A Few Notes on Female Characters in Game of Thrones

Last year, I rewatched the first six seasons of Game of Thrones as a lead-up to season 7, and it was nice to revisit the episodes of this always-exciting, often-compelling, sometimes-aggravating show.  This time around, I was really struck watching the female characters in the series.  Now, let me say before I get started that I’m not calling Game of Thrones a show that has it all together where female representation is concerned.  The series has a track record of handling sexual violence poorly, inclusion of women of color is thin on the ground, and the show has a habit of using female nudity as set dressing.  That said, it also does right by many of its female characters in various ways, and I’d like to highlight one that jumped out at me on my rewatch.

In a lot of fiction featuring strong female characters, there’s a tendency to go the “not like the other girls” route with a heroine, to hold her up as a woman who’s exceptional – as in, an exception to the usual.  In a way, this is understandable, since plenty of stories center on those who are atypical/outcasts as well as those who are special, often at the same time.  But with “not like the other girls” in particular, it carries a gendered connotation that there’s nothing worthwile to be found in those other girls, and the heroine is exemplary specifically because she isn’t representative of the rest of her gender.  In fact, in the earliest episodes of Game of Thrones, we seem to see this dynamic play out in the Stark family.  While mother Catelyn and older sister Sansa fit effortlessly into the notion of what a “proper” lady should be, Arya resists these rules, preferring swordplay to needlepoint.  The idea is that Sansa especially is frivolous, carrying only about clothes and boys, while Arya is cool, unlike her sister.

The more women we meet in Westeros and Essos, however, the more we see how untrue that is.  Again and again, we meet female characters who chafe under the expectations of what a women is allowed to be, and the overall picture becomes, not one that depicts at most a few special ones rising above the rest of her gender, but one that shows pretty much all of them fighting to be her own person in whatever way that means to her.  The badass fighters are the ones who instantly stand out:  in addition to Arya, there’s Brienne serving in Renly’s Kingsguard and later pledging her sword to the Starks, Meera serving as her brother’s protector, Ygritte running with the rest of the Wildling army, Yara becoming her father’s heir (despite him still having a living son) through her fierce naval strategies, the Sand Snakes doing their thing in Dorne, and Osha fighting tooth and nail to keep Bran and Rickon safe.  And of course, while she doesn’t do much physical combat herself, Danaerys is the actual queen of the badasses, lighting up slave owners with her dragons on her way to take back the Iron Throne.

Like I said, those are the most obvious examples:  we’re taught to equate strength with fighting skills, and these women can throw down something fierce.  But we see strength and independence rippling through the show in other ways.  Shireen devouring histories about the Targareons and their dragons.  Margaery using her astute judge of character to position herself for advantageous matches.  Catelyn being willing to do anything for the sake of her children.  Talisa forsaking her highborn life to care for wounded soldiers on the battlefield.  Melisandre holding the ear of monarchs to make her visions become truths.  Olenna being completely over the niceties of court, saying what comes to mind whenever she feels like it.  Missandei gaining an important place at Danaerys’s side through her brilliant knowledge of languages.  Cersei being as Machiavellian as any of the scheming men on the show.  Little Lyanna doing her house proud.

Even characters who seem, if you will, the most “like the other girls” have their own strength, whether it’s Gilly trying to protect her baby, Ros rising in Littlefinger’s establishment, Shae being discontent to merely be Tyrion’s whore, or even Myrcella not wanting to leave Dorne at her parents’ behest.  And Sansa, who once seemed primed to represent the unfortunate flipside of the trope, has done a lot to survive all manner of horrible things.  Yes, she’s been abused, terrorized, and worse (the unfortunate “sexual trauma as character growth,”) but she’s survived Joffrey and the Lannisters, various shakeups at King’s Landing, life on the run, and despicable men who feel entitled to her beauty.  In the most recent seasons, she’s really been discovering her voice and finding ways to assert her power, and I appreciate that.

So, while Game of Thrones is far from perfect when it comes to gender, this is an area where it does excel.  There’s no “not like the other girls.”  There’s just the girls/women, their society, and what each of them does to circumvent the restrictions their world tries to place on them.