r/HOTDGreens • u/OkGuava919 • 6h ago
Show For all the women and (genuine) feminists in this sub; which character(s) did they ruin the arcs/characterisations of THE MOST in the name of this adaption?
I'm not saying this lightly nor did I think of it off the back of my hand. But C&H have iterated that they've chosen to tell this story through a feminist lens or a scope that honours and highlights "true" feminist values and it really does not seem like it given what the true values of feminism are.
It's no secret that they have built their own story now, and that they've built it off of the bones of another (Fire and Blood) and they've taken the opportunity to press forward their personal moral agendas and beliefs.
Sara Hess is and has been very vocal about how she's championing the women of ASOIAF in the name of women in the modern world and holding them to the same standard as the men. But I beg to differ.
However again, I'm not a woman- so I feel somewhat perhaps not too qualified to speak up on it/give my opinion on it. With that in mind;
For the women of this sub, and the genuine feminists who linger or regularly visit, when you look at the characters of this adaptation in the books in comparison to their show-counterparts, which one(s) has been ruined the most for you personally by the agenda of C&H?
And give your reasons why in the comments!
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u/RazihellValentina 5h ago
"Babies die all the time" said by the mother who saw her 5 year old's head be sawed off in his bed
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u/BellyCrawler 5h ago
Alicent. It's hilarious because they were obviously trying to make the adaptation more feminist but in injecting their subpar writing they made everyone worse.
Show Alicent is a confused, mopey, inconsistent character whose depiction sways with whatever mediocre writing the showrunners are trying to get over. None of her ambition or personal desire for power and security translate to the screen anymore because she's been robbed of actual character agency outside of "How can we make Rhaenyra look good?"
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u/TheDragonOfOldtown yes i am autistic how could you know 5h ago
Honestly, both.
All of this started with the “Dangerous Woman” novella.
Yet all I have seen is “Always* Innocent Women” 🥺
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u/strawberry2nd 5h ago
Of all the characters, Alicent and Rhaenyra were the first to be butchered, but Alicent ultimately suffered the most damage.
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u/Skaramouche04 4h ago
The greens in my opinion. I hated what they did with Aegon and Aemond, they are supposed to love each other ! Alicent is awful too, but she's part of the greens so it tracks.
Rhaenyra mostly looks incompetent and devoid of any ambition. She's completely boring
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u/NevadaB 4h ago edited 4h ago
I voted for the Greens collectively because it includes both Alicent and Helaena. Unless their names are Rhaenyra, women in this show aren't allowed to be good mothers. They've turned Alicent into a spineless simp and a useless wet towel who sells off her children. The Alicent from the book was terrified her children would be killed. They totally lobotomized Helaena who says stuff like 'babies die all the time'. Noo, babies don't die all the time the way Jaehaerys did. He was not killed by sickness, he was murdered in his bed in the most brutal way possible at the orders of his own relatives. I can understand her going mad with pain but I'm sure Condal and Hess used this heartless line just to downplay the gruesome murder of the Green children who just aren't as valuable as the ones from TB. Why should the audience care for him, when his own mother and grandmother don't seem to care?
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u/Mayanee Sunfyre 3h ago
My honest thought process when I saw Helaena's 'children die all the time' and Alicent later acting like B&C never happened in front of Rhaenyra was something like:
'These reactions are absolute asinine dialogues. Nobody reacts like this.'
I was seething and wanted to throw something against the TV and cursed a lot on the inside against the writing. Even made worse that Aegon's fitting reactions were called irrational, frantic and etc. by the writers in interviews. And that D&D made a proper Helaena reaction in the Dance History and Lore videos.
Phia tried to change this at least with petitioning for more scenes with Tom however the writers barely listened and also claimed that she was 'wrong' with Dreamfyre being the mother of Dany's dragons and since Phia like many noticed that Dreamfyre is the dragon that is treated the worst on the show they just don't care about her scenes and Helaena as a character (also since Canon Helaena makes Rhaenyra and Team Black look bad).
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u/thesilentstranger6 Jaehaera Targaryen 4h ago
Ripping every single woman of their agency and giving all their victories and defeats to men will never be feminism.
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u/SuccessfulCity4897 4h ago
Alicent. In the book, Alicent's a quintessential medieval highborn Lady who wants to make her house more powerful by making her son King. In the show, Alicent wants to... make up with a girl she used to be really tight with 20 years ago? Excuse me? It's not that her motivations are bad, they are simply nonsensical.
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u/Similar-Cartoonist31 5h ago edited 5h ago
Uh though question. I voted for geens.
They ereased the main point of greens forming and Alicent doing as she did, she was a mother in medival world who did not live by our modern standards, her main concern was survival of children, if Rhaenyra got the Crown sooner or later her cbildren would have to die by order of Rhaenyra for Jace to get the crown. There was two ways either surender and wait for the day you're kids get killed or put up a fight no matter what.
The show completely ereased that and made her having Aegon crowned as "misunderstanding" and then later had her sell out her kids to a woman with who she spent more time being an enemy than friend. No mother especially medival mother would give up her children. Just watch Magnificent Century and look to what ends Hürrem and Mahidevran went to protect they're kids.
They ereased Helaena's book character and gave her no autonomy she actually had in the book. Aegon even listens to her council.
The show was twisted in such way that people belive Rhaenyra a punk rock flawless Princess was "usurped" by a conservative religious woman who hates women, when that's not the case.
