When did Daenerys Targaryen become your least favourite character?

[Queen Cersei I]

Q: When did you start hating Danerys?

A: When GRRM abandoned all subtlety, nuance, previous characterization, and character consistency in Danerys character arc in ADWD, in favor of the didactic message woman+ power= unmitigated disaster.

His previously stated goal (to show, through Cersei and Dany, "the two different ways women could rule in medieval times,") can, in my mind, only be interpreted in the following manner:


--Whenever a woman gains absolute power, she, as a matter of course, loses roughly 60 IQ points. (Either going from super competent girl genius to mediocre minded, giggling teenager (Dany) or from slightly above average to drooling moron (Cersei).)

--When the woman in question is a ruler, her sex life is of the utmost importance. Whether she behaves evilly (using sex to bend men to her will) or well (having sex with and dreaming endlessly with a single, weirdly unattractive male whose appeal is about as scanty as his brainpower), her sex life deserves roughly three times the attention of her actual administrative decisions, if not more.

Thus, pages of Dany's obsessing over Daario in a teenybopper fashion and shagging him in an experienced porn star fashion was not pointless filler, the author's opportunity to once again engage in some overheated sexual fantasies, or an incredibly sexist adherence to the idea that what a woman's doing in her bedroom is essential to what sort of human being she is, but totally awesome and necessary character development.

--Women "rulers" are acceptable as figureheads, but must leave the real business of ruling to competent men. The exception to this is when there is an exceptional woman with no apparent female qualities whatsoever (Asha) is born into a land filled with some of the stupidest, craziest, most incompetent men around; then sometimes it might be better for the girl to take power, until the next man comes along to continue the glorious patriarchy.

But-- women have no business making the actual decisions of government. When they do so, for whatever reasons, the result is epic disaster. (Hello Dany! Hello Cersei! Hey there, Arrianne!) If the female in question is evil as well as stupid, she will actually think she, a woman, is capable of ruling like a man and will ignore the advice of the wiser males around her and lead her land to disaster (Cersei.) If she is good but misguided she will see the error in trying to make decisions herself, and submit to her patriarch/ daddy and learn to do everything just like him (Arrianne). And if she is really good, she will hate ruling, have no confidence in her own judgment, suddenly start being wildly less intelligent than her kingsguard advisor, despite the fact that the kingsguard/ advisor is portrayed as of average intelligence previously, and she a brilliant girl, and hope for the day a wiser (read: male advisor) will come along and rescue her, from her own girly incompetence and feminine lack of judgment.

--It is totally consistent characterization and not at all offensive to have a girl who has been effectively sold and deflowered at thirteen delivering lines like the following regarding the sexual assault of helpless sex slaves: “There was no rape. When your owner first lay with her, your wife was his property.”

Honestly, I don’t hate Dany, so much as the ridiculous, inconsistent way the books have taken to characterizing her as of late.

[Jon Flowers]

I think the tedium of ruling a nation is the point. It's all fun and glory when you conquer but the actual day to day governance of the realm is mundane. Robert couldn't handle it. Cersei despised it. Dany at least attempted to give a go at it but in the end the resentments of the people against her is too much. I don't see any other ending for her time in Meereen to end BUT in bloodshed. They will never accept her there because it is not her home. I think she'll finally realize this early on in the next book.

Yes. Martin seem very invested in expressing the tedium of rule and Dany's character is just happens to be his device for this at the moment, causing her popularity to falter a bit. For what it's worth I think he has an excellent point. Ruling a kingdom with no real institutions such as courts would be extremely difficult to do well. Also, I'm glad you got what I was saying since I obviously confused at least one other person (Nik) :).

[Jon Flowers]

Q: When did you start hating Danerys?

A: When GRRM abandoned all subtlety, nuance, previous characterization, and character consistency in Danerys character arc in ADWD, in favor of the didactic message woman+ power= unmitigated disaster.

His previously stated goal (to show, through Cersei and Dany, "the two different ways women could rule in medieval times,") can, in my mind, only be interpreted in the following manner:


--Whenever a woman gains absolute power, she, as a matter of course, loses roughly 60 IQ points. (Either going from super competent girl genius to mediocre minded, giggling teenager (Dany) or from slightly above average to drooling moron (Cersei).)

