Taking Down Joffrey Was the Beginning of the End for Game of Thrones

To watch Game of Thrones is to put oneself in the headspace of the people who populate its world. And what typically roams through their minds? Ambition, anxiety, fear, fury, and lust (we mustn't forget about lust) — fraught emotional elements that, once combined, resulted in turning Thrones into HBO's most popular series. 

It's still remarkable how infectious the show was at its peak before the adaptable material dried up and its overall quality dimmed and later died. Example: In the penultimate episode of Season 1, when Ned Stark (Sean Bean) was executed on the orders of the cruel boy-king Joffrey (Jack Gleeson), viewers demanded satisfaction — nay, retribution! — alongside Ned's survivors. Tuning in for Season 2 was compulsory. 

Game of Thrones, developed by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss and based on George R.R. Martin's justifiably popular A Song of Ice and Fire series, then took every opportunity to show us (and the Starks) that hope for justice in this world is for dopes. Take "The Lion and the Rose," the second episode of GoT Season 4 (airing April 13, 2014, a pop culture eternity ago). Here, King Joffrey of Houses Baratheon and Lannister, First of His Name, King of the Andals, et cetera, died a sudden painful death following his wedding to Margaery Tyrell (Natalie Dormer), poisoned by a rare concoction colorfully referred to as "The Strangler." 

The episode ends with a close-up of Joffrey cradled by his mother, Cersei (Lena Headey), his face a ruptured mess of blood, snot, and tears. It holds on this ruin for several beats before cutting to credits, almost as an assurance to long-suffering fans that Joffrey, the monster heir to the Iron Throne and a primary source for much of the series' dread, was indeed dead at last. (The following episode, "Breaker of Chains," reprises this shot, in another amusing instance of the show’s gallows humor.) Once more, our minds were one with many of the characters onscreen: surely, things would improve now that Joffrey was dead? 

This foolish hope is still comforting 10 years later, especially after revisiting all the vicious things Joffrey got up to during his wedding feast. Joffrey tormented his uncle Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) by ordering the former King's Hand to be his cupbearer in full view of the court. He employed an actor's troupe to reenact the War of the Five Kings, meant to humiliate the surviving members of the fallen would-be sovereigns in attendance at the ceremony. This unpleasantness amid such pageantry was often accented by uncomfortable silence and seething grimaces.

Written by Martin, "The Lion and the Rose" was an opportunity to bask in the awfulness of his most hated character before snatching the life from him one last time. As an added flourish, he (with episode director Alex Graves) had Joffrey slice the feast's enormous pie with his Valyrian steel sword with such mindless violence that it butchers one of the white doves meant to spring forth from it. (In the books, it was Ser Illyn Payne, Ned Stark's executioner, who did the honors.) The scene goes at length to illustrate Joffrey's cruelty and to suggest the even more heinous things he might have accomplished had he lived.

When he finally took his last gulp of poisoned wine, it felt as though justice had been done for all in the realm who were brutalized by the king, either by command or by his hand. Justice for Robb Stark (Richard Madden), who raised the North in rebellion after Joffrey ordered Ned's execution, and Catelyn (Michelle Fairley), who died alongside her son during the infamous Red Wedding; for Ros (Esmé Bianco), who went to Joffrey's chambers at Tyrion’s behest in hopes to meeken the boy, and suffered mightily for it; for Sansa Stark (Sophie Turner), Joffrey’s betrothed and his hostage, who pleaded for mercy seconds before Ser Illyn's sword fell and was made to endure many kingly tortures in the time that followed.

Witnessing Joffrey get his just deserts was a shocking yet satisfying moment for those who hated the character in both the show and life, but that joy inevitably turned to ash. Remember, Joffrey was but a byproduct of a far more terrible and unchecked power: his grandfather Tywin Lannister (Charles Dance), the architect behind many of the atrocities that took place before and during the events of Game of Thrones. For the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros, Joffrey's death might have been quietly celebrated (best to avoid Tywin's fury), but it came as little comfort. So long as Tywin held onto power, the realm would bleed. 

And don't forget about Cersei. Joffrey’s death unleashed Cersei's belligerent wrath and put King's Landing in the most danger it had experienced since the rebellion of her husband, Robert Baratheon (Mark Addy). Among Cersei's many deeds following Joffrey's demise were two profoundly disastrous missteps: pursuing the trial of her brother Tyrion, whom she blamed for the king's untimely end, which culminated with the death of her father and the stability of her house; and her arming of the Faith Militant, just to spite House Tyrell, which allowed the High Sparrow (Jonathan Pryce) to overthrow the crown in Season 5. Cersei endured serious penance for that last transgression, though she paid back the citizenry of King's Landing, the Tyrells, and the Faith for her walk of shame. With interest. 

This brings us to poor Sansa, whose relief was equally short-lived. Ferried away from the wedding feast to the Eyrie by Petyr Baelish (Aidan Gillen), Sansa entered the care of her crazed aunt Lysa (Kate Dickie). There, the sad prospects of wedding her dim cousin Robin (Lino Facioli) paled in the threatening gloom of Lysa, whose devotion to Petyr and jealousy of Catelyn would soon put Sansa's life in jeopardy. Later, Sansa was married off to Ramsay Bolton (Iwan Rheon) and finally returned to the Stark home of Winterfell, where her despair found new and untold depths. Joffrey's death was a distant memory for her by then. 

"The Lion and the Rose" was another lesson in tempering expectations, especially for TV viewers who were accustomed to seeing their favorite characters find peace and closure after long stretches of injustice and hardship. In Game of Thrones, peace is relative. Joffrey's death was a crucial moment for the series, but it also marked the beginning of an inevitable trend toward diminishing returns. As character motivations became unfathomable and its twists began serving plot over character, the quality of the series declined as its showrunners lost the knack for putting viewers in their characters' heads. 

That makes D.B. Weiss' recent comments about this episode on Josh Horowitz's Happy Sad Confused podcast an appropriate way to summarize the concept of hope in and for Game of Thrones after Joffrey's death. "It was fun to go back to the old-fashioned joys of just killing off a really bad guy. It felt like it was balancing the scales a bit." The problem with Weiss' statement is simple: the scales didn't balance, not for Westeros and not for Game of Thrones. They tipped into chaos and stayed there.

Jarrod Jones is a freelance writer currently settled in Chicago. He reads lots (and lots) of comics and, as a result, is kind of a dunderhead.