“Offended” is a great word to use. I was going to go into full rant mode about her, but based on the promo, I think I need to save that for next week.

I always thought Darth Sansa was a bit unearned by the show (see point #1 at the end). But I was actually slightly hopeful, because I’ve always seen Sansa’s arc as very slow and subtle development where she increasingly comes into a position to be able to use her empathy and intellect as a weapon. This actually hearkens back to advice that Petyr gave her:

“Everyone wants something, Alayne. And when you know what a man wants you know who he is, and how to move him”

So Book!Sansa becoming a Show!Marg player is not a completely unreasonable trajectory. One key difference though:

“The only way to keep your people loyal is to make certain they fear you more than they do the enemy.”

“I will remember, Your Grace,” said Sansa, though she had always heard that love was a surer route to the people’s loyalty than fear. If I am ever a queen, I’ll make them love me.

Sansa is a highly compassionate, which is demonstrated over and over, from the second she lays a hand on the Hound’s shoulder in AGOT. And she’s even compassionate to her “enemies”:

“Help him,” Sansa commanded two of the serving men. One just looked at her and ran, flagon and all. Other servants were leaving the hall as well, but she could not help that. Together, Sansa and the serving man got the wounded knight back on his feet. “Take him to Maester Frenken.” Lancel was one of them, yet somehow she still could not bring herself to wish him dead. I am soft and weak and stupid, just as Joffrey says. I should be killing him, not helping him.

So whatever Sansa is going to become, there’s every indication in the world that she is going to guided by “good” motivations. This is why when people were rooting for Darth Sansa to get into Winterfell and “make some Frey pies” (a suggestion I’ve seen), I cringed. Because Sansa is NOT the type of person to seek revenge through means as horrific as violating guest right and feeding the meat of the victims to both herself and their family (unknowingly).

That’s not to say Book!Sansa won’t get revenge. But time and time again it’s been made clear how much her empathetic nature guides her. You better believe she’d have damn good motivations in any action of hers.

But what’s distressing to me about Season 5′s plotline is…Darth Sansa had her agency stripped away again. Brienne’s bat-signal establishes the fact that Sansa is likely to be a maiden in need of rescue. And we can talk about how “this time Sansa’s in control,” but what part of her rolling her eyes and appearing actively upset at her marriage arrangement last episode was her “making Ramsay hers”? Even though they fast-forwarded through her character development and didn’t establish the skill-set she had on full display in 4x08, at least they gave her a degree of agency. And this plotline has just stripped it all away.

Truthfully, this might even be okay to stomach if there was any logic whatsoever in this plotline, but as I explained before, there absolutely isn’t. D&D blithely subbed Sansa into a victim role because they thought it’d be more interesting to the audience. It’s disgusting.