On Sunday’s Game of Thrones finale, one of Westeros’s most mysterious, manipulative, controlling, scheming characters finally announced what his intentions have been since the beginning of the show.
To — fucking so fucking boringly — sit on the Iron Throne with a child bride at his side. Wow. Just like every other fucking dude in the game. It’s like, bro, everyone said you were a schemer. That was your scheme?
Lord Petyr Baelish stated his plan to Sansa, and while doing so said everything he’s done — every SINGLE step — has been in the service of that goal. So I took a look at every step he took to get where he is at the end of season six.
(He’s in Winterfell, which is 1,500 miles from the Iron Throne, which is where he wants to be.)
Season 1
Where is Petyr?
In Kings Landing, as Master of Coin.
What is Petyr doing to win the Iron Throne?
Step 1. Convincing a woman who loves him to poison her husband, who happens to be Hand of the King (offscreen).
Step 2. Telling that woman to write a letter to her sister, a woman he is in love with, to point the blame for the poisoning at the wife and brother of the current king (offscreen).
Step 3. Secretly getting the crown deep into debt with the same family that he just accused of poisoning the Hand of the King (offscreen).
Step 4. Agreeing to help the man of the woman he is in love with to investigate the fact that his best friend didn’t father the children everyone thinks he did.
Step 5. Betraying that same person after winning his trust and bringing about his own beheading.
Did this get Petyr on the Iron Throne?
No. No it did not.
Season 2
Where is Petyr?
In Kings Landing, still employed as Master of Coin, despite plunging the realm into crippling debt. Traveling to the Reach and Riverlands to negotiate alliances and prisoner exchanges.
What is Petyr doing to win the Iron Throne?
Step 6. Pledging allegiance to the younger brother of the person with the more legitimate claim to the throne, despite working for the current person who is on the throne, who he knows to be illegitimate.
Step 7. Lying to the woman he loves about the location of her daughter to secure the freedom of the person he tried to implicate in the poisoning death of the former Hand of the King.
Step 8. Arranging for a woman to be married to the illegitimate king, despite the King currently being marriaged to daughter of the woman he loves.
Step 9. Hitting on the daughter of the woman he loves after she is unceremoniously dumped by the illegitimate king for the bride that he arranged for him to marry.
Did this get Petyr on Iron Throne?
No.
Season 3
Where is Petyr?
Promoted to Lord of Harrenhal, Petyr is planning on arranging a marriage for himself and peacing out of King’s Landing (the town where the Iron Throne is) (which is the thing he wants).
What is Petyr doing to win the Iron Throne?
Step 10. Leaving his position as Master of Coin, his closest attachment to the crown.
Step 11. Proposing a marriage to the crazy woman who he convinced to poison her husband, who is in love with him, and who also happens to be the sister of the woman he loves, while also trying to get the daughter of the woman he loves to leave town with him.
Step 12. Leaving town without her.
Did this get Petyr on the Iron Throne?
Uhhhh. No.
Season 4
Where is Petyr?
In between King’s Landing and the Vale, trying his best not to consummate his marriage to the woman he suggested he himself marry.
What is Petyr doing to win the Iron Throne?
Step 13. Organizing the poisoning of the illegitimate king.
Step 14. Helping with the escape of the daughter of the woman he still loves (who was just recently murdered), ferrying her out of town into his protection at his mountaintop fortresses.
Step 15. Murdering the woman he arranged himself to be married to right after he marries her.
Step 16. Convincing the daughter of the woman he loved, who he just told he also loves, to lie for him to exonerate himself in the murder of the woman he married one day ago.
Did this get Petyr on the Iron Throne?
Does it sound like it did?
Season 5
Where is Petyr?
Chilling in the protection of the Vale, probably smoking a bowl, concocting one more foolproof plan to win the Iron Throne.
What is Petyr doing to win the Iron Throne?
Step 17. Marrying off the daughter he loves of the woman he loved to a murderous, sadistic bastard.
Step 18. Leaving town, allowing her to be brutally mistreated at the hands of said bastard
Step 19. Returning to the town he fled after he murdered the illegitimate king, and pledging allegiance to the mother of the King he killed, one who he accused to others of poisoning the Hand of the King, now promising to use the forces of the lady who he murdered to take back the castle where the daughter he now loves of the woman he loved is being held captive as the bride of the murderous, sadistic bastard who he just married her off to.
Step 20. Passing along a tidbit off information to the woman whose granddaughter he arranged to marry the illegitimate king he then killed, for her to use to arrest the woman he just pledged allegiance to.
Did this get Petyr on the Iron Throne?
No. No it fucking didn’t.
Season 6
Where is Petyr?
In the North.
What is Petyr doing to win the Iron Throne?
Step 21. Returning to the mountain castle he left to convince the son of the woman he killed to ride to the rescue of the daughter he loves of the woman he loved, to help rescue her from the murderous, sadistic bastard he set her up with.
Step 22. Using the forces of the impotent dude he instilled as leader after he killed his mother to help save the bastard brother of the daughter he loves of the woman he once loved.
Step 23. Asking her to marry him so the two of you can sit on the Iron Throne together, despite her having no claim to the Iron Throne.
Did this get Petyr on the Iron Throne?
Do ducks shit in little tiny diapers?
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