For those of you still bitter over the “Game of Thrones” ending, Lena Headey just added a bit more fuel to the fire by admitting she “wanted a better death” than the one Cersei Lannister got.
In the show’s penultimate episode — spoiler warning for the one or two of you who somehow haven’t seen it — Daenerys (via her last remaining dragon) burned Red Keep and much of King’s Landing to the ground, and, absolutely, pathetically defeated, Cersei spent her final moments in the arms of her brother, Jaime, as they were both crushed by the Red Keep’s collapsing ceiling.
That outcome rubbed a lot of fans the wrong way — not because people wanted Cersei to win the game of thrones, but because after multiple seasons outