the psychology of CERSEI | Therapist analyzes Game of Thrones/ASOIAF

Jamie and I are more than brother and sister. We shared a womb, came into this world together. We belong together.

I think Cersei Lannister is one of the most interesting characters in The Song of Ice and Fire books and in the show. You know, her characterization falls off in places, particularly towards the end. But I'd consider Lena Headey's portrayal of Cersei possibly my favorite performance from the show. Like the mannerisms she uses, of that slight head tilt with a cold, almost bored smile. It's really effective. I think, kind of her own adapted version of Tywin's cold stare, but for as much as she hopes it to have this graceful sort of smile, like these people are so little afraid that she barely has to take them seriously. Despite that, she can't always quite keep her anger out of her expression. That might all be conjecture. It's such a loose point that it's hard to mention of any real substance. But I also think that sums up Cersei in part. Someone trying to emulate all the cold, calculated scheming of Tywin, and yet never quite able to keep her reckless, fiery anger out of things. Someone who wants to be Tywin and sees herself as Tywin's only true son, and yet understands neither the flaws of her father nor his teachings on politics and war. Beyonds, like the broad strokes she can glean at a distance. Now, supposing that sense, she can tend to reflect the worst of her father. But also, that's not fair for me to say. It's her. She's a complex character who, on the face of it, is George R.R. Martin's way of exploring the evil queen archetype. But how did she get to that? What can we understand of Cersei's thoughts and behaviors, and whatever else I end up saying in this video? Yes, I am a counselor who has done a lot of these character analysis videos in the past, all of which you can find in a playlist here. As I try to stress, but probably don't mention enough, obviously, these are fictional characters. You can't accurately analyze fictional people. But that doesn't mean we can't draw out some level of believable meaning, and that there isn't some fun and purpose to be had from this task. And what I do here isn't the same as my job. Also, this is different. Um, but so that said, let's jump into the big old messy world of Cersei Lannister.

