Daenerys the Cheater

[Castel]

But yes, Mary Sue isn't a term to be casually thrown around. Mostly because it was originally devised as a descriptor of fanfiction characters, and as such runs with several issues when one attempts to apply it to established characters from a piece of fiction, even when they "fit the bill" in a number of aspects.

Yes, poor Patrick Rothfuss has been dealing with people who have no idea what the term means since he first got published.

[1234567]

To the OP: You could make a similar list for any character currently alive.

:agree:

If you class Dany, Jon, Tyrion and Arya as the main characters then they have all had exceptionally lucky breaks and things handed to them and repeatedly survived several near fatal situations.

Jon:

1. If R+L=J then Ned (not the brightest bulb in the box) has managed for 14 years to hide any details of how his sister died, hide from Varys and LF etc the origins of Jon's birth.

2. Jon gets out of fighting with Robb by joining the Black Watch that has convenient vows which don't let him fight and retain his honour.

3. He gets given one of the rarest and most prize possessions in Westeros, a valyrian sword.

4. Gets the wildlings to not only be convinced that he has changed sides, but also hears their plans, meets their leader etc.

5. Escapes wildlings due to the miraculous intervention of Summer.

6. Saved from being killed by Mance due to the timely appearance of Stannis.

7. Gets made Lord Commander

8. Gets to cut off the head of the man who set up his father

Tyrion:

1. Doesn't get killed at birth. (Even more of a miracle if Tywin actually thought he was Aerys son and not his.)

2. Taken hostage in the Eyrie, but manages to convince a sellsword to change sides.

3. Convinces the murderous mountain clans to follow him all the way to his father's camp. (these are the same clans who attacked first and asked questions later on his previous encounter with them).

4. Not dying at the Battle of the Green Ford despite having poor fitting armour and never having been in battle before.

5. Becomes a power house fighter during the battle of Black Water.

6. Surviving Mandon Moore's attack / assassination attempt.

7. Escapes King's Landing after his trial due to Jaime and Varys.

8. Doesn't get greyscale despite contact from one of the stone men and ingesting river water.

9. Being saved from the river.

10. Escapes being killed by Penny.

11. Escapes slavery.

12. Despite having no funds, convinces the Second Sons to work for him on the promise of money he doesn't have when the other option for Ben Brown Plumm was taking him to Cersei for a guaranteed Lordship.

Arya:

1. Happens to find a secret way out the Red Keep which she is later able to utilize.

2. Sword training from the ex-first sword of Braavos

3. Has the first ex-sword of Braavos detect that something is off with a member of the KG asking for Arya.

4. Found by Yoren (who circumvents his vow to the night's watch and gets her out of the city.

5. Escapes Amery Lorch

6. Doesn't get killed by the Tickler or Gregor Clegane

7. Meets a magical assassin who helps her take over the castle to her brother's forces.

8. Luckily doesn't reveal herself to her brother's forces (who turnout to be disloyal)

9. Escapes Harrenhal

10. Gets found by the BWB

11. Gets saved at the Twins by Sandor

12. Happens to find a ship to Braavos and uses a special coin for passage.

13. Gets taken care of and assassin training in Braavos

[MyDogIsNamedDanerys]

I think what the OP was getting at was that Dany's "lucky breaks" or "cheats" are just so fantastically beyond anyone else's, it's not even fair. Tyrion's breaks were believable. The worst of his situations happened to have a greedy sob (who isn't in this series?) right there to take a Lannister up on his debts.

As for the Meta stuff, that affects the likability of the character. It may not be her fault, but it's not bizarre to think people's perception of a character are changed by the events they experience. Every chapter I see that starts with her name, I think, "oh god, what amazing things are going to happen for her this time just at the end of some impossible situation." The coincidences that go her way are not realistic for me. That's my opinion, so whatever. Others have their own.

