#god how sad would it be

[fightsbck]

   *  ARRIVAL OF A BARATHEON BASTARD       VS. A LANNISTER PRINCE.

content: so this. this started out purely as a joke. i just wanted to make a a very quick and witty comparison and it. it turned out into a full-blown thing. in any case, i’ve talked about this briefly before but!!    I LOST THE POST,  so.   here is me winging this meta / discussion again,   and hoping that it’ll make sense.   again,   this is in no way of disrespecting any other character(s);   just a full opinion written that you’re free to agree / disagree.

warning:  if you haven’t watched ep 1 of season 8?   spoilers.

introduction.

so, as i’ve said: this started out purely as me attempting a joke. when i first saw gendry’s appearance in, what i will dub as: The Arrival 2.0, my first immediate thought was: this is a prince. of course, i’m biased. i like this character. so, i’d want him to take a high position that we’ve learnt to idolise. but it’s not that simple. in reality, gendry is written as a lowborn and, if we’re being realistic, princely probably isn’t the right word nor occupation that can agree with him. regardless, that was my fight thought.  here is an edited screencap for visual aid:

but then i went away to pull out the first episode of got to get a screencap of joffrey in a similar pose. i was baffled by two things: (1) was the re-discovery that we are all seeing this in both the northerner’s point of view but, most important? from arya’s. i might come back to this point later? but we’ll see. continuing, another shocking factor was (2) joffrey, himself. here is another edited screencap for visual aid:

what had baffled me so much was that,    i was wrong.    gendry didn’t look at all like a prince when he’s compared to joffrey.    joffrey looks like a prince:   he has the golden hair,  the right horse,   the right shirt etc.   gendry,  in comparison,   looks rugged and worn-down.   the only thing that’s salvaging him from completely looking like a truly lowborn commoner was that he was relatively clean-looking.  otherwise,  his usual look are him covered in ashes and soot.

gendry doesn’t look like a prince. but maybe that’s the point.

so,  once i’ve established that my joke won’t be funny after all because i was dead off-the-mark with this assumption,  i’ve started to sit down and think:  you know what.   it makes sense.  i think gendry is supposed to look the way he does:   a common folk,   a working man.  aka anything but a royal.   this is ironic,  because i think joffrey,  in return,  is supposed to look like a royal  —  though, in reality, he’s no right in claiming the title considering he was a lannister bastard, himself.   gendry may be a lowborn,  but at the very least,  his claim is stronger in regards to blood. traditionally, of course, that won’t fly. but, let’s save that conversation for later.

appearance alone.

comparatively, joffrey looks divine.   his hair is yellow and thick, and he’s surrounded by the guards that are dutiful to keep him safe,  and his horse is even different-in-colour from the others.   there’s a lot of work just in this scene to pop joffrey up as the prince among the rest.  we, as the audience,  though maybe not immediately drawn,  can somewhat subconsciously conclude that  hey,  this kid must be someone among these marching men of many.

gendry is... not like that at all. yes, again, i repeat, he looks clean. but ... he doesn’t look expensive, you get what i mean? his hair is cut short, suggesting ruggedness. he looks like he’s just been working in the smith and davos was telling him last-minute that they have to go out and go to winterfell. he threw a cloak on his shoulder — which! by the way! looks sagged, while joffrey’s were meant to make him look bold and thick, but the thing is, gendry looks comfortable, which plays a lot in the bastard vs. prince thing because gendry’s whole lifestyle probably pertains more to comfort than to conform himself to any westeros’ fashion standard — and was up on a horse and just, riding to his next destination.

gendry also blends with the crowd, and yet, somehow, he stands out anyway. one could argue that it’s mostly because we see it from arya’s point of view, and she was looking up to the men on horses which was why gendry appeared more grand in our eyes — if compare to joffrey, who, upon first look, we view him with the standard eye-level view: so everything that makes him stand out was literally what he wears and how his guards were stationed around him, but. 

let’s dwell further.

colour scheme and foreshadowing.

‘cause it’s honestly my fucking favourite thing,  but !! this is more of just me emphasising on the foreshadowing that they’ve done. because it’s. incredible. with that, imma get rid of my edited things and pull out some hues from the original screencap of the show.

first, we’ve got joffrey.

so as i’ve said: joffrey is expensively dressed. he’s got the thick coat just like robert’s, he’s got the gloves, and he’s got the beautiful steed that he mounted. and then there were the colours. joffrey’s whole aesthetics are elegance (black) and violence, anger, danger (red, which, now that we’re reading deeper into it, should come off as a warning, huh?) as well as the touch of yellow / gold to represent the riches.

joffrey is everything a royal lannister is, and the tv-show flaunts it.

in the meantime, here’s gendry:

like i said. he’s all rugged and rough-looking, and even his colours are portraying it. gendry’s general tone have always been with earth signs. he is the green of the tree, the brown of the mud: he is stability and home personified. because yes, he may lack the riches, but gendry has always been someone — in this case, arya, specifically, and then later jon with the whole westeros suicide squad — could depend on. 

and the best thing is? he carries the very colours of what the baratheon, i think, should be. stags in the wild: strong and intimidating creatures with its large antlers that could kill (which means they possesses a level of dangerousness that people should be aware of; in this case, gendry with his strength that the show has let us see glimpses of again and again), but they’re peaceful. they’re calamity. they’re reliable.

further scenes. feat. the hound!

it is also interesting to note that, following their first glimpse, both of the characters went on to different side of the spectrums. joffrey (if you count his encounter with sansa next as the second scene, instead of him just Smirking at sansa as the second one) shows arrogance and - him, just basically standing there, in full leisure. he is in no rush. he does not work. he’s nothing to do. joffrey, after all, is the prince.

gendry’s second scene is him reprimanding the people who are handling dragonglass to be careful. to be honest, i do admit, it’s just an establishing shot. (for non-film nor media students, it’s just a quick shot to establish or made known to the audience what we’re watching: in this case, we’re discovering that hey, the dragonglass is a lot, and it’s safely arrived and gendry, obviously, will probably smith a lot) however, it’s a shot of gendry working.

he’s worried about what’s to come, he’s seen death in the face, he knows his duty, knows why he’s brought there, and he’s taking it pretty damn seriously. you can also parallel it with how joffrey’s encounter with arya later when arya had his sword and nymeria attacked him (though it won’t be a strong parallel) but essentially: in the face of danger, joffrey slunk away. gendry got right back up (fitting, really, since he actually literally fell the last time we saw him in s7 in the snow) and started to do something about it.

(it’s also!! cool to think that joffrey’s next scene consists of him taunting the hound. while gendry’s is him aiding the hound with the axe that he asked for. even when the hound mocked him, gendry didn’t rebuke by saying anything mean before arya could interrupt them.)

tl;dr. conclusion.

joffrey is a prince, though it is funny to reflect, later, that he is undeserving of the title for his cruel and cowardly nature. and that, of course, he is illegitimate to the throne by his blood. gendry is an unrecognised bastard. in my interpretation, he doesn’t even go by waters as a last name. and yet, his character is strong and dependable. maybe not princely, no, because gendry is nothing like the diplomat sansa or tyrion is. but, i think, he represents everything a prince should be.

and that’s that.

please don’t reblog.