I think it goes without saying that Cersei had a difficult upbringing. She was the eldest one of her siblings. Although she is Jaime's twin, it's only by technicality that she came out first. All the same, she is the eldest, the first, the one who should be top of the tree. Except, of course, she's not. As a woman, she is not entitled to inherit before a male heir, and so therefore is placed below Jaime, and possibly even Tyrion. But I don't think Tywin ever considered having to choose an heir beyond Jaime, not even when Jaime was a Kingsguard. I suppose the perhaps obvious point here is that there will be many, many times in her life that Cersei sees herself as overlooked by others, simply because she is a woman. When Tywin Lannister spoke, men obeyed. When Cersei spoke, they felt free to counsel her, contradict her, even refuse her. "It is all because I am a woman." And there is some truth to that. She was never fully trained in war and politics and things, while Jaime was. So what deeper understanding does she have to give orders? I suppose. Plus, yes, Westerosi culture isn't the most accepting of women. All the same, it's still not the entire truth. Daenerys, Margaery, Olenna, Tyrell, even Catelyn, before she let Jaime go free, could all speak with authority in their own way. There is more to why Cersei isn't obeyed as often as Tywin is than just being a woman. Yes. However, that idea was probably the entire truth when she was a child. In spite of any talents, intelligence, or strength she might have shown growing up, she was a girl, and therefore not permitted to learn fighting or war strategy, or even much of politics. Even when she would dress as Jaime and secretly take his place in sword training, that became gradually harder to do as they aged, and Tywin was very firm that she did not exist in that male world. Even had she shown a natural talent for sword fighting and things, Tywin would not have permitted it. And in that sense, it didn't matter what she did growing up. She would always be ignored. She would never have the same respect, attention, even just time with her all-powerful father that Jaime got to have, despite the fact she was older than him. And then adds to the insult, Tyrion was born. Tyrion, in both Cersei's and Tywin's eyes, killed his mother to come into the world. Tyrion, who is this grotesque creature, so vilified in Westerosi culture, even he got some training from a Master at Arms, where she did not. Her father hated Tyrion, and yet even he, it seems, was given some level of political education and eventually trusted to rule as acting Hand of the King. Cersei was never hated by Tywin the way Tyrion was, and yet what did she ever get from him? In many ways, then, it was worse to be ignored than hated. It's not that you can actually compare them like that, but it probably would have felt worse to her. At least in being hated, there was some level of relationship, some awareness of you, I suppose. Cersei instead felt she was nothing more to Tywin than a mere bargaining chip, a thing to sell off in marriage for the sake of politics. Nothing she achieved, no amount of ability in anything, would change that. "Her father's eyes had always been unsettling, pale green, almost luminous, flecked with gold. His eyes could see inside you. You could see how weak and worthless and ugly you were deep down. When he looked at you, you knew." I mean, that is a quote that tells you exactly how Cersei feels about herself: weak and worthless and ugly. And as the quote also suggests, it's probably Tywin's treatment of her that is the source for a lot of those feelings. At the same time, though, it's also confusing that the "why am I worthless? Why do I feel that way? Why am I seen that way?" to feel you deserve a cold stare without really knowing why. At the same time, you know, you'd want to come to some conclusion for why, uh, your father looks at you like that, why you feel that's how he looks at you, some explanation to at least get a handle on this feeling. And Cersei's conclusion is: yes, I'm seen as worthless because I am a woman. I've been made to feel worthless about myself too, because I am a woman. Therefore, the only reason people see me as different to my towering father is simply because I am a woman. She's not exactly wrong there, but she's also unable to grow or push beyond that treatment because she needs that our idea to explain her own feelings of worthlessness. I think, you know, if she were to perhaps find subtler ways of delivering power and influence despite being a woman, that would then suggest to her, perhaps being female isn't the reason I feel so worthless. Since if that's the case, then why does she feel worthless now? She has to answer that question again. And to be honest, I very much doubt Cersei would ever reach a point of power and influence and authority where she doesn't still feel insecure and worthless and weak. Power itself isn't going to heal that. You know, I've talked about this kind of thing before in videos like my one on Nate Shelley from Ted Lasso, so I won't delve into that too much here. Feelings of worthlessness that her father and she herself have both tied to her sex. And I think it's out of that understanding that you can see the Cersei emerged as someone quite misogynistic. There are endless quotes of her insulting other women, regardless of who they are, as being harlots and [ __ ] and of block of frightened ends. She seems generally to regard women as weak and pathetic beings whose only weapons are their sex and their tears. It's misogyny internalized from their culture, but also from their father, a man who stripped his own father's mistress naked and paraded her through the streets. And I think in everything I've said, you can see where it came from. Being a woman is rationalized as the thing that makes her feel weak and worthless, but as this isolated thing, not who she is really, not a spirit or her brain or anything, it's just her body. She kind of splits it off. "I feel weak and worthless, but it's not me, just my womanhood." That is weak. Therefore, all women must be weak. I must continuously project that weakness onto them in order to spare myself the feelings. Deep down, I have a strong spirit, a man's spirit, that was just cursed with a woman's body. "She had a warrior's heart, but the gods in their blind malice had given her the feeble body of a woman." By the way, I don't think I need to stress this, but I'm just saying in case this isn't a point about transgender. This is a point specifically about Cersei and about misogyny. But in that sense, anyway, she is the exception to her misogyny. She needs to be, if she wants to separate herself from everything she does project onto women. And let's not forget, we can, we can Cersei's mother died when she was only seven, meaning Cersei was denied a strong female role model, someone who could show her the strengths of femininity that it seemed Joanna must have had for it to be said that "your Tywin Lannister ruled the Seven Kingdoms, but later Joanna ruled Lord Tywin instead." All Cersei really had for female company was servants, people seen as lower than her, lesser beings, people she could boss about, obvious vessels for her to project all the sense of worthlessness that originally was projected onto her. And she did have female friends too, but even they were lower born. So in that sense, she grew up in an arena where men are powerful and at a distance and have all the things she wants, and women are simple, weak, lesser servants and maids to be bossed about. Those are her experiences. She chose to identify with the male stuff in order to project negatively onto the female. And actually, there's another point that ties into this regarding her relationship with Jaime, but we'll make that its own separate, hopefully short point. So I talked at length, exhaust stiff length, in my video on Jaime about how his twin, incestuous relationship with Cersei may have come to be, but I didn't mention one other possible factor that relates to Cersei because it's specifically from her perspective, which is largely to suggest that perhaps Cersei wants to be Jaime. We've seen how she considers herself a man's spirit, just cursed with a woman's body. We've seen how she was born first, she's the eldest, and yet gets passed over in place of Jaime. How Jaime gets all the attention and training and influence that she wanted as a child. She, in her own body, seems unable to win any of it from her father. So she merges her sense of identity with Jaime's, which, as I said in the Jaime video, identity doesn't begin its conception as a concrete, separate thing anyway. So it may have already been merged with this other twin baby who looks very similar, and you're slowly growing together, struggling to figure out who am I? Who other people wants me? What's not me? Where are the lines drawn? I don't want to make this sound too straightforward, but when you are ignored and made to feel either non-existent or worthless by your father, where next to you sits a twin brother that, as far as you interpret it, is treated like a golden, perfect male. It's unsurprising you might lean into that twin unity and try to see Jaime as part of you. "He is seen as perfect because he's me, he's part of me, and therefore I'm perfect too. It's just this female body that isn't." And also, as I mentioned in the Jaime video, the extreme amount of rivalry this difference in their treatment could give rise to both twins, but one treated as a golden heir, the other largely ignored. The sheer amount of rivalry you could get out of that, perhaps so unbearably extreme that they can't even acknowledge the rivalry and they instead twist it into the opposite, and total unity, in order to shut out the pain for feelings around their differences. And then I suppose, how we're controlling dynamic with Jaime plays into this. Out of the two of them, she is very much in charge. She tells Jaime what to do at all times. He doesn't really think, he lets her operate as his brain, to which they can merge even more. Same as dressing up as each other, her taking his place in sword training, same as the two of them sharing physical intimacy and eventually sex. He might be a different body, I might be cursed with this female body, but I controlled him, I joined with him, I operate his brain, he is me. Which, I guess, is where we come to the narcissistic side of Cersei that sees others as an extension of herself. Because if I am right about any of that conjecture, I just feel, I think it also works both ways. You know, it's not just Jaime, the perfect child, therefore I join with him in order to also feel that way. But seeing herself as perfect and then extending that outwards with Jaime. He has a reflection of her own perfect self. And beginning to realize, I've done quite a few character analyses on narcissistic characters, so, um, maybe I'll go over something different next time. Um, but a point that often comes up is that narcissists don't actually see themselves as perfect and brilliant the way people often assume they do. Deep down, they'll see themselves as the total opposite, so, so worthless that they have to shut that idea out under the illusion of affection, a total perfection they have to keep pushing and investing in, otherwise the cracks of what they feel deep down might start to break through. Cersei has to craft an image for herself as completely perfect, not part good, not with a few flaws, not a gray area like we all are in truth, but total perfection. And so she ends up with this very black and white division of the world, what's called splitting, seeing everything in that same lens. I am totally perfect, or totally worthless. I am totally perfect. Jaime is my twin who reflects his perfection. Geoffrey is my golden boy, you can do nothing wrong. Tyrion, on the other hand, is a nothing but vile. He is not me. Tywin, as well, actually. I think Cersei idealizes him as something perfect that maybe isn't then an extension of her, but is certainly part of her identity. She regularly describes herself as being like Tywin's true son, or as "Lord Tywin with teats." Lord Tywin is this colossal, all-powerful, awe-inspiring force of nature, who she at first can't believe would die on a toilet. She dislikes that when his body is first laid out in the sept, the Silent Sisters have fashioned his lips to be smiling because it makes him appear less formidable. "That should not be." She blames Petyr. "He should have told the Silent Sisters that Lord Tywin Lannister never smiled. The man is as useless as nipples on a breastplate." But a half-smile made Lord Tywin seem less fearful, somehow. I hope I'm not laboring this point too much, and that again, Tywin is perfect. Even the things about him I might hate, even how cold and horrible he could be, that's just a reflection of how strong and powerful he is. I have to see him as perfect because I come from him, I kind of am him, I'm identifying with him. And if he's not perfect, then neither am I. Not to say that's how everyone would view their father in this situation, and there is all still a level of spectrum to all of this. You know, it's not like she is a narcissist, therefore this is exactly how she thinks in every situation. No. Um, but it does seem to be the prevailing perspective that she has of her father. So in that sense, she lives a life trying to carry on her father's work after he dies without ever being properly taught by him, changed to the idea of being her father, without understanding his flaws, being Jaime, trying to control Jaime, often in a partly unacknowledged rivalry against her father, you know, prove to him how much power and strength she has through how she can use Jaime. And if at any point she falls short of being Tywin, it's not because A, she's not as skilled as him, or B, Tywin wasn't as perfect as she imagined him to be, or even C, sometimes things just do go wrong. It's not any of that. It's instead because she's cursed with this woman's body that she hates, that isn't truly her. She herself is Lord Tywin Lannister. I probably am laboring that point now. I just wanted to make it clear how trapped she becomes by this worldview and view of herself. She's the complete contrast to her twin there, I think, where Jaime slowly starts to recognize how much agency he has over who he wants to be. Cersei instead squeezes herself smaller and smaller into an image that increasingly fails to line up with the world around her and ultimately catapults her towards tragedy. Anyway, now that we've touched on the idea of perfection, let's talk about Prince Rhaegar.

