warning: there are spoilers ahead if you’re not up to date with “game of thrones”.
It’s no secret that “Game of Thrones” deviated from the text many times in the fifth season. We’ve seen this with the character of Sansa and the expansion of a fan favorite on screen. But there’s a change in the text that has increasingly confused fans of the beloved book series this season.
You are reading: Renly and loras in the books
Being Loras Tyrell, Margaery’s brother and a popular supporting character on “Game of Thrones,” has been increasingly reduced to a caricature of homosexuality, and no one is sure why.
loras was very subtly alluded to as gay in the book series, but it was done so quietly that george r.r. Martin had to confirm the speculation. In the HBO adaptation, Loras’s homosexuality is his most obvious trait.
In episode four of season five, we saw the Militant Faith, a military offshoot of the Faith of the Seven, exercise its newly bestowed power by aggressively rooting out “sinful” behavior. They concluded their foray into King’s Landing with arrest as parrots, charged with “perversion” in the form of homosexuality.
loras was introduced in the first season during a jousting tournament, where he beat gregor “the mountain” clegane (an impressive and rare feat). Afterwards, it quickly became clear that he was not only a skilled fighter, but also Renly Baratheon’s lover.
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george r.r. Martin’s subtle references to Renly and Loras being gay were so thorough that many missed them. He is referred to once in the text as “Renly’s Little Rose” and the “Knight of Thoughts”, but this could be interpreted as rumour.
The most obvious occurrence came from a scene between Jaime Lannister and Loras in the third book, a storm of swords. Jaime is frustrated with Loras, saying “Now sheath your damn sword, or I’ll take it from you and shove it somewhere even Renly never found.” This definitely implies a homosexual relationship between Renly and Loras, but it could still be attributed to rumours. and among the thousands of pages of text, it was an easy inference to miss.
showrunners david benioff and d.b. Weiss decided to do away with the ambiguity and take advantage of HBO’s allowance of nudity and adult material. Renly and Loras immediately established themselves as a gay couple in the first season.
this is all fine and dandy for the first two seasons of “game of thrones”, where we saw loras do more than just worship renly. Loras had a big fight scene with Brienne of Tarth in Season 2, and was shown conspiring with Ella’s sister Margaery to keep Renly in power. She was one of the heroes at the Battle of Blackwater, saving King’s Landing from Stannis Baratheon’s attack.
There have been no further signs of him serving as a noble knight or pivotal warrior like he is in the books. instead, his sexual orientation has become the defining characteristic of loras.
Now, the show has created a narrative in which Loras is arrested for being gay, a plot that doesn’t exist in the written series.
this is equally disappointing and confusing on several levels.
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It seems anti-progressive to have a gay character who openly defines himself by the fact that he’s gay. One user online pointed out this difference by explaining that on HBO, Loras is “a gay character,” while in the book series Loras is “a knight and son of House Tyrell, who happens to be gay.” There have been many protests online about this treatment of Loras, especially in recent episodes where Loras is now being persecuted for his faith because of his sexual orientation.
one of george r.r. The editors of Martin’s book, Jane Johnson, have been on Twitter a lot recently, referring to show-loras as a “gay cartoon”.
There was also a recent post on the “a song of ice and fire” subreddit, where a user explained the many ways this is an abominable parrot adaptation. the user points out that faith in the books does not seem to dictate that homosexuality is a sin. it seems to be more of an ancient Greek-inspired social rule, where heterosexuality is the norm, but homosexual relationships are also tolerated among men.
The user, a man who identifies himself as gay, stated: “When I watch my favorite series about a fantasy world, why the hell do I need to watch guys being harassed for being gay…in the At best, I’m pleased with a kind of weird pity, at worst, I’m completely offended.”
The purpose of adding this story is unclear. the militants of the faith exist in the books, but they are more concerned with bridging the gap between the elite and the common people, as well as removing the corruption from within the castle. In fact, it is Margaery who is arrested at Cersei’s behest, on charges of adultery and treason.
The showrunners have chosen to put both Tyrell brothers behind bars, and Margaery takes the blame for knowing about parrots. but they could also be trying to make a broader comment about the nature of religion and homophobia.
are weiss and benioff trying to equate militant faith with the persecutions carried out by real world religions? if so, how will this play out?
Olyvar, Loras’s lover in the series, works for Littlefinger, so by testifying against Margaery and Loras, he chooses to destroy the alliance he built with the Tyrells. but that doesn’t make much sense. The Tyrells have proven to be strong players in the Game of Thrones, with more financial resources than many of the major houses and a cunning matriarch, Olenna. did littlefinger really instruct olyvar to testify?
We’ll have to wait and see how this new storyline progresses, but fans aren’t optimistic that it will get any better. Out of all the supporting characters, Loras has been assigned the weakest writing, and it’s a real shame.
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