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SPOILER WARNING If you only watch the show, this thread will spoil you of future events in HBO's Game of Thrones. Thread contains discussion of all books of the series A Song of Ice and FireClick Here for the spoiler-free thread. |
On August 30 2013 05:26 GreenGringo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:16 ComaDose wrote:
I don't understand why you think giving women super powers is feminist and unbelievable and giving men super powers is normal. Sorry, which male PoV characters have super powers, again? The secret warging abilities that remain dormant for most of the series? Are Davos' onion-smuggling skills supposed to be super powers?
Wargs, they're vastly male so far
Jaquen H'gar
The Clegane Brothers (giants)
Aeron Damphair
And thats only counting the ones that are actual straight up freaks. There are also a large number of characters that are unbelievably good at battle starting from really young ages. The book really isn't believable anyway, so making the vast majority of women subordinate and weak for the sake of "realism" is sillly.
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On August 30 2013 05:31 GreenGringo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:20 Bigtony wrote:
The explanation for Brienne being a good fighter is pretty legit. She's the only child of a relatively wealthy lord but also hideous. Has the resources available to train, and no one really wants to marry her. She's a bit of an outlier physically (6ft + tall, very masculine body type), but not impossible.
IDK what is so unbelievable about that. Lol... 6 feet with greater strength than strong men isn't "a bit of an outlier". It's a huge outlier. A woman has to be an outlier to even compete with a man of average strength, let alone someone like Jaimie Lannister.
Do note that she probably isn't up to par with pre-handloss Jaime. Plus genetic freaks do exist.
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On August 30 2013 05:31 GreenGringo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:20 Bigtony wrote:
The explanation for Brienne being a good fighter is pretty legit. She's the only child of a relatively wealthy lord but also hideous. Has the resources available to train, and no one really wants to marry her. She's a bit of an outlier physically (6ft + tall, very masculine body type), but not impossible.
IDK what is so unbelievable about that. Lol... 6 feet with greater strength than strong men isn't "a bit of an outlier". It's a huge outlier. A woman has to be an outlier to even compete with a man of average strength, let alone someone like Jaimie Lannister.
I don't think there is anything in the series to suggest that Jaime has exceptional physical strength in relation to other men.
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On August 30 2013 05:32 Acrofales wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:26 GreenGringo wrote:On August 30 2013 05:16 ComaDose wrote:
I don't understand why you think giving women super powers is feminist and unbelievable and giving men super powers is normal. Sorry, which male PoV characters have super powers, again? The secret warging abilities that remain dormant for most of the series? Are Davos' onion-smuggling skills supposed to be super powers? Have you even read the books? Ridiculous question. I already mentioned the wargs. Don't you realize how appalling dishonest it is to accuse someone of being ignorant and then going on to adduce as evidence EXACTLY the thing he just mentioned?
As for Greenseer powers: they fall into the same category as warg powers. Dormant for most of the series and looming in the background except for a few Bran chapters in the last one. Hardly compares to the in-your-face, superhuman powers of Dany, Melissandre, Arya or Brienne.
On August 30 2013 05:32 Acrofales wrote:I think we can home in on Tyrion who just happens to have people around him ALL the time to protect him from certain death.
Sam the Slayer. Sorry...how is being a midget a super power, again? How is being fat and cowardly and getting a lucky hit with dragon glass a power?
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On August 30 2013 01:03 GreenGringo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 29 2013 21:39 TSORG wrote:On August 29 2013 20:44 GreenGringo wrote:On August 28 2013 06:40 Redox wrote:
I actually think what GRRM did to Cercei was the meanest thing he has done to any character. She had always been an evil, scheming bitch of mediocre intelligence. But now he really assassinated her character by making her really stupid, paranoid, delusional, a whore, an alcoholic etc. And to finish it all off he has her driven naked through the city for all to see, including her breaking down and losing the last of her dignity. Because a simple death like for other characters would have been too kind.