What this sounds like to me is you already assume she's going to get lucky, so any situation where she comes out ok you are going to call plot armor. With Tyrion, you like him and give him the benefit of the doubt, and go with it. There is literally nothing other than your preconceived notions at play here.

Plot armor is a lazy ass reason to hate someone. Littlefinger has the thickest plot armor in existence, but I don't hate him for that. I hate him because he's evil, sick, bastard who needs to pay for what he's done. Word up if you hate Dany for specific things she has done or are (there are plenty - torture, crucifixion, pride, arrogance, violence, fear of her insanity).

In the end, it just feels like a waste to have her ever reach her goal of sitting the Iron Throne. She doesn't deserve it anymore than the next person fighting for it, and I much rather see anyone of the other characters that I have invested more time reading about and getting to know than her.

Wait so the reason you don't want her on the throne is because she doesn't have enough pages written about her so you don't know her well enough? Now I'm just confused what you are trying to say. Just come out and say I don't like her and therefore don't want her to win. It's not that hard.

I am glad we agree that she deserves to win as much as anyone else, or at least no less.

That's my opinion, it seems I've finally found others that hate her as much as I do, that's cool. Either way, the series is still enjoyable.

I don't really see the point in hating characters for meta reasons, in fact I think that this is an excuse. 99% of the time people don't want to say I JUST DONT LIKE HER LEAVE ME ALONE. And then I will!

[reek it rhymes with meek]

I agree with everything the blue onion said. ok

[Corm]

<snip>

Firstly I'd like to say that I purely dislike Dany as a person, how lucky she is doesn't really bother me. That said, I feel I must argue points which I don't think make sense.

The OP came up with 35 points just with Dany, you managed 33 with 3 separate characters (I suppose you might not have listed all of them but I had to say it).

A lot of the points that you made are not the same as what the OP stated. He talked about things that were directly handed to Dany through absolutely no work of her own but pure luck. You've even mentioned rewards that these other characters had to suffer for. Some of the points he made I don't agree with, some of the points you've made I don't agree with. But, having time and given context you should have really supplied direct parallels to what he claimed he was saying instead of situations that go right for other characters.

I've found that there are people on both sides of whether they like Dany or not who will condemn/defend anything she does or is associated with her simply because they like/dislike her, then they post about how biased everyone on the other side is. In the end these arguments resolve nothing but just make people angrier due to those they do not agree with as I myself can attest to. You can't convince someone who won't listen to reason so there's no point trying. It always starts off as a nice discussion but ends up with people getting offended. A week and there'll be something similar up.

[themockingbird]

To Mydogis... I don't like her; I thought I had said that in a previous quote. I was just trying to explain what I think the OP meant when he said "chea, etc."

I gave a few reasons for why I don't like the writing of her character from a literary standpoint. As a "person," I don't like many of choices she's made or the arrogance she carries herself with, and a ton of other reasons that I honestly don't care to list because they've all been said over and over (and well, I think there are enough lists in this topic. So, to quote you, "I just don't like her." :D That's why I came to this thread -- to find others who hate her as well.

Anyway, I absolutely think Littlefinger and characters like him are despicable, but they are a hell of a lot more fun to read about, for me.

[CurP]

:agree:

If you class Dany, Jon, Tyrion and Arya as the main characters then they have all had exceptionally lucky breaks and things handed to them and repeatedly survived several near fatal situations.

Jon:

1. If R+L=J then Ned (not the brightest bulb in the box) has managed for 14 years to hide any details of how his sister died, hide from Varys and LF etc the origins of Jon's birth.

2. Jon gets out of fighting with Robb by joining the Black Watch that has convenient vows which don't let him fight and retain his honour.

3. He gets given one of the rarest and most prize possessions in Westeros, a valyrian sword.

4. Gets the wildlings to not only be convinced that he has changed sides, but also hears their plans, meets their leader etc.

5. Escapes wildlings due to the miraculous intervention of Summer.

6. Saved from being killed by Mance due to the timely appearance of Stannis.

7. Gets made Lord Commander

8. Gets to cut off the head of the man who set up his father

Tyrion:

1. Doesn't get killed at birth. (Even more of a miracle if Tywin actually thought he was Aerys son and not his.)

2. Taken hostage in the Eyrie, but manages to convince a sellsword to change sides.

3. Convinces the murderous mountain clans to follow him all the way to his father's camp. (these are the same clans who attacked first and asked questions later on his previous encounter with them).

4. Not dying at the Battle of the Green Ford despite having poor fitting armour and never having been in battle before.

5. Becomes a power house fighter during the battle of Black Water.

6. Surviving Mandon Moore's attack / assassination attempt.

7. Escapes King's Landing after his trial due to Jaime and Varys.

8. Doesn't get greyscale despite contact from one of the stone men and ingesting river water.

9. Being saved from the river.

10. Escapes being killed by Penny.

11. Escapes slavery.

12. Despite having no funds, convinces the Second Sons to work for him on the promise of money he doesn't have when the other option for Ben Brown Plumm was taking him to Cersei for a guaranteed Lordship.

Arya:

1. Happens to find a secret way out the Red Keep which she is later able to utilize.

2. Sword training from the ex-first sword of Braavos

3. Has the first ex-sword of Braavos detect that something is off with a member of the KG asking for Arya.

4. Found by Yoren (who circumvents his vow to the night's watch and gets her out of the city.

5. Escapes Amery Lorch

6. Doesn't get killed by the Tickler or Gregor Clegane

7. Meets a magical assassin who helps her take over the castle to her brother's forces.

8. Luckily doesn't reveal herself to her brother's forces (who turnout to be disloyal)

9. Escapes Harrenhal

10. Gets found by the BWB

11. Gets saved at the Twins by Sandor

12. Happens to find a ship to Braavos and uses a special coin for passage.

13. Gets taken care of and assassin training in Braavos

I do not really agree on many reasons you listed for Arya for example... like escape from Harrenhal... she did it herself. It was not given to her. She did not even really need help of Gendry/HotPie... she took them because she wanted them. Like many many other things Arya achieved she did it herself... (even if she used Jaqen's help to free northerners, but we know she would try to do that regardless :) )

Danny, was getting a trump card after a trump card and all Danny had to do is just point where these cards should be used. Asides from SEX and passing of some judgements at Meeren she did not really do that much... oh yeah, and saying Dracarys to solve problems.

[1234567]

The OP came up with 35 points just with Dany, you managed 33 with 3 separate characters (I suppose you might not have listed all of them but I had to say it).

To be honest the response was typed up in 5 minutes off the top of my head. It wasn't done as a debating defense but just a quick illustration of the fact that all the main characters have ridiculously lucky breaks. It just seems like most of the reasons people hate Dany in regards to lucky breaks could equally be applied to Jon, Arya and Tyrion etc.

A lot of the points that you made are not the same as what the OP stated. He talked about things that were directly handed to Dany through absolutely no work of her own but pure luck. You've even mentioned things that these other characters had to suffer for. Some of the things he said I don't agree with, same with some of the things you said. But, having time and given context you should have really supplied direct parallels to what he claimed he was saying instead of things that go right for other characters.

I see some of the things the OP states as given to Dany without her working or suffering for them as her having worked for them and suffered for them. Some points the OP mentions I would agree are areas where she got very lucky, just like the characters mentioned above. I'm not sure you can have direct parallels as the characters get lucky breaks in different ways, but there's a quick run through of my take on the OP points below. Just my view on them anyway. Of the OP points, I think about 7 or so I would count as very plot armour lucky or unrealistic.

OP Points

1) Yep her wedding night was a lucky break.....the nights afterwards weren't.

2) He was her husband and she worked at being a wife he desired over several months. A lot of work on her part and a lot of it being not much fun.