Just to be clear, Prince Rhaegar Targaryen is most certainly not perfect. However, he might seem it to a 10-year-old child caught up on ideas of love and romance and knightly chivalry. In many ways, Cersei was once very similar to how Sansa is at the beginning of the books, drunk on fairy tales of romance. Which isn't surprising, you know, um, what the hell else is a young Cersei supposed to do with her time or to dream about when women's entire purpose in this society is largely to form a political marriage? It's small wonder they get idealized into something perfect and meaningful and magical. A young Cersei really, really likes the idea of getting to marry Prince Rhaegar. She was told as young as six or seven that Tywin was planning it, and so left her three or four years to secretly dream about that marriage. Rhaegar, on the face of it, is the embodiment of the shining prince. Despite her love for Jaime, which, as we've said, has far more to do with narcissism and control than actual love. Now, actually, she was giddy with excitement about the idea of Rhaegar, so much so he drew pictures of herself riding behind Rhaegar on a dragon, that she then had to pretend Jaime was Queen Alisan and King Jhaerys when he found the picture. Cersei always knew she'd be married off one day, and if that was the case, Prince Rhaegar is as perfect a marriage as she could possibly wish for, particularly when it would mean she becomes Queen. Particularly when Rhaegar is generally idealized in Westeros as the perfect person for someone looking for narcissistic validation and proof to a self-image of her own perfection. Being Queen to Mr. Perfect is, of course, what she'd want. She might even decide she's entitled to it. It's her right, her destiny. "I deserve all the adoration and radiance of being a beautiful, powerful Queen." Because if I don't deserve it, maybe that opens the door to all those buried feelings of worthlessness again. And just more generally, she's a child at this point. Kids can just dream of rosy marriages, of course they can. She's a kid with dreams about this wonderful marriage that is supposed to be announced at the end of a final feast following Tyrion, King Aerys's honor. Except there is no final feast, it doesn't come about, and King Aerys, instead of agreeing to this marriage, tells Tywin that "you are my most able servant, Tywin." "The King said, but a man does not marry his heir's, his servant's daughter." Essentially, Tywin, and therefore Cersei, are having ideas above their station, which is finally part of the reasoning Cersei gives for killing her friend Malara, but we'll come to that later. Um, the point is, marrying Rhaegar was supposed to bring her everything she'd ever wanted: adoration, love, perfection, and the throne. The very first point of view chapter begins very aptly: "She dreamed that she sat on the Iron Throne, high above them all." A level of power and position to carpet over all her feelings of worthlessness. But she did not marry Rhaegar, and then Rhaegar was killed at the Battle of the Trident by Robert Baratheon, and she ended up marrying Robert instead. But I think Rhaegar then comes to symbolize some past idealized, innocent, dreamy world that could never quite be. She never forgave Robert for killing her perfect prince, though. All the same, she still had high hopes about this new marriage. Robert was the new king, and he was a powerful, good-looking man at the time, and she'd recounts with Robert, the only time he'd ever made her wet was on their wedding night. But during sex on their wedding night, Robert whispered Lyanna's name instead of Cersei's, which was obviously not just painful to Cersei in its own right, but it makes it clear just how much this was a political marriage only. Robert had no love for her. She was nothing more than a political tool to her father, no power, no ability, just a pawn in his game. And also an object for Robert when he wanted to claim his rights, as they call it, which in Westerosi culture is perfectly acceptable for a man to do. However, that doesn't make Cersei any more consensual in any of the times that followed. He would hurt her during sex too, and then blame it on drink or deny any memory of it happening. In other situations, he would hit her, insult her. Everything Cersei had dreamed of turned out to be the complete opposite. It's more a prisoner than a queen in that sense. There's something horribly ironic that Rhaegar stole away Lyanna Stark for himself, where it was Robert who yearned for Lyanna, and Cersei who yearned for Rhaegar instead. Robert and Cersei ended up with each other. Is there a greater point to me mentioning all this stuff? Um, well, I think I think I'm trying to say one, it makes it painfully clear that being Queen isn't enough. She is still a woman in a man's game. If she really wants to feel powerful, she has to play the man's role in this game, to rule that throne for herself. As I suggested with characters like Margaery, or Catelyn, or possibly even Margaery, there are many subtle ways for a woman to use influence and power in the world of Westeros. But Cersei needs something more direct, because otherwise, even if she might be doing more behind the scenes, her image is still a political tool. She wants the image of something mighty and powerful, something like Tywin. The hope is the more she visibly looks powerful, the more she'll be able to convince herself of that inside. And also, while she wants power, of course, she doesn't want to be in a position to suffer under someone else like Robert again, some other new person to replace him. Cersei is the term, and rather than suffer more abuse, she instead becomes something of an abuser, which we see, I think, first in her relationship with Sansa, who is a younger girl, betrothed to her son Joffrey. And Cersei looks on her misogynistically as a good-looking but stupid, pathetic little dove, a girl who has a head lost in fairy tales. Sansa suffers physically and psychologically from Joffrey, and would almost certainly have suffered more had situations not changed and their marriage been broken off. And whilst Robert wasn't torturous to Cersei like Joffrey is to Sansa, there is a certain parallel to their relationships. Cersei overlooks all of Joffrey's horrible treatment, and she plays an odd role of half-offering advice to Sansa as though talking to her own younger self and trying to teach her, but at the same time deliberately trying to scare Sansa with the brutality of the world and her situation. That kind of becomes its own psychological torture, seeking pleasure in destroying Sansa's innocence, basically. Did Robert do that to her? Quite possibly. When Joffrey is next betrothed to Margaery instead of Sansa, Cersei would no doubt like to have played the same role to her as she did to Sansa. Only Margaery is a different sort of person. And then in A Feast for Crows, we get the character of Taena Merryweather, a girl who basically ends up becoming something of a friend and confidante to Cersei at a time where she's increasingly paranoid and wants somebody to trust. And Cersei ends up sleeping with her, trying to imagine herself playing the role of Robert, drinking deliberately hurting Taena, trying to make sense of what Robert would do during sex. And then afterwards, pretending to Taena that the event never happened. I think her increasing alcoholism and gaining of weight is also meant to metaphorically reflect the side of her becoming like Robert, becoming her own abuser, despite wanting to be absolutely nothing like him. She was so repulsed by Robert that she sought an abortion after he impregnated her, and instead would go on to give birth to children fathered by her brother Jaime, and then just pretends that they were Robert's. So yes, perhaps that seems a smaller point to make in terms of her overall behavior and personality and where it all comes from, but it's still worth mentioning. Cersei has to endure a hell of a lot of trauma there. The abuse quite possibly also contributes to this hatred of her body and her hatred of women. I think it's very important to at least raise that as an idea. That said, I suspect the groundwork for that begun long before Robert. All the same, that plus already wanting to be like Jaime and Tywin and hold that male position in the world she comes out of all of this experience wanting her time in the sun. And in a way, she gets it. But we're gonna jump back now and discuss, I think, the deepest seeds to her own downfall that will follow.

