asoiaf read: catelyn in a game of thrones

i didn't take any notes on this chapter so we're going straight to the analysis.

Just like with Bran, I wondered what exactly Catelyn's arc in this book was. Across her eleven chapters, Cat's journey takes her many places. In the end, I think a lot of that had to do with shattering expectations and confronting reality, which parallels with Sansa in ways we'll discuss later.

I determined this because so many of Cat's chapters are spent thinking of the way things used to be. In her introduction, she reminisces about Riverrun and it's godswood in comparison to the one in Winterfell, and notes how different they are. This is something that happens often, especially once she travels south to find the owner of the dragonbone dagger. Cat will begin relaying her memories of a place or a person upon thought, but then she is confronted with the current reality and how it's changed.

However, one of Cat's best traits is her ability to adapt. Unlike Sansa, who is beat down by the constant shattering of her songs and stories, Catelyn simply shifts herself to what the time is offering her. That's not to say that she doesn't get clouded by the past - her putting her trust in Petyr and Lysa are evidence of this - but she tries her best to adjust when she can.

Something I want to note about Cat as a character is the fact that she is allowed to exist as more than just a mother and wife. This is something I haven't forgiven the show for, making Cat's entire character revolve around her motherhood to the point of it making her do foolish things. In this book Cat adheres to all three of the Tully words: family, but also duty, and honor.

The only time we see Cat turn into this flattened character is when after Bran's fall, and even then it's much more complex. Cat is in shock and extremely stressed by the events, and it is clear that this is not her usual mode of being. The previous chapter as well as the reaction of her and others shows this. Unlike the show, where Cat begs Ned to deny the king's wishes, in the books she urges him to go, to protect his family and Robert's. Cat is the one who realizes that she is the best candidate to go south to search for the dagger's owner. When confronted with the man she believed to have put a hit on her son, she took action against him. And when it comes to war at the end of the book, Cat gives Robb just as much council as his bannermen, without overstepping in a way that she thinks might take away his agency. She is also allowed her flaws, such as her thoughts on base born children, and trusting the past when she ought not to. She is so much more than just a weepy, nagging mother, and I can't wait to see where her journey takes her in the next book.

asoiaf read: analysis of bran in a game of thrones

okay, so I've decided that i need to come back and talk about bran's chapters and arc in this book more in depth.

When i first finished reading, i was a little unclear about what Bran's character arc was supposed to be in this book. He only has seven chapters, which doesn't seem like enough time to establish and go through any change. That mistake is easy to make, especially if you don't know the amount of time that passes in this book. All that being said, Bran definitely does have an arc.

Bran's first two chapters are used for establishing - both his character and the world he lives in. The first chapter, in particular, spends more time on world building than it does on Bran, at a glance. The beheading of the Night's Watch deserter seems more like a background for introduction to the ways of the Northerners and our characters, as well as a set up for the boys finding the dead direwolf and it's pups. Of course, that's if you're looking at this chapter outside of the context of the prologue, which we're doing just for now. The second chapter, in contrast, speaks about Bran more directly as it relays the many stories about his climbing. I think it is safe to say that Bran's love of seeing the castle from above is foreshadowing to his next chapter.

The end of the second chapter throws a wrench into everything we've been set up to believe would happen to Bran later in the book. The next time we see Bran he's in an extended dream, filled with surreal imagery and symbolism. This is our first glimpse into his endgame, and the truth of what this entire series is about: not the politics or the wars or the conquests, but the battle for survival in the face of winter. From this point onward, we are reminded again and again that this is the focus, but subtly. It is no mistake that Bran doesn't remember the circumstances of his fall except in the vaguest terms.

Chapter four chronicles Bran's introduction back into the world after his accident. Multiple times we come face to face with Bran's feelings of inadequacy due to his paraplegia. No longer able to conform to the ableist standards for which Westerosi society has set forward for him as a boy, Bran is frustrated with his lot. Yet, he insists he is not broken, a subtle push against this. But unlearning oppressive ideology is hard - when presented with his saddle plans, Bran's mind goes to war and how he could learn to fight on horseback pretty quickly. I think it is important that it is Tyrion, a fellow outcast due to ableism, that provides the plans for Bran's saddle. I think it means a lot more coming from him, another person who has spent much of his life looking for ways to be mobile in this oppressive society. It's a genuine attempt at help, rather than someone trying to fit Bran back into the mold in anyway they can.