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u/DumbTeen9 5h ago
I really can't choose? Alicent being an annoying hypocrite doesn't make her a bad character, the age change though nonsensical had potential, but the entirety of season 2 cancels that out
Rhaenyra was ruined over all, her younger self saved by millie alcock's amazing performance and pure talent for the "doomed teen" character but otherwise its all badly written
They could've done so much with helaena and baela. The former dreamer concept had merits and book baela (rebellious, impulsive, etc) would've been so fun instead of the wife material for jace were getting. The took the line where she wanted to marry at the start of the war and ran with it ignoring everything else
Jeyne arryn and baela, jeyne was made such an obnoxious ass in the episode she showed up in and Rhaena was reduced to a whiny dumb dumb. She was having the time of her life in the Vale in the book shaping her into the person she grew to be during the regency not... whatever they're trying to do
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u/mariakonoval 4h ago
I think, they changed everyone: Blacks and Greens so much, that only names and dragons makes the story recognizable. Change names, coloring and replace dragons with some magical species and you won’t tell from first sight that the story is GRRM’s.
They tried to make show look feministic so much, they diminished most women’s suffering.
Alicent was changed so much, I don’t think it needs explanation. It looks frankly misogynistic.
They changed Daemon, so fans think him to love Rhaenyra so much, he was her lapdog (I saw countless comments about it). But he wasn’t. And HMO, the way they made Daemon, totally diminishes how much Rhaenyra suffered from him. Instead of showing Daemon as he is and viewers understanding that Daemyra is not a lovestory, but story about predator and his victim, showrunners chose to make him supportive and able of self-analysis (which he wasn’t). Partially, one of the reasons of Rhaenyra’s downfall was Daemon and his total influence on Rhaenyra.
They made Helaena a little bit mad from the very beginning. In book, she lost her mind after the death of her children. She lost her marbles because of trauma, not because she was weak, sweet autistic girl from the start. Showrunners took away her motherhood.
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u/cheeselul House Baratheon 3h ago
I think the showrunners forgot that feminism also means holding women accountable for their horrible deeds. Turning Rhaenyra into a saint/getting rid of all of her core ambitions and making her rely on the men around her is certainly an unfeminist choice.
Turning Alicent into an inconsistent character and ignoring all her traits that made her cunning and evil is also a very unfeminist choice.
Turning Rhaenys into a blind blacks supporter is a very weird choice.
Erasing Nettles from the story is not only not feminist but weirdly racist (they're okay with changing the ethnicity of house Valeryon, which creates inconsistency for both team black and team green as well as GOT elements, but the original black character with an interesting premise and very badass storyline gets removed?).
HOTD is not feminist. The fact that they won't allow women to be evil and cunning is not feminist. Removing all the nuance from the story in order to make a black and white, evil vs good story is not feminist. HOTD was never rewritten to be feminist, it was rewritten because the script writors can't understand nuance to save their lives and are overall mediocre writers.
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u/SteppenWolf25 2h ago
Alicent going against the wishes of the rotten corpse, showing ambition and fighting for the lives of her children and grandchildren is feminism. She didn't owe Rhaenyra anything. Selling them off to a woman who hated and only mocked them since the day they were born is not.
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u/OrcBarbierian 1h ago
I am here to bitch and moan about Rhaenyra. Let her be a terrible person, stop blaming all her flaws on men and the patriarchy 🙄💅 True feminism is letting women be terrible people with flaws. Rhaenyra's biggest flaw is her damn ego; Walter White's biggest flaw was his ego, and he's a great character to watch.
Let women be terrible people, too. Let her be fat: she had six pregnancies in relatively close successesion, coupled with the fact that she's overindulging in food while her city starves.
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u/Tiger951 Vhagar 1h ago
Pretty much every woman in this show got ruined.
But from the options here, Alicent got absolutely butchered!
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u/Bloodyjorts 45m ago
I voted for Alicent, but honestly all your choices are pretty much equally ruined by their warped idea of Rhaenyra-centered feminism.
Alicent the child bride, whom they frequently blame for her own abuse and use sex to humiliate her. Who sold out her family and we are supposed to believe that was a genuine sacrifice.
Rhaenyra whose dull and whose enemies are incompetent but she will still lose, who didn't even have the grooming done well because they didn't want to make it look like it had an effect on her.
The Greens, who barely get screentime, are made rapists or psychos or walking spoilers, who are not even a team anymore, Helaena cannot enjoy flying, no attention payed to the forced incestuous marriage between children.
The Blacks, who are little more than Rhaenyra cheerleaders, the Velaryons who just forgor about Laenor being murdered, Baela who isn't allowed to be a tomboy, how they massacred Laena and Laenor, all the cool female side characters they cut or lessened lest anyone think any woman other than their punk rock princess can be cool, all the canon lesbians they cut or closeted, and even Daemon only got character development through a vision that tells him Rhaenyra is the specialest prince that ever was promised.
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u/Dr_Doomsduck 6h ago
I think Alicent first and foremost, because she was essentially robbed of ALL her ambitions. Rhaenyra still has the desire to get the throne and occasionally gets to do something worthwhile. Alicent has been turned into a simp that betrays her children while berating them for not sticking with one another.
But also, Nettles. She was a very compelling, interesting black low-born female character with a unique backstory and a fascinating role in the Dance and they completely edited her out for the sake of making Daemon (and Rhaenyra) look less terrible.