated moved in King's Landing that kept her alive. When Tyrion offered to break her betrothal for instance. She was able to keep face and carry that mask and not break. Yeah, she didn't manipulate Joffrey like Margaery but I'd argue that wouldn't have worked anyway. Joffrey wanted Sansa to suffer since that day she saw him in his weakness at the Trident. Plus, she was a traitor's daughter to everyone, especially him. She has considerably less cards in her favor than Margaery. But she still manages to survive in an extremely deadly court where she is little more than a hostage who can be killed at any momENT. Which is saying something.

Maybe Cersei understands the political importance of Sansa being alive but Joffrey doesn't and we already know Joffrey did what he liked.

 

I'm less talking about the more men thing (though it's obvious) and more that she warned JOn about how Ramsay was like and in battle, she even understood there was no way Rickon was going to survive, and Jon ignored her advice, did the exact thing Ramsay was hoping for, and his men got slaughtered because of it. I'd argue w/ the KotV she wasn't holding them back or whatnot more that she didn't know if they'd arrive in time but in all honestly I think the scene doesn't make sense as anything other than a ex machina cool scene that D&D wanted.

I guess you're right that she should have listened to Brienne.

With Ramsay vs Roose, hear me out: While they managed to defeat Ramsay in battle, I don't think they would have defeated Roose. Roose has his shit put together. He's a brilliant commander and a seasoned war veteran. He knows how to actually run a keep and lands and it's people and he's a more legitimate source of power than Ramsay is. 

If Jon, Sansa, and their ragtag army had fought Roose then they definitely would have lost. In fact, I bet that most people would not have joined their cause. Ramsay was known to be crazy and obviously many wouldn't want to follow him. Roose was an awful person but at least he wasn't mad like Ramsay was. There was a higher chance of him garnering more loyalty. 

So while Ramsay being Lord of Winterfell/etc. is a dangerous move and gambit, I figure since Sansa was already trying to escape (since she did it next episode) she was putting into place the seeds of who she thinks she can win Winterfell back from. IDK, I may be reading way too much into that, but I do think that there would've been a huge difference in outcome if they fought Roose instead of Ramsay.

[Gertrude]

1 hour ago, DanyDayne said:

I think she's smart. Not as smart as the episode tried to make it look, but smart enough to know how to survive and learn from her mistakes. She's come a long way. 

I agree she's always been smart, just naive. I think the Show hasn't done much to show us Sansa's cleverness and relies on people saying it. Honestly, I think they've been fucking up her character since season 5. Season 4 ended with her in her power dress and ready to debut as Darth Sansa, but they didn't really go anywhere with that and just assumed we'd all be on board. They've turned her into a sullen brat who might be saying the right things, but her attitude is just so thick that people don't want to listen to her. Not a great leadership quality and not exactly wise.

[Lord Davos Seaworth]

It's just poor story-telling. Basically Sansa's arc is clearly supposed to go from being used as a pawn by the major players, to becoming a player herself (i.e. by learning from the very best; Littlefinger, Cersei, etc). Problem is, they ran themselves into a corner with screen-time and resolving all the plots/character arcs, so they started breaking the number one rule of good story-telling by "telling" us what Sansa has become, rather than "showing" us through her actions. At least that's what I think is going on.

[RhaenysBee]

A subtotal of zero. 

Sansa isn’t smart, she never made smart decisions, she never portrayed any conscious strategic thinking. 

The show makes a feeble attempt to make her seem smart by putting incompetent professionals around her (a maester who doesn’t know how long the longest winter lasted) and putting random trivia in her mouth that she has absolutely no realistic reason or basis to know (how to insulate armor). She is also supposed to have “learned” from Cersei because of the total of 20 hours she spent in her company while being a hostage at King’s Landing.

Because, you know, Cersei is “smart” too. She is also a wise, intelligent strong female character who made wise, intelligent strategic decisions that resulted in her rise instead of like sheer luck and nonsensical writing. 

[Gertrude]

59 minutes ago, Lord Davos Seaworth said:

Problem is, they ran themselves into a corner with screen-time and resolving all the plots/character arcs, so they started breaking the number one rule of good story-telling by "telling" us what Sansa has become, rather than "showing" us through her actions. At least that's what I think is going on.

I agree with your main point (poor storytelling), but disagree that they ran out of screen-time for Sansa. She's had plenty to show us how smart she is. The problem is that the writers didn't have a clue how to do it. They could have had her be smarter with Ramsey instead of just trolling him and letting Theon rescue her by chance. They wasted their time with Baelish/Arya/Sansa last season. Baelish wasn't on his A game and apparently Sansa didn't twig onto him until the last minute - drama and gotcha moments are more important to the show than actual character development.

[Dragons 7th Eye]

1 hour ago, Lord Davos Seaworth said:

It's just poor story-telling. Basically Sansa's arc is clearly supposed to go from being used as a pawn by the major players, to becoming a player herself (i.e. by learning from the very best; Littlefinger, Cersei, etc). Problem is, they ran themselves into a corner with screen-time and resolving all the plots/character arcs, so they started breaking the number one rule of good story-telling by "telling" us what Sansa has become, rather than "showing" us through her actions. At least that's what I think is going on.

That's what I think it is, as well. They made the transition in the middle of the series and they should have started to build her then. Instead they just took it for granted that audience would get along with their line of thinking that now she is more.

All the things that are wrong with the show scream to me that the production team realistically and emotionally quit on it several years ago. It will be a monumental regret for them in the coming years when they didn't appreciate the historical thing they had in their hands and instead just wanted to be done with it.