--When the woman in question is a ruler, her sex life is of the utmost importance. Whether she behaves evilly (using sex to bend men to her will) or well (having sex with and dreaming endlessly with a single, weirdly unattractive male whose appeal is about as scanty as his brainpower), her sex life deserves roughly three times the attention of her actual administrative decisions, if not more.

Thus, pages of Dany's obsessing over Daario in a teenybopper fashion and shagging him in an experienced porn star fashion was not pointless filler, the author's opportunity to once again engage in some overheated sexual fantasies, or an incredibly sexist adherence to the idea that what a woman's doing in her bedroom is essential to what sort of human being she is, but totally awesome and necessary character development.

--Women "rulers" are acceptable as figureheads, but must leave the real business of ruling to competent men. The exception to this is when there is an exceptional woman with no apparent female qualities whatsoever (Asha) is born into a land filled with some of the stupidest, craziest, most incompetent men around; then sometimes it might be better for the girl to take power, until the next man comes along to continue the glorious patriarchy.

But-- women have no business making the actual decisions of government. When they do so, for whatever reasons, the result is epic disaster. (Hello Dany! Hello Cersei! Hey there, Arrianne!) If the female in question is evil as well as stupid, she will actually think she, a woman, is capable of ruling like a man and will ignore the advice of the wiser males around her and lead her land to disaster (Cersei.) If she is good but misguided she will see the error in trying to make decisions herself, and submit to her patriarch/ daddy and learn to do everything just like him (Arrianne). And if she is really good, she will hate ruling, have no confidence in her own judgment, suddenly start being wildly less intelligent than her kingsguard advisor, despite the fact that the kingsguard/ advisor is portrayed as of average intelligence previously, and she a brilliant girl, and hope for the day a wiser (read: male advisor) will come along and rescue her, from her own girly incompetence and feminine lack of judgment.

--It is totally consistent characterization and not at all offensive to have a girl who has been effectively sold and deflowered at thirteen delivering lines like the following regarding the sexual assault of helpless sex slaves: “There was no rape. When your owner first lay with her, your wife was his property.”

-- No fan base can ever have enough virulent, misogynistic hatred aimed at numerous female characters….Oh, wait! That’s what I’ve learned from these message boards! Ha. Never mind that last one, then.

Honestly, I don’t hate Dany, so much as the ridiculous, inconsistent way the books have taken to characterizing her as of late.

I can't speak to the views of anyone else, but I strongly disagree. As I've said, her faltering popularity after gaining power folllows a nearly identical arc to that of Jon Snow. Even though I disagree, I see where you're going with your argument, but I think you're in danger of taking the discussion away from Dany altogether and back to sexual politics which I feel like we've discussed at length already. Just my opinion though. I'm not here to try to marginalize anyone else's.

[Prince of Dragonstone]

First, please be aware that I am a bit biased. I am wholly on the Targaryens' side. I want them to restore their place on the Iron Throne. It is theirs by rights. I do not care if it is Dany or Aegon. I just want them back and I want the Lannisters to die burning and choking on their own blood.

That being said, I think you all have forgotten that she is, what, 17 years old??? For everything that she's accomplished so far, I'd say she's pretty damn phenomenal. My only issue with her is that she needs to trust Barristan more and everyone else a WHOLE lot less. Barristan has always given her good council. I also wish that she would take Jorah back into the fold. Tyrion will also be a great councilor for her as he was very effective and a natural leader in King's Landing when Cersei wasn't mucking up his plans.

Dany cannot rule on her own. No one can, much less a 17 year old girl. She needs to realize that it takes a lot more than dragons to rule. I am rooting for her to succeed and I hope she comes out of this triumphant.

[Maester Nikolas]

@Jon Flowers- Fair enough if you did confuse me- there's several viewpoints of this thread rattling about in my head.

@Queen Cersei I- Wow, I didn't see that coming. Makes sense, but it's hard to tell what is opinion, and what is the world view of the Middle Ages. In any case, ASOIAF is many layered, and I wouldn't jump to conclusions- especially since we don't know all the angles.

