More than simple thrills

Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Costerwaldau) and ultimately into a plot to murder Robert herself, destabilising the already fragile political order.

Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) is deeply shaped by the sexual abuse she experiences at the hands of her brother (Harry Lloyd) and her arranged marriage to Dothraki leader Khal Drogo (Jason Momoa). Her lack of autonomy early in her life is a substantial part of what inspires Daenerys to turn her quest to retake the Iron Throne into a moral crusade.

Sansa Stark (Sophie Turner) is sexually and psychologically harassed by Joffrey Baratheon (Jack Gleeson), the sadistic young king of Westeros, who orders her father’s execution in the first season; is pursued by Petyr Baelish (Aidan Gillen), who views Sansa as a proxy for her mother; and then married off to Ramsay Bolton, who rapes her and threatens her with torture. This awful history turns her from a hopeful teenager, who romanticises the world around her into a ruthless leader. The extent to which the show is able to execute its exploration of sexual violence and female leadership, without compromising that intellectual mission, is at the heart of some of the most heated debates about the series. But wherever you fall in these conversations, Game of Thrones is the subject of serious political argumentation because it strives to say something significant about what happens to a society that treats women as commodities.

This is not to say that the spinoffs have to focus on the same set of issues or draw the same conclusions.

HBO can zip across continents and move forward and backward in time. The network just ought to remember that if it wants a series to be seen as more than a parade of dragons and naked ladies, those fantastical battles and heart-stopping revelations need to be in service of something larger than simple thrills. – The Washington Post