When Cersei was 10, the very same day her betrothal to Prince Rhaegar was supposed to be announced at this final feast, Cersei found the confidence and courage to visit a fortune teller named Maggy the Frog. And yeah, ask her fortunes. And from what we know with the story since, Maggie's predictions seemed pretty accurate. She tells Cersei that she will not marry Prince Rhaegar, but will marry the king, who turns out to be Robert Baratheon. She says Cersei will have no children with him, but three blonde-haired children of her own, which are Joffrey, Tommen, and Myrcella. And possibly, in her own ominous way, suggesting all children will die young. Um, I'm not sure it says "gold shall be their crowns and gold their shrouds," which I think suggests they will be born with blonde hair and die with their hair still blonde, rather than darkening as blonde hair tends to when aging, but I could have that wrong. She also suggests a queen more young and beautiful will come to cast so say down and take all that she holds dear, and that when all is done, the valonqar will come to wrap his hands around her pale white throat and choke the life from her. Which is all very ominous, troubling stuff for a child to hear. What's more, later that day, it came to pass that she was not marrying Rhaegar, making the prophecy start to appear accurate. And as you would, she went and asked the Septon what valonqar means, and found out it was a High Valyrian word for "little brother." She will be Queen, but possibly all her children will die, as is also evidenced by this younger, more beautiful queen casting her down and taking all that she holds dear, and she will then be killed by her little brother, or a little brother. There is one other important aspect to this prophecy before we get to discussing how it shapes Cersei. It's that her friend Malara comes along for this fortune telling, and when she asks of her future, principally, will she marry Jaime Lannister, who Malara seems to swoon over? Maggie the Frog tells her, "Not Jaime, nor any other man," said Maggie. "Worms will have your maidenhead. Your death is here tonight, little one. Can you smell a breath? She's very close." And sure enough, after Cersei discovers she won't marry handsome Rhaegar, presumably Cersei and Malara are fretting about the prophecies and if they would come true. I can only imagine how terrified Malara would be, expecting that she was going to die that day. Malara, it seems, insisted that if they never spoke about the prophecy, maybe it wouldn't come true. After which, it's implied that Cersei killed her by throwing her into a well. She could still hear Malara have a spoon insisting that if they never spoke about the prophecies, they would not come true. She was not so silent in the world, though. She screamed and shouted, which of course confirmed that aspect of the prophecy. Malara did die that night at the hands of Cersei, and we can imagine that in itself was an experience with profound effects on Cersei, murdering her own friend at the age of 10. I would assume the first of her murders, and not one really done out of self-defense or as part of a war in a way that could be easily rationalized, but an entirely unnecessary killing of an innocent person, fueled partly by fear. Malara's idea of not speaking about the prophecy almost sounded wise to Cersei. She would have wanted to believe that, and the best way to ensure it was never spoken of is to kill the only other person who knew about it, other than Maggy the Frog. Actually, it's unclear what happens to the fortune teller, so I'm hoping that gets clarified at some point later in the books. You know, did Cersei also kill Maggy the Frog, or was she too afraid to dare visit the tents again? I don't know. Either way, Malara was a walking, living reminder of this prophecy that Cersei would not want to think about. Being rid of Malara means avoiding having to think about it. Plus, as Cersei says in the books, "Malara had turned out to be a greedy little schemer with ideas above her station," which coincidentally, getting ideas above their station is something she says quite often of others. She also killed Malara because Malara dreamily hopes of marrying Jaime Lannister, Cersei's twin. But Jaime is Cersei's, hers and no one else's. The idea of Jaime with someone else, especially, although I doubt she was thinking that at this age, actually, but the idea of Jaime sleeping with someone else, you know, no, that ruins the image of Jaime as part of her identity. He can only join with Cersei. Even if Cersei herself sleeps with other people, Jaime can't. As a side note, it's also in that lens entirely unsurprising that Cersei suggests Jaime join the Kingsguard, not just because it means Jaime would be nearer to her in King's Landing, but also because it stops Jaime ever marrying or being with anyone who isn't Cersei. So yeah, she just likes Malara for even dreaming of coming between her and her twin. And she says it's "getting ideas above her station," which is exactly what Cersei was also doing at the exact same time, in dreaming of marrying the esteemed Prince Rhaegar. So, in that sense, I think there's a very clear projection going on there. Certainly having ideas above her station of marrying a prince and becoming the queen that she wants to insist is her right, her destiny, an ambition to surely paper over the deeper feelings of worthlessness. Only to then be told, "No, King Aerys won't marry his heir to his servant's daughter." Cersei is his servant's daughter. You know how that idea would sting and draw up all the worthlessness and the anger at herself. "How, how could I be so stupid to think I'd ever marry the prince? How could I be such a silly, dreamy little dove?" Except, of course, Cersei can't be angry at herself. She needs to project it outwards. So she pushes all of that rage onto Malara instead. Malara being the jumped-up one in wanting to marry Jaime. Such rage there at herself, projected outwards, mixed with all these feelings about the prophecy as well. And then it turns murderous. I think the prophecy is more the rationalization afterwards, maybe about the murder. "I had to kill her to stop the prophecy." And also, "Malara isn't an innocent girl and my friend that I should feel terribly guilty about murdering. No, she is some greedy little schemer who betrayed me." That's a more comforting rationalization to give herself about what she did. She's dead and drowned, and she taught me to never trust anyone but Jaime. And I just have to wonder if Cersei comes out of that experience with that as an idea imprinted in her mind: people who betray her need to be killed. She talks of Sansa portraying her as though Cersei had been nothing but good to the girl she tormented. I think she even talks of Tommen in that light, about betrayal, although I can't find a quote so I might just be getting that confused with the show. But this is getting a bit all over the place and stretched, so let's pull it back to some more grounded key points. One, the idea of the valonqar, little brother, who will murder her, of course, dials Cersei's hatred of Tyrion up to 100. You know, she already hated Tyrion. Let's not forget that. Tyrion, who killed her mother in her eyes. Tyrion, who is this visibly grotesque being. I've already mentioned about splitting, you know, people being all good or all bad, particularly those first key relationships in your early years. Jaime is all good, so Tyrion gets slumped with the all bad. Cersei buries all the rival feelings with Jaime and twists them into an idea of joint identity, but she has to dump the rivalry somewhere, so it's onto Tyrion, who she hates. Oberyn the Eyeless recounts the seven-year-old Cersei showing Tyrion to him: "When I commented that you seemed a poor sort of monster, your sister said he killed my mother and twisted your little cork so hard that I thought you would like to pull it off." I think the squeezing of the penis there is quite a dramatic, glittery example, but probably dare suggests even young Cersei hating her female body and wishing to be a man, and jealous of even this hideous younger brother who gets to be one and gets all the things she wishes she had. I'd guess that's what George R.R. Martin was going for there. I, I don't know. Um, but the prophecy gives Cersei an even clearer conscious reason to hate and fear Tyrion as a symbol for all the split-off negative aspects of herself that she projects onto him. How seamlessly this prophecy seems to align with her hatred of Tyrion is probably a key part of why she so readily believes it. That's point one. Point two is, she also believes it so readily because she half wants to. You know, let's not forget, this prophecy also predicts all the things she has ever dreamed of becoming: Queen, high above them all, with beautiful children of her own. She half wants to play believe that. Only that wish also comes alongside the fear for the other sides of the prophecy. Decides to also lend themselves to why she bullies and torments Sansa too. Sansa, who was betrothed to marry her son Joffrey, who was originally supposed to become Queen. Therefore, the more younger and more beautiful two cast, uh, say down. That's the worry there. If she can torment and in many ways control Sansa, then that threat can be prevented. When then, after that marriage is called off, Margaery is to become Queen instead. Margaery