@Prince of Dragonstone- I agree. Dany is doing quite well for a seventeen year old- and I'm hoping that she turns out well. The fact that she only turned hormonal at 17 is pretty good- plus her focus of trying to rule wasn't as strong as before, and she's been... distracted, recently. I'm hoping the Yukani fling Daario with a catapult next.

[Sevumar]

Q: When did you start hating Danerys?

A: When GRRM abandoned all subtlety, nuance, previous characterization, and character consistency in Danerys character arc in ADWD, in favor of the didactic message woman+ power= unmitigated disaster.

I don't think this is a very fair criticism. We may well end up with competent women in positions of power. In fact, if you look closely, there are some good signs. It seems to be one possible future for Sansa, for example. Alys Karstark seems clever and capable. Maege Mormont seems to hold her own despite taking a social position normally only open to men. Arianne Martell shows some promise.

Cersei and Dany are undoubtedly the highest-profile women holding power in their own right (or attempting to), but both have fatal flaws. Both characters have been discussed to no end, but since this is a Dany thread, I'll stick with her and make some general statements. The single most formidable obstacle facing women as leaders in Westeros is the level of prejudice and misogyny. Society does not offer most women the chance to prepare for leading a polity at any level. They are often and repeatedly told that they are incapable of ruling and only good as marriage bait, mothers, and accessories for their husbands.

Combine all of that with Dany's youth, inexperience, ignorance, and her gigantic sense of entitlement, and you'd have to expect her to fail fairly often. It doesn't make sense to see Martin's world populated with lots of women in positions of power. It wouldn't be consistent with the societies he's created.

Dany's inconsistence bothers me, but not because it is used as a plot device. To me, she has always seemed an inconsistent character, swinging back and forth between extremes of competence and foolishness. She is capable of making useful insights and clever decisions, but she has made her share of boneheaded, idiotic mistakes. She's often too proud to reexamine her failures and learn from them, instead opting to double-down. Does a person who behaves in this manner seem like one who should succeed? Not in my estimation.

--Whenever a woman gains absolute power, she, as a matter of course, loses roughly 60 IQ points. (Either going from super competent girl genius to mediocre minded, giggling teenager (Dany) or from slightly above average to drooling moron (Cersei).)

There have always been bits of mediocre, giggling teenager in Dany and drooling moron in Cersei. They're right there in the pages of the book. Yes, they become more prominent as we get into AFFC and ADWD, but it's not as though they appeared from nowhere.

--When the woman in question is a ruler, her sex life is of the utmost importance. Whether she behaves evilly (using sex to bend men to her will) or well (having sex with and dreaming endlessly with a single, weirdly unattractive male whose appeal is about as scanty as his brainpower), her sex life deserves roughly three times the attention of her actual administrative decisions, if not more.

There is a problem in the fandom with people wanting to focus on the sex lives of female characters overmuch. But in Westerosi society, the sexual behavior of women is unfairly scrutinized, especially in comparison to men who indulge in the same conduct. To expect this not to play a role in the story would be expecting Martin to be inconsistent in the portrayal of his world. We're meant to be bothered by it when it happens to female characters, and Martin succeeds here.

--Women "rulers" are acceptable as figureheads, but must leave the real business of ruling to competent men. The exception to this is when there is an exceptional woman with no apparent female qualities whatsoever (Asha) is born into a land filled with some of the stupidest, craziest, most incompetent men around; then sometimes it might be better for the girl to take power, until the next man comes along to continue the glorious patriarchy.

I don't expect to see a lot of female rulers in Martin's society, given the rules and attitudes he has shown us with both his male and his female characters. Seeing one rise up and break the expectations of society is a great opportunity for an epic story, but it's unrealistic to expect to see gender equality in Westeros within the scope of ASOIAF.

Martin has shown us that patriarchy is anything but glorious. Throwing away the talents and potential of half of your society has never been a good policy and it's one thing that keeps real nations from developing as quickly and successfully as they otherwise might.

--It is totally consistent characterization and not at all offensive to have a girl who has been effectively sold and deflowered at thirteen delivering lines like the following regarding the sexual assault of helpless sex slaves: “There was no rape. When your owner first lay with her, your wife was his property.”

It seems slightly out of character for Dany, but as difficult as it is to read, it's actually a lot more legally sophisticated than most of her other statements/pronouncements.

[Queen Cersei I]

When she started banging Daario...