In the light of this I think its pretty funny that some people called GRRM feminist, because there are some women with power or whatever. In fact though they are mostly irrational because they are overly emotional, involved in major fuckups, responsible for the downfall of their families etc.
All of the intelligent or lets say rational people who are actually good at the game of thrones are men (Tywin, Tyrion, Kevan, Roose Bolton, Littlefinger, Varys, Illyrio, Doran Martell, etc). Maybe the Queen of Thornes being the only exception. But that's history for you. More male politicians. Equal male and female politicians would have resulted in a series that has little in common with European history, which is not the "look and feel" that GRRM was going for. Characters like Dany, Brienne and Arya are proof that GRRM is quite happy to make unrealistic characters for the sake of having girls who are just as strong as boys. What more is he supposed to do? Fill his novels with unrealistic feminist characters? strong female rulers were not exactly common in history but theyre also not that rare. Queen Boudica, Empress Maud, Mathilda of Tuscany are some examples of "strong" female rulers. Female warriors were more rare ofcourse, but Jeanne d'Arc is a famous example, and i think also the inspiration for Brienne. Well Dany is the strongest of rulers at the sweet age of 14. That's why I say she's unrealistic as a character. Indeed, she's inherently unrealistic due to the "dragonborn" aspect of her story. Brienne is unrealistic not because she has strong character, but because she's one of the best swordfighters in Westeros and as strong as the strongest of men. We don't have girls near the top of the field even in Starcraft. Add in the physical component and the odds of a person like Brienne occurring in real life drop to almost vanishing. Arya, do I need to mention her? She cuts down soldiers left and right even as a ten-year-old pup.
Dany is believable. She has the advantage of her bloodline, inheriting a Khalsar from Drogo, and somewhat of a deity factor going for her. The last one is obtained by unrealistic means, but this is a fantasy what do you want. For the other two, there have been many female rulers that have walked that path.
Arya is also quite believable. Tomboys do exist, but more importantly so do child assassins. Much like her real life counterparts, Arya doesn't kill by cutting soldiers down, but by being unexpected and sneaky. If you follow her story closely she slowly becomes increasingly desensitized to the violence. Which makes sense, considering her POV chapters are probably the most violent.
Brienne is probably the most far fetched admittedly. Still, this is a feudalistic world and Brienne does have the nobility thing going for her. Therefore, it isn't too crazy that she'd have the environment to improve her swordmanship, I mean she DID have a master-at-arms for her tutor.
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All of this debate is silly. There are dragons and zombies and all kinds of crazy magic and yet we think its justified for GRRM to protray women as weak and subordinate because of "realism". A lot of praise for both scifi and fantasy genres is that they can use an alternative universe to transcend the biases and prejudices of the world that we live in. GRRM utterly fails to do that, and ends up with a world that mirrors or even magnifies our current biases.
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I'm sorry GreenGringo you have repeated many times that brienne has in your face super human power but I have no idea what you are talking about. Shes just a tall muscular skilled woman.
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On August 30 2013 06:05 ComaDose wrote:
I'm sorry GreenGringo you have repeated many times that brienne has in your face super human power but I have no idea what you are talking about. Shes just a tall muscular skilled woman.
That's a super power to him because the idea of a woman who could match the physical prowess of a man is unnacceptable to his worldview.
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On August 30 2013 06:05 ComaDose wrote:
I'm sorry GreenGringo you have repeated many times that brienne has in your face super human power but I have no idea what you are talking about. Shes just a tall muscular skilled woman. She has the condition of gigantism and then, on top of that, she happens to be a master swordsman. And doesn't suffer any personality flaws. With the exception of Dany, she's the most unrealistic character Martin ever wrote.
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On August 30 2013 06:01 FrostedMiniWheats wrote:
Brienne is probably the most far fetched admittedly. Still, this is a feudalistic world and Brienne does have the nobility thing going for her. Therefore, it isn't too crazy that she'd have the environment to improve her swordmanship, I mean she DID have a master-at-arms for her tutor. It's stretching the borders of believability, is my point, in such a way that none of the male characters do.