is not so easy for Cersei to bully and quash and manipulate at all. I think as soon as it even appears remotely difficult to quash Margaery, all of Cersei's biggest paranoias explode, and out comes this hugely intense hatred and rivalry for Margaery, who has to be stopped at all costs. In the show, she goes as far to blow up the entire Sept of Baelor with Margaery, most of her family, and many other people inside. Whether or not she does that in the books is yet to be seen, but she does appear to be planning something with wildfire. And point three, before we move on, Joffrey dies. I, I hope that's not a spoiler. I mean, I assume you expected spoilers on an analysis like this. Her first son, her golden boy, dies, like the prophecy seems to suggest, and she is devastated. Not because she loves Joffrey, exactly, but because he's this, this narcissistic extension of herself, a perfect boy to reflect how perfect she is. Joffrey dying reflects a fear of her own death, perhaps, as does her esteemed father dying too. Paranoia absolutely takes over at this point, and principally, the paranoia is aimed at Tyrion. Tyrion haunts her as this very visceral symbol of all those fears and rejected negative parts of herself, so much so he haunts the nightmare that she has at the beginning of her first POV chapter. "She dreams she sits on the Iron Throne, high above them all, and everybody kneels to her. Only then the dwarf appeared as if from nowhere, pointing at her and howling with laughter. The lords and ladies began to chuckle too, hiding their smiles behind their hands. Only then did the queen realize she was naked." He is a symbolic reminder of the worthless, weak, broken, prophetic feelings she might have deep down. I guess the abject is often what you'd call this in art. It's a term from Julia Kristeva, which you can Google if you want. This whole kind of horror imagery of art, these Gothic, scary beings that haunt good, innocent, clean characters and threaten them with death and whatever else. The abject is kind of a way of seeing that the whole imagery in storytelling as like psychologically splitting off our own negative parts onto these other imagined Gothic monsters that then haunt us because we can't escape them. They are part of us, they're all our split-off parts, they will come running back, and there's the worry that we will be engulfed by them. So I think that has some, um, bearing in how Tyrion is viewed by Cersei in the books. Cersei reaches a point where anything that ever goes wrong is somehow Tyrion's fault, somehow his plans to thwart her. In fact, after Tyrion kills their father, Tywin, in the Tower of the Hand, before then escaping the city entirely, Cersei is so fearful that Tyrion might still be hiding somewhere in some secret passage in that tower that she burns the entire thing to the ground. Enough of that, though. This is already getting longer than any of the other videos, and there's still much more to discuss. For example, her children. So, as I said before, Cersei does all she can to prevent bearing any children by Robert. She can't cope with the idea of someone like him coming out of her. But that's, that's quite a crude way for me to put it, actually. Um, but you can very much understand that sort of fear. Robert has been abusive to her. She doesn't want to kind of repeat that trauma cycle by giving birth to someone who can reflect another Robert. Even more so, her children have to be her, a narcissistic extension of her. As such, she has all three children with Jaime, her twin, the person most like her in all the world. Having sex with Jaime is in many ways kind of having sex with herself. Which, as a side note as well, I guess then Jaime, when he goes away for war and is imprisoned, and Cersei still has her needs, she looks to Lancel Lannister, her cousin, to fulfill them. He's the person who is the closest resemblance of Jaime, a kind of proxy Jaime, which does make sense. Although she also does sleep with the Kettleblacks later in the story, which bear no resemblance. So I guess there is that. That's that's pretty exclusively in order to get them to do things she wants, which I suppose makes sense for the side of Cersei that thinks sex and tears are a woman's only weapons. Cersei somewhat struggles to see beyond her own view of women and how that limits even her. But yeah, that was a tangent. Um, she and Jaime have their first child, Joffrey, claimed son of King Robert Baratheon, therefore making him a claimed future heir to the throne. He is 100% Cersei's golden child. If we talk about this all-good, all-bad approach to people, Joffrey is the all-good. It doesn't matter what he does, he is never wrong or bad or anything other than her perfect, wonderful boy. She has to see him as perfect because he is this extension of her, and she has to see herself as perfect. Which again, that's a very straightforward way of warning, and it's not exclusively that, but it's worth saying. Um, and that is in many ways everything that goes wrong for Joffrey, I think. How much she pushes the idea of perfection onto him, all naturally inflates Joffrey, though, makes him feel superior to everything, and he turns out not the nicest person to build it very lightly. I don't wish to say that's all Cersei's fault, but it is a shame that Cersei struggles to see beyond her own narcissistic desires for her son. She just can't help push this idea of how great a king he's going to be. You know, "I'll show the world, my son is going to be so, so much better than Robert ever was on the throne. Robert was horrible to me, but Joffrey, my son, my blood, he's going to fulfill all of my dreams. They'll all see." There's a sort of bit of revenge against the world in her hopes for Joffrey, rather than seeing Joffrey as her son, her own child with independent thoughts. The interesting bit, of course, is how Joffrey disregards his own mother. He ignores a lot of what she says, views her like some weak, prophetic woman. "I can't stand the wailing of women," and increasingly distances himself from her, which is partly natural for any growing adolescent to, you know, seek independence from their parental figures and be their own person. But all the same, it's interesting beyond that, how Joffrey comes to reflect a lot of the abuse Cersei already suffered from both Tywin and Robert, all over again. It sadly cycles back for her. But even then, she has to see Joffrey's good. When he's horrible, even to her, it's because he's strong. It's a sign of how powerful a person he's going to become. That's how she interprets it, mostly. The next child was Myrcella, who is an interesting one because I don't actually have too many thoughts about her. We don't see as much of Myrcella, and you know, I've only read the books once. If there's any nuance to their dynamics of Cersei's feelings about Myrcella that, you know, you could add in the comments, it would be greatly appreciated because, yeah, I'm not really sure here. My instinct is to see her as a little bit ignored and disregarded for being a woman. That's why we don't get much screen, not screen time, book time, to page time, letter time, um, it's because she's mostly overlooked by the characters whose point of view chapters consider her, such as Cersei herself was overlooked growing up. Cersei is mad when Myrcella, like any other children, are sent away from her, but that has more, I think, to do with wanting to keep these symbols of her own image close, rather than genuine care for them, which is different to the show. I know in the show, Cersei is portrayed much more as a good mother, or at least that's how people see her in the show, but it's most definitely not the case here. I also feel a lot of her anger at Myrcella being shipped off to Dorne is about the fact it's Tyrion who specifically sent her away. But yeah, I don't know. Let me know your thoughts. Myrcella, as a woman, probably reflects to Cersei her own ideas around her beauty. But in the books, Myrcella ends up with a terrible wound to the face, which I imagine alters Cersei's feelings there a lot. Makes it difficult for Myrcella to be a reflection of her own imagined image of beauty, especially when Tyrion also has a terrible wound to the face. There's a parallel there, perhaps. Anyway, their third child is Tommen, who you could probably see as what tends to be called the scapegoat. He's the all-bad one to split those feelings onto. Everything he does is wrong. He's never as good as perfect Joffrey, an idea to send doubly so when Joffrey dies and results in even more idealization of him, even more reason to compare Tommen to him. Tommen just never quite amounts to that. "The world is full of horrors, Tommen," Jaime said. "You can fight them, or laugh at them, or look without seeing. Go away inside." "Tommen considered that. 'I used to go away inside sometimes,' he confessed." When Joffrey, Joffrey, Cersei stood over them, the wind whipping the skirts around her legs. "Your brother's name was Joffrey. He would never have shamed me so." "I never meant to. I was frightened, Mother." "It was only that your lord father smelled so bad." "Do you think he smelled any sweeter to me? I have a nose too." She called his ear and pulled him to his feet. "Lord Tyrell has a nose. Did you see him retching in the Holy Sept? Did you see Lady Margaery bawling like a baby? I wouldn't be surprised if everything Cersei."

