So why is everyone so damn uncomfortable? Both are old enough to give consent, to feel curious, to engage in sex - and, considering the history of this show, what Gendry and Arya do in that forge is a lot less problematic than most sex scenes we’ve seen before. When the two come together in Season 8, Arya is 18 years old on the show and Williams is 22 years old in real life. Gendry meanwhile was subjected to torture, near rape, and sent to live in exile for years, trying to hide from the Lannisters and survive long enough to be of service in the war against the Night King. The two shared a connection, they challenged each other, supported each other, and their separation deeply affected Arya, who would go on to train with the Faceless Men and seek revenge for the deaths of her family. Gendry was the person who comforted and protected Arya during a particularly difficult time in her life, taking the place of her brother Jon in many ways. Now Gendry’s older on the show (as is the actor who plays him, Joe Dempsie), but when the pair first met, friendship and a familial connection were all creators David Benioff and D.B. We’ve seen her mature on the series, overcoming impossible odds, witnessing horrendous violence, and yes, showing an interest in boys, the first being Gendry himself.
When Williams began her run on Game of Thrones, Arya was 11 years old. This is a young woman we’ve seen grow up over the course of the last eight years.
In fact, “Arya Stark age” and “How old is Maisie Williams” were trending searches in the hours following the show’s air. The biggest problem fans had with watching Maisie Williams show a bit of side boob on screen seemed to be the question of her age. We’ve long denied women their sexual freedom in all kinds of overt and insidious ways, but even with a growing movement of equality and empowerment helped along by movements like #MeToo and #TimesUp, the ripple effects of being suppressed by unfair societal standards are, at least subconsciously, still being felt.
We see it on full display anytime a young girl is scolded for wearing short shorts, or a woman is accused of “baring it all” on social media, or a female character is labeled a “whore” because she’s had multiple partners. It’s not a revelation, this idea that women aren’t allowed to have sexual agency. (Just think of the Warhammer jokes, the Needle puns, the “making steel … and other things, sing” innuendos.)īut the most-talked-about bit of the duo’s passionate embrace ended up revealing something darker than our sexual fantasies about Gendry’s poker and how well he uses it. It proved that we’re still not comfortable with women enjoying sex. Between any other couple on this show, that sex scene would’ve prompted memes about Gendry’s virility and Arya’s dominatrix kink. It began with Arya quizzing a flustered Gendry on his sexual history and it ended with her pushing him down on a heap of sacks and ordering him to “take his own bloody pants off.” It was hot, to say the least, and not because it took place in a literal forge.
The intimate exchange happened late in the episode, as Winterfell prepared to fight off the marching Army of the Dead. We’ve watched men shave each other’s nipples, a red witch give birth to a demon spirit, a Dothraki warlord rape his young bride, a man rape his sister next to the body of their dead son, a sadistic bastard rape a lady of Winterfell as his mutilated manservant looked on.īut oddly enough, the most uncomfortable sex scene the show has given fans - according to the internet - is the consensual romp between Arya Stark and Gendry the blacksmith in the second episode of the show’s final season, "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms." Over the course of eight seasons, we’ve seen tits and ass and orgies. The show’s first episode concluded with an incestual tryst between Cersei Lannister and her brother Jaime that ended when the latter pushed a young Bran Stark from a tower window. Game of Thrones has never been shy about sex.