It proves that GRRM is a feminist. He's prepared to rig the deck to make sure he has women who can hold their own against anyone.
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On August 30 2013 06:47 GreenGringo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 06:05 ComaDose wrote:
I'm sorry GreenGringo you have repeated many times that brienne has in your face super human power but I have no idea what you are talking about. Shes just a tall muscular skilled woman. She has the condition of gigantism and then, on top of that, she happens to be a master swordsman. And doesn't suffer any personality flaws. With the exception of Dany, she's the most unrealistic character Martin ever wrote.
GRRM said: Brienne is well over six feet tall, but not close to seven, no. Just off the top of my head, I would say Brienne is taller than Renly and Jaime and significantly heavier than either, but nowhere near the size of Gregor Clegane, who is the true giant in the series. Shorter than Hodor and the Greatjon, maybe a bit shorter than the Hound, maybe roughly the same height as Robert.
not a giant. i would consider insecurity a personality flaw.
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i dont get all the fuss... i dont see that women are portrayed worse than men. perhaps there are slightly more pov characters which are male than female but thats about it.
most characters are flawed, male not less than female but of those which are almost completely flawed there are many men too.
If we count those who are truly screwed up then
Pretty much all the greyjoys are irrational bloodthirtsty or religious weirdos (except asha and perhaps theon, tho he wasnt exactly normal either)
Not to mention Gregor Glegane and his band of insane monsters.
Janos Slynt was a proper delusional nutcase and the list goes on.
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On August 30 2013 05:49 GreenGringo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:32 Acrofales wrote:On August 30 2013 05:26 GreenGringo wrote:On August 30 2013 05:16 ComaDose wrote:
I don't understand why you think giving women super powers is feminist and unbelievable and giving men super powers is normal. Sorry, which male PoV characters have super powers, again? The secret warging abilities that remain dormant for most of the series? Are Davos' onion-smuggling skills supposed to be super powers? Have you even read the books? Ridiculous question. I already mentioned the wargs. Don't you realize how appalling dishonest it is to accuse someone of being ignorant and then going on to adduce as evidence EXACTLY the thing he just mentioned? As for Greenseer powers: they fall into the same category as warg powers. Dormant for most of the series and looming in the background except for a few Bran chapters in the last one. Hardly compares to the in-your-face, superhuman powers of Dany, Melissandre, Arya or Brienne. Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:32 Acrofales wrote:I think we can home in on Tyrion who just happens to have people around him ALL the time to protect him from certain death.
Sam the Slayer. Sorry...how is being a midget a super power, again? How is being fat and cowardly and getting a lucky hit with dragon glass a power?
Being big and well-trained is a super power, according to you, but Tyrion's magic bodyguards (Bronn, Podrick, Jon Connington, and to a lesser extent Oberyn and Jaime), and somehow having an Other (an actual superpowered being) impale himself on your point of dragonglass despite being confirmed awful at anything resembling swordfighting fall entirely within the realm of normalcy for you then. Are you maybe a bit confirmation biased?
EDIT: for the record I am not saying Tyrion and Sam are unbelievable in ASOIAF, I am saying Brienne IS believable.
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On August 30 2013 05:34 packrat386 wrote:
The Clegane Brothers (giants)
Aeron Damphair
Is this some kind of really weird troll?
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On August 30 2013 14:10 forsooth wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:34 packrat386 wrote:
The Clegane Brothers (giants)
Aeron Damphair Is this some kind of really weird troll?
no...
The clegane brothers are huge. Aeron has weird ocean powers. Both of them are clearly unrealistic characters.
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On August 30 2013 14:20 packrat386 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 14:10 forsooth wrote:On August 30 2013 05:34 packrat386 wrote:
The Clegane Brothers (giants)
Aeron Damphair Is this some kind of really weird troll? no... The clegane brothers are huge. Aeron has weird ocean powers. Both of them are clearly unrealistic characters.
