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rodoA/N: A good long while ago, someone onfail_fandomanon mentioned being interested in the parallels between Stannis and Daenerys and I ended up writing this. A recent comment reminded me of it and so I decided to post it.
If there is one thing Game of Thrones has in spades, it’s monarchs, especially if you consider the ones we only know of as backstory to the main event. There are good kings, bad kings, drunken kings, lecherous kings, tragic kings and mad kings. There is no kind of king that Westeros and Essos haven’t seen at this point, yet it is quite interesting what an assortment we do see on screen. There is a mad king (Aerys), whose reign leads to the reign of an ineffectual and bad king (Robert). Robert’s reign, on the other hand, leads to a whole gaggle of king and queens fighting over the Seven Kingdoms. We have Renly, who doesn’t have the right but thinks he would be a better king than either of his brothers, who is kind but also shrewd, and an administrator more than a warrior. We have Joffrey, who is as mad and bad a king as Aerys. We have Tommen, who is like Robert, easily manipulated by his family, but kinder than his putative father. And we have Balon Greyjoy and Robb Stark, both of whom fight for independence for their people, and in part for their way of life.
In all these, we have some obvious parallels: Joffrey is Aerys reborn, from the family history of incest to his cruel streak. Tommen on the other hand is more like Robert, if he had been a better person. And Balon and Robb are two sides of the same coin. Renly and Cersei both claim the crown without having a right to it, strictly speaking, but think themselves more suited to the job than anybody else. Which leaves us with Stannis and Daenerys, two people who couldn’t be more different at first glance. Stannis is not charismatic, while Daenerys bewitches the people with her personality as much as her dragons scare them. Daenerys is young and supernaturally attractive. Stannis is balding. Stannis is considered the safe choice by the Iron Bank, since he’s reliable in a way the other monarchs aren’t. Daenerys is a wild card who upsets the status quo. And yet I’m going to argue why those difference only serve to highlight their similarities even more.
1. Born in the Shadow
Both Stannis and Daenerys have spent most of their lives in the shadow of their elder siblings and were deeply shaped by that experience. Stannis was born a second son, to a father who already had the most perfect son he could wish for: Robert was good-natured most of the time, easy to forgive and fast to make friends. Stannis meanwhile failed at those pursuits, and people always considered him lesser for it, especially when his younger brother also was more like Robert. And while Stannis was more than adept as a general, it was his brother who gloried in being a warrior king, even if it was others’ strategies that won his wars. And when the war was over, Stannis was rewarded with a castle he never wanted and a wife he had a cold relationship with. And yet, he remained dutiful.
Daenerys on the other hand was born a girl when her family had already been deposed. She spent her childhood running with her brother, who always expected to be king and who considered her more of an asset than a member of his family. It was Viserys who was supposed to be the king, and it was Daenerys who might bear him heirs, until it was decided that she’d be used to acquire his army. It was Viserys who called himself the Last Dragon, Daenerys’s own blood apparently not making her worth the title, just because she was a woman.
These early relationships shaped both of them, and it shaped how they approached their reigns. They both lived in an exile (of sorts) during Robert’s reign, Stannis on Dragonstone as opposed to his home in Storm’s End, and Daenerys in Essos. Stannis always felt slighted, like he had to prove something while simultaneously insisting everything was his by rights. Daenerys reacted to her brother’s treatment by overcompensating and taking the role of the dragon for her own. She also decided on her mission against slavery as much because she considered her treatment like that of a slave as she did because of the sympathy she felt for the oppressed. She too felt slighted by Westeros and its kings, and she too tried to prove to everyone that she was the blood of Old Valyria, while insisting on her right as queen.
For both of them, their early years motivated them to take up the quest for the Iron Throne, both of them cling to their right to it, and both of them have been deeply shaped by their life as an outsider.
2. Desire and Duty
On the outside, both Stannis and Daenerys justify their decision to fight for the Iron Throne with the fact that they inherited it. Stannis’s claim derives from his older brother Robert (who took the throne through a combination of conquest and his Targaryen grandmother), since all of Robert’s other heirs aren’t actually his heirs, but illegitimate children borne by the queen. Stannis, with his love of law and rules, considers himself the next in line, and so argues that it is his duty to be king.
Daenerys derives her claim from the fact that all the male members of her family are (supposedly) dead. She never considered Robert’s rule rightful, and so considers all who base their claim on him usurpers. It was her family who created the Seven Kingdoms in the first place, who rode on their dragons to unite the realms. She is the rightful queen of the Seven Kingdoms, and so she comes to take what should be hers, once she has accumulated enough men to succeed at the task.
But no matter how much they both insist on those reasons, the simple truth of the matter is this: they fight for the Iron Throne because they want it.
Stannis could have easily dismissed his right. Probably not with Renly, who might always consider him a threat due to the fact that he was older, but were he not who he is, it would have been easy to make a deal with the Lannisters for what he really wanted: Storm’s End. It wasn’t as if he was particularly close to Robert or hurt by the idea that Cersei had cuckolded his brother. All he would have to do was forget about Ned Stark’s letter and what he had found out in King’s Landing. But he didn’t want that. He wanted to sit on the throne, and he wanted to feel the satisfaction that would come with finally not living in his brothers’ shadow. He could also have allied with Robb Stark in exchange for northern independence, but that too would have required him sacrificing being king of the Seven Kingdoms.
And Daenerys? She could have stayed in Slaver’s Bay. She could have continued to conquer Essos, could have freed all the slaves in the other Free Cities. She could have rebuild Valyria on the remnants of the old one, made an empire more glorious than anything Westeros could ever have offered. She could have been hailed a goddess by her people for freeing them, for ending the wars between the cities and for walking through fire. But she didn’t want any of that. What she wanted was Westeros, which had been promised to her since she could toddler, and for which she had been married to a Khal she couldn’t even speak to.
Ultimately, they both did what they did because they felt they had the right, more than because they actually did.
3. Justice and Governance
Both Stannis and Daenerys put great emphasis on their abilities as rulers, arguing that it sets them apart from their rivals.
Stannis has a reputation for being just. Not kind, but just, as is illustrated by Ser Davos telling how he lost part of his hand (for smuggling) and gained a knighthood (for saving the people of Storm’s End during the siege). Unlike his brother, Stannis will not forget when someone did something heinous just because it’s politically expedient. He punishes the wicked and rewards the virtuous, or at least that’s how he’d like to see himself.
In truth, he is overly strict and inflexible and has trouble taking context into account when it comes to judging a person’s crime, and he is just as given as others to take his sympathy for a person into account, not that he likes that many. And even he will stoop to a low when it is the only way he can attain his kingship, because that goal (and presumably the good he can do if he is king) is worth the price other people have to pay. It is worth murdering his brother. It is worth sacrificing Gendry, and that’s even before we near his end.
Daenerys is similar to him in that she too likes to view herself as a just queen and a liberator. It’s why she insists justice is to be done when the masters crucify the slave children. It’s why she punishes those that betray her. It’s why she doesn’t stop in Astapor, and instead continues to Yunkai and Meereen. It’s why she stays in Meereen and tries to rule it, why she tries to follow the advice of her advisors, even when she seems unwilling to do so. And the people reinforce her view of herself. The former slaves consider her something akin to divine.
But the truth is far from as simple as Daenerys would like it. She’s overly cruel, and she delights in doling out “justice”. When she locks her former handmaid in a vault, leaving her to die of thirst in the dark, that is cruel, but it clearly, on a darker level, makes her happy. She is also rash and tends to act before she thinks things true, not willing to look for compromise any more than Stannis is.
They both try, but ultimately fail, to be the good monarchs they want to be, and they are both blind to the fact that they too have their double standards when it comes to what is just and what is not.
4. Forged in Fire
Both Stannis and Daenerys are, thematically, surrounded by fire. Daenerys has her dragons and stares longingly into flames. Fire is her weapon and part of the words of her family. She burns the khals. She literally walks into a pyre and comes out carrying fire made flesh. She is the true Last Dragon, and she is the Unburnt.
But Stannis too, is surrounded by fire. One of his two most important confidantes is a red priestess who prays to a god of fire. He adds R’hllor’s flaming heart to his banner. In one of the earliest scenes of the second season, Stannis offers his old gods to her pyre, and he uses her magic to kill his brother. He prays to the fire, looks in the fire for answers, relies on the fire to solve his problems, and finally, sacrifices his only daughter and heir in the flames for a chance to become king.