Some might not argue that it was not so much the banging itself, as the pointless, ridiculously detailed multiple page long descriptions that accompanied the banging, that was the issue.

I actually liked her quite a bit in Game of Thrones and tolerated her kind of boring storyline in Clash of Kings. In Storm of Swords, I remember being skeptical at how easy she was having it and thinking that what she did in Astapor was pretty low and could come back to bite her later.

I think that was purposeful. Previously, I thought that (based on her good judgment and self possession in earlier novels, that seemed evident despite the ridiculous supernatural help and dragons ex machina she was always treated to, unlike any other character in these novels) Dany was competent and had potential, despite the luck and supernatural assistance that was often so ubiquitously present in her storyline. In the past, I (and A LOT of other people) detected a strain of misogyny in the widespread complaints that Dany is actually very very stupid, only succeeds due to her dragons, etc. While I didn't think this was necessarily always indicative of misogyny, I did believe that Dany was being put forth as a genuinely competent and intelligent female ruler.

But then came along ADWD. Oyvey. Now I could say without reservation that it appears to be very much GRRM's intended message that no, Dany is not al that smart, and has merely succeeded through a winning combination of luck and dragons. Or, he is far, far to cunning to actually more or less state that outright himself, but I think with his latest venture he has made it so that readers can easily say Dany is stupid and has only succeeded due to her dragons and will not really have much textually based evidence to go against them.

GRRM shows Dany as a stupid, incompetent female. In the past, I've complained that there are no females to compete with the likes of the brilliant males-- Tywin, Tyrion, LF, Varys, etc. Dany has been put forth as a counterpoint. Rather than disproving this point, however, I think she proves it. The only really smart females are extremely minor characters who appear to have no desire to rule in their own right. (The queen of thorns and margary Tyrell are the only two I can think of, both of whom kind of make a point of not ostentatiously putting themselves forward and ruling as dumb Cersei and others do.)

As for the argument, "it was her age," simply look at Robb Stark. Or Jon Snow, almost the exact same age, managing to rule so brilliantly in contrast to Dany.

I suspect what is going to be done is showing Tyrion finding Dany, and Dany learning to put all power in Tyrion's hands and becoming a much better person as a result. Ugh.

I actually liked her quite a bit in Game of Thrones and tolerated her kind of boring storyline in Clash of Kings. In Storm of Swords, I remember being skeptical at how easy she was having it and thinking that what she did in Astapor was pretty low and could come back to bite her later. And after Dance of Dragons and all of the cruel and/or idiotic decisions she made, I wouldn't shed a tear if Drogon ate her.

Everyone else has pretty much said whatever I would have: She has no idea who it was she actually crucified (she later marries Hizdahr; wonder how much he knew about the crucified slave children?), she tortures people for information systematically, she's indecisive at the worst times, she's entitled and immature, she can't take good advice, she has blinders on when it comes to her family, on and on and on. Her city is starving and the Astapori are starving and yet she always seems to have plenty of lamb and fruit and whatever else she eats. "

Do you hate Tyrion though, too? Because he too feasted on rich fare as the city starved. As Tyrion says (and as GRRM seems to agree upon, or at least when its his much glamorized little avatar in question, rather than some stupid girl), there is no reason why he should starve. Pycelle says he likes to keep a simple table during a famine, Tyrion says he likes to eat all he can since he has food.

Many of the morally bad things Dany does Tyrion is guilty of doing as well, he is just not made to look bad for it as she is.

[Maester Nikolas]

@Sevumar- Her sense of entitlement certainly wasn't helped by her brother. She was told her whole life "You've been taken away from what is rightfully yours, we will give it back to you- in the meantime, take what is ours" especially by Illyrio for some reason I can't yet fathom. On top of it, her brother was spouting all his "Targaryens are gods" nonsense, along with all his garbage about 'Blood of the Dragon' and such. In fact, I'm surprised we haven't seen residue of Viserys' influence already- that it's been held off until she tried to rule might be telling. But her time with Drogon out in the middle of nowhere seems to be helping [issolation, dehydration, and malnutrition issues aside- which probably led to her hallucinations towards the end of the chapter] her get back on track. Also, is it just me who see it as ironic that Viserion is the gentlest, friendliest, and the sweetest of Dany's dragons is named after her brutal brother.