This continues into his fifth chapter, where, after finally riding out of the walls on his own, Bran feels inadequate again when he can't defend himself against the Wildings that attack him. However, I think this experience works to let Bran know that a warrior's life is not for him -  not because he is paralyzed, but because he isn't cut out for it mentally. He is no Theon, and no Robb, even keeping the age gaps in mind. He is no Arya. Hopefully, he will realize that this is fine. Of course, it will not happen in this book. Unlearning oppressive ideology takes time. Once chapter 6 comes around, it is shown that Bran is beginning to become more comfortable with himself and his disability.

Throughout these two chapters, we have subtle reminders of the real threat, in the way of Old Nan's story about the Others, and even the Wildlings raiding in the woods. These come again in chapter 6, where Osha, the captured Wilding woman, tells Bran that Robb needs to march his army north, not south - toward the true problem, and not the distraction. Of course, we know he does not listen, but that is not Robb's fault - he doesn't have much to go off of. What's important is that Bran is listening, and that the things he saw in his dream, and what the crow has told him, haven't fallen on deaf ears. Bran is no longer afraid of the weirwood tree.

Bran's last chapter brings us to the climax of his arc in this book, away from the traditional male role. Again, we see that Bran does cling to some vestiges of this other path, reminiscing about his sword practice with Prince Tommen and wondering if he could go to war riding Hodor's back - remember, unlearning oppressive ideology is hard. But this chapter is also the beginning of a new journey for Bran. His dream of the crow, and his father in the crypts, is the first of his green dreams that he actually remembers. His father's death hangs over his head before it even happens. From this point forward, Bran's life will be led along by prophecy, an aspect he shares with many characters that lived before his time. Slowly,we begin to see how Bran will be directed away from Winterfell and toward the far north, as he learns about the First Men and the children of the forest. Bran's new journey that begins with this chapter, is that of the greenseer.

Lorde, a continuation (or: why White Teeth Teens is awesome)

As the title states, I'm not done talking about Lorde just yet, but I didn't want to weigh down my other post by wandering off topic.

Starting where we left off in my previous post, in my eyes Royals is like a glaring red mark on what is otherwise a pretty stellar track record. It seems especially so when you consider that Lorde has covered similar topics multiple times, and she did it better, and without being racist or otherwise offensive.

The most obvious comparison is the song Team, her third single to be released. This song is what Royals wanted to be: a song about how Lorde and her friends don't care that they're poor, because they make the best of it and have fun anyway. Hell, she even mentions how she's tired of a mainstream trend in this one as well, but this time around her representative line is one that's ubiquitous in anything you could label as 'club' or 'party' music - the phrase 'throw your hands in the air'  doesn't really specify any genre or group of artists. "I'm kind of over being told to throw my hands up in the air" has a similarly nonchalant tone, but this one comes across as much more ambivalent and breezy, as opposed to the more sneering and condescending 'we're not caught up in your love affair'. I have no trouble imagining a playful shrug as she throws out the words, "so there".

White Teeth Teens is another that I thought of. I feel like I can't bring up this song without bringing up The Love Club, from the eponymous EP (which is no longer available, to my knowledge, but the song in on the deluxe version of the album). This is only because these two songs are really similar; I'd almost say eerily so if they weren't by the same artist. White Teeth Teens could almost be seen as a remake or retelling of The Love Club - it has the same themes and a similar story, but, in my opinion, is much more fluid and coherent as a narrative. The Love Club kind of jumps around with telling what's happened to Lorde, while White Teeth Teens happens in chronological order and has discernible settings and scenes.

Like Royals, White Teeth Teens concerns Lorde and rich folks, but whereas Royals flippantly insults the way you choose to spend your money in its quest to show how much Lorde doesn't care about said rich folks, White Teeth Teens sits you down and describes a series of events with the aforementioned clique - basically, it shows instead of telling. There is also a change in premise that works to this song's advantage - Lorde is with them, which lends to her credibility as a narrator. Royals!Lorde doesn't seem like the kind of person who's ever had a conversation with a rich person, let alone befriended one. White Teeth Teen!Lorde is relaying this info to you first hand, and therefore it feels more genuine.

This song is also subtle. While it's obvious that she's in a clique (something that happens in like 70% of her songs that include more than one other character), Lorde never comes right out and says that it's a clique of rich kids. You're trusted to glean this information from the language she uses to talk about them. She refers to the leader of the clique as the Empress, for example. The fact that they're even called the White Teeth Teens speaks to this: their teeth are so white that they glow, which means that they aren't just using whitening strips and good brushing techniques; they're getting them professionally done, something it costs good money to do.