Being ridiculously tall is not a superpower. There are lots of people on Earth well above seven feet tall. You ever watched an NBA game? As for Aeron, he's just a religious wacko who thinks he hears god speaking to him just because he stands in the water for hours. He's no different than any religious person in the world who thinks they can divine the will of god.
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Netherlands19141 Posts
The only thing unrealistic is this whole discussion.
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On August 30 2013 05:49 GreenGringo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:32 Acrofales wrote:On August 30 2013 05:26 GreenGringo wrote:On August 30 2013 05:16 ComaDose wrote:
I don't understand why you think giving women super powers is feminist and unbelievable and giving men super powers is normal. Sorry, which male PoV characters have super powers, again? The secret warging abilities that remain dormant for most of the series? Are Davos' onion-smuggling skills supposed to be super powers? Have you even read the books? Ridiculous question. I already mentioned the wargs. Don't you realize how appalling dishonest it is to accuse someone of being ignorant and then going on to adduce as evidence EXACTLY the thing he just mentioned? As for Greenseer powers: they fall into the same category as warg powers. Dormant for most of the series and looming in the background except for a few Bran chapters in the last one. Hardly compares to the in-your-face, superhuman powers of Dany, Melissandre, Arya or Brienne. Show nested quote +On August 30 2013 05:32 Acrofales wrote:I think we can home in on Tyrion who just happens to have people around him ALL the time to protect him from certain death.
Sam the Slayer. Sorry...how is being a midget a super power, again? How is being fat and cowardly and getting a lucky hit with dragon glass a power?
Okay, first of all, this anti-feminism/feminism thing is stupid, as if there's a problem with having powerful women, and it's a fantasy realm, GRRM can do whatever the hell they want, as long as it's consistent and realistic within the established canon. Within the context of this story, plots lines are pretty logical and consistent. And there have been TONS of powerful women in history, although not the norm, they exist. As is the case in a GoT (Catherine the great, queen Elizabeth, Victoria, etc., etc.). Where you have entrenched monarchies and nobilities, your are BOUND to have some women that inherit control of their house because of a lack of a male heir, and some of those women will be strong (as is the case with men, where some will be strong, some weak).
Second of all, none of the people you talked about have super powers. The ONLY "powers" in the four women you listed were the waking dragons by Dany, and the visions/ghosts/lack of eating (see below) of Melisandre. The waking of dragons has more to do with Targaryen heritage, and was kind of a one-off thing. She has dragons. So what? Why is it more or less unrealistic to give a fucking DRAGON (a dragon, people) to a male or female character? And the Arya thing is dumb, she's a kid with really good hand-eye co-ordination who's desensitized to violence. Enuff said.
And finally, for my most important point, GRRM wanted to minimize the power of sorcery in his novels. Can you guys really think of the number of actual, 100% confirmed instances of something sorcerous going on? For Melisandre, there are only three actually confirmed powers: The fact that she has visions, how she can summon ghost assassins, and the fact that she doesn't need to eat. Visions are definitely awesome, as is the no-eating thing, and summoning ghost assassins is a pretty good skill toi have, but these are hardly world-shattering powers, particularly since the visions are often cryptic.
However, as far as killing kings with leeches, "summoning" winds and weather by burning people, control of flame, etc., think about this: If your whole persona and power derives from people perceiving that you have powers, and you can predict the future, you could EASILY make it seem like you have powers. IF you know that Robb, Joff, and Balon are going to die, why NOT concoct a stupid ritual that makes it seem like you are the cause of what happened? It would easily increase your power in the eyes of your followers. Same for "summoning" winds by burning men. It's a helluva way to eliminate potential threats to your power base, and make your followers believe in your powers more. If you know the winds are coming, you can easily make it seem like you caused them. If you know someone's going to poison you, just slip some antidote in your mouth and you're good to go (although resistance to poison could stem from the not-needing-to-eat thing, which is admittedly a cool power). Also, we know that a lot of her control of fire derived from powders. She's just got really good slight of hand with that shit (think uber-skilled magician).
