The Game Of Thrones creator addressed criticism around how women were portrayed in the HBO series, ahead of the premiere of House Of The Dragon later this month.
It’s safe to say that many of us Game Of Thrones fans are excited for the upcoming prequel House Of The Dragon.
The show, which is set 200 years before the original fantasy series, is drumming up a whole lot of excitement ahead of its premiere on 21 August.
But alongside that excitement has been an ongoing discussion about the treatment of women in the Game Of Thrones franchise, with many sharing their concerns about the show being anti-woman and wondering how women will be perceived in House Of The Dragon.
In a recent interview, creator George RR Martin addressed these claims, saying that it is no more “anti-woman” than real-life history.
“I get inspiration from history, and then I take elements from history and I turn it up to 11,” Martin said at a Comic-Con panel in San Diego.
“Games Of Thrones is, as many people have observed, based very loosely on the War of the Roses. [House Of The Dragon] is based on an earlier period in history called the Anarchy.”
He added: “I don’t think Westeros is particularly more anti-woman or more misogynistic than real life and what we call history.”
Game Of Thrones has a long history of criticism for its treatment of women in the show.
In 2019, actor Jessica Chastain called out the series for its treatment of Sansa Stark – a character who was brutally raped during the fifth season of the show and later transformed into the powerful and stoic Queen of the North.
“Rape is not a tool to make a character stronger. A woman doesn’t need to be victimised in order to become a butterfly,” Chastain tweeted. “The little bird was always a Phoenix. Her prevailing strength is solely because of her. And her alone,” the actor wrote.
Many also criticised the torturing and hyper-sexualising of the female characters on the show. One user tweeted: “I could not get through Game Of Thrones because of all the casual rape. Rape seemed essential to all plot points involving women. And when it wasn’t rape it was torture.”
Martin’s comments come after House Of The Dragon star Olivia Cooke said the show would not feature the same kind of violence against women that was in Game Of Thrones’ early seasons.
“I wouldn’t feel comfortable in being a part of anything that has just egregious graphic violence towards women for no reason whatsoever, just because they want it to be tantalizing in a way that gets viewers,” Cooke told The Telegraph.
“I was lucky enough to read the [prequel] script before, and it has changed a lot from the first few seasons [of ‘Thrones’]. I don’t think they’d be in their right minds to include any of that any more.”
Co-showrunner and director Miguel Sapochnik told The Hollywood Reporter the production “pulls back” on the amount of consensual sex in the series, but sexual assault is still very much present in the script.
“[We] don’t shy away from it,” Sapochnik said. “If anything, we’re going to shine a light on that aspect. You can’t ignore the violence that was perpetrated on women by men in that time. It shouldn’t be downplayed and it shouldn’t be glorified.”
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