Despite an entire cottage industry being built out of “We Know Which Westeros Resident You Are Based On the Sandwich You Ate On April 4, 1997” quizzes, you probably don’t want to relate to anyone on Game of Thrones. It’s a show where even the heroes, like Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen, are incest-loving murderers. But you especially shouldn’t relate to a Lannister, ESPECIALLY if you’re a politician. Even a blind Arya knows that’s bad optics.
In her new memoir What Happened, which chronicles her unsuccessful (but popular vote-winning) presidential campaign against Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton compared herself to Cersei Lannister. “Crowds at Trump rallies called for my imprisonment more times than I can count,” she wrote. “They shouted, ‘Guilty! Guilty!’ like the religious zealots in Game of Thrones chanting ‘Shame! Shame!’ while Cersei Lannister walked back to the Red Keep.” Clinton is, of course, referring to the season five finale of the HBO series, where Cersei is forced by the High Sparrow to take a deeply humiliating “walk of shame.”
About that scene, Lena Headey, who plays the Protector of the Seven Kingdoms, said, “There’s a part of you that’s f*cking terrified. I can’t even imagine people wanting your blood. Cersei has done wrong, but she doesn’t really deserve this.” Clinton echoed those comments in her book, calling the hatred she faced from Trump supporters “flabbergasting and frightening.” In that sense, the pop culture comparison between the two powerful women makes sense. But the rest — the constant wine drinking, sleeping with her brother, blowing up the Sept, etc. — maybe not so much. (Also, does this mean Bill Clinton is Robert Baratheon That makes a little sense, actually…)
Clinton continued, “Was this all because I’m a woman No. But I believe it was motivation for some of those chanters and some of that bile.”
What a, well, shame.