3) She has spent her life as an exile living in various different parts of Essos. She has previously learnt to adapt quickly to new situations. The dream about the dragons helps her find the strength to adapt to Dothraki life. Again IMO, something she worked at.

4) Given the fact the baby dies, this seems a moot point.

5)The first part of the OP sentence explained the last part: in fact given his character it was more of a miracle Viserys lived so long.

6)Wasn't a lot of this orchastrated by Varys. He needed her to be threatened/killed at the right time to get the Dothraki for Aegon.

7) Yep Jorah's intervention was lucky. The chaos in Westeros explains the lack of other assassins.

8)Her child and husband die and she kind of knows she is partly responsible for making a wrong decision. I find it amazing the "meh" attitude a lot of posters have to a woman having her husband and baby die and told she now can never have another child (although like Jon's "death" I doubt that it true).

9)GRRM said the immune to fire was a one off event. Also she didn't know for certain the eggs would hatch and she would be unharmed. It's a pretty brave move walking into a pyre on a hunch. She gambled her life and it paid off.

10)Yep a lucky break and a good example of plot armour to the rescue.

11)Ditto.

12) Given her curiosity value and the dragons and her heritage, that part seemed realistic.

13)The visions haven't helped her. In fact prophecy seems to bite everyone on the ass who even tries to interpret it.

14)Well she had taken the dragon in for protection.

15)The guys were there to protect her. That's what bodyguards do.

16) Yep, plot armour strikes again.

17) It makes sense that Illyrio would try to get her and the dragons back to Pentos. The fastest way is by ship.

18) I can't remember it being mentioned anywhere that it is a common occurence from that close a distance. She is much nearer Slavers Bay than Victarion was, Volantes is etc.

19)Didn't Jorah advise her on where to go? He would know where to buys the best warriors.

20)The way she bought the Unsullied seemed perfectly legit. She had all the city could offer, why would the slavers assume she would sack it. Even the Dothraki don't sack the cities. She played the Grand masters there and it was a good move on her part.

21)I thought it was Barristan etc who did the actual tactical stuff. I must re-read that part again.

22)Prophecy and ass biting.

23)Won through finding a break in the defense of the city walls. Seems logical. Worked for the Orcs at Helm's Deep (in the film version).

24)Again Bodyguard: it's their job.

25)I'm not so sure how good a friend Quaithe is....but Dany maybe no better at working out what she is saying than Mel can work out what she sees in the flames.

26) It's what Viserys told her. It is not necessarily true as a wave of Targs died because of a plague in the past. Although this could also be a future plot point for Tyrion proving he's a Targ because he didn't get greyscale.

27)Yep, lucky.

28)Don't agree with this one. Also no example cited.

29)The same westerosi who left her brother and her to wander in poverty and fear for years, only showing up after they find out about the dragons. Also Dorne hadn't entered the war of the five kings so weren't distracted.

30)Disagree. IMO she'll get to Westeros to find Aegon is already King.

31)Yep, good plot armour.

32)No dragon horns or spells seem to have been used by the previous Targ kings and queens in Westeros either. Quentyn was having some sucess until he was toasted.

33)It is a fantasy novel. There have been prophecies since the being of the series. It would be odd if they aren't connected to the main characters.

34)She's been captured by the Dothraki= not respite. Her advisors save the city and themselves. This makes sense.

35)Victarion is very lucky plot armour.

[1234567]

I do not really agree on many reasons you listed for Arya for example... like escape from Harrenhal... she did it herself. It was not given to her.

There were several lucky things that happened to her during the escape: the stable boy believing her in regards to the horses, managing to slit a guard's throat without drawing any attention etc. I wasn't trying to say that Arya didn't find a way out herself, but that she was ridiculously lucky in managing to escape in the first place and then not being pursued.

While Arya is more active in what she does, I would disagree that she does everything by herself. She has a hell of a lot of back up and support and gets lucky with who she interacts with. Her plot armour may not be as thick as other characters, but she still has a number of very lucky breaks and survives some seemingly implausible situations.

