Was Ned honorable or just a fool playing the wrong game?

            Ned Stark. Ned Stark was the great man who ran the north and ran Winterfell. Ned Start was the great man who was personally asked by the king to be the hand of the king, to be his right-hand man. But was Ned really that great? Did he really understand the chess match that is King’s Landing, that is the Iron Throne and all its components?

            Ned ran Winterfell the way he knew best so of course he understood everything that was going on, how everything was supposed to work, etc. Here he was playing checkers with everyone else playing checkers as well. Everything was ran how a simple man, much like Ned was, knew how to run things. Not to mention, Ned had control of the people and what they did. This is very important to remember. 

Not only was this apparent in Ned, it was translated right on down to his kids as well, especially Sansa. She saw how her mom and dad were. She saw how everyone did things and how everything was run and controlled. Not to mention she was probably read and was told countless fairytales about being a queen and about the king and queen falling in love together. This only but further would have pushed her down the same road as her dad. 

            When the king asked for Ned to be his right-hand man you could tell Ned knew he did not have a choice but to say yes. I mean, the king did just personally travel a month to ask him. But when he said yes, you think he knew more of what he was getting into. In terms of the job he was going to perform and where he was going to live.

            At first, Ned was trying to run things in what one would call an honorable manner. Making sure money was only being used or given when the Throne actually had it or making sure the Throne was run the right way. Although this honorableness is a quality you would want The Hand of the King to have and is probably what worked very well for Ned in Winterfell, it is not the move for King’s Landing. 

Honorableness is a great quality but the quality of a fool in King’s Landing. 

            Sansa was very similar when she arrived at King’s Landing as well. She tried to act like the perfect lady for her future Husband in Joffrey. She tried to take care of him and be there for him, like when the direwolf attacked him, but very soon realized that it was not going to be like the fairytales as Joffrey wanted nothing to do with her. He did not want her help when he was attacked by the direwolf and was kind of against marrying her in the future. 

Ned made several, several mistakes when arriving at King’s Landing. Even though to him these were the correct decisions to make as he was trying act honorably, like I mentioned before, they actually were very wrong. Let’s go through some shall we and see where they had him end up.  

            Ned noticed Joffrey was different and decided to act on it. Now I understand why he was dumbfounded at first when looking at the King and Queen and then looking at Joffrey. The King had brown hair and the Queen had blonde hair and Joffrey had had blonde hair. Although they do not have the information that we have at the time about brown hair being dominant over blonde hair, Ned probably has a good idea that Joffrey should not have blonde hair. In addition, Joffrey does not look like the King, he looks much more like the brother of the Queen. Of course, this does not add up but where Ned went wrong, very wrong, with thinking that other people had not noticed nor cared. Other people definitely noticed but knew what would happen if they tried to say something.

            Like did you really think people did not realize this same thing. There is a reason no one said anything.

Another mistake Ned made was by playing checkers during a chess match. Not only was he not thinking more than one step ahead like everyone else, he was not even playing the same game as them. This became apparent when he was making decisions such as snooping around trying to figure out whose kid Joffrey really was and who Robert’s bastard children were. Although what he was trying to do was honorable in his opinion, he did not think ahead about what if someone found out or who talks to who about certain things. 

I ask myself, how could you not realize that this could be problematic. 

            Not only did Ned not think ahead nor play the right game but he also did not have anyone but himself in King’s Landing. People like Little Finger and the Queen had what one could call informants or even spies around the city to relay information that they valued as necessary. Ned had no one more than just himself, which proved to be an issue. This later led to him trusting people like Little Finger, which was yet another mistake. Everyone had their own agendas and helping other people was not one of the things on those agendas. Ned especially messed up because Little Finger told him personally not to trust him. Not to mention, Little Finger mentioned how he was very close with Ned’s wife, which should have been off putting too. 