describes of Lord tywin's cold stare that could see inside and spots all of her worthlessness. I wouldn't be surprised if Tommen would describe something similar of Cersei's stare towards him.

"Geoffrey would never have shamed me so" is an interesting phrase. Everything Tommen does isn't an independent person; it's a reflection of Cersei, either to shame her or to make her proud. That's what her children exist for in her mind, and Tommen is often a vessel for her own feelings of shame.

What she likes about Tommen, I think, is that she can easily control him. Despite endless examples of Joffrey talking back to and belittling Cersei, the one time Tommen does it, she sees it as disrespectful and disobedient and punishes Tommen by forcing him to whip Pate, the Whipping Boy. And if Tommen refuses to whip him, Qyburn is to cut out Pate's tongue right in front of Tommen, which is just a horribly cruel fate. That's what happens the one time he talks back.

But when Tommen doesn't and he just goes along with what his mum says, she thinks Tommen did as he was bid. His meekness troubled her; a king had to be strong. Joffrey would have argued. He was never easy to count on in that way.

Although the thing is, as much as Cersei thinks she can control Tommen, all her controlling nature is doing nothing but pushing him away. You know, the second he starts to be taken in by Margaery and the Tyrell family, Cersei is insistent that they're schemingly manipulating Tommen and pulling him away from her. But in the books, they might not be at all. I mean, they probably are to some extent, but everything we see of this is from Cersei's viewpoint. It might just be Tommen much prefers the Tyrells to his own family and his own mum, and who could blame him? You know, it's not surprising he's distancing himself from Cersei in place of them. It might just be he's seeking independence and space away from a mother who's horrible to him.

But the point I'm making here is that there comes a time when all children seek independence from their mothers. It's always going to be a very hard thing for the mother or any parental figure in general, um, to experience. It's a very hard thing for them to navigate. But when these children are supposed to be narcissistic extensions of you and your mind, plus you have this prophecy stuck in your head about them and then yourself being killed, I think losing any control whatsoever over her children feeds this fear of her own death and such paranoia. Joffrey very literally dies, Myrcella is sent to the other side of the continent and then gets scarred, killing her beauty, probably in Cersei's mind, and Tommen is being taken in by House Tyrell. Anyway, all of these might feel like deaths to Cersei, and all of them might reflect her own fears around death. These symbols of "who I am" are dying or being lost. What does that say about me?

And personally, Valonqar means little brother, but not necessarily Cersei's little brother. It doesn't have to mean Tyrion or even Jaime. I like the idea that it might mean Tommen, who kills her by being the little brother of Joffrey. I don't think it will. I don't think that's Tommen's character, and I think that was uh, changed some things in a bad way in the books, but it would be an interesting twist. I think Valonqar could mean a lot of people, though. It's only her who insists it must mean Tyrion.

