Murder on the Westeros Express: Character Death in Game of Thrones

OBLIGATORY SPOILER WARNING ATTACHED TO ANYTHING DISCUSSING GAME OF THRONES:

As the title suggests, this is a post about character death in Game of Thrones. If you're not caught up on the series, read on but on your own head be it. Also a confession; I’ve not read the books so if you, dear reader, could refrain from telling me what happens later on, I’d be very much obliged, ta. On with the blog!

Game of Thrones is back and I couldn’t be happier. It’s brilliant example of how, as Hollywood movies trend towards all of their films being as inclusive as possible, Hollywood TV can and will throw money at huge, expensive shows with enormous casts and complex stories and make it just for adults. 

Woooo!!! Political machinations!!! Allegorical parables!!! Dragons!!!

It’s a show full of breathtaking moments (the Battle of Blackwater Bay is probably my favourite scene in any TV show) but cast your minds back to series one, episode 9 where it really stood out from the pretenders. Yeah, you know which bit I’m talking about, this scene right here: 

This might surprise some of you, but watching Ned Stark die in the first series came as a shock to my sister. She’d not really bothered with Game of Thrones and was only watching because it was on the telly, but when the moment happened, she was definitely surprised, saying, “They can’t kill off Sean Bean! He’s the main character!”

And then described how she thought it would have panned out, with Ayra Stark leaping up, killing the executioner and running away to have awesome adventures with her beloved daddy. This to me, after three series and a half series of main characters dying, sounded ridiculous of course. But it wasn’t ridiculous to my sister, who saw all main characters everywhere as untouchable, so why should Game of Thrones be any different? 

Game of Thrones has a serious reputation for being very brutal with its leading roles. Think back to poor Renly; he was built up to be Robb Stark’s partner in battle, only to be slain in the 6^th episode of series two. After him, surely it was Robb who would be gloriously victorious, but one Red Wedding later and he’s off the pitch for good. Joffrey, who as the show’s main villain was vital to the proceedings, couldn’t survive his own wedding. Being a main character in Westeros takes its toll, but what makes this different to other shows which seem to equally enjoy a bit of character death every so often?

Really, what does killing a main character mean? If you take the Steven Moffat route, then it means getting a cheap shock before pushing a big Reset button which takes away any jeopardy, because what’s a story with stakes compare to a mess of clever clever twists? In Bones, it means Booth can be shot and buried by a stalker, but then hastily revived unconvincingly one episode later. Even Life on Mars couldn’t quite commit to it, and had John Simm happily running around with his 1970’s cop buddies after he’d jumped off a roof. This means that death is a revival, and a character faking their death or enjoying a robust afterlife shows that death is not the end, meaning that there can be no consequences.

But death in Game of Thrones always has consequences. The show’s motto, All Men Must Die, is a battle cry against the transiency of TV death, for there can be no last minute revival from a bad case of sword through the neck. There’s only one character, Beric Dondarrion, the leader of the Brotherhood Without Banners, who has cheated death, and he is a periphery, a dangerous symbol of the world outside the known concepts of life and death.

And he pays for every single time it happens, but more on that later.

There are no audience tricking loopholes, no fake funerals, no body switching – people die and stay dead, and each one has severe consequences. Take the orphan children Theon has brutally murdered and tries to pass off as the charred remains of Rickon and Bran Stark. Thinking her little brother has killed two of the remaining Starks, Yara decides her brother is half mad and takes his reinforcements away, leaving Theon at the mercy of his turncoat soldiers and subjecting him to a life of torture at the hands of the fully mad Ramsey Snow. Two orphan children cease the Greyjoy campaign for independence and the War of the Five Kings loses its first contestant. The horrible Janos Slynt, who orchestrated the murder of all Robert Baratheon’s bastard children, is sent packing to the Wall; the consequences of his part in the slaughter is still to be meted out in the show, but seeing as Wildings are surrounding Castle Black and the watchmen tend to panic without Jon Snow around, the night will most likely be dark and full of terrors for the least likable officer of the Night’s Watch.

There’s supernatural death, death by infection, death by zombification, death by dragon:

 And this is my second favourite moment of telly ever

In fact the only character who seems to die of natural causes is Robert Baratheon, who should have known better than harshing his buzz with boar hunting. But the show is never casual about the reality of surrounding its character’s with death, and this is shown through the arc taken by everyone’s favourite little murderer, Arya Stark.

Fun fact, 'Arya' is the fastest growing baby name in the USA!

Arya’s development as a character comes through her relationship with death. Her Dancing Master Syrio Forel taught her to pray to the God of Death, but it was still a cool game she was playing. Then, when her father is taken and guards are looking for her, she accidently kills a fat boy. She brags about this when Hot Pie starts to bully her, and it’s obvious that it’s still a sort of game to her. But then Polliver kills her friend with her own sword, and it’s no longer a game. She repeats the names of her potential kills, only praying to the God of Death, and the fun, sparky Arya of Winterfell, who could shoot better than her brothers and threw mud at her sister, is slowly replaced by a woman with death in her eyes. 

This change happens when she is talking to Thoros of Myr, when she sees hope for her father after all – if Thoros, a drunk priest, can bring Beric back to life, what’s stopping Ned from being reattached to his head? But she also sees how life after death can change a person too; before, Beric gave Arya, Gendry and Hot Pie a place to stay in safety. Afterwards, he sells Gendry for a bag of gold and the promises of a scary Red Woman. Arya sees no safety with the resurrected and, after watching her old life burn away at the Red Wedding, she makes her first kill out of red hot rage, knifing the man who desecrated her brother’s body. But now, Arya has made a dent in her list of names, coolly seeing off Polliver when he no longer posed a threat, kills out of revenge, not necessity or anger. How long until she kills for pleasure? Or until she gets her own comeuppance? I’m not sure, but I won’t stop watching until I find out.

Normally, killing the main character is a sign that a show has ran out of ideas, which why so many are written back in with little regard for logic. Resting the first series on Ned’s shoulders, when he was always going to be on the chopping block, was a bold move; even bolder was to splinter the stories and follow the chaos of war and politics, turning the show into a true ensemble piece, with everyone seeking different trophies. This is a show that isn’t afraid of challenging expectations of what a telly death means – not for Game of Thrones are the lame excuses of dreams, wizards or ‘timey wimey’ (God I hate that phrase) which are the fallback of other and dare I say, lesser, shows. It’s difficult to say who is the true star is now (although personally, my love for Bronn is as pure as his awesomeness) but on whoever the spotlight falls, I feel safe in the knowledge that their time on top will be spectacular. If, perhaps, short.