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If you’re like me, then you are absolutely pissed that Littlefinger is not sitting on the Iron Throne by now…
SPOILER ALERT!!!
Lets be real. He is easily the best character on Game of Thrones and he is obviously the most clever. So why was Littlefinger killed at the season 7 finale? Here are the Top 3 Mistakes that Lord Baelish made that put him off his game and caused him to lose the Game of Thrones.
Chaos isn’t a pit. Chaos is a ladder. Many who try to climb it fail and never get to try again. The fall breaks them. And some are given a chance to climb, they cling to the realm or the gods or love. Only the ladder is real. The climb is all there is.
-Lord Petyr Baelish (Littlefinger)
#1 He Lost his Focus
In Littlefinger’s most iconic quote, he mentions that chaos is a ladder. He talks about how power can be attained by climbing higher on the ladder, but some get distracted from climbing or worse, get distracted and fall off the ladder, by simple things like the realm, gods, or love.
Lord Baelish fell prey to one of these distractions, and lost his focus off of his climb. He invested too much trust into Sansa Stark, revealing to her his true ambitions and his intentions of seizing the throne. He even revealed to Sansa how he got to where he is and told her the manipulative things he had to do to get there.
Out of all the people in Westeros (or Essos for that matter) he never once told information like that to anyone. Let alone ALL of his big secrets to ONE individual. This was the beginning of his downfall. He gave into the wants and desires of the flesh and heart by exploiting his position to someone he shouldn’t have…. out of love.
#2 He Didn’t Follow His Own Rules
Littlefinger’s biggest threat wasn’t an army. It wasn’t a dragon. It wasn’t even a white walker. Lord Baelish created his own worse enemy, Sansa Stark. By teaching Sansa everything that he knew (about money, power, manipulation, etc.) he was arming Sansa with the skills she needed to bring him down.
One such piece of advice, was that he taught her to imagine what was the worse intention that someone could have for doing something, and then plan to defend against it. Well, she took his advise! Against him! He gave her the knowledge and planning ability she needed to bring Lord Baelish to his knees.
Another one Petyr Baelish’s rules that he didn’t follow was to imagine every possible scenario. Good ones, bad ones, unexpected ones, and have a plan in place for them. He obviously didn’t plan for Sansa and Arya to plot against him and turn the trial into an execution for his own crimes. Had he followed his own rules, we might have seen “King Petyr Baelish, First of His Name, King of the Andals and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, and Protector of the Realm.”
#3 He Was Unaware of a Big Threat
Let’s be real… Its hard to manipulate someone to complete loyalty when they have a brother who can see through fricken time! Petyr Baelish was unaware, and therefore unable to plan against, Bran’s Three Eyed Raven abilities. It’s hard to be a good liar and manipulator when all your BS is being pointed out behind closed doors by Bran Stark. (Is he even a Stark anymore?)
Had Littlefinger been aware of Bran’s powers, he probably would have played his cards much differently. He knows when he would lose in a situation, and he would avoid all of those situations at all costs. Had he been aware that his greatest skills were worthless, even deadly to himself, by staying in Winterfell, he would have gone a different route in a different part of the world.
Conclusion
What do you think of these points? Do you agree with them? Smack down a comment below and tell me what you thing I should have added. I know that I am doing this more to help me mourn the loss of my favorite character, so I hope that this consoles you as well.
Thanks for reading! See you next season in Game of Thrones!
PS…. Maybe we’ll get to see some more of Littlefinger via Arya Stark! 😉
Why Petyr Baelish died | Did Littlefinger die? | Littlefinger Game of Thrones | GOT Lord Baelish death | why did they kill off Littlefinger? | Why Littlefinger should have won | Why Lord Baesh got killed off | What happened to Littlefinger? |
About Dick
Dick Polipnick is the Founder of Online Growth Systems, a media company that helps big-name brands turn their e-commerce businesses to profit and advises high-growth, venture-backed startups.
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s this how justice is done in the north? You accuse me of crimes, I deny them. So you cut my throat and let me die? Where is the king’s justice?