So much more would have been easy to do with more time. Just simple quality dialoque scenes that don't even cost practically anything in this context. Full season more and the eight that we got as full. Perhaps even one more season. It is nonsensical. But it is what it is. One of the greatest shame in popular culture, ever. But the directors got rich and bored and wanted to move on to other things putting this, what will inevitably be their crowning moment, on a cruise control.

[Gertrude]

2 minutes ago, Dragons 7th Eye said:

So much more would have been easy to do with more time. Just simple quality dialoque scenes that don't even cost practically anything in this context. Full season more and the eight that we got as full. Perhaps even one more season. It is nonsensical. But it is what it is. One of the greatest shame in popular culture, ever. But the directors got rich and bored and wanted to move on to other things putting this, what will inevitably be their crowning moment, on a cruise control.

Agreed. I don't know why they didn't hire more writers with all the money they throw at this show. I think it's pretty obvious D&D burned out but still insisted on writing as much as they did and show-running on top of it. They would still have control over the story, but more ideas to toss around would have been a great, great thing.

[Crona]

She isn’t but Sansa isn’t incompetent either. The show is just trying to pander to Sansa, that’s it. They have no other way or idea of how to construct Sansa’s character other than saying she’s smart when in reality it relies on plot induced stupidity by others to make her smart.

[Pandean]

1 minute ago, Crona said:

She isn’t but Sansa isn’t incompetent either. The show is just trying to pander to Sansa, that’s it. They have no other way idea of how to construct Sansa’s character other than saying she’s smart when in reality it relies on plot induced stupidity by others to make her smart.

This show panders to a bunch of characters, tbh.

[Arya Targaryen]

I think Sansa is pretty much capable of being a peace-time Lady of Winterfell or any castle. She was raised as such, she clearly knows the ways things need to be handled. 

Other than that, she knows 3 things (or persons) better than anyone (or mostly anyone): Cersei, Ramsey and Littlefinger.

Littlefinger was in love with her, so he didn't want to do any harm to her, even pretected her in his own ways. She knew very well not to trust him, yet he was able to manipulate her for a long time.

Cersei and Ramsey: she has every reason not to trust them, like, at all, considering what she went through.  So when they march against Ramsey, she knows that Ramsey might play with Jon, and she is correct - but other than that, she doesn't know a thing.

Same with Cersei. She doesn't know her better than, say, Tyrion, but she hates her, distrusts her, and therefore she doesn't believe anyting Cersei says. Right now she is right - but this is pretty narrow-minded. I mean, Cersei really could have had the common sense to realise the danger the Others present. 

Littlefinger and Ramsey are dead. In case Cersei dies too (whoever kills her...)  - what's left of Sansa's knowledge or "cleverness"? Pretty much nothing.  She might do great as a Lady of Anything, but as a ruler? I have my doubts.

[Lord Varys]

In the show Sansa never did do anything smart, did she?

[Cas Stark]

1 minute ago, Lord Varys said:

In the show Sansa never did do anything smart, did she?

The show has a bad habit of having characters do objectively stupid things:  like having a huge, fresh army at your beck and call, and failing to tell anyone about it, while you rant about there not being enough men.....and then, when you finally pull the army out at the last minute, after your brother is dead and thousands of your people are dead, you are rewarded by being called smart.  Or, marrying your family's betrayer for revenge with no plan of actual revenge, and again, being rewarded by the show and called tough and independent.  Jon and Sansa both made a series of horrendous decisions, were basically called stupid losers by their own bannermen, yet still, Jon was rewarded with King in the North, Sansa, with Lady of Winterfell.

[nymeria_2321]

11 hours ago, Rose of Red Lake said:

 

This, and asking "Aragorn's tax policy" questions like how are we gonna feed everyone, plus dragons, who have to be fed more than 20 goats per day. Like omg...that is a lot of food. 

 

Her questions were totally valid to ask, like how to feed the armies and the dragons, but she didn't have to do it in such a bitchy way

[MinscS2]

I don't dislike Show-Sansa, but I dislike that the show now forcefully tries to tell us that Sansa is very smart, possibly the smartest character on the show at this point. (Although that's not saying much, given that the actually smart characters seem to have been drinking dumb-juice for the last couple of seasons.)

Sansa has said and done some smart/clever things on the show, but imo she's done and said far many more stupid things.

The point above is excellent: Asking about potential logistic- and food-related issues and how they should be solved is a smart thing to ask. In fact, I'm glad the show finally brought it up.
On the flip side, barely hiding the contempt behind the question and asking in front of all the lords and ladies of the north, essentially undermining both Jon and Daenerys, is a very dumb thing to do.

If Sansa was truly smart, she'd ask Jon in private - but then we couldn't have Fake-Winterfell-Drama 2.0. 

[Smoke317]

Not a damn thing.  And it pissed me off that the most anticipated reunion in GoT & ASOIAF history (Jon & Arya) had to be shit on by once again placing Sansa on an unearned pedestal as the smartest person Arya has ever met...  Why does everyone have to be dumbed down in order for Sansa to be lifted up?  I’m shocked she didn’t go down to the forges and tell Gendry how to properly forge dragonglass weapons.  Because she’s so fucking smart...  She did have to teach Royce to put leather into the armor because an experienced military commander like him from the “snowy” mountains of the Vale wouldn’t know that right?  Ridiculous. 

[Error-504]

17 hours ago, ummester said:

She was smart enough to realise metal armor gets sticky in freezing conditions, when the stupid fucking armorers, who should have been trained to realise it, didn't. She is smart enough to realise that Cersie is full of shit and that the only reason Jon bent the knee was because he wanted to dip his end in something silver.

So yea, it's not that she is that smart - just that everyone else is supremely dense.

dont most people wear clothing underneath their armor though? How many just slap it on their naked body? Where do they get all the leather? Much easier and more practical to tell the soldiers to grab an extra sweater to wear underneath, don't you think?