If you’re going to win at the Game of Thrones, you need to get used to back stabbing. Through the first seven seasons of the hit series, in fact, there’s been so much back stabbing that most of us probably forget who stabbed who-and whose back has yet to be stabbed. Thankfully Venngage , a graphic design site, created this spoiler-filled infographic for fans to overanalyze as we eagerly await the Season 8 premier.
To create this impressive map of (dis) loyalty, they watched every episode from the first seven seasons, calculating betrayal webs, victim bars, and motive charts.
Betrayal-as they define it-is merely an act that contradicts ones word or breaks trust, and…yeah, there are there a lot. Across seven seasons, Venngage counted a staggering 83 acts of betrayal-an average of about 1.2 betrayals per episode, or one betrayal every 45 minutes. With six episodes and about 330 minutes left to go, that means we should witness at least seven or eight more betrayals in the final season.
Game of Thrones\’ final season should witness between 7 and 8 betrayals
Given the way she’s pacing, Cersei Lannister is the safest bet to rack up at least one more. Her character accounts for a whopping 8.4 percent of all betrayals on the show-tied only with the (spoiler) recently-throat-cut Petyr Baelish.
The thickness of the lines denotes the significance of the betrayal. Before losing his neck, Littlefinger perpetrated the two most significant betrayals: Ned Stark and Joffrey Baratheon. Looking at Cersei and Jamie, the balance of significance of the betrayals clearly tips towards Cersei.
Worth noting is that the infographic only recounts betrayals that occurred during the television timeline. That means Jamies let off the hook for one of the realms most famous and literal back stabbings-the regicide of Mad King Aerys Targaryen.
The character most beset by betrayals is the Mother of Dragons, Danneyrs, which helps to justify her overall victim/messiah complex. That said, everyone who has betrayed Dani- with the exception of thirsty, stubbled Jorah-has perished. If that troubled look on Tyrions face when he watched Danis dragons lay waste to Lannister soldiers spells even an iota of betrayal, he’d better watch himself: The odds of crossing the Mother of Dragons and living are not in his favor.
Ned Stark betrayed absolutely no one, emphasizing the basic law of the realm: loyalty to men rarely pays. Loyalty to the realm, however, seems to pay quite nicely. At the center of the web, we find Varys. All those dotted-lined legs signify his many subtle, implicated disloyalties.
Back-stabbing, however, doesnt always pay off, and those whose betrayals outnumber their victimizations often meet more gruesome ends-particularly Littlefinger and Ramsay Bolton. Those who mostly play the role of victim, however-Danaerys, Jamie, Tyrion-have survived every season.
Venngage also analyzed the motives behind each betrayal. Since a betrayal implicitly requires trust, most of them occurred between family and friends. In both categories, the motive was usually power. But Tyrion and Jamie, the two characters who many guess will prove to be turncoats, arent transparently motivated by power. They’re motivated by duty and rectitude. And we all know what happens to characters who take the high kings road.