What Do You Say To Death?

[CletusMusashi]

This is a thread to talk about death on the show, as general or as specific as you like. Long ramblings about what you think the Westerosi afterlife is like are fine. So are one sentence posts such as "Haha, fuck you, Joffrey!"

 

Which brings me to my own first post about death. GoT has a reputation for killing so many people left and right that "life is cheap," yet I feel that it actually tends to take death very seriously.

 

I should have been dancing and laughing when Joffrey died, but a king getting killed is a big deal, and triggers off a huge chain of events on those who are still living.. I was, and in fact still am, way too worried about what happens next to enjoy what just happened. Watching him get slapped and humiliated tended to make me giggle much more.

 

I loved watching The Hound insult Polliver, and I loved watching him throw a table at him. But I didn't love watching Arya kill him. I didn't mind it, any more than I minded Joffrey dying. But I didn't cheer at his death. I just thought "Well, good riddance." I understood her wanting him to remember who she was and what he'd done, and I wasn't offended by it, but, again, I didn't cheer at it.

 

Honestly, the only time during this series that I've actually laughed or gloated over someone dying the way I do at a good kill in, say, a Schwarzenegger movie, was when Dany took over the Unsullied and her dragon flame-roasted Evil Ghandi. I think that was partly because every single part of that story arc played out exactly as expected. It wasn't about shock. It was about showing that a cliche can still be awesome if it's done well. And also... the Essos storyline seems to be the most traditionally fantasy-based. It's the story where beautiful princesses frolic around with their pet dragons and their army of suitors (albeit some suitors less qualified than others,) and free all the slaves, punish bad guys, and kick ass whenever any conflict whatsoever arises.

 

But in the Westeros arcs, death doesn't involve dragons or pink unicorns nearly as much as it involves your victim's angry relatives. Death, on most of the show, isn't Rambo blowing up a guy with an AK47 by shooting an exploding arrow at him. Most of the time, death is just death. It's serious business, and I appreciate the writers for their ability to so regularly depict it as such.

[Constantinople]

I've noticed that the idea of death is often connected to Braavos.

Syrio Forrel, former First Sword of Braavos, said that there is only one God, and his name is Death.

Jaqen H'gar is an assassin from, or based out of, Braavos. When Ayra decides to search for her family rather than travel with him, Jaqen gave her a Braavosi coin and told her if she ever changed her mind to give the coin to someone from Braavos and say "Valar Morghoulis", which we now know means "All men must die"

To figure out which of the leaders of the Second Sons would kill Daenerys, Meero proposed they put 3 coins in a hat, one from Braavos, one from Volantis, and one from somewhere else, and that whoever selected the Braavosi coin kill Daenerys.

Not sure how the Iron Bank fits in that.

[Constantinople]

Another type of death is social death.

 

When a man join's the Night's Watch, he gives up all rank, title, lands.  Whatever inheritance he has will pass to the next heir in line.  In effect, it's as if he died.  I don't recall if Qhorin ever told Jon that they're both already dead, but he seemed to intimate it.  Admittedly, this doesn't mean much for many of their "recruits", but it could still mean that another son, a daughter or a cousin inherits a farm, or a tavern or something even smaller.

 

The realms of the dead and the living aren't meant to cross.  That's why it's the Night's Watch that fights the army of the undead, the wights, and their masters, the White Walkers.  It's also why the penalty for deserting the Night's Watch is death.  It puts the two realms back in their proper relationship with one another.  Yoren, in this view, is a type of grim reaper, which is why he's permitted to visit the land of the living.

 

I'm not saying this is the actual rationale used in Westeros, only a kind of anthropological explanation.

 

(On a side note, that's why there' something very wrong with Thoros raising Beric back from the dead so many times.  Beric is where he shouldn't be.  At the very least, if "only death can pay for life", he owes the Red God 6 or 7 deaths for his continued re-incarnations).

 

The Kingsguard is similar to the Night's Watch.  Their vows are, theoretically, for life and they forswear their inheritance, at least according to Tyrion.  I don't know if they also vow not to marry or have children, but I suspect they're supposed to be as dedicated to their job as the Night's Watch is to theirs, so if I had to guess, I'd guess yes.

 

That's one reason why Ser Jaime is such a lightning rod (the kingslaying and twincest are the other obvious reasons).  He travels back and forth between the realms of the living and the dead, depending on whether he wants to be a Lannister or a Kingsguard.  When he wants to be a Lannister, he takes Lannister soldiers to attack Ned Stark in King's Landing to warn Ned that Tyrion should be returned.  When he wants to be a Kingsguard, or at least not a Lannister, he tells his father he won't rule Casterly Rock in Tywin's stead.  But, as Maester Aemon once said, "There comes a time in each man's life when he must choose".

[CletusMusashi]

The Unsullied would also fall under what you've described. In order to make them fearless against death, their programming attempted to beat and cut most of the life out of them.

ETA: I think the Iron Bank of Braavos might have have similar connotations to "iron price," or "Iron Islands." Iron=Slaughter. 

Edited April 25, 2014 by CletusMusashi

[matilda76]

The death of Ros was very sad. Just that image of her at the end, shot through with arrows. There's something about deaths on this show of people of low birth, how within the context of the machinations of the show, they're nothing, but for the viewers, these deaths are perhaps the most cruel and brutal of all: the two farm boys burned to a crisp by Theon, villagers tortured to death by the Tickler and Polliver. And then there are the deaths that we don't actually see, but are as good as done, case in point this past Sunday with the Hound predicting the death of the farmer and his daughter. They had five minutes of screen time, and yet I won't soon forget them. You want them to be okay, but it very effectively drives home how dangerous and sinister a place Westeros has become while those who have no say in the matter are trying to cling on to their meager lives as best they can. But really, they are living on a knife's edge. 

Edited April 25, 2014 by matilda76