Lastly, and this is one of my favorite parts, this song has the nerve to have a plot twist in the form of a reveal. After taking you on a journey through a night with these kids as they drink and preen and seemingly wreak some havoc, Lorde pulls the listener aside and informs you that she's not actually a White Teeth Teen. And it really is constructed that way - listen for yourself. At about 2:17 in, her voice starts singing "and everything worked out so good/I wear the robe like no one could" repeatedly, and over this Lorde starts talking directly to the listener, using the word 'you' for the first time, saying that she has 'something big' to tell us. She then goes on to say that she never really fit in with them because it's 'in the blood'.

This is something that comes up in Royals too, and one of the reasons I related the two - they share the idea that this isn't something you can really come into, instead having to inherit it. Lorde could never truly be a White Teeth Teen - or a Royal, for that matter - because she doesn't come from the same crop. However, the hip-hop indicators in Royals render this point nonsensical, since a large number of black rappers (including Jay Z and 50 Cent, two of the ones she most closely implicated) came from close to nothing before they got big. In White Teeth Teens it makes a lot more sense, because she's not just talking about being born into money, but also being raised in an entirely different culture from ones that those of us less fortunate are.

These last few lines manage to throw a new trope onto the song that cast the rest of it into an entirely different light. Suddenly, Lorde's reliability as a narrator is called into question. She says straight up that she 'tried to join, but never did', so what events is she relating in the verses? Are they from when she tried to join? Or did she make it all up? She's still a liar either way - in the former because she uses the word 'us' in the chorus, which tricks you into thinking she's one of them, and in the latter because she made the whole thing up. It's hard to settle on either of these, though, because of that constantly repeating line playing in the background. Is that a statement of denial now, because she never got in? It doesn't seem that way, judging by the mood of the song, but it could definitely be read that way in both cases. Did it only exist to cement the idea of Lorde being a White Teeth Teen in our heads before she pulled the rug out from under us? Was she tricking us this entire time? The possibilites pile up the more you examine it.

That being said, the explanation that came to me while listening is that Lorde is lying, just not to us. She's in the clique, but she lacks the pedigree, and is pretending to be something she's not. I think this neatly explains a lot of aspects of the song - why it's in first person, the use of we in relation to the clique, etc. This idea came to me because of the admission. Like I said above, it seems to be done in the form of an aside, but with the two theories I posited above, that doesn't make much sense. If you look at it this way, however, it's like that because she's telling us a secret - the biggest of her secrets in fact. It even explains the lines she's speaking over: they're there because they represent the facade, that she belongs (i wear the robe like no one could), and this is being projected toward the rest of the clique while she breaks the fourth wall to speak to us, hence while it's in the background. The return of the chorus after this is her putting the fourth wall back up and resuming her place, her secret safe with us, and from the rest of the crew.

It's stuff like this that makes me wonder if Royals was included on the full album outside for any reason besides its popularity. It really has no place amongst stuff like this and Buzzcut Season and Ribs; it just falls flat in comparison. Why listen to something that's implicit in the oppression of a marginalized people when you can listen to a layered story like this?

how lorde slipped up in royals, or: i finally figured out why i stopped listening to this song despite it not bothering me that much initially

I know I'm late to the game (on a formal post, anyway), but while I was in the shower this morning I had a revelation.

So, as some of you already know, Lorde's uber-popular song Royals hit some sour notes back when it started to get really big, for reasons of, "us black folks are getting really tired of white folks telling us that rap culture is materialistic without understanding why it's that way". I've always agreed with this stance, but I used to argue that, compared to some other forays into this area, Royals was the tamest one I'd seen, mostly because of the song's very laid back, almost apathetic, attitude. Despite this, I still stopped listening to the song, because something about it bothered me. I was never able to quite put my finger on it, until today.

I do stand by what I'd said about the song's mood - there's nothing even a little bit aggressive about this song - but there is something a bit insidious lurking beneath it's chill surface. At a glance, the parts of the song that make you cry foul are the things she lists off as what "everybody's like" - particularly the Maybach, Cristal, diamonds on your 'timepiece', and the gold teeth (and possibly the grey goose). She could have chosen anything, and pretty much did for literally everything else (tigers on a gold leash?), but instead she chose to include these hip-hop indicators - products that frequently appear in rap music by black artists. The real problem, and the thing that turns this song racist, is the line "we're not caught up in your love affair".

Um,

See, here's the thing: without that line, the song could easily be (and was meant to be, i'm sure) one about how Lorde and her friends don't care to be rich, don't want to be rich, and have fun even though they aren't rich, even with the hip-hop indicators. However, the combination of those and the aforementioned line changes everything - suddenly, she's talking down to these people - not just shallow rich people or even 'fame whores', but also black rappers, group of people made up mostly of people who were dirt poor before they got enough money to even begin to think about any of those things. The idea of 'rap materialism' is one that tends to forget that small fact. Are there rappers that are materialistic? Yeah, definitely, but do they need Lorde, or any other white person, to tell them that? No.

And it's not like there's really anyway we could look around this, because the stuff she chose to call out is pretty specific. Go listen to a Jay Z bragging song, preferably from the mid-2000s. Or a 50 Cent song from around the same period. She very nearly called these guys out by name. Do I think that Lorde knew what she was implicating when she wrote this? Probably not; most white people don't get they don't have a place criticizing aspects of black culture. Hell, a lot of non-black people don't understand that rap is a part of black culture and not just a music genre. But that doesn't mean we can excuse this from Lorde, or anyone else.

And this song could have been saved. Had Lorde kept on with whatever motivated her to mention tigers on a gold leash and listed other outlandish, nearly cartoonish rich people antics, the line about  not getting 'caught up in your love affair' could have worked. What should have been a fun, harmless song gets relegated to a trash bin full of condescending lectures toward the wrong people, all because of ten words and a single line. It's a shame that such a talented storyteller has this blemish on her record because she's yet another white person who doesn't know what white privilege is (and even worse because only a few of us see it this way).

deconstructing the good woman/bad woman dichotomy in the tdk trilogy

ah, dichotomies, the bane of every person who isn't a... well, actually dichotomies hurt everyone, but i'm not here to talk about real life ones (atm anyway). i here to talk about the one i mentioned in my last post: the good/bad dichotomy in chris nolan's female characters. (i'm only focusing on the tdk trilogy because i haven't seen any of his movies outside of it except inception.)

like i said, this thing is really, really false. even without factoring characters and characterization, i can tell that the thing was something inadvertently made up by the fans. it probably started as them pointing out a flaw and now they're trying to stick all the girls in there. "but frankie, but frankie, why is it so easy to put them in there at a first glance though?" that's answered easily: it's because nolan doesn't write enough women. when you make a series of three movies with a big cast of characters you should have more than six females among them. that even number makes it more than easy enough to separate them into dumb groups without a second glance. for two, this dichotomy in general ignores nolan's work deconstructing yet another dichotomy: the one between good and evil. also, misogyny, because you sure don't see anyone trying to force the male characters into these limited moral spaces!

but yeah, to the girls. i mentioned the four main female characters in my other post - rachel, anna, selina, and talia - and how they 'fit' into the dichotomy. of course, it doesn't work that easily. for one, three of these four girls slide around the grey area more than batman does, really. rachel is the only girl that can be called good, but that's because she dies before she can be forced to do things that would put her into the grey area as well. the good/bad thing really flattens the characters into two-dimensional caricatures of the things nolan actually wrote.

i wanna talk about talia next because she's the only one who might fit into the 'bad' category, but even then it's only because she doesn't care about what her father really stood for - if she did she would be an antivillian like her dad and bane. her revenge makes her a bit more shallow in terms of morality compared to selina and anna.

i like anna because she's one of the characters that sits right in the grey; she's a cop on the mob's payroll but it's only because she wants to help her mom. she has a hand in rachel's death but it was unknowingly. she refuses to sit firmly in the 'good' or 'bad' area - she's the epitome of what nolan was trying do, really.

selina is a fun one as well, because she's also firmly in the grey; she's a jewel thief, but only because she can't get any higher in life because of her record. she has no qualms with killing, but the only people she kills are people who are endangering her (of course, us having spent so much time with batman skews our perspective on this). she even has a sort of code when it comes to her stealing. she's a darker shade of grey, but still grey nonetheless.

and this isn't even counting the fact that to put the dichotomy in effect you have to erase the three neutral female characters from the story: barbara gordon, judge surillo, and talia's mother. all three put into the plot of one of the movies in some way but aren't there enough (or are too dead) to reallly have an established moral compass.

like i mentioned above, the real problem here is the fact that there are only seven of these guys amongst a sea of complex male characters. let's not make it worse by trying to erase pieces of their characterization, please?

subverting tropes with c. nolan

okay guys.

