In Defence Of The Game Of Thrones Overreaction

SPOILER ALERT: In response to Mitch Knox's thoughts on the mass emotional reaction to this week's jaw-dropping episode of Game of Thrones.

We sat and stared. Three of us on the couch together, blank eyed, in shock and sick to our stomachs. For a few long minutes, no one said a word. Then one of us broke the silence - "I feel like something terrible has happened to a family member".

I'd spent that day reading the paper. It's one of my favourite things to do on the weekend, lie down and catch up on what's going on in the world. I'd been through it cover to cover – the Woolwich attack, the inquiry into Britain's torture and human rights abuses in Afghanistan, missing children, their bodies not found, missing young women, whose bodies have been found, the increase in child pornography online, Syria, Iraq, numerous countries in Africa, and a protest in Turkey that developed into a riot.  

That night, all I wanted to do was escape to Westeros for a nice wedding that would see the Starks get a step closer to justice - in Real Life, justice can be very hard to come by.

I am one of the many people who were shattered by the events that took place in Westeros early this week. Yes, I like to refer to it as a real place. I think the first question in every job interview should be “who do you think is the rightful heir to the Iron Throne?” And yeah I posted about it, I shared numerous articles and memes, watched YouTube clips, cursed HBO and George RR Martin (may the Others take him ... but not until he's finished the books) And yeah, I'm still trying to find the portal to Narnia. What of it?

The only thing that pissed me off more than the decimation of the northern army and their liege Lord was being told that my outrage and despair over events in a fictional world, was akin to “a giant, flashing neon sign” screaming that I “have no concept of what's going on in the world” and my “priorities are terrible”. Or that my “sense of rational thinking” was obliterated. Seven hells! I'm as sane as they come.

The criticism comes from a piece published earlier this week on theMusic in which the writer launched into a scathing (“it's totally fine to form emotional connections with fictional characters. Well, it better be, or pretty much my whole life is a lie. But to gaze upon the Game of Thrones fandom from an outsider's perspective must be like watching a dense child who is learning to feel things for the very first time”) attack on GoT fans who expressed intense emotional reactions to what is known as The Red Wedding.

After reading his article I asked myself – what would Tyrion do?

I believe the criticism comes from a good place. I hypothesise that it comes from anger and despair with the state of our world and the rampant injustices that occur every day to innocent, good people. And then looking around the internet and wondering why so many people rarely react with this much force when they hear that the Syrian death toll is rising.

But I hypothesise that this is exactly why the reaction was so intense. Every day we are overwhelmed by the harsh realities of our world and, unless we are willing to join the numerous amount of foreign nationals now volunteering with the Syrian opposition, we feel largely helpless when it comes to seeing out just and fair ends.

This is why we create stories, fictional worlds, places where we can alter our own realities to make them seem less of the living hell they so often are.  And we fill these worlds with as much adversity as exists in our own, but we also fill them with heroes who TRIUMPH. Where good CONQUERS EVIL (Sorry, I too believe caps lock is a great way to “emote via text”). Worlds where we can have the justice we crave in Real Life.

In slaughtering the Starks, the moral and honourable good guys trying to do the right thing in a world full of creeps, the fiction moved too close to our reality. And while I don't think a lot of fans have thought that deeply about their emotional reactions, I believe that this is where it stems from. But this is also what makes this such great fiction. It's challenging us by doing what we don't expect and what we don't want it to do. Much like Real Life.

And I pray, to the old gods and the new, that in Westeros, AND in Real Life, we will see some justice.