@Queen Cersei I- Sorry to disrupt you here, I mean, everyone is justified to an opinion, but as Jon Flowers has already said it is derailing the topic slightly. Plus I don't want to get caught in a potentially angry debate about GRRM's treatment of women.

[Evritt Doots]

First, please be aware that I am a bit biased. I am wholly on the Targaryens' side. I want them to restore their place on the Iron Throne. It is theirs by rights. I do not care if it is Dany or Aegon. I just want them back and I want the Lannisters to die burning and choking on their own blood.

That being said, I think you all have forgotten that she is, what, 17 years old??? For everything that she's accomplished so far, I'd say she's pretty damn phenomenal. My only issue with her is that she needs to trust Barristan more and everyone else a WHOLE lot less. Barristan has always given her good council. I also wish that she would take Jorah back into the fold. Tyrion will also be a great councilor for her as he was very effective and a natural leader in King's Landing when Cersei wasn't mucking up his plans.

Dany cannot rule on her own. No one can, much less a 17 year old girl. She needs to realize that it takes a lot more than dragons to rule. I am rooting for her to succeed and I hope she comes out of this triumphant.

Yes, but why was she more intelligent @ 14 than she is @ 17?

To me, her brain power began to diminish right before/after the Mirri Maz incident with Drogo (who was awesome- would've loved to see him smash Ser Gregor- which I feel he could have done easily), when she stopped listening to the wisdome offered by others, and just decided that, since she is "the blood of the dragon", she can pretty much do whatever the Hell she wants.

And the thing with the crucified slavers- that was one of the few things that she has done that I liked. Come one, seriously- no one can think that these people were in any way innocent. Martin has shown us so far that characters in Westeros may be complex and of a more gray nature than either black or white, but in Essos, anyone who is not a Dothraki or ex-patriate Westerosi is totally evil.

But mostly, Dany is boring. I'm re-reading these books now (listening- I read the first time through), and I skip all of Dany's chapters after GOT. There's simply nothing there.

[Silmarien]

Q: When did you start hating Danerys?

A: When GRRM abandoned all subtlety, nuance, previous characterization, and character consistency in Danerys character arc in ADWD, in favor of the didactic message woman+ power= unmitigated disaster.

His previously stated goal (to show, through Cersei and Dany, "the two different ways women could rule in medieval times,") can, in my mind, only be interpreted in the following manner:


--Whenever a woman gains absolute power, she, as a matter of course, loses roughly 60 IQ points. (Either going from super competent girl genius to mediocre minded, giggling teenager (Dany) or from slightly above average to drooling moron (Cersei).)

--When the woman in question is a ruler, her sex life is of the utmost importance. Whether she behaves evilly (using sex to bend men to her will) or well (having sex with and dreaming endlessly with a single, weirdly unattractive male whose appeal is about as scanty as his brainpower), her sex life deserves roughly three times the attention of her actual administrative decisions, if not more.

Thus, pages of Dany's obsessing over Daario in a teenybopper fashion and shagging him in an experienced porn star fashion was not pointless filler, the author's opportunity to once again engage in some overheated sexual fantasies, or an incredibly sexist adherence to the idea that what a woman's doing in her bedroom is essential to what sort of human being she is, but totally awesome and necessary character development.

--Women "rulers" are acceptable as figureheads, but must leave the real business of ruling to competent men. The exception to this is when there is an exceptional woman with no apparent female qualities whatsoever (Asha) is born into a land filled with some of the stupidest, craziest, most incompetent men around; then sometimes it might be better for the girl to take power, until the next man comes along to continue the glorious patriarchy.

But-- women have no business making the actual decisions of government. When they do so, for whatever reasons, the result is epic disaster. (Hello Dany! Hello Cersei! Hey there, Arrianne!) If the female in question is evil as well as stupid, she will actually think she, a woman, is capable of ruling like a man and will ignore the advice of the wiser males around her and lead her land to disaster (Cersei.) If she is good but misguided she will see the error in trying to make decisions herself, and submit to her patriarch/ daddy and learn to do everything just like him (Arrianne). And if she is really good, she will hate ruling, have no confidence in her own judgment, suddenly start being wildly less intelligent than her kingsguard advisor, despite the fact that the kingsguard/ advisor is portrayed as of average intelligence previously, and she a brilliant girl, and hope for the day a wiser (read: male advisor) will come along and rescue her, from her own girly incompetence and feminine lack of judgment.

