Game of Thrones' Daenerys Targaryen Recreated in Dragon Age

The Harkinator

Did something happen?
Jun 2, 2010
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inu-kun said:
misogynerd said:
conmag9 said:
008Zulu said:
inu-kun said:
Daenarys is SOIAF's biggest mary sue
Other than having three dragons, how is she the Mary Sue? Her brother abused her, her husband and child were murdered.
Whether or not she's a Mary Sue, having an incredibly crappy childhood/dramatically losing loved ones and then overcoming it on the way to greatness is VERY common in Sues. She's got three dragons, most people she comes into contact love her, she seems to actually be winning despite having a sense of morality (which is rather against the grain of ASOIAF's general themes), she's the last living descendent of the rightful monarchy (such as it was), unusual hair color, having awesome followers that make her seem even better by comparison, immune to fire (in the show at least) etc. She's got quite a few common sue traits. Whether she is or not isn't for me to say, as it's a fairly subjective judgement. But you can see why some might call her that?
Really? I don't know if we read the same books. She has on a pretty bad losing streak at the end of DWD and, in general, seems like a stupid teenage girl who falls for terrible men.
That's the reason why the last book made her even look worse for me, she completely fucks everything (destoys entire regions, conquers a city even she doesn't want and started a massive war) and does nothing but whine, but is still considered a good ruler and nobody calls her on that, with the added bonus of having imprgnable plot armor due to having to fill a prophecy she hasn't even started doing.
Is she considered a good ruler by anyone but herself? The Daenerys stuff is through her eyes and she thinks herself to be the good Queen, bringing order to Slavers Bay and doing the right thing all the time. So she thinks she's a good ruler because she's trying to do good things.

But she isn't, her bad losing streak as you put it is mostly her own fault. She has no comprehension of the culture of the places she's conquered so has no idea how to rule them. Her illusions of being a good ruler were quite badly shattered when her dragons killed some people. As a supposed trial run for her invasion of Westeros and rule of it she's doing really badly. And again she doesn't understand the culture of Westeros or how it works, so she'd face similar problems. In the books she isn't a Mary Sue and is an interesting enough look at how winning a crown and wearing it are two different things, she's actually quite similar to Robert Baratheon in that regard, except she's got dragons who aren't just going to sit around once she's conquered places.

In the TV show she is a Mary Sue, hands down. The writers are clearly in love with her to the detriment of others. Their bias against Stannis is obvious and they believe he would be a terrible king but think Renly and Daenerys would be great rulers, even though each has their own merits and drawbacks in the books, they really badly undersell Stannis and didn't really show the frivolous side of Renly, they talk about it and his life of parties but they don't show him being able to win allegiances through his personality, also they make him afraid of blood which is quite minor but annoying since Renly was quite an able warrior in the books, competing in tournament melees. But Daenerys does everything right, everyone tells her what a great ruler she is and the times she messes up are glossed over (like Drogon terrorising people) just a little too much.

Not to say the TV show is bad, it's excellent, but the writers really do have massive hard ons for Daenerys and seem smitten with her.
 

008Zulu_v1legacy

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Sep 6, 2009
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conmag9 said:
Keep in mind, this may be different from the books, of which I've only ever read one. Grains of salt will be available on request.
Brandon is a Warg who can dominate humans, I wager he will be able to dominate a dragon.
 

conmag9

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Aug 4, 2008
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008Zulu said:
conmag9 said:
Keep in mind, this may be different from the books, of which I've only ever read one. Grains of salt will be available on request.
Brandon is a Warg who can dominate humans, I wager he will be able to dominate a dragon.
Is he able to do that to mentally sound humans? Hodor's not exactly what we call an bastion of iron will. I'm not sure how smart dragons are in ASOIAF, but my money would be on "hard to dominate". Powerful supernatural entities, power made flesh and all that? Sounds hard to control, as Dany is swiftly starting to learn in a more mundane sense.
 

PrinceOfShapeir

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Mar 27, 2011
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conmag9 said:
008Zulu said:
conmag9 said:
Keep in mind, this may be different from the books, of which I've only ever read one. Grains of salt will be available on request.
Brandon is a Warg who can dominate humans, I wager he will be able to dominate a dragon.
Is he able to do that to mentally sound humans? Hodor's not exactly what we call an bastion of iron will. I'm not sure how smart dragons are in ASOIAF, but my money would be on "hard to dominate". Powerful supernatural entities, power made flesh and all that? Sounds hard to control, as Dany is swiftly starting to learn in a more mundane sense.
Hodor may not be terribly bright, but Dragons are just animals. Terrifying, dangerous, intractable animals, but animals nonetheless.
 

Therumancer

Citation Needed
Nov 28, 2007
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conmag9 said:
008Zulu said:
inu-kun said:
Daenarys is SOIAF's biggest mary sue
Other than having three dragons, how is she the Mary Sue? Her brother abused her, her husband and child were murdered.
Whether or not she's a Mary Sue, having an incredibly crappy childhood/dramatically losing loved ones and then overcoming it on the way to greatness is VERY common in Sues. She's got three dragons, most people she comes into contact love her, she seems to actually be winning despite having a sense of morality (which is rather against the grain of ASOIAF's general themes), she's the last living descendent of the rightful monarchy (such as it was), unusual hair color, having awesome followers that make her seem even better by comparison, immune to fire (in the show at least) etc. She's got quite a few common sue traits. Whether she is or not isn't for me to say, as it's a fairly subjective judgement. But you can see why some might call her that?
Well, a Mary Sue is supposed to be a perfect power fantasy for girls. Most heroic fantasy characters have more than a few things in common with "Mary Sue" characters even when they aren't "Sues". Dany comes close to being a social Sue, but she has a lot of disadvantages, including being dependent on others for just about everything. It could be argued that her morality and idealism are a big weakness in that world, and they do come to bit her in the rear. She has dragons but can't control them perfectly. While she's highly charismatic and has a gift for getting people to like her, she's not that talented a leader and needs advisors, and bad things tend to happen when she doesn't listen to them. If Dany became more directly powerful, getting spell casting ability, learning to fight her own battle, or just overcoming a lot of her naivity and becoming a more talented ruler in her own right, she would become a true Sue, and that might happen closer to the climax if she's intended to be one of the big winners.

It should also be noted that I believe RR Martin once said something about how the real heroes haven't appeared in the story yet (or hadn't when he made the comment). I believe part of his intention here in dissecting fantasy tropes was to focus on the things that happen in the background of your average fantasy story. Almost everyone here is someone who traditionally would be a supporting character or part of the backstory. He's showing what causes the chaos and why things are the way they are, and getting you to at least empathize with the people who make it that way, where in most stories it would start out by narrating the basic situation, but then focus entirely on the hero and their perspective and them setting things right. If the hero walks in and starts cutting down evil barons and such you generally don't care because you don't see much about why the baron became evil or their point of view to begin with. This has lead me to believe that the eventual ending of GoTs is going to be something of an intentional "arsepull" where the heroes will come out of nowhere as happens in heroic fantasy from time to time, set things right, and we, as the watchers will be surprised because we didn't see it coming any more than the guys focused on their own affairs and politics were.

Dany seems like she's being set up as the quintessential romance option for a hero, someone who has resources, but no real ability to use them, and is in the perfect position bloodline wise to resolve the entire conflict and be accepted onto the throne. I guess you could say she's like a version of Ce'nedra before Belgarion shows up. I'm probably wrong but I'd imagine she'll eventually wind up with a serious love interest who will seem out of focus but will wind up being the actual hero of a story where the focus isn't on the heroes. Another analogy might be a fantasy version of say "Astro City" where super heroes exist, but the stories are actually about everyone but them.

