There have been plenty of TV moments that critics and viewers have declared ‘crossed a line’.
I’m thinking of shocking moments like when Spike assaulted Buffy, the time Negan introduced Glenn to Lucille, or Black Mirror’s very first episode (if you know, you know).
Yet arguably the best TV series of the 2010s made a name for itself in doing things that other TV shows would never dare to do.
I’m writing, of course, about Game of Thrones, a show where heroes were slaughtered, villains triumphed, and the good trampled under the boot of tyranny.
From its very first episode, which ended with the attempted murder of a child who’d witnessed incest, Game of Thrones was deliberately transgressive.
Yet despite its reputation for pushing boundaries, it took until season five for critics to claim the series had ‘crossed a line’.
Ten years ago today, the season five finale, Mother’s Mercy, aired, during which Jon Snow was betrayed by his brothers, Daenerys was captured by the Dothraki, and Myrcella was murdered.
However, it wasn’t those stories that shocked fans and critics alike; it was Cersei Lannister’s (Lena Headey) penance walk.
This scene saw the former queen of Westeros walk through the streets of King’s Landing naked while the common folk pelted her with rotten food.
When you read those words, it may sound a bit tame – especially considering the moment has evolved into the ‘shame’ meme – but it genuinely was horrible to see Cersei, a character who’d always seemed so in control, robbed of her dignity and pride.
The scene was criticised at the time for being gratuitously cruel, overly long, and a lazy attempt to drum up sympathy for a widely despised character.
In their article for EW, Melissa Maerz – titled ‘Cersei’s walk of shame: Too much on Game of Thrones?’ – wrote that what bothered her was how ‘sexual violence and humiliation have become TV’s laziest trick for getting viewers to sympathise with cold female characters.’
She went on to say, ‘There are more creative ways to create empathy for Cersei without resorting to sexual humiliation’.
The walk, however, did inspire a lot of sympathy for Cersei.
A quick scroll through the comments under the clip on YouTube will show lots of fans saying how they hated Cersei, but that this scene had made them feel sorry for her.
Here’s the thing, though, I think Cersei’s penance walk was just the final bow from a season that taught the Game of Thrones creators the wrong lesson.
You see, season five generated a lot of controversy. Beyond Cersei’s walk there was the brutal murder of Shireen and Sansa Stark’s rape all of which shocked viewers and got the series a lot of publicity.
After this season, I think Game of Thrones – in the absence of books to adapt – became addicted to shock and scandal.
That’s why we got moments that seemed spectacular in the moment – I’m thinking specifically about Cersei blowing up the Sept of Baelor – but don’t make much sense when you stop and think about it (why would anyone follow Cersei after this?).
This wasn’t a huge problem in season six, but as we moved into seasons seven and eight, characters seemed to keep losing IQ points between episodes, acting in stranger and more ridiculous ways.
What went wrong with Game of Thrones?
Our Deputy TV Editor Tom Percival shares where Game of Thrones went wrong…
Game of Thrones fell off in a big way in its last two seasons, and there are a couple of reasons why.
As we’ve addressed in this piece, the series got in a sort of arms race with itself, with each season trying to up the spectacle and surprises at the expense of its characters and the story it was trying to tell.
It’s also undeniable that the series lost its way a little when it ran out of books to adapt, leaving the writers with only a vague idea of where George R.R. Martin planned on taking the books.
Finally, and I think this is probably the biggest problem, everyone working on it was exhausted after a decade of making the show. I think this led to them rushing the final season and caused the massive pacing issues (especially around Daenerys’ turn to the dark side).
It was clear the show had become more and more dependent on scandal and shock as the quality of the writing waned.
This all culminated, of course, with the much-maligned season eight finale, where Jon Snow killed Daenerys after she went mad and torched King’s Landing.
This ending, while undeniably surprising, was widely criticised as rushed and poorly executed.
And you know what put the show on the road to ruin? I think it was Cersei’s first few steps of her penance walk.
All eight seasons of Game of Thrones are available to stream now on NOW.
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