In a sentiment that might be reiterated until the end of media itself,Game of ThronesSeason 8 left a ruinous landscape in its wake. Practically every character fell victim to incoherent writing choices. In the best circumstances, a character simply went out with fanfare amounting to an underwhelming “kaput.” In the worst case scenarios,their arcs were mangled so poorlythat the remnants shriveled into dust out of embarrassment. Somehow, Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) suffered both fates in one go. There are as many reasons why the villainess deserved a better conclusion as there are why she was a leading, longstanding television presence: psychological complexity, a Shakespearean performance, and a viable threat to every continent. Rocks falling, killing the Lannister twins in the process, was the least satisfying ending conceivable for this particular cultural zeitgeist and left all aspects of Cersei unresolved — her acumen, her depravity, and her precarious, precious vulnerability.
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Cersei Lannister Was Always Complex
Writing and acting go hand-in-hand, but givenGame of Thrones', ahem, questionable choices, let’s grant credit where undeniable credit’s due. Lena Headey acted from the top of her head down to her toes, and then her cells threw in extra for good measure.She captured every variance demanded of a monstrously difficult character; graceful menace glittered in her glances, nuance dripped from her fingertips, and the smallest shift in how she carried herself conveyed a monologue’s worth. Headey’s Cersei was sometimes a prowling carnivore sizing up the most acutely satisfying way to devour her prey and sometimes a caged animal pacing the length of her cell and showing the whites of her eyes. She was regretful, fearful, regal, pitiable, and a primal force, often within the span of minutes.
Cersei entersSeason 1 as a reserved and cunning woman who just so happens to be committing incest with her twin brother on the regular and is probably plotting a coup to boot. (Whoops!) One of the show’s strongest points was permitting audiences an early and frequent glimpse into Cersei’s interiority;A Song of Ice and FireauthorGeorge R.R. Martindidn’t reveal Cersei’s point-of-view until book four,A Feast for Crows.If Martin spun a web of mystery surrounding the lone Lannister lioness, then HBO peeled back her layers without pause.
The women of Westeros exist as all women do but in manifold ways still too rarely depicted fictionally: they’re as sophisticated an emotional tapestry as any male protagonist deemed gritty enough to lead a genre-pushing modern fantasy. As with all people with uteruses in the patriarchal Westeros, Cersei despises the ways structuralized misogyny limits her ambitions. In her mind’s eye, as the eldest child and rightful Lannister heir, she deserves to inherit Casterly Rock and also deserves the boon of her father Tywin’s (Charles Dance) respect, whom she idolizes aspirationally.
As described by Tyrion (Peter Dinklage), Cersei is defined by greed: “For power, for honor, for love,” a personality trait that’s tragic and reflective of her circumstances. Cersei might have been villainous from day one if left to her own devices, but there’s little doubt the world she inhabits and the circumstances of her familial upbringing contributed to her insatiable craving for power and validation. All her ambitions focal down to this singular point. In one of her point-of-view chapters, Martin demonstrates the skill of his pen with this passage: “She had played the dutiful daughter, the blushing bride, the pliant wife. She had suffered Robert’s drunken groping, Jaime’s jealousy, Renly’s mockery, Varys with his titters, Stannis endlessly grinding his teeth. She had contended with Jon Arryn, Ned Stark, and her vile, treacherous, murderous dwarf brother, all the while promising herself that one day it would be her turn.”
Cersei’s Contradictory Humanity Made Her a Nuanced Character
One of Cersei’s most subversive (and therefore best) facets is how the control she craves is an unconsciously aimless sort. Her goals slide into the ether beyond “secure the throne” and “retain the throne,” and she isn’t nearly as clever as she supposes herself. She mimics Tywin’s behaviors without comprehending the mental gymnastics behind his chess game moves. As a result, Cersei’s too impulsive and grudge-holding for her own good, and her subconscious internalized misogyny is almost conscious intentionality. Rather than a lithe apex predator on the hunt, Cersei is all wildfire (wink wink) and minimal common sense — which arguably makes her far more dangerous than the logic-driven schemers.
Thanks to Westeros' multiplicity of female representation (up to a point), Cersei’s desperate, constant need for control and the banked fire of her narcissism doesn’t read as “women be dumb and reckless” sexism. Women aren’t a monolith. If Sansa Stark (Sophie Turner) wants her subjects to love her, then Cersei believes instilling fear is her only shield of protection. How could she not when little else was demonstrated?Wiping out her enemies with the wildfireis symbolic of her volatility, her calculating patience applied correctly, and the image of a one woman army against the masses. There’s no triumph in Cersei’s singular victories, but there’s sympathy: if this woman went to therapy, she would have to reckon with her agonizing loneliness.
Cersei’s love for her children is one of her most redeeming and painfully human sensibilities. That affection might be born from the fact they share her blood (just like her obsession with Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) likely stems from seeing him as her male echo), but even though her parenting skills are woefully lacking, her grief over her childrens' deaths is harrowingly real. For all her vanity, regret is no foreign emotion for the Lannister Queen. She fears that their fates are punishment for her sins; all she feels at her coronation is anger and emptiness because winning the game came at the cost of her children. She samples two overused tropes while embodying neither: the evil, ambitious mother and the caring woman softened by parenthood.
The abuse and marital rape she suffers while married to Robert Baratheon (Mark Addy) are just as appallingly real. Much like Sansa, Cersei fantasized about marrying a beautiful prince only to find married life — womanhood as a whole, even — another form of captivity, and another game she’s forced to play. The walk of atonement that spawned a thousand memes serves as her life’s culmination up to that point: degradation, violation, hatred, and left so bleeding and bruised she can barely crawl.
Cersei’s Death on ‘Game of Thrones’ Wasn’t Satisfying, and It Didn’t Honor Her Legacy
Seasons 5 and 6 steadily built to Cersei serving as Daenerys Targaryen’s (Emilia Clarke) main adversary for the Iron Throne. Cue Seasons 7 and 8: the woman with as many layers as Joseph’s dream coat had colors was reduced to drinking wine, smirking, and staring into the middle distance. Sometimes she dished out quality zingers. Mostly, she skulked around towers. Using civilians as human shields against Daenerys was quintessential Cersei to the bone, and it makes thematic sense for her actions to backfire against her for the last time.
But death via cascading debris while clutched in Jaime’s arms ain’t it.Narratively, there was no true contest for the Throne and only the barest tension. If one believes in basic narrative structures and the subtle act of foreshadowing, thenGame of Thronesspent seasons laying the thematic groundwork for Cersei, with her emotional and literal wildfire, to become the Mad Queen. Cersei would exact her revenge on the smallfolk by burning King’s Landing to ash. Jaime, her former best beloved, would go from Kingslayer to Queenslayer. Instead…rocks.
Everyone wilted under the weight of Season 8, but all of Cersei’s active contributions to the prestige fantasy series of this generation vanished. Her arc never concluded; that went out the metaphorical window with the Red Keep’s debris. Cersei deserved a death worthy of her complex characterization, pop culture legacy, and storyline importance. To add insult to injury, Cersei wasone of the series' primary female characters. Another woman meeting an unsatisfying end without consideration to her story isn’t a good look,Game of Thrones.Cersei spent her entire life clawing for more, and the lioness deserved better.