--It is totally consistent characterization and not at all offensive to have a girl who has been effectively sold and deflowered at thirteen delivering lines like the following regarding the sexual assault of helpless sex slaves: “There was no rape. When your owner first lay with her, your wife was his property.”

Honestly, I don’t hate Dany, so much as the ridiculous, inconsistent way the books have taken to characterizing her as of late.

Oh dear....I hate to disagree, but....I don't think Dany is portrayed as incompetent in Mereen.

She has never become my least favorite character. Daenerys is still my number 1 favorite. And I like Cersei too (she did happen to come into power right after losing her firstborn son and her father, so.....her becoming a bit unstable is understandable).

[Maester Nikolas]

Yay! Another Dany fan! I was hoping that it wouldn't be me and one or two others against the might or the rest of the thread.

[Sevumar]

GRRM shows Dany as a stupid, incompetent female. In the past, I've complained that there are no females to compete with the likes of the brilliant males-- Tywin, Tyrion, LF, Varys, etc. Dany has been put forth as a counterpoint. Rather than disproving this point, however, I think she proves it. The only really smart females are extremely minor characters who appear to have no desire to rule in their own right. (The queen of thorns and margary Tyrell are the only two I can think of, both of whom kind of make a point of not ostentatiously putting themselves foward and ruling as dumb Cersei and others do.)

As for the argument, "it was her age," simply look at Robb Stark. Or Jon Snow, almost the exact same age, managing to rule so brilliantly in contrast to Dany.

ASOIAF is full of illustrations that teens are not well-equipped to lead large organizations, cities, or countries and that following someone simply because they come from the "right" bloodline is a recipe for warfare and disaster.

The other part of the lesson is that rulers can't do it alone. This one is particularly important to Dany as the story goes on. Any individual leader might be a good general, a scholar, a thoughtful legal mind, or one of many other things, but s/he needs advisers and vassals to cover weaknesses. In Westeros, the Hand of the King, maesters, and the Small Council provide some institutional support for the monarch, and it's important to remember that Dany never had access to any of these resources. For a long time, her only counsel came from a broken down exile knight, her bloodriders, Barristan, and a host of people who were trying to take advantage of her.

Robb was a decent military commander, but in his political decisions, he relied heavily on advisers and other resources to keep him afloat when he was in over his head. In the end, even that didn't work. His mistakes have been well-covered in other threads, but he was far from a skilled leader. Quentyn makes a wealth of mistakes because of his ignorance, age, and sheltered upbringing. Jon is a more complicated case and I won't go into it here.

I do think that age is a big factor and one that you're unfairly writing off.

I suspect what is going to be done is showing Tyrion finding Dany, and Dany learning to put all power in Tyrion's hands and becoming a much better person as a result. Ugh.

I think we might end up seeing the opposite. Tyrion's out of options and Dany might just be the only person in the world to call him on his bullshit. He does have a lot of knowledge that she can use, and desperate rulers are often forced to make the best of a substandard set of resources. That's long been one of Dany's themes.

[Jon Flowers]

@Jon Flowers- Fair enough if you did confuse me- there's several viewpoints of this thread rattling about in my head.

I think you confused me a bit as well. I wasn't sure if you were refering to any or all of my post and so wasn't sure how to respond. Anyway, to clarify, I'm drawing a parallel between Robert's difficulty transitioning from warrior to ruler with Dany's, not saying they have anything else in common. And the Jon comparison addresses both of their popularity archs, going from favored characters to characters that are disliked by many. And as I said, I think this has more to do with Martin's themes regarding the weight of rule than with either character's personality or even actions. Looking back, I might have better edited my post, to be more clear about all of that. I wasn't trying to be a smartass btw :). Thanks for your patience.

[Ororo727 Jon Snow Fangirl]

It hasn't happened.

[Maester Nikolas]

@Sevumar- Yes! Dany needs a court- she's been trying to rule by herself, thinking that's what a good ruler should do, and no one is trying to contradict her. Barristan, I think, is avoiding commentary because he is I) A knight, not a politician II) Too loyal to the Crown to comment III) Avoiding a comment that could lead into a discussion about her family before she's ready to hear it.

