‘Game of Thrones’ season 4: George R.R. Martin on Cersei – Jaime Lannister scene
“Game of Thrones” has surprised, delighted, and entertained many throughout the first four seasons, but to date we cannot think of a moment that fans responded to as negatively as the one between Jaime and Cersei Lannister on last night’s “Breaker of Chains.”
Why did Jaime rape his sister mere feet away from his own son Joffrey’s corpse? It took away all of the character’s story development, and also was a departure from a similar scene in the George R.R. Martin books, which saw this moment play out differently where the two had consensual sex. Changing something consensual to a rape is drastic, and it destroys much of the likable Jaime from last year.
After the episode aired, Martin was of course the recipient of many a shocked and/or angry email, and he did take a moment on his official blog to comment. His response is somewhat surprising, since he basically washes his hands of the moment and says that he had nothing to do with the decision-making behind it:
“I think the ‘butterfly effect’ that I have spoken of so often was at work here. In the novels, Jaime is not present at Joffrey’s death, and indeed, Cersei has been fearful that he is dead himself, that she has lost both the son and the father/ lover/ brother. And then suddenly Jaime is there before her. Maimed and changed, but Jaime nonetheless. Though the time and place is wildly inappropriate and Cersei is fearful of discovery, she is as hungry for him as he is for her.
“The whole dynamic is different in the show, where Jaime has been back for weeks at the least, maybe longer, and he and Cersei have been in each other’s company on numerous occasions, often quarreling. The setting is the same, but neither character is in the same place as in the books, which may be why Dan [Benioff] & David [Weiss] played the sept out differently. But that’s just my surmise; we never discussed this scene, to the best of my recollection.
“Also, I was writing the scene from Jaime’s POV, so the reader is inside his head, hearing his thoughts. On the TV show, the camera is necessarily external. You don’t know what anyone is thinking or feeling, just what they are saying and doing.
“If the show had retained some of Cersei’s dialogue from the books, it might have left a somewhat different impression — but that dialogue was very much shaped by the circumstances of the books, delivered by a woman who is seeing her lover again for the first time after a long while apart during which she feared he was dead. I am not sure it would have worked with the new timeline.
“That’s really all I can say on this issue. The scene was always intended to be disturbing… but I do regret if it has disturbed people for the wrong reasons.”
We usually do not post quotes of such length, but there is so much valuable stuff Martin says here that it is hard to omit anything. He may be correct in that the circumstances and timing of Jaime’s return may have rendered his original scene impossible, and thanks to that, we wonder what the point was of there being such a scene like this at all. We feel like Benioff and Weiss wanted to keep something in here since it was such a memorable scene in the books, and due to that they pushed the limits of the characters and gave us something that was a hodgepodge designed for a “jaw-dropping moment.” But “Game of Thrones” is a show of such quality that we don’t need these moments, and if the showrunners continue to pursue these over genuine storytelling, we may be concerned about the series’ direction for the first time since the very beginning. You don’t need a Red Wedding every episode to tell a great story.
Hopefully, we’ll continue to have more reaction to this event in the future. For now, share your thoughts on it with a comment, and head over to the link here if you want to get some further TV updates from us via our CarterMatt Newsletter.
Photo: HBO