Trust me, GRRM is a very intelligent, capable writer, and I strongly suspect that a lot of the "sorcery" in his novels is less powerful than may seem at first glance. The only really sorcerous people are those who receive visions, wargs (could almost just be looked at as a mutant/weird genetic trait, and again hardly a world shattering power until you can warg into everything like Bloodraven), the house of the undying, the suite of confirmed red priest powers (including a weird type of resurrection), and the others and the faceless men, but we still don't really know what the fuck their deal is. There are minor powers, but people like Melisandre probably don't have the whole suite of powers we think they do or they like to appear that they do. They're just really good at manipulating people.
GRRM drops tons of hints in his novels too, like Maesters talking about sorcery as different types of knowledge, how many people claim to be sorcerors but actually lack true powers, etc. It's like the riddle posed by Varys to Tyrion: power rests in those who people believe it rests, or something along those lines (can't remember the exact phrase, but you get the gist).
I seriously think people overestimate the level and power of sorcery in the novels. Only a few people actually have extensive powers (e.g. Bloodraven), but even they can get fucked over.
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On August 29 2013 23:51 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On August 29 2013 23:36 Selendis wrote:On August 29 2013 23:06 Acrofales wrote:On August 29 2013 22:29 Selendis wrote:On August 29 2013 20:44 GreenGringo wrote:On August 28 2013 06:40 Redox wrote:
I actually think what GRRM did to Cercei was the meanest thing he has done to any character. She had always been an evil, scheming bitch of mediocre intelligence. But now he really assassinated her character by making her really stupid, paranoid, delusional, a whore, an alcoholic etc. And to finish it all off he has her driven naked through the city for all to see, including her breaking down and losing the last of her dignity. Because a simple death like for other characters would have been too kind.
In the light of this I think its pretty funny that some people called GRRM feminist, because there are some women with power or whatever. In fact though they are mostly irrational because they are overly emotional, involved in major fuckups, responsible for the downfall of their families etc.
All of the intelligent or lets say rational people who are actually good at the game of thrones are men (Tywin, Tyrion, Kevan, Roose Bolton, Littlefinger, Varys, Illyrio, Doran Martell, etc). Maybe the Queen of Thornes being the only exception. But that's history for you. More male politicians. Equal male and female politicians would have resulted in a series that has little in common with European history, which is not the "look and feel" that GRRM was going for. I agree with you. A song of ice and fire is a deconstruction of high fantasy. And part of that I think, is showing just how sexist medieval society is. The books are full of sexism because it's a reflection of real life. Those are my thoughts anyway. For all I know Westeros society is sexist because GRRM is sexist. But I would like to think it's the former.
What more is he supposed to do? Fill his novels with unrealistic feminist characters?
Robert Jordan did a very good job at creating a matriarchal world in his wheel of time series. And it was very realistic too (for fantasy anyway). So it definitely is possible. But should GRRM do it to AOIAF? I don't think so. And yet, RJ's female characters were by far his worst. Nynaeve tugging her braid got really really cringeworthy, as did Elayne's temper tantrums. And that's without mentioning how badly Fayle was written. RJ was far better at setting the background of the matriarchal society, than actually writing about the women who ran the place. GRRM's female characters are strong because they themselves are portrayed as strong women in a society dominated by men, and this is partly because he writes them well. This is true. Martin has the easier job though. There are strong women in the real world and throughout history against the backdrop of a patriarchal society. But a matriarchy is pretty much theoretical. You really have to have a good imagination in order to work out just how a woman would behave, not only in a position of power but also in a position of power as part of the dominant gender. That's a valiant attempt at defending RJ, but mostly his forte wasn't his characters, female or otherwise. His focus was on worldbuilding, which isn't really supposed to hurt character development in theory, but tends to do it in most large series where worldbuilding is a factor.
I thought he did an excellent job with Rand. But with that said I am biased in saying so; I don't have a baseline to compare it to. Perhaps you can comment on the realism of his character...