 

            The most significant mistake that Ned made, and one that I mentioned previously, was that he was he was playing checkers while everyone else was playing chess and playing it well. What made it so significant was that Ned never realized that he was not playing the right game. This was definitely exploited by other people which just made it worse for Ned. Another viewer of Game of Thrones said it best, “He did NOT know how to play the game.”

            Now these were some pretty bad mistakes, I do not think anyone would deny that. But how could Ned not realize them?

            All of these mistakes proved to be costly for Ned. They put him in a situation where he had to plead guilty for treason or have his head cut off. Even when doing so he still had his head cut off, right in front of his two daughters. So, all of his honorable work that he did, everything he thought he was doing to benefit the throne was actually him acting like a fool and got him the worst result possible, death.

            Now Sansa had a very similar experience when entering King’s Landing as well. She made a couple mistakes, none that were as serious as Ned but left her in almost a similar situation. Here’s some of the mistakes that she made.

            The first and foremost mistake Sansa made in my opinion was believing in the fairytales. In fairytales, everything works out in the end perfect. Complications are held to a minimum and in some, the king and queen fall in love and live their lives ruling at ease. This is just not the case in Game of Thrones. There is complication on top of complications and people just do not work the same way. Most importantly, ruling the land is not easy. There are, especially more than ever after Rob dies, people trying to come and take the throne that they rightfully think is theirs.

            To add to this mistake, and much to which I mentioned previously, she thought that her and Joffrey were going to, more or less, get to know each other and get married and have kids. This just could not be less true. Joffrey wants nothing to do with her. He did not want her care or to hang out with her. He was even skeptical when he was told that Sansa was the girl he was eventually going to marry and have kids with. 

            Here is where Sansa differed from her father as this is when she began to realize her mistakes.

            One last mistake that Sansa made was thinking that people were looking out for her when she was at King’s Landing. Now, she did have some people who did look out for her, but she was honestly just another pawn in the game. She was just seen as an outsider by most, especially by the queen. This was the complete opposite of how it was in Winterfell where she had people tending to her, but in King’s Landing she did not have this as much. To add to this mistake, Sansa, as Ikumi Kayama said, would “trust characters who are most untrustworthy and distrusts characters who are interested in her well-being”. Such as characters like Little Finger who is very untrustworthy who Sansa trusted a good bit, especially as time went on. This just put her in bad situations continuously.

What Sansa did different then her father was notice that things were not as they were in Winterfell and that people acted different. She noticed her mistakes. And the biggest kickers of them all were two different things. First and foremost was watching her dad get his head chopped off, even after admitting to treason, which was supposed to save his life. Second, was when The Hound, someone who has been a part of the game for a long time, just in a different way, tells you specifically to “Save yourself some pain and give him what he wants” (S1:Ep10), you should listen. If these two things, among the others, is not enough of a kick in the face to tell you that you need to start playing the game like everyone else then I don’t know what is. 

Sansa figured this out, unlike her father did, and as bad as it may sound, this is the reason she is alive and he is not. 

Both Sansa and Ned had their mistakes and one could call these mistakes honorable but truly, Ned was a fool for never realizing that he was not playing the right game.

 

Sources: 

“Calm down Ned Dont Lose Your Head - Happy Ned Stark Meme.” Make a Meme, makeameme.org/meme/calm-down-ned. 

Kayama , Ikumi Studio Kayama’s. “Game of Thrones: Why Sansa Is Not as Dumb as You Think. Studio Kayama.” |Studio Kayama|, 9 June 2013, studiokayama.com/game-of-thrones-visual-communications-why-sansa-is-not-as-dumb-as-you-think/. 

Moua, Linda. Ned Stark: The Honorable Fool, Lawful Stupid, Blogger, 7 Oct. 2019, univ375.blogspot.com/2019/10/ned-stark-honorable-fool-lawful-stupid.html. 

Riesen, Guillaume. “Hair Color.” Understanding Genetics, 15 Feb. 2019, genetics.thetech.org/ask-a-geneticist/hair-color-genetics.