[Corm]

<snip>

That makes more sense to me. My conclusion is that, while other people have had lucky breaks, Dany does get more, more easily. But that shouldn't affect whether I like a particular character or not and it doesn't.

I see some of the things the OP states as given to Dany without her working or suffering for them as her having worked for them and suffered for them. Some points the OP mentions I would agree are areas where she got very lucky, just like the characters mentioned above. I'm not sure you can have direct parallels as the characters get lucky breaks in different ways, but there's a quick run through of my take on the OP points below. Just my view on them anyway. Of the OP points, I think about 7 or so I would count as very plot armour lucky or unrealistic.

I should clarify, I meant that it would have been better to list cases of ass-pull situations (as happen to Dany quite often) instead of situations where there was simply a positive outcome for a character.

[Ivy Snow]

I used to LOVE Dany. Especially with the first and second book. My fondness for her started to dwindle in book 3. I don't like Dany that much anymore but it isn't because she always get lucky breaks. It's mostly because of her attitude. She's just a nicer version of Viserys. They're both so full of themselves but hey, that's just what I get from her POV. Her story arc also started to bore me.

I'm not a sexist as well. I love female characters in this book, all of 'em, but Dany is at the bottom of my list.

[BabyMeraxes]

If these are the people you consider Mary Sues then you have a fundamental misunderstanding of what the term means.

You know, maybe I don't (I'm pretty sure I do), but I couldn't give two shits. Anyone who uses the phrase Mary Sue should feel shamed publicly, and should probably just hop back onto the Harry/Hermione ship they rode in on, and set sail for oblivion.

[Castel]

You know, maybe I don't (I'm pretty sure I do), but I couldn't give two shits. Anyone who uses the phrase Mary Sue should feel shamed publicly, and should probably just hop back onto the Harry/Hermione ship they rode in on, and set sail for oblivion.

Why? Because they may or may not read fanfiction? What is wrong with fanfiction? Sure Martin doesn't want it but there are plenty of authors that are fine with it.

I'm sorry but your post smacks of the same arrogant, elitism that people have when they talk about fantasy and how it's for children or it's boy fiction or how silly it is.

[teemo]

I think describing her as a Mary Sue is somewhat insulting to GRRM...now if she seriously turns out to have a smooth ride to Westeros and easily sits upon the Iron Throne and lives happily ever with Jon or something, I may change my mind, even though I hate that term. I think Dany has plenty of hardships ahead of her and may even turn out mad like her father. I wouldn't call her a cheater quite yet, because I think it's not unlikely that she'll die.

[Kittyhat]

I do not really agree on many reasons you listed for Arya for example... like escape from Harrenhal... she did it herself.

Most of what Arya did in Harrenhal was only possible because the plot handed her Jaqen H'gar. Also, much as I love Arya, a little girl actually successfully catching a full-grown, trained guardsman flat-footed enough to manage to slit his throat while he's awake and standing up is a pretty big stretch, enough to arguably smack of plot armor as well.

If you take away all of the various gimmes handed to Arya, she never even makes it out of King's Landing.

[MyDogIsNamedDanerys]

Why? Because they may or may not read fanfiction? What is wrong with fanfiction? Sure Martin doesn't want it but there are plenty of authors that are fine with it.

I'm sorry but your post smacks of the same arrogant, elitism that people have when they talk about fantasy and how it's for children or it's boy fiction or how silly it is.

I don't think you get what s/he is saying at all.

The term Mary Sue is used as a lazy way to undermine characters when no actual criticism can be managed by the attacker. In hp fandom, Ginny was regularly called a Mary sue, because Harry/hermione fans hated her for basically no reason other than that she was Harry's love interest.

The term is even sillier in Danys case since she's not flawless at all and makes many mistakes and dubiously moral descisions for which she suffers - especially in adwd.