@Jon Flowers- No worries, the responses are breeding like rabbits here, notice how I'm starting to address my response on purpose now? Why are we all so quick to give our opinion on this topic? And I agree with you completely. Can't wait for her to get back from her 'Retreat with a Dragon' and get back to being her calm, collected, and clever self.

@Ororo727 Jon Snow Fangirl- Yes! Stand with me and the other Dany fans- we shall hold back the tide of people angry with the dull plot of ADWD and the morally obscure choices of Essos.

[Lady Octarina]

I recently got to the conclusion that I never really liked her; I only enjoyed her chapters while Viserys and Ser Jorah were around. Until they weren't anymore.

I began to dislike her when she set off on her own journey and I began to see just how dull she was, in the way she described things and talked in that pseudo-poetic megalomaniac way. And then I began to hate her somewhere during the Slavers' Bay saga, when I realized she was as mad as her daddy, but much more dangerous. And then my hatred was doubled when we saw, in ADwD, that not only was she a mad queen that everyone seems to worship unfairly, she was also an incompetent ruler, undeserving of any love from the fandom, and yet gaining it more than any other character.

[Sevumar]

@Sevumar- Her sense of entitlement certainly wasn't helped by her brother. She was told her whole life "You've been taken away from what is rightfully yours, we will give it back to you- in the meantime, take what is ours" especially by Illyrio for some reason I can't yet fathom. On top of it, her brother was spouting all his "Targaryens are gods" nonsense, along with all his garbage about 'Blood of the Dragon' and such.

I have a lot of sympathy for Dany's treatment at the hands of her brother. He abused her in just about every way possible: physically, sexually, and emotionally. On top of that, he was her only real source of information and lore about her family and its legacy. Of course she's going to be crippled by that kind of upbringing. What continues to surprise me, though, is that she's shown us she has a talent for adapting to new circumstances and making the best of them, but it seems to have disappeared sometime during ASoS.

She's had numerous opportunities to learn from her mistakes, use the resources she has secured for herself (Barristan's knowledge, for instance), and reflect on some of the lies she once believed, but she hasn't done much of it. That's probably the single most frustrating thing about her. She can be amazingly resourceful when she discards her sense of entitlement and reins in her temper, but that aspect of her personality was largely dormant in ADWD.

In fact, I'm surprised we haven't seen residue of Viserys' influence already- that it's been held off until she tried to rule might be telling. But her time with Drogon out in the middle of nowhere seems to be helping [issolation, dehydration, and malnutrition issues aside- which probably led to her hallucinations towards the end of the chapter] her get back on track.

I think we have seen evidence of his influence, primarily in her temper and how she deals with her anger. "Waking the dragon" has become a catchphrase for her whenever she feels the need to exact vengeance on someone for angering or annoying her. It's important that even in her desperate situation, she still realizes the mistakes Viserys made, and she has largely stopped making excuses for him. I disagree that she seems to be on the right track at the end of ADWD, because I don't think she's drawn the right lesson from her experience in Meereen.

Also, is it just me who see it as ironic that Viserion is the gentlest, friendliest, and the sweetest of Dany's dragons is named after her brutal brother.

That's a really good point and it just makes me wonder even more who will end up as his rider.

[Maester Nikolas]

Hmm... and there's the backlash to my exuberance *Sigh* I knew it was coming. I won't even bother prying into the 'insanity' angle here, I'll just get lost, confused, and probably caught between a lot of angry posters who've been at this longer than I am.

@Sevumar- Thanks for the reply. Now that I think of it, it is showing in her temper and how she deals with anger. The 'Dragon retreat' could go both ways, and frankly I hope it ends up with a good result. But who knows- living with a dragon for a month or so could do some crazy things- time will tell. Also, check out the thread 'GRRM in Toronto'- someone just got back and told us what he said. There's hints towards Victarion and possibly Dany's storyline. Yay!

[gilby]

Just the sheer weight of high scrabble value names in her chapters

[Maester Nikolas]

Why do the people in the East have such long names? It makes conversations so awkward. Plus I can never remember the names.