Post by Leo of Red Keep on Mar 2, 2017 8:43:44 GMT
This scene between the Queen and the Prince in S1E03 is the basis of a common misconception about Cersei and her parenting effort.
On first sight, people mostly see her spoiling her son and she does say he is her "darling boy and the world will be exactly as he wants it to be" but there is a lot more to it, namely the price it will take.
Everything Queen Cersei says in this conversation is sound advice:
As a future king, Joffrey will have to care about his image and keep his weaknesses to himself. He must understand that he has a role in shaping it, he cannot take it for granted. She tells him about the realities of a prince's marriage and asks him to play the role of an acceptable husband, then she speaks of the need for alliances in a feudal system.
She also tells him to consider the motivation of the people who serve him. He comes up with the prospect of a central army fit to an absolute monarch and she answers that this is not what he will be.
It is the contrary of delusion, Prince Joffrey is receiving a lesson in realism.
A king does not simply get anything he wants.
Finally, she tells him to be wary of everything: "everyone who isn't us is an enemy". This apparent paranoia is inherited from her husband, the winner of a rebellion. An ally is not a friend and a king must know this.
Cersei is smarter than people think she is.