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On August 31 2013 00:18 Selendis wrote:Show nested quote +On August 29 2013 23:51 Nebuchad wrote:On August 29 2013 23:36 Selendis wrote:On August 29 2013 23:06 Acrofales wrote:On August 29 2013 22:29 Selendis wrote:On August 29 2013 20:44 GreenGringo wrote:On August 28 2013 06:40 Redox wrote:
I actually think what GRRM did to Cercei was the meanest thing he has done to any character. She had always been an evil, scheming bitch of mediocre intelligence. But now he really assassinated her character by making her really stupid, paranoid, delusional, a whore, an alcoholic etc. And to finish it all off he has her driven naked through the city for all to see, including her breaking down and losing the last of her dignity. Because a simple death like for other characters would have been too kind.
In the light of this I think its pretty funny that some people called GRRM feminist, because there are some women with power or whatever. In fact though they are mostly irrational because they are overly emotional, involved in major fuckups, responsible for the downfall of their families etc.
All of the intelligent or lets say rational people who are actually good at the game of thrones are men (Tywin, Tyrion, Kevan, Roose Bolton, Littlefinger, Varys, Illyrio, Doran Martell, etc). Maybe the Queen of Thornes being the only exception. But that's history for you. More male politicians. Equal male and female politicians would have resulted in a series that has little in common with European history, which is not the "look and feel" that GRRM was going for. I agree with you. A song of ice and fire is a deconstruction of high fantasy. And part of that I think, is showing just how sexist medieval society is. The books are full of sexism because it's a reflection of real life. Those are my thoughts anyway. For all I know Westeros society is sexist because GRRM is sexist. But I would like to think it's the former.
What more is he supposed to do? Fill his novels with unrealistic feminist characters?
Robert Jordan did a very good job at creating a matriarchal world in his wheel of time series. And it was very realistic too (for fantasy anyway). So it definitely is possible. But should GRRM do it to AOIAF? I don't think so. And yet, RJ's female characters were by far his worst. Nynaeve tugging her braid got really really cringeworthy, as did Elayne's temper tantrums. And that's without mentioning how badly Fayle was written. RJ was far better at setting the background of the matriarchal society, than actually writing about the women who ran the place. GRRM's female characters are strong because they themselves are portrayed as strong women in a society dominated by men, and this is partly because he writes them well. This is true. Martin has the easier job though. There are strong women in the real world and throughout history against the backdrop of a patriarchal society. But a matriarchy is pretty much theoretical. You really have to have a good imagination in order to work out just how a woman would behave, not only in a position of power but also in a position of power as part of the dominant gender. That's a valiant attempt at defending RJ, but mostly his forte wasn't his characters, female or otherwise. His focus was on worldbuilding, which isn't really supposed to hurt character development in theory, but tends to do it in most large series where worldbuilding is a factor. I thought he did an excellent job with Rand. But with that said I am biased in saying so; I don't have a baseline to compare it to. Perhaps you can comment on the realism of his character...
Rand was okay, but Brandon Sanderson murdered him, imho. + Show Spoiler +The internal struggle between light and dark was rather poorly done, imho. He also murdered Padan Faine (although I'm not sure it was Sanderson or the notes he got: Faine's ending was incredibly anti-climatic).
Anyway, I don't think anybody is contesting that people enjoyed reading WoT, and you can even enjoy reading about the characters and their development, but WoT was principally a world-building series, and didn't focus much on creating consistent characters. Characters were plot-devices to develop a story about the world. The main characters were okay, but you notice the inconsistencies in the supporting cast. Cadsuane, for example, is supposed to be a very intelligent and capable woman, yet she does incredibly stupid stuff when around Rand. Sure, you can yell "ta'veren", but ta'veren is a terrible plot device that destroys character development. It basically preempts any logical explanation for why a character does something.
And all of Egwene, Nynaeve, Elayne, Aviendha, Min and Siuan go completely doofus because of love (or in Elayne's case it gets even worse because pregnancy!), despite being otherwise very capable and intelligent women (who also have inexplicable bouts of stupid because the plot requires it).
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