And why did HBO decide to kill him? Is this going to push the story somehow? No, they did it because they did not know what to do with it. He was one of the most valuable characters in previous seasons, but this season he just walked, smiled here and there and created an illusion of manipulative activity. Maybe, if he really did do at least something this season, that scene would not be so bad and more valuable.
And this HBO bullshit started S6E10. Look, we do not know what to do with these characters, so we just kill them for no reason. In books, if Martin kills a character, he does it for a reason, not because he does not know where to put them.
Am I the only one who thought this was a disappointing ending to Littlefinger? When you were not paying attention in class and everyone is looking at you? It’s not as if Sansa and Arya have knocked him down at his own game. They simply moved him.
His biggest mistake was being written by a chronically tardy author, who had to let TV writers finish his plotline.
Well, this is Petry from the series. The book character would never hand Sansa over to the Boltons.
In the books, Sansa stays with him in the Eagle’s Nest and Petyr plans to marry her to the Valley’s heir. With this, Petyr will have in his power the Fluvial Lands (for being supreme Lord of the Trident), of the Valley (manipulating Sansa and the heir) and still paving the way to be able to control the North.
Petyr delivered a fake Arya Stark to the Boltons. With this he may already accuse them of treason to the crown. He taking the North with the consent of the crown, may be appointed as the new lord or protector there (he tried to do this in the series, but using Sansa, a mistake).
With three regions under your control, taking the Iron Throne becomes easy. Especially when all other regions are facing major problems.
Porto Real is in trouble with the Militant Faith. Campina is in trouble with Euron Greyjoy. The Storm Lands is in trouble with the Young Griff. Dorne is quiet, but for the other regions, it is not a problem (taking into account that nobody knows the plan of Doran Martell). The Iron Islands are occupied.
Despite his ingenious planning and manipulation, Baelish is not incapable of making mistakes, nor is he above overplaying his hand if he is convinced of the superiority of his position, political or otherwise, which is a direct contrast to Littlefinger’s usual meek and cautious nature, proving himself not above arrogance. The first mistake was when he subtly made a jab at Cersei about her unnatural relationship with her brother Jaime, that knowledge is power, which resulted in Cersei nearly having him killed before deciding to remind him of his place. Another fatal flaw Baelish has is underestimating people. He remarked to Varys that Tyrion is an unworthy ally, seemingly underestimated Ramsay Bolton’s vile nature, wrongly believed that the North would not rally behind a “motherless bastard” like Jon Snow, and was initially skeptical of Bran Stark’s omniscience as the new three-eyed raven, the last of which led to his death.
rved that side in the first place when all is said and done, and nobody appears capable of trusting him.
Varys, in spite of appearing subservient and passive, is an extremely intelligent man, a master of deception, manipulation and calculation. Varys’s subtle and calculative nature is made more impressive by him owning the most prominent spy network in all of Westeros, which is only matched by the spy network of Petyr Baelish. Despite having a mutual rivalry and hatred for one another, both Baelish and Varys are incredibly similar: they appear to be sycophantic and meek, but are in fact shockingly ruthless and possess powerful intellect, they both have vast networks of personal spies, traitors and double agents that are entirely at their disposal, and they both rose to positions of great political power. Varys and Littlefinger have such a rivalry with one another so unusually complex that they are able to spar verbally with one another intensely without ever coming to blows. Instead they calmly insult one another as quickly and as precisely as two master swordsmen sparring to the death. However, while Littlefinger has a personal ambition to take all of the reachable power there is in the Seven Kingdoms for himself and eliminate anyone who obstructs him, Varys dedicates himself to be the ultimate kingmaker and is hell-bent on restoring what he sees as prosperity to Westeros for the sake of the people . For all the similarities in their means, the pair are antithetical to each other in their intended ends. Their origins are also significantly different: Littlefinger was born the heir to a noble house (albeit a lower-ranking one) whereas Varys was born a slave, a status he only escaped from after being left for dead following his castration.