The evolution of Game of Thrones’ Cersei Lannister, explained by her costumes
The very last season of Game of Thrones is upon us. Starting on April 14, the pop culture phenomenon will attract zillions of visitors, questioning which characters will live on to the end. Honestly, the probabilities of Cersei Lannister making it out alive are not exquisite (Vegas oddsmakers are taking bets now not merely on her demise, however, who precisely will kill her), but hers has been a hell of an arc to watch. Her character is one of the most complicated on display. Is she a heartless villain and sociopath? Is she worthy of empathy? Rather sure to each.
Through it all, Game of Thrones costume dressmaker Michele Clapton has contemplated Cersei’s reports and own family history through her intricate costumes, on which each element is strategic and significant. Cersei tells us plenty about what’s happening in her lifestyle via her dresser, much like her favorite punching bag, Sansa Stark, does. “Cersei has usually spoken plenty through her costumes, often due to the fact she didn’t have a voice. On Game of Thrones, you’ve got to mention so much in so little time. I use costumes on Cersei to get across her temper and how she’s feeling visually,” Clapton instructed Elle in 2017.
Spoiler, Aquaman
Cersei, played through Lena Headey, has achieved some terrible matters. She watched coldly as her brother driven a small child out a window … Because the boy stuck them having intercourse. All three of her kids with Robert Baratheon, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, are in reality the made of her incestuous affair. Or as a substitute, former Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, as she convinces her other lover to kill her husband by giving him an excessive amount of wine and letting a wild boar finish him off.
That’s merely the primary season — her atrocities move on and on. And yet! She’s also had many injustices and indignities heaped on her. Her father, Tywin Lannister, didn’t certainly love her, viewing her as a marriageable pawn and infant-making system to boom Lannister’s energy. She was conscripted right into a loveless marriage to an alcoholic king who pined for Jon Snow’s lifeless, secret, actual mom. All 3 of her children died tragically. She was compelled to stroll down the streets naked in public by using non-secular zealots. By season 8, her handiest companions are a big zombie who tortures human beings and a creepy guy who lives within the basement.
Cersei is not like Sansa Stark, whose conduct and cloth cabinet frequently emulates those around her. Circumstances, her Lannister loyalty, and her own — often horrible — choices shape Cersei and affect her garments, hair, and bearing. Here’s what her costumes tell us about her man or woman, damaged down into three eras of Cersei:
Queen consort and Queen regent
When we meet Cersei within the first few seasons, her fashion is traditionally female: flowing, wavy hair, colorful robes, frequently worn kimono fashion. Her sexuality is a supply of power for her, as it’s the only electricity she has at that point. While she has little sexual heat over her husband, Robert Baratheon, she has a top-notch effect on Lannister guys: her brother Jamie, her first cousin, and real fuccboi Lancel, whom she uses to help her kill Robert. With Robert’s demise, her son, Joffrey, is installed on the throne, bringing her closer to electricity.
Lena Headey makes a case for compassion in the direction of Cersei, telling Time in 2017, “As we’ve grown to realize her a chunk more, we see that she’s a girl surviving in a sincerely s–tty global desperate to be heard, pronouncing something seven instances whilst a person says it once. … With Cersei and Jaime, we’ve continually talked about it — Cersei’s always desired to be him. Therefore, for her, that courting is of completion. There’s been envy because he became born with privilege just for being a man.”
We see her carrying red, a Lannister signature, and usually an electricity color, a piece within the starting. Still, once Joffrey is established on the throne, and they begin feeling more powerful, the shade suggests up more consistently. Clapton informed Entertainment Weekly that this was when Cersei started to “emphasize her Lannister strength.” We also begin seeing armor info on her robes, which at this factor she nonetheless wears as decoration, like this sternum armor corset:
During this period, she wears huge lion heads on the entirety, the image of the Lannister clan. It seems on her necklaces, belts, and decorations. You can see it twice at the above appearance, in both her choker and armor. As the show’s embroiderer Michele Carragher says on her website, even the embroidery becomes extra armor-like. Cersei is a Lannister; pay attention to her roar.
Things begin to get exciting in season three when Margaery Tyrell comes to Westeros to marry Joffrey. She is young, appealing, a favorite of the citizens, and a threat to Cersei’s power, due to the fact they each want to apply Joffrey to their gain. “When she’s battling with Margaery, who wears much less and less to reveal her adolescents, Cersei wore an increasing number of extra ornate dresses,” Clapton informed Time. Thus starts offevolved one of the nice sartorial periods within the display, mainly for style nerds. “Margaery’s in brilliant opposition with Cersei. It’s almost like style combat between them; that’s quite humorous,” Clapton told me in an interview for Fashionista in 2013.
