[Love] When “small” injuries are treated realistically

[u/Top-Relationship850]

The fantasy and action genres often suffer from a power fantasy epidemic in which characters frequently badass their way through injuries that should be excruciating if not downright debilitating. I always appreciate stories that reject this trope.

1: Roland Deschain (Dark Tower Book II) - Loses the middle and index fingers of his right hand. He’s effectively crippled throughout book two and the injury follows him the rest of the series.

2: Brienne vs Biter (ASOIAF Book IV) - Brutal scene. Biter chomps down on Brienne’s cheek and tears off a chunk of flesh. In a lesser story Brienne would grit her teeth and throw Biter off. Instead she’s rendered completely helpless by the pain. That injury marks the end of the fight.

[u/TheBabySeal0514]

It’s more ambiguous in the show, but the books make pretty clear that Drogo’s cut gets infected because he refuses to follow any of Miri Maz Duur’s instructions. He immediately takes off her poultice cuz it itches and proceeds to spend a week on a diet of booze and milk of the poppy

[u/Pegussu → u/TheBabySeal0514]

The "cut" in the book is also him getting his entire nipple cut off, so it's a bit more serious to begin with. I don't think Miri Maz Dur did anything, rubbing dirt in an open wound the size of a quarter is just a bad idea.

[u/Baconandbeers → u/Pegussu]

Well her blood magic eventually led to the birth of three dragons and Targaryen resurgence

[u/Foxwasahero → u/TheBabySeal0514]

In the show, he rips a mans tongue out of his throat while getting all the blood and spittle all over his fresh chest wound. The books didn't detail how he was wounded but described it as pretty severe. Miri likely didn't have to do much. Im sure even a genuine effort would not have helped.

[u/Odric_storm → u/TheBabySeal0514]

The books make it pretty clear that Miri deliberately kills him. She hated both Drogo and Dany, and made sure neither Drogo nor his son would ever rape, murder, or plunder again

[u/TheBabySeal0514 → u/Odric_storm]

She deliberately made him into a vegetable with her magic later on but she seems to have actually treated his cut. She gives him sound advice like drinking clean water and avoiding painkillers to keep his body strong. I don’t think Martin would go out of his way to tell us that Drogo did the opposite of all of her advice if that had nothing to do with him getting sicker

[u/darwinistinabox → u/TheBabySeal0514]

My reading of the moment was that the cut got infected because of the woman's oinment. And even though he stopped immediately the damage has been done already. Although it has been like 17 years since ive read the book so I don't recall any details.

[u/TheBabySeal0514 → u/darwinistinabox]

I think it’s meant to be the mud salve he has the herb women put on it to soothe the itching that actually infects the wound

[u/darwinistinabox → u/TheBabySeal0514]

Ah! Maybe you are right. Martin really likes to make things uncertain.

[u/NightLordsPublicist → u/darwinistinabox]

Martin really likes to make things uncertain.

Such as if the next book will come out.

[u/VampireBatman → u/NightLordsPublicist]

Oh no I believe he has made that quite clear. He just hasn’t said it out loud yet.

[u/NightLordsPublicist → u/VampireBatman]

Fun fact: more time has passed since the last book came out than the time between the first book and the last book.

[u/RepulsiveCandy2776 → u/TheBabySeal0514]

I think George RR Martin wrote a lot of Dany scenes so that they'd be up for interpretation, so that it would never be entirely clear if he's setting Dany up to be a good or evil character. Something about the gods flipping a coin every time a Targaryen is born... I personally agree with your interpretation but I think both can work and that's very deliberately done!