It's also been pointed out the TV series departed from the books, and I suspect a big part of it is that they wanted to have a couple of characters who would be around for a long time who the people can cheer for and focus on. What us serious genera fans think is a lot different from the average viewer shows like this require to survive and succeed, and that includes someone to cheer for, even if it's a malevolent anti-hero like Tony Soprano. Right now I think we've pretty much got two straightforward good guys in the form of Jon Snow and Dany, whether Jon is going to die remains to be seen. Then we've got a popular anti-hero in the form of "The Imp" along with a plucky little girl to be a wild card. As people have pointed out all of those characters are a bit different from the book versions, Dany in particular stands out to an extent.

Also the actress playing Daenerys is both beautiful and exotic, and plays her role very well being able to come across as brave, regal, innocent and vulnerable all at the same time. It's not PC to point out but hot girls are time stamped, and they have this one at a perfect time. I'd imagine the bean counters don't want to kill her character because she attracts viewers, and she doesn't want to go either (despite perhaps saying so for negotiation purposes) because she's riding high with a successful, high profile, role in her prime. She's a valuable commodity and everyone likely knows it, this kind of thing is a factor with TV and the theater that doesn't apply to the books. They are going to do everything they can to keep her on the forefront of things. I wouldn't be surprised if despite his comments about wearing the pants if George RR Martin himself has pretty much been told certain characters are off limits at this point due to the amount of money involved. That's not a good thing (creator's rights) and nobody would say so publically, but TV executives have a lot more oomph than even a successful writer, not to mention that I'd imagine even George knows he's riding higher now than he has any other time in his life because of the TV show and knows what side his bread is buttered on.
 

RedDeadFred

Illusions, Michael!
May 13, 2009
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inu-kun said:
misogynerd said:
conmag9 said:
008Zulu said:
inu-kun said:
Daenarys is SOIAF's biggest mary sue
Other than having three dragons, how is she the Mary Sue? Her brother abused her, her husband and child were murdered.
Whether or not she's a Mary Sue, having an incredibly crappy childhood/dramatically losing loved ones and then overcoming it on the way to greatness is VERY common in Sues. She's got three dragons, most people she comes into contact love her, she seems to actually be winning despite having a sense of morality (which is rather against the grain of ASOIAF's general themes), she's the last living descendent of the rightful monarchy (such as it was), unusual hair color, having awesome followers that make her seem even better by comparison, immune to fire (in the show at least) etc. She's got quite a few common sue traits. Whether she is or not isn't for me to say, as it's a fairly subjective judgement. But you can see why some might call her that?
Really? I don't know if we read the same books. She has on a pretty bad losing streak at the end of DWD and, in general, seems like a stupid teenage girl who falls for terrible men.
That's the reason why the last book made her even look worse for me, she completely fucks everything (destoys entire regions, conquers a city even she doesn't want and started a massive war) and does nothing but whine, but is still considered a good ruler and nobody calls her on that, with the added bonus of having imprgnable plot armor due to having to fill a prophecy she hasn't even started doing.
First of all, you're pointing out character flaws. That goes against being a Marry Sue, so I really don't know why you're throwing that around... A Marry Sue is a character who basically has no flaws or if they do, they're really minor things that have no impact on the story.

Secondly, lots of people have called her on her shitty ruling. Heck, she herself does at sometimes (something along the lines of "how can I hope to rule the Seven Kingdoms if I can't even rule one city?").

Yes, she has plot armor (so do Tyrion and Jon), that doesn't make her a Marry Sue. Honestly, the gripes you're having (besides plot armor) make it sound like you want her to be a Marry Sue.

OT: Wow, that's a ridiculously close recreation. These character creators have come a long way. Well, I guess it could have been possible with others. I've never tried something like this in Mass Effect or Skyrim. Maybe it's possible in those too. I doubt you could do it to this extent though.
 

Hurr Durr Derp

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Apr 8, 2009
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How is this newsworthy in any way? There are tons of games with character editors and there are tons of gamers making lookalikes of other characters in those games.
 

soren7550

Overly Proud New Yorker
Dec 18, 2008
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While is is all nice and impressive and all, I fail to see how this is news.