[BigBucket]

Why not? They were trained to unquestioning obedience, and they had no cause to love their former masters. Many throughout history have been undone by not thinking through all of the implications, particularly when faced with another who decides to think outside the box.

Sorry if this has been addressed already but I can't be arsed to wade through all the posts that add nothing to the discussion at hand.

This is the point I was making. You brainwash slaves and train them into soldiers with unquestioning obedience for the purpose of selling them to your neighbours. You wouldn't do that without a fail-safe. I'm thinking of it in terms of the 'Three Laws of Robotics'. Something along the line of.. The first rule of the Unsullied - You will not take action or allow your comrades to take action that directly harms the city of Astapor. The second rule of the Unsullied -You will obey, without question, the orders of the owner of your contract, unless said orders would conflict with the first rule. Whether that would be technically possible would be something for the psychologists to discuss I guess but, hopefully, you get what I mean.

"As soon as the contract is completed those Unsullied will be unquestioningly obedient to me. If I tell them to kill the Slave Masters I can take back my payment and have thousands of Unsullied for free." That's hardly outside the box for A Song of Treachery and Backstabbing. .

[eyeheartsansa]

Why? Because they may or may not read fanfiction? What is wrong with fanfiction? Sure Martin doesn't want it but there are plenty of authors that are fine with it.

Fanfiction is a breeding ground for some terrible, terrible writing. Every now and then something gold comes up.. but it's alot of wasted effort since it's just piggybacking on someone else's universe. It's an amusing hobby and maybe ok for shits and giggles, but anyone who is serious about creative writing needs to come up with their own stuff.

[Howlin' Howland Reed]

This is the point I was making. You brainwash slaves and train them into soldiers with unquestioning obedience for the purpose of selling them to your neighbours. You wouldn't do that without a fail-safe. I'm thinking of it in terms of the 'Three Laws of Robotics'.

Yes, I was thinking of posting something about Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics earlier. I think it's a very appropriate comparison in light of how they're described in ASOS. Had they just decided to get even with the slavers, that would have been one thing, but instead Dany found a loophole that shouldn't have been there.

I think this is by far the greatest cheat in her storyline -- although it's a bit weird that someone in Qarth didn't just try to take the dragons by force, I forget whether this is explained in some way -- and I agree that many characters have "been handed" stuff in a similar manner, or have simply been privy to the same type of plot armor. I know there's a lot of talk about people not having plot armor in ASOIAF (even GRRM has said so, no?) but that is simply not true. This isn't the story about a bunch of random people involved in arbitrary events -- all the characters play an important part, that's why they're in the books. The only special thing with GRRM's style of writing lies in how he will unexpectedly remove the plot armor for some, in order to serve the overall story.

Dany is still an interesting character (although her chapters in ADWD were mostly extremely boring) and I don't care so much about the cheats per se. She can be a pretty horrible person, though, but I'm just too cowardly lazy to get involved in such discussions... :leaving:

[Parwan]

From Kittyhat:

Can you cite one, even just one passage in any book wherein she says, even to herself, that she's just in Mereen to practice ruling?

I think it's the But how can I rule seven kingdoms if I cannot rule a single city? comment to Barristan that implies it. But I agree, that it's about avoiding the mess in Astapor, as well.

I think the best answer to Kittyhat's question is, "There is no such passage." The charge that Dany is in Meereen simply to practice ruling is without merit. There are legitimate criticisms of Daenerys; this isn't one of them.

First of all, the quote, even taken out of context, strongly implies self-criticism. A question of the form, "How can I do X if I cannot do Y?" is quite different from the statement, "I am only doing Y to prepare myself for X." When placed in context, the self-criticism is much more apparent. Dany is taking responsibility for the situation in Meereen. (Yes, she clearly has things for which she should take responsibility. I'm not arguing that matter here.) Her advisers want her to abandon people who depend upon her and march west. She refuses to do this. This shows that she has at least some ability as a leader.