Emilia Clarke explains Daenerys' decision and how the hints were always there Listen to JOE's brand new GOT reaction show, The North Awaits, with Michael Fry & Carl Kinsella right here. That epic scene was coming and here's why. Advertisement As always, if you haven't seen the most recent episode of Game of Thrones, consider this to be your spoiler alert warning. "King Jaehaerys once told me that madness and greatness are two sides of the same coin. Every time a new Targaryen is born, he said, the gods toss the coin in the air and the world holds its breath to see how it will land" - Ser Barristan Selmy. Well, we definitely know which way the coin has landed with Daenerys Targareyn because she's determined to take the Iron Throne with fire and blood. For the last few weeks, Dany's mental state has been the issue of much speculation and we finally got a definitive answer because The Mad Queen is here. Watching her slaughter thousands of people in a horrific firestorm will go down as one of the defining moments in Season 8 of Game of Thrones. During an interview with the show's Inside the Episode featurette, Emilia Clarke gave an insight into her character's mindset during that epic sequence. Advertisement "It's so natural for a person to resort to anger and that’s exactly where she goes. It's there, it has always been there. It’s what has drove her throughout everything. Here comes that familiar feeling of anger and she doesn’t do anything to choke that. She lives in it. It’s this feeling that you could call Targareyn craziness, or you could give it all of these names that it doesn’t deserve because it's just grief. "It’s hurt and she has this ability to make this hurt feel a little bit less for a minute. And the feeling is to fucking kill her (Cersei). When you feel that much failure, disappointment, shame, hurt, and lost love, there’s only so much pain that you can handle before you snap," said Clarke. Given the fact that Daenerys has previously liberated cities, ended slavery, and killed tyrants, plenty of fans have been perplexed as to why she has now become the embodiment of everything that she loathes. Well, David Benioff, showrunner on Game of Thrones, has said that the Daenerys' recent losses have been a contributing factor to her horrific decision. Benioff also referenced an old line that Maester Aemon Targaryen said about Targaryen's being left alone in the world. "Dany’s an incredibly strong person, she’s also someone who has had really close friendships and advisors for her entire run on the show. Those people who have been closest to her have either turned on her, or died. She’s very much alone and that’s a dangerous thing for someone that has so much power, to feel so isolated. At the very time when she needs guidance, friendship and advice the most, everyone’s gone." Advertisement The line about Daenerys being alone in the world is an overt reference to Maester Aemon's quote that "A Targaryen alone in the world is a terrible thing." Daenerys' relationship with Jon Snow was also a factor in her horrific decision to unleash the full fiery fury of Drogon on King's Landing, according to the show's creators. "Jon Snow is someone that she has fallen in love with and as far as she’s concerned, Jon has betrayed her by telling people about his true identity and also, he’s unable to return her true affections at this point. Advertisement "When she says let it be fear, she’s resigning herself to the fact that she may have to get things done in a way that isn't pleasant and horrible to lots of people." Despite the fact that Daenerys has always been portrayed as a 'hero' in the show, it's worth remembering that she hasn't been adverse to unleashing some fire and blood before. For example, she burned the masters in Astapor, destroyed fleets at Slaver's Bay, killed thousands of Lannister/Tyrell forces during the Loot Train Attack, and executed the members of House Tarly via dragonfire. Granted, these people were her enemies but Benioff thinks that there has always been a darkness to Danaerys Targareyn that was waiting to be unleashed. Advertisement "Even when you look back to Season 1 and Khal Drogo giving the golden crown to Viserys, her reaction to watching her brother’s head being melted off is kind of chilling. If circumstances had of been different, I don’t think this side of Dany would have ever come out. If Cersei hadn’t betrayed her and executed Missandei, if Jon hadn’t told her the truth. If all these things happened in any different way, I don’t think we would have been seeing this side of Daenerys. "I don’t think she decided ahead of time that she was going to do what she did. Then she saw the Red Keep which is to her the home that her family built when they first came over to this country. It’s in that moment when she’s on the walls of King’s Landing, looking at that symbol of everything that was taken from her, when she makes the decision to make this personal." The Queen is dead. Long live The Mad Queen? We'll find out in the finale of Game of Thrones.