GoT - Where Are The Pitchforks?
The bind that a modern writer has when
dealing with a fictional world like Westros set in some kind of endless
medieval period ‘might be’ how to undermine that world. In ‘A Song of Ice and Fire,” the role of the
Westerosi peasants, laborers, townspeople, conscripts, prisoners and ultimately victims is
almost non-existent. Barring short
shit-throwing efforts against Joffrey and Cersei, they are merely objects to the
lords and ladies of the 7 Kingdoms. It
is, after all, a ‘game of thrones’ centered on Westros– a title which clearly makes fun of the whole power
and wealth-driven process. Many people cheering for their favorite king or queen might have missed this. GoT is much like the present, as is evident. Yet the TV series and the books 'Game of Thrones' is based on leave the peasantry and townspeople uninvolved or bystanders – unlike actual history. And so in GoT we are left with kingdoms. The people have no independent ‘agency,’ as the academics like to say.
 |
| Where are the Pitchforks? |
The only Westerosi forces that represent
something democratic outside the kingdoms are the Wildlings, who recognize no
royalty; and the Brotherhood Without Banners, backed by the God of Light. And perhaps Jon Snow, who rejects his Targaryen
claim to the throne.
The narrative arc of the White
Walkers and the Night King is clearly about climate change, not an 'othering' identity as
some liberals have recently suggested.
This overwhelming existential danger ‘should’ have allowed the various factions – the 7 Kingdoms, the Wildlings, the Brotherhood Without Banners, the Dothraki, the
Unsullied – to unite. Like Trump and
other climate deniers, Cersei and Euron Greyjoy had no truck with this. The environmental danger was neatly disposed
of with one unbelievable stab wound by Arya, so that wide social narrative fell apart
and we were left with the little kingdoms again. Without
that tricky stab, the Night King would have won, as the climate change zombies
had killed almost everyone. Which they
still might.
----------------------------------------------
DAENEryS:
Daenerys had been pictured as a megalomaniac
for a long time, so her legions of ‘supporters’ should not be surprised. That would mean they have ignored the
narrative of someone who wants everyone to ‘bend the knee’ or else. She is the ‘queen’ to rule them all - shades of LotR. This might disappoint the Hillary Clinton or
Elizabeth Warren fans, but then it says something revealing about them. Ah, the limits of bourgeois feminism!
 |
| London after the Blitz or ... |
Daenerys is like the U.S. military,
which champions itself as a 'liberator' because it freed the slaves in 1865 and then dropped nuclear weapons on Hiroshima
and Nagasaki -
a firestorm worse than this. JRR Martin
likened the dragons to nuclear weapons in prior interviews and writers' opinions do actually matter. In that war the U.S. also
incinerated many German (Dresden) and Japanese
cities full of civilians through conventional bombing. Probably Hiroshima/Nagasaki is the best comparison to what happened to King's Landing. Later the U.S. heavily bombed 18 of 23 cities in northern Korea, then wiped out a bunch
of villages in Vietnam
to 'save them' while leveling Hanoi. More recently there have been several Iraq wars using massive bombing and artillery
where the victims were again civilians. These laid
waste to cities like Baghdad, Fallujah and Tripoli. Aleppo and
Raqqa were recently destroyed by U.S. bombers to save them from
Daesh, though civilians were allowed to leave – unlike Daenerys.
To this day, gruesome military
interventions are styled as ‘humanitarian’ efforts to free people from tyrants, nearly always in order to put another tyrant in their place. If you didn’t like the ash-covered and
body-charred city of King’s
Landing then you shouldn’t be cheering for the military or royalty. But in the U.S. this is second nature for part
of the population. Now
we are waiting for more bombs to fall on Iran
or Cuba or Venezuela or the Donbas or Chinese ships or ? Unlike part of our population, JRR Martin does not like war or
‘good kings’ so this is partially reflected in this story.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Betting Pool - Spoiler
So who won the game, as the betting
pools predicted?
We have Drogon to thank for melting
that damn Iron Throne. We have Jon
Snow ‘doing the right thing’ and putting another mad Queen out of our misery,
but he gets punished for this. So Bran
Stark, the mystic 3-Eyed Raven, ‘wins!’
He rejects war with Sansa, his sister, who gets independence for Winterfell and a crown.
6 kingdoms and counting! He won’t have a
son, so no lord has to ‘bend the knee’ to a line of his creepy raven kids. He’s a cipher who knows everything and does
nothing. They wheel him into meetings
and wheel him out like someone in a nursing home. The Iron Throne is now a wheelchair! The new-old Hand Tyrion Lannister, the compassionate dwarf, conducts
a comic meeting about rebuilding King’s Landing – yet no mention of cholera or
burying the dead. From tragedy to
farce. The technocrat reigns.