So I was going to do a final section of the video to talk about how everything leads to the way she rules in *A Feast for Crows*, but I realize I've kind of touched on a lot of this stuff already at different points in this video, like Cersei's dream to be high above them all, set against the mockery that Tyrion becomes a symbol for mockery that reveals her deeper feelings of worthlessness that become apparent when she's naked in that dream. Although I think her nakedness in that dream also foreshadows a walk of atonement in a deal that cancels the Crown's debts to the Faith of the Seven. She agrees to let the Faith arm themselves with the Faith Militant, and then shortly after, they arrest Cersei on grounds of adultery. And after days upon days of traumatic imprisonment, they let her go on the condition that she walked naked for hours all the way back to the castle, whilst the Septons stand behind, ringing a bell, chanting the word "Shame," and people in the streets jeer and throw food or dung at her.

It is but all fall beyond imagining. I suspect it feeds all of the self-hatreds and shame Cersei already feels about her body and being a woman, and only makes it all worse. It also forces her to face some of her guilts and shames in a way that is too overwhelming to be at all helpful. I think she ends up hallucinating as she walks and seeing the faces of her father and Ned Stark and Joffrey glaring at her from the crowds. I think she comes out of this experience understandably a bit defeated and broken, but we'll have to see what happens next in the book.

Everything points to a very extreme revenge that she might try to exact, which I suppose would mirror what I said of the defeated Tyrion after the Battle of Blackwater, getting pushed so far that it all flips around into feelings of revenge. In my video on Tyrion, I've discussed already how she's slowly becoming a bit like Robert's. I've mentioned how, you know, Cersei isn't an unintelligent person; she can be quite shrewd and savvy. The problem is, I she was never given any proper political training from her father or anyone else, really. So that leaves a lot of gaps. You know, she sees Tywin as a very hard and ruthless, powerful man, but doesn't understand that even Tywin Lannister knew when to wait and when to show restraint and when to form allies.

B she's not at all good at reading other people's intentions, largely for the fact she struggles to consider other people's brains as something independent from her own mind. You know, Tommen is just her tool who will do whatever she thinks, and when he starts to show independence, it's not because he's his own person; it must be he's being manipulated by the Tyrells.

The fun one is the character of Rhaenys Waters in the books, who Cersei thinks looks a little bit like Rhaegar Targaryen, and I think that emphasizes the side of her half wanting to return to this idealized past that Rhaegar comes to represent for her. She believes Rhaenys desires her and will be loyal to her commands, and despite all advice to the contrary, she uses Iron Bank funds to give him command of a fleet of ships to help keep the peace. But instead, Rhaenys just leaves with all the ships and quite possibly becomes a pirate because, again, he is his own person with independent thoughts. Cersei failed to even consider the possibility of it happening.

Either people are nothing but her tools who will think as she wants them to think, or they have out of nowhere suddenly betrayed her and now she wants them immediately destroyed. People are either under her thumb or need to be instantly removed. There's no gray middle ground where people can slowly transition between the two or even be neither of those extremes. And Jaime is, of course, the other example, a man that was under her total control and identity at the beginning of the books. When he started to find some independence, to question her or refuse her wishes, she kind of turned away a bit, decided, no, he's not me, he's gone, he's a different person now.

Everything Cersei does was in *A Feast for Crows* works as a tragedy. She moves from one political blunder to the next, and yet there is something very sad about her downfall. Now you can see her destroy herself with her own paranoid fears, her own limited view of herself and of others, how terribly lonely she is underneath everything, and yet she's also incredibly cruel, and she spirals King's Landing into chaos and then eventually gets herself imprisoned by the Faith of the Seven, for which she suffers the Walk of Atonement.

I don't expect Cersei to survive much longer in the books. Even if she does defeat the Faith of the Seven with some kind of wildfire plot, that would most likely fan the fury of the common people and the general chaos that's befallen King's Landing. Varys himself is very keen to ensure the chaos continues. Um, she is gradually coming to reflect someone very similar to the Mad King, Aerys, even down to a rusard-like helper at the side, and Qyburn, who began Qyburn. She found to consider he might jump ship at any moment. He legitimately might. I always felt that about in the show when he was at her side at all times, just wondering why the hell is he still here when everything's increasingly going wrong. What's his motivations, anyway?

This has been my final video analyzing the Lannister characters. Check out my videos on Jaime, Tyrion, and Tywin if you want more. I don't quite know where I'm going next yet. Will I do other characters from other families in *The Song of Ice and Fire*? Will I analyze different shows or films? I'm not sure yet. It's been fun, though, certainly a push to do all of this in as short a time as I have whilst also working a job. You know, it takes so much longer having to scan back through pages and pages of books than it does flicking through bits of the show or a film, but I've enjoyed the challenge.

If you have any ideas for what I should do next, your suggestions are welcome. But otherwise, I've attempted to condense all my thoughts into this sprawling video. I hope it all makes some sense. Even if it doesn't, let me know what I got wrong, what I failed to consider, what I missed, stuff I forgot from the books as well, you know, I've only read them once. And judging by my Jaime Lannister video where I mistakenly said he kills his cousin, this there's also a chance I've confused some points with the show. So if there is any of that stuff in this video, please point it out for other people. Otherwise, like the video, subscribe for more stuff, support me on Patreon for even more stuff and a voice. Hopefully, see you next time.

And as ever, a special thank you goes to Janice McMahon, Local Treat, You Gaber, Michael Gallagher, In Squares, Flying Spider, Samara Salsi, Joshua C. Folliard, Chad Bramwell, and Zachary Juarez. Thank you.

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