Emilia Clarke wholeheartedly agrees with those who were disappointed by the fate that befell Daenerys Targaryen in the Game of Thrones finale. In fact, the actress has admitted that she still feels sad when she thinks about how her character’s story ended. From the very first season, audiences rooted for Daenerys, hoping to see her soon on the Iron Throne, reigniting the flame of her House—brought to its knees many years earlier and on the brink of extinction, just like the dragons they had tamed for centuries. It is thanks to Daenerys that Westeros was able to admire dragons once again (three, to be exact), but her promising future was swept away in the series finale. Some time has passed since then, and Emilia Clarke has offered a new take on the fate in store for the Mother of Dragons.
Emilia Clarke was furious when she found out how Daenerys would die
Airing from 2011 to 2019, Game of Thrones left its mark on the television landscape but also delivered one of the most divisive finales in TV history. Many, for example, disliked the ending for Daenerys Targaryen, who lost her mind by setting King’s Landing ablaze while riding her mighty dragon, only to be killed by Jon Snow, the person she trusted most.
Speaking to Variety a few years after the TV series ended, Emilia Clarke admitted that she still has some reservations about how her character’s story concluded. Just before she dies, Daenerys turns to Jon Snow and asks him to “break the wheel together,” but Jon has to stop her and so he stabs her. “That’s the last thing I say before that little brat stabs me. Absolutely outrageous. I was furious. I was absolutely furious,” Clarke admitted. She then added: “Beyond the controversy surrounding his actions, the fact that he killed me really upset me. It was pretty rude. I gave everything to that man; I razed cities to the ground for him, for us,” she added jokingly: “But now I’ve had enough; I’ve given far too much; I’m furious.”
During the interview, the actress also recalled her first read-through of the eighth season’s script, when she discovered Daenerys’s fate: “I had just gotten back from vacation, I turned on my phone, and I saw a message notification. And there it was, of course. I went home, sat down, and did what I always do—read it from start to finish—and then I found myself leaving the house in a daze—I’d forgotten my keys, my phone, everything—and I walked for hours trying to process what I was supposed to do that season. It was a really, really intense experience. You always get a little emotional at the end of every shoot. But this time it was like saying, “I don’t know what’s happening to me,” almost in tears. It was such an important part of my life, the starting point of my career, that its end and then the arrival of COVID… existential crisis, here I come! It took me years to figure out what it was all about. It took me years to understand what it meant. I meet just as many people who haven’t seen it as those who have. So, I’m just grateful it happened. But I still can’t quite wrap my head around it, if you know what I mean.”