For both of them, fire is integral to their fight for the throne, in a way that it is for none of the other characters, even Cersei, who uses wildfire to get rid of all who might stand in her way. It accompanies them from their beginnings (Stannis on Dragonstone, burning the Seven, Daenerys in Pentos not being bothered by the too hot bath) to their end (Stannis sacrificing his daughter and Daenerys burning King’s Landing), just like they both get intertwined with red priestesses who consider them their saviours reborn, a role both are reluctant but still tempted to make their own.
But fire is a double-edged sword, so to speak. It might burn their enemies, but it is a hard element to control, and there is always a hint of darkness to it when they use it. When Stannis burns the leeches to kill his rivals, he doesn’t consider whether the other kings really deserve it, just because they’re “other kings.” He sacrifices Mance to the flames even though that is an unusual punishment in Westeros. Daenerys burns the Tarlys when they refuse to bow. Fire might be what helps both of them fight for the throne, but it is an inherently destructive force that eventually turns people against them.
5. The Heroic Interlude
Both Stannis and Daenerys have what I’d like to call their “heroic interlude” - the moment where they turn away from the pursuit of their goals to actually try to be the monarchs they think they are and help the people of Westeros without demanding fealty first.
Stannis does so when he moves north to help the Night’s Watch against the approaching wildling army, saving Castle Black at the last minute. But once that immediate danger is gone, he doesn’t stay. Instead, he decides to take the north and makes the fateful decision to keep fighting for his throne rather than his people, leading to his final downfall when he sacrifices his daughter, is deserted by his troops, when his wife commits suicide and he loses his last battle.
Daenerys turns north after a lot of convincing and she succeeds in her fight against the darkness, at great cost to her. But that victory feels hollow to her when others were the great heroes of the battle. When someone else defeated the great enemy, and another gets the credit for assembling the force that was needed to beat the white walkers. That moment, at the celebration, is a pivotal one for her – so far, she has been the one who was hailed as the people’s hero, yet here, they do not do that. That, and the revelations about Jon’s parentage, shake her view of herself to the core. Her image of herself stands on two pillars – the fact that she is the legitimate Targaryen heir, and the fact that she is Mhysa, the Breaker of Chains, the liberator of Slaver’s Bay, a near mythical being.
But like Stannis, she is nothing if not stubborn, and so she doubles down on her conquest despite legitimate opposition and the people’s stubborn refusal to consider her their queen. And in that situation, coupled with even more losses, she resorts to what has always been her solution to situations she can’t find her own way out of: fire.
6. Inevitable Downfalls
The downfall of both Stannis and Daenerys was inevitable the moment both chose to make a move in the game of thrones. Both make a lot of enemies on that path, and both go too far to reach their goals.
Stannis was bad at making friends to begin with, and always struggled with his inability to do so as well as the judgement he got from others for it. He was one of the best military commanders Westeros had, but that didn’t convince people to follow him. He refused to make allies, refused to compromise and that, ultimately, led to his downfall. He didn’t have the numbers, and yet he kept fighting, valuing his pride over his life and those of his loved ones. He did everything he could to get what he wanted, even though it was never going to be enough.
The situation is similar enough for Daenerys. The moment she decided to sail for Westeros, she was going to be confronted with a reality quite unlike any she’d seen before. The people in Westeros, understandably, have quite a different view on Targaryens, and were never going to welcome her as their saviour. Her options were always a) give up on the Iron Throne, or b) get your hands dirty getting it. She chooses the latter option. And as mentioned above, doing so wipes out the last of the insecurities she’s been wrestling with in the last season, leaving behind a woman who is convinced she is indeed the saviour. She finally, fully, accepts that role, becoming what she proclaim to hate: a tyrant.
In the end, both Stannis and Daenerys get killed for the crimes they committed to get what they wanted – Stannis gets killed by Brienne for murdering his little brother, while Daenerys gets killed by Jon, who sees no other way to stop her. It is an intimate, non-heroic death for two people who had longed to be “great”, and to earn that epithet.
It is strange, how on the surface both are very different from each other, while at their core, their characters and stories are very similar. Daenerys is Stannis, if he had charisma, alluring looks and dragons. Stannis is Daenerys, had she been born a boy who doesn’t attract other people to his side.
Had they ever met, they would have hated each other, no doubt.