Arya goes off 'west' to find Ireland or Iceland on a Stark ship, which made no sense at all. From assassin to explorer.
Arya goes off 'west' to find Ireland or Iceland on a Stark ship, which made no sense at all. From assassin to explorer.
For killing Daenerys, Snow is exiled
to Castle Black by Grey Worm, which is really quite a light sentence for a queen-slayer. Jon gives up any claim to royalty,
leaving the craziness behind, including Castle Black. Perhaps he will find another Ygritte beyond the Wall in Scotland
with Giantsbane and the Wildlings - who by no accident are called 'the Free Folk.' Jon's
is an anti-royal path and he's about the only one. The Dothraki and the Unsullied go home, much to their
relief I’m sure, as being cannon-fodder is an unpleasant duty. Until climate change
forces some of them to again cross the other ‘narrow sea’ and find refuge in Germany, France or England. They are, after all, representative of Africa
and the Middle East in this narrative, but
have lost their blonde ‘savior.’
This agreement came about in some
kind of “Runnymede” discussion among the
remaining lords of Westros, tired of war and authoritarian rulers. The writers (and Martin) were
no doubt plumbing history to see how to ‘break the wheel.’ This happened historically when the English nobles
got King John to sign the democratic Magna Carta at Runnymede (a ‘meeting
meadow’ near London)
in 1215. No Magna Carta here surely, and
no King John or Jon or Cersei or Daenerys.
Tarly, the Book Worm, nevertheless suggests democracy. They all laugh at him. Even Sansa has an indulgent smile. Poor sweet boy.
So that is how royalty got its kind of comeuppance on GoT. Partial independence, a blank mystic king, more power to the lords and peace for a time. We will
have to wait for all of them to be totally disposed of by revolution.
-------------------------------------------
WRITING
As to the complaints about the
change in writing after the show-runners took over from JRR Martin’s text, there
is an excellent article by Zeynep Tufekci in the Scientific American (here: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/the-real-reason-fans-hate-the-last-season-of-game-of-thrones/?redirect=1
) that partly explains the change from ‘social’ writing to individualist, psychological
writing that occurred in ‘Game of Thrones.’ Tufekci points out that many beloved characters
continued even when their deaths were inevitable. The “Long Night” episode should have seen
most of them dead. But most of the 'fan favorites' were still alive after this bloodbath. Brienne of Tarth even
gets mercy sex! Tufeckci also spotlights the
weak logic of ‘fate’ or genetics, the same fate that Bran ‘knows.’
C.G. Gibbs made this same
point in 2015 about present U.S.
fiction at a literary talk at May Day Books for his novel ‘Factory Days.’ At present
the memoir, the family story, dysfunction, psychology, the ‘character,’ the ‘hero’ are still the
center of much U.S.
television, film and fiction. Some have
called the hyper-individualist memoir the ‘literary expression of
neo-liberalism.’ Essentially, the socially-conscious early 20th
century writing of people like Upton Sinclair, John Steinbeck, John Dos Passos,
Richard Wright, Jack London, Mike Gold, Jack Conroy, Meridel LeSeur, B. Traven,
Agnes Smedley, Theodore Dreiser, James T. Farrell, Tillie Olsen and Edward
Dahlberg became a thing of the past, especially as it relates to the working
classes and capitalism. African American
fiction is about the only strain to partly carry on this U.S. tradition past the 1940s.
 |
| The real pyramid had a vastly larger 'bottom.' |
And so GoT is done. In reality, any
story set in a medieval economy and society, with so many situations, history
and characters could never be finished, as it reflects the real world – which
never stops. Any ending is arbitrary. Individuals die but history continues because society is not built on individuals but on the social relations of millions. It should end up with the revolutionary
destruction of the serf economy that Westros and the Iron Bank are built on, the
subsequent advent of capitalism, which is 'in the egg' in King's Landing, and its eventual replacement by world-wide
socialism. But JRR Martin will have to
write that story until he is about 92 years old. He’s 71 now…
Even the GoT documentary about how they shot the last season reveals the hundreds of extras, artisans, artists, organizers and technical workers needed to do this film or any film. The actors, director and show-runners are only the few at the top of a very big pyramid.
Even the GoT documentary about how they shot the last season reveals the hundreds of extras, artisans, artists, organizers and technical workers needed to do this film or any film. The actors, director and show-runners are only the few at the top of a very big pyramid.
Other reviews on GoT, below. Use blog search box, upper left, under ‘Game of Thrones’ or ‘GoT.’
Reviews on fiction books, type ‘fiction.’ A link to YouTube program 'Democratic Dimensions' where
CG Gibbs discusses the present dearth of socially-aware fiction and the literary mafia:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpC8nqtw0kU
A ‘tip of the hat’ to Barry Link for
the Scientific American link.
The Kulture Kommissar
May 21, 2019
No comments:
Post a Comment