<doc-sep>The internet wasn’t too thrilled after watching Game of Thrones last night, when Emilia Clarke’s character, Daenerys Targaryen, killed thousands of innocent people in King’s Landing, which had just surrendered. Emilia and the creators of the show preemptively responded to that criticism in a video. Spoilers! Ahead! If you’ve been on Twitter at all in the past 16 hours, you’ve probably realized how pissed people are that Dany has fully descended into madness on Game of Thrones. In a behind-the-scenes video about the episode, shot before it aired, the creators defended her plotline. Warning! There are major spoilers ahead for last night’s episode of Game of Thrones. Proceed with caution. Basically, fans have been pissed at Thrones for playing into the “women are crazy” stereotype by making Dany’s descent into madness so unrealistic/rushed/bad. Last night, it got even worse when Dany made the choice to kill thousands of innocent people during the battle. As a quick recap, Jon Snow and the rest of Dany’s homies marched into King’s Landing after blowing through the gate, and the Lannister army promptly surrendered. That’s when Grey Worm (on the ground) and Dany (in the air) took things into their own hands and decided to fully start roasting/murdering innocent people. For many fans, it was a crazy (heh, get it?) jump to make for a character who’s been mostly even-keeled for the run of the show. The episode’s director, Miguel Sapochnik, explained what was going through Dany’s head before she went off the deep end. “She feels empty. It wasn’t what she thought it was. It’s not enough,” he said. D. B. Weiss, one of the show’s creators, agreed. “She knows she has won this war. It’s in that moment when she makes the decision to make this personal.” This content is imported from {embed-name}. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. Cosmo Emilia Clarke added that Dany felt super alone in the moment. “Every single thing that’s led her to this point, and there she is, alone.” And David Benioff, another show creator, said it was actually all about who her family is. “Ultimately, she is who she is, and that’s a Targaryen,” he said. “She has said repeatedly throughout the show, ‘I will take what is mine with fire and blood,’ and in this episode, she does it.” This content is imported from YouTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. Totally, totally. A woman is definitely prone to ending thousands of innocent lives just because her dad did the same, even though in the entire series, she’s been insistent on not becoming that person. That checks out! I’m just going to leave this here... This content is imported from YouTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. Emma Baty Emma Baty is the Associate Entertainment Editor at Cosmopolitan who focuses on movies and TV. This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io<doc-sep>
Warning: Game of Thrones spoilers ahead. Emilia Clarke broke her silence on Daenerys becoming the Mad Queen on last night’s Game of Thrones…and she did it with a spot-on (and good-humored) Instagram post. The actress shared a photo of herself this morning with her Khaleesi wig off and a giant bottle of champagne, writing, "This is what it took not only to shoot ep5...but to watch it too! #🤯 @gameofthrones @hbo #soshockingitblewmywigoff #😳 #🤢" Everything about that caption is so accurate. For context, in last night’s Game of Thrones, Dany ignored the surrender bells of King's Landing and pursued the Red Keep, burning everything in its path with her dragon, Drogon. By doing so, she killed Jaime, Cersei, the Mountain, the Hound, Qyburn, and many more innocent people. She also killed Varys earlier in the episode. Game of Thrones' showrunner D.B. Weiss explained that initially, Dany hadn't meant to kill everyone—but something snapped when she heard the surrender bell. "I don't think she decided ahead of time that she was going to do what she did," he said in Game of Thrones' Inside the Episode feature. "And then she sees the Red Keep, which is, to her, the home that her family built when they first came over to this country 300 years ago. It's in that moment on the walls of King's Landing, when she's looking at that symbol of everything that was taken from her, when she makes the decision to make this personal." Clarke warned everyone before that Dany's fate was hard for her to take. "I went for a very long walk the first time I read the final season," she told Stephen Colbert recently. "I read it, and I couldn’t quite handle it. So I just walked out—it should’ve been raining—it was just that kind of a moment, like, I’m in a daze, and I don’t know what’s going on, existential crisis. And I just went for a walk and didn’t bring anything. I walked around London for two hours, going, ‘Ah.’ If you saw me, that’s what I was doing." Alyssa Bailey News and Strategy Editor Alyssa Bailey is the news and strategy editor at ELLE.com, where she oversees coverage of celebrities and royals (particularly Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton).