HBO
In life, in love, in all our dealings, we try to surround ourselves with chill. That’s because the world around us is a constant swirling maelstrom of awful news, bad takes, and presidential elections. The compendium of unchill.
That may be the case in all worlds, fictional or not. Unchill abounds. Unchill transcends. Unchill silences the chill.
Don’t believe me? Just look at the world of Westeros. For the second straight year, I spent the entire season of Game of Thrones trying to find chill anywhere I could.
And you know what? There isn’t a lot of it. Last year, out of 43 characters, 30 of the characters finished with positive chill points. (Wait. I think I just disproved my previous sentence there. Fuck. Thesis statements have never really been my thing.)
But what about this season? Well, this year, 26 characters finished in the plus, so … I guess … uh, shut up and read the final rankings.
And before we began, thanks to the whole lot of you who read this inanity every week. I don’t know why you do, but I appreciate it with the kind of love Cersei has for the peasants of Flea Bottom.
Hey, speaking of last place finishers from this season.
56. Cersei Lannister: -1,000,100
While it’s common to solve problems with violence, especially in Westeros — a society where flaying, raping, skull fucking, and torture don’t cause anyone to look askance — almost everyone agreed this was a twee bit of overkill.
I mean even O.J. was willing to go to trial.
So congrats, Cersei for being Season 6’s least chill Bro.
55. Melisandre: -300,500
Here’s a hypothetical. To save the realm, you are required to raise someone from the dead. But your powers limit you to only one, no takesbackies. Do you raise A. The brooding bastard child who in his entire time alive was able to rally about 4,000 people to his cause and in the process disillusion like 25,000 others or B: THE MOTHER FUCKING LAST GIANT THE WORLD KNOWS.
54. Lancel Lannister: -25,000
Just a sincere lack of hustle and heart, whether squaring off against The Mountain in the Red Keep, or under the Sept of Baelor, needing to crawl 25 feet to blow out a candle.
53. The High Sparrow: -11,900
Last year, he was the undisputed MVP, coming out of nowhere to take over a whole city. Looks like he let it get to his head and got fat in the offseason. No, Really.
You telling me he hustled to stay on top with a gut like that? I’m telling you he didn’t.
52. The Children of the Forest: -10,000
A fictional reminder that realpolitik is often only solution a temporary solution to a geopolitical crisis, and it will often have unpredictable long-term implications no one can predict.
T-51. The Hound: -5,000
Let some people get killed. Killed some people. What was the point of his storyline even?
T-51. Randyll Tarly: -5,000
“Let’s see. I have one of the most priceless items in all of the land, a thing that I know pretty much every person in the world knows I possess and would do anything to get their hands on. Should I use the biometric scanner sword case I purchased that can only be opened by me, or the hooks over the fireplace.”
50. Lyanna Stark: -5,000
Pawning your problems off on other people is not cool.
49. Jaimie Lannister: -1,850
Bitched the fuck out when the High Sparrow told him to kill him, which, oh, could have only saved thousands of lives later on, including your son’s wife.
48. Yara Greyjoy: -1,375
Threw the biggest hissy fit we’ve ever seen in a show full of millennial hissy fits, when her millennial ass fair and squarely lost an election to be King of the Ironborn.
Say what you will about Al Gore’s methods of fighting the contested presidential election in 2000, at least he didn’t run off with the entire U.S. Navy after the Supreme Court ruled against him.
47. Tyrion Lannister: -1,050
Brought back slavery after a leader abolished it, which was something even the Antebellum South couldn’t fucking achieve.
T-43. The Original Three Eyed Raven: -1,000
Fuck your boring ass narration during these cool ass flashbacks. There’s a reason no one gets the stupid museum audio tour device and it’s not because they cost extra. It’s because they suck.
And there’s a reason the episode ten flashback was the best. It was because you were dead.
T-43. Bran Stark: -1,000
Just bring the fucking wall down you dumb ass. Just do it. We all know you are going to do it. Just fucking do it. See what fucking sympathy you get from this column.
Dumb ass
T-43. Robert Glover: -1,000
Chill Bros answer the call, yo. Chill Bros answer the call.
T-43. Samwell Tarly: -1,000
And chill Bros earn their family swords.
T-39. Septa Mordant: -500
How many friends you think she has? Two? At most.
T-39. Lord Varys: -500
Patiently waited over 20 years to see a Targaryen take the throne. Patience is chill. Patience is very chill.
T-39. Euron Greyjoy: -500
Maybe you should have murdered your niece and nephew before you had your fancy ass ocean baptism to become king of your now shipless island nation. Great leaders have foresight.
T-39. Loras Tyrell: -500
Weak shit. Weak shit all season.
38. Brynden Tully: -475
I call him Brynden the Wackfish because everything he did this season sucked.
T-36. The Masters: -250
Chill societies who through the grace of a benevolent proxy are allowed to keep their slaves for a period of seven years would act chill and shit about it. These guys didn’t.
T-36. Ser Davos Seaworth: -250
I had no problem with anything he did this year.
T-34. Those Two Idiot Dothraki Bros: -200
Casual misogyny ain’t chill in 2016, Dothraki Bros. Neither are Bros, come to think of it.
T-34. The Knights of the Vale: -200
Number of alive giants there’d be in the world if you’d hustled just a little faster: One.
T-32. Jorah Mormont: -100
Has not cured greyscale yet, therefore is not chill (if you were on Twitter two days ago, you’d get this joke).
T-32. The Massive Corpse Orgy Mounds: -100
Don’t get me wrong. Nine times out of ten a writhing mass of dead, bloody corpses and slowly asphyxiating men is chill as fuck. This one just happened not to be. I don’t make the rules.
31. The Bernie Sanders Mother Fucker From Episode One: -50
Stood around talking all season about shit that served no purpose in the end.
30. The Waif: -25
Gives a good thorough stick beating. Gives a less thorough stabbing.
29. The White Raven: -25
Has been sitting around in a crate for years just waiting for winter to come. That’s cool.
28. Daario Naharis and Jorah Mormont’s Horses: 50
Literal workhorses of the show.
27. Margaery Tyrell: 100
Trying to save the lives of people who just maimed your brother is fucking admirable.
26. Grey Worm: 150
Got knives. Got jokes, too.
T-24. Roose Bolton: 200
Maybe probably should have killed his son instead of letting his son kill him, but say what you want about the brutal Boltons, at least Roose was a damn pragmatist in a world of egoists and hedonists. That’s some chill ass shit.
He was also my pick for chillest Bro of the season before it began, and crapped out in episode two. Fuck him.
T-24. The Dude Sucking On Some Titties: 200
If that’s all he does with his life, that’s a god damn life well lived.
T-22. Olenna Tyrell: 250
She should change her name to Olownna Tyrell.
T-22. Brienne of Tarth: 250
Did… did she do anything this season? Like of worth?
T-19: The Dothraki: 400
Perhaps the most fearsome fighting force in the entire place, the Dothraki have all the idiotic unbridled enthusiasm of a college freshman pledging a frat. They reacted to that dragon the way most first years do to finding out they’re about to attend their first kegger.
T-19. Theon Greyjoy: 400
Really bounced back from the whole not having a dick thing. I don’t know if I could bounce back from the whole not having a dick thing. I do have a dick, though, is what I’m saying.
T-19. Robyn Arryn’s Gyrfalcon: 400
I was out with a friend the other day and was explaining this column to her, and showed her my rankings, and she said, “Why is a falcon ranked so high? Falcons aren’t chill.”
Some people just don’t get what’s chill.
T-16. Ser Bronn: 500
Anyone who tells you to fuck a girl with your precious metal prothesis is okay in my book.
T-16. Rhaegal and Viserion: 500
The Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol to Drogon’s Kobe.
T-16. Ser Arthur Dayne: 500
Two swords two swords two swords two swords.
15. The Mountain: 600
Dominated in a smooth, methodical, silent way. Like an undead zombie Martina Hingis
14. Arya Stark: 700
Whatever.
13. Ser Aliser Thorne: 750
Told a dead guy who came back to life he would kill him again. The fuck you gonna do to mess with a guy like that?
12. Tormund Giantsbane: 1,700
Ate some bread, smashed some skulls, took the mantle of the leader of the Free Folk from Mance Rayder. A very, very strong season.
11. Daario Naharis: 1,750
Could you imagine trying to get a girl off after watching her gleefully immolate hundreds of people while riding a fucking firebreathing dragon? I’d be impotent the second I got in the room.
10. Ellaria Sand: 2,000
Stabbed a motherfucking king, allied herself with the most powerful fighitng force currently in the world. Did exactly nothing in between. What a life.
9. Lady Crane: 5,000
Westeros’s best drug dealer.
8. Daenerys Targaryen: 11,250
Collected armies the way the average ruler collects tavern wenches. And one is a lot more useful than the other.
7. King Tommen Baratheon: 24,500
You know what? Fuck this fuck dick.
6. Drogon: 35,000
True, he’s a goddamn diva, but would you go to war with him? I’m damn sure you wouldn’t go to war against him. Fuck, no, you wouldn’t.
5. Jon Snow 50,500
Actually fucked up like a hundred times this year. Still, always and forever, looks better than anyone else out on the battlefield.
4. Lyanna Mormont: 249,250
Could inspire a fucking ragtag bunch of misfits to get to the national title game.
3. Wun Wer Wun Dar Wun: 250,250
At least he now gets to be in giant person heaven, hanging with all his giant friends. At least, that’s what I like to picture Wun Wun doing. I like to picture Wun Wun happy.
2. Sansa Stark: 350,300
Here’s what I said about Sansa before the season started: “Sansa is like a player you hear about in the offseason that’s cut out partying, hired a dietician, and is really refocused on the game. Could have a breakout season of chill.”
I’d say she did all that and more.
1. Hodor: 27,000,000
Only did the chillest thing ever seen in the entire world.
Thanks again, as always, for reading. See you in Season Seven.
NOW WATCH: THE 10 MOST SHOCKING GAME OF THRONES DEATHS