We live in a time where the entertainment industry is full of vapidity. Most companies and actors seem to care more about making something that sells instead of something meaningful, and it is hard to find characters in entertainment that provide more than a cheap laugh or shallow lesson. Though there's nothing wrong with enjoying a show or movie purely for the sake of enjoying it, especially when doing so can be a much-needed escape from reality, it is also important that we surround ourselves with fictional characters and entertainment that stimulates our minds and inspires us to be better. We always look for good role models for our children, but us adult humans need them, too.
In my vigorous and exasperating hunt for such inspiration, I have stumbled upon a flawless example of a fictional person whose demeanor embodies everything a human should aspire to be, or to put it more in a more modest fashion, the Holy Grail of influential characters in all of entertainment history. Her name is Daenerys Targaryen, she is my ideal role model, and soon, she’s going to be yours, too.
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD
For those who don’t know, Daenerys Targaryen is a main character on HBO’s award-winning television series “Game Of Thrones,” based off of George R. R. Martin’s book series. Portrayed by the beautiful and talented Emilia Clarke, viewers have seen Dany through thick and thin, watching her grow from a helpless pawn under her brother’s thumb in season 1 to the fierce conqueror she is on the show’s current season, season 7. Her growth as a character, while impressive, is hard-earned; Daenerys’ success is less of a straight shot, and more of a winding road. Mistakes are made aplenty, and it is those missteps that make her all the better of a character--they show that she’s human, and that even a rogue queen with 3 freaking dragons under her command can make the wrong decision. She gets angry, makes rash choices, and has to deal with the consequences, in that order, and more than once. We’ve all been there many times, and will probably continue to do so. That’s just the way life is. Even further, we see Dany learn from her mistakes, and lean on her friends when she needs help, both of which are necessary qualities of the quintessential successful and happy person that everyone strives to be, and also something many of us learn to utilise as we make mistakes of our own. The first key to a successful role model is relatability, and the fact that Dany, a person whose fictional life in many aspects does not compare to any actual lives, is still, indeed, so relatable, is reason enough to make her someone to look up to.
If we look more closely, another facet of Dany’s personality worthy of praise is her kind-heartedness. From the very beginning, we very clearly know that Daenerys cares primarily about two things: her people, and gaining back her rightful crown. Her one and only goal in life is to be where she believes she belongs, Queen of Westeros, yet it takes six seasons for her to even set sail towards the country she was born to rule. You might be asking yourself why that is, and the simple answer is that she’s spent the majority of her time creating a better life for the brutally mistreated. Be it burning alive the cruel, ignorant leader of a wild tribe, or completely reconfiguring the dynamics of an entire city, Daenerys is unstoppably determined when it comes to making a better life for others. Hell, she even abolished a centuries-old slave trade! And the best part is that all of these things are selfless tasks that she ultimately never needed to do. Sure, quite a few of these conquests worked in her favor and earned her two wholly-devoted armies, along with a fleet of ships and a close-knit group of experienced advisors, but that doesn’t make her motives any less pure; it simply makes her smart. Dany could have traveled down more selfish and harmful avenues that would have made her life much easier personally, but rather chose a path that would benefit more lives than just her own. Seeing this kind of altruism is rare, especially in a ruler, and it’s even better that it’s such a prevalent part of her character. In the world we live in, we oftentimes focus on ourselves and our own internal issues, so witnessing such powerful kindness in a character is galvanizing.
More than anything, Daenerys Targaryen is a badass woman who needs no one but herself to achieve her dreams. She attacks things head on, and is never, ever afraid to speak her mind. She is intelligent, she is tender, and she is brave. She is a born leader who wears her humanity like armor, and her integrity is a valuable quality that the human population could use a lot more of. She is a character that we all need to emulate, whether you’re young or old, broke or rich, this or that. If the entire human population aimed to live like Daenerys, we could obtain a better life for us all--and, hopefully some cool, fire-breathing dragons to call our own along with it.
