Hi hamliet! Since it's GoT season, I wondered if you could give your opinion (or write a little something if you want) about Jaime's redemption arc, what you think about it, and what you think might happen to him later~
A GOT ask!!! Bless you friend!!
So I am one of those people who sees Jaime as better written in the books than in the show, but I’m gonna keep my answer to the show and ignore the terrible writing of season 4’s Notorious Scene.
Even in the show, Jaime is second to Sansa in terms of well written character arcs. He’s extremely well done, and his redemption follows pretty standard conventions including backsliding/floundering to figure out just what his experiences as a prisoner and with Catelyn freeing him and his journey with Brienne really means.
The thing about Jaime is that, just like Cersei, he’s emotionally stunted as a character, less of an adult emotionally than a child. I mean, he’s fucking his sister, but that actually makes sense in a twisted way when you consider the cruel way their father raised them, what he forced Jaime to do to Tyrion in regards to his first wife, and how the only person who shared all his experiences and understood their father and could also remember their mother was Cersei. Tywin didn’t exactly raise Jaime or Cersei to be anything but pawns in his game, teaching them their loyalty was utmost to the Lannisters. The Lannisters always pay their debts, but their greatest debt was to him for siring them, really (at least in Tywin’s mind). Cersei and Jaime both struggle with a lack of control, with genuine love for their family and at the same time, with the inability to really even be allowed to grow up and strike out on their own–because Tywin is still controlling them both even as adults.
Jaime tried to regain some control by being a kingsguard, but that backfired when he had to stab the Mad King, and then that just reinforced what his father would essentially demonstrate. Only family will support you. Family matters most, because you can only rely on them. And Cersei wouldn’t look down on him. Yet, their incestuous relationship is exactly their way of still defying their father. In addition, it provides the emotional comfort and support they are desperate for, the emotional comfort they lost when their mother died and which their father never gave them.
Enter Catelyn Stark. She had many flaws, but she let Jaime go even though it was a politically terrible move that did result eventually in her death, because she wanted to save her daughters. It’s literally the exact opposite of all the choices Tywin’s been making throughout Jaime’s entire life. So, while I don’t think Jaime was terribly moved by it, Catelyn’s quest surely resonated on a certain level.
But what really inspired him is Brienne, of course. A woman who loved a dream just like Jaime does, a comfort she could never really be with romantically (Renly) but did what she could to protect him anyways. But Brienne is also strong and she serves not her family, but oaths she’s made to people who matter to her. And that’s so different to Jaime. Brienne is, in many ways, the polar opposite of Cersei physically and personality-wise. And she accepts Jaime in due time for who he is, believing his story, despite knowing how vile he can also be, and this shakes Jaime’s world because he’s never known someone who does that besides Cersei.
Jaime saved Brienne and still experienced consequences for it, losing his hand. He got Cersei back and a golden hand, only to have Cersei immediately turn on the little brother Jaime still cares for, and then for her to send him to save his daughter, and he fails just as someone innocent and moral, just like a young Brienne, accepts him for who he is. He learns Cersei has cheated on him, while he’s never been with anyone else. He still tries to make it work, though, because he is so unwilling to give up on their dead father (he didn’t have closure with Tywin or with Tyrion) and his ideals, because he wants to believe that it was worth it, that their father’s “Lannister first” mantra really was worth it and therefore so is everything he’s been through.
It’s not.
And he finally realizes it when Cersei’s “me” attitude masquerading as “us” (though Cersei’s attitude is also born from a childlike fear and desperation) leads to her literally refusing to help save the world from monsters that will kill them all. Jaime now sees the big picture after knowing that people outside their family are valuable people (Brienne); Cersei still just sees Tywin’s lessons and his cruelty, and she paradoxically clings to his lessons of grasping power, family, while trying to protect herself from suffering as she suffered under Tywin.
So he goes. Like Brienne, he chooses to do the right thing. He’s been making small steps (freeing Tyrion, telling Myrcella the truth, letting Brienne and Pod escape the Tully castle) and now he’s galloping.
I think he’ll complete his redemption arc here. All redemption arcs come with suffering, and he’s already lost a hand, so there’s that. But honestly? Like with Theon, even though I desperately want those characters to survive their redemption arcs, I don’t have a lot of hope. I do expect a moment for him and Brienne first, though, and if he dies, he should die in her arms.
There is the prophecy in the book that Cersei’s little brother will choke her to death. It’s clearly Jaime in the books, and I think that should be what happens in the show too because it’s so poetic, but honestly, idk if that’d be best for Jaime at this point in the show, and so I’m open to other ways.