so yesterday there was a post on my tumblr dashboard about how the marvel movies do better than the dark knight trilogy at portraying women. i'm not really here to talk about that rn, because i made a lot of posts about it on my blog already (here, if you wanna see them idk), but i'll just tell you that i agree with the sentiment but literally every argument, while they do apply to the portrayal of women in media, doesn't apply to the tdk trilogy. but, like i said, that's not what i'm here to talk about. while i was talking about that i mentioned that the only time nolan really did something interesting with his female chars was in inception. i mentioned how in his movies if there are two female chars one is usually good and one is bad and that's annoying, we all know that. in inception he subverts that with both of the girls.

there are a lot of ways to interpret inception, but the two most popular are the theories the one where mal was right (cobb is in some super deep dream state), and the one where she's wrong (she's really dead). there are others, and even within those two there are separate subtheories, but i'm gonna focus on these two supertheories for this.

in the movie, mal is presented as a sort of villain: not only does she get in the way of jobs, she has no problems with killing them in the one occasion where death has some kind of weight in a dream. she's dangerous, and it's only because cobb confronts her that the team can complete the job. ariadne, on the other hand, is the team's architect, and is one of the most important members of the team even before she makes cobb take her into the dream with them. she builds the mazes, and is the one who sees through cobb and actually takes initiative to do something so that the team won't be compromised by mal in the field. from what i've said above, you can deduce that they fall neatly into the categories most female characters do in a nolan story: ariadne is the good one, and mal is the bad one, right?

but it's not that easy.

to say that mal is the 'villain' and that ariadne is some kind of 'hero' is grossly simplifying both women.

in the case of ariadne, it's a bit simpler: if you've seen inception more than once while simultaneously having an internet connection, you know that the team aren't heroes. you don't have to look far to see it; miles straight up calls cobb wanting ariadne to work with them corruption. she's not neutral, but ari isn't exempt because she's new either. she's not the good one, she's just another person helping the protagonist.

now onto mal. there are two things that need to be put out there right now: 1, mal is still the antagonist. antagonists don't have to be evil, nor do they have to be villains, they just have to be against the protagonist, and she is. 2, mal does qualify as an anti-villain: on the sliding scale of anti-villains, she's a solid type four. 

however, like i said, to say that she's a villain at all is still simplifying the character a lot, and when you really look at it she doesn't really fit into the list of 'bad' women in nolan's films.* first off, her MO is super important. her whole motivation in the movie is getting cobb to realize that the world he's living in isn't real, and that he needs to come back home. whether you agree with her or not, that's not really that villainous or evil or even that bad. her means are more than a bit dodgy, let's be honest here, but in the end she doesn't want to ruin their job, she's just willing to do it if it'll get her husband to wake up. 

secondly, you have to take into account that mal isn't real. (this is where subtheories can make things mucky, but let's work under assumption that in both theories she's a projection.**) sure, she gets in the way of the crew at times when they're trying to work, but she's a projection, and an extension of cobb. take away all the layers, and the thing that's really getting in the way of the team is cobb's subconscious. ariadne says as much when cobb stops her from asking him about the layout. so, really, if you're really pressed about inception not having a villain, it does have one: it's cobb.

"but frankie, but frankie, cob can't be the villain! he's the protagonist!"

i said it above, but i'll say it again: the antagonist isn't always a villain, and the villain isn't always the antagonist. the protagonist can be evil just as easily as your antagonist can be good; heck, sometimes they're both evil, and sometimes they're both alright folks! protagonist is just term that means 'person/people we're following'. that's it. it doesn't mean 'hero' or 'good guy' or anything else, just that. mal is an antagonist because she's opposing cobb, but cobb is the villain because he's really the one getting in the way - also, not to mention the little stunt he pulled with not telling everyone about limbo. if you want to take it even further, you could say that cobb is the antagonist as well, since mal is an extension of him. 

so, in reality, the nolan dichotomy doesn't work here, as the 'good' woman isn't really good, just on our side, and the 'bad' woman isn't even real.

* my real problem with the good/bad dichotomy is that it's actually false (they all are, lbr). going off of the four nolan films that i've seen, it seems like it works - rachel is the good one and anna ramirez is the bad one, selina is the good one and talia is the bad one - but that completely ignores a) the nuances of the last three (rachel is a bit too saintly, but that's for another day), and b) the other three women who have some kind of presence in the dark knight and the dark knight rises. this is something i ought to discuss in a separate post though.

** there's a subtheory within the 'mal was right' camp that says that she was the real thing, and that she was really there and all that jazz. i'm not really here to argue that that was wrong, because i needed to make a point, but i will say that if that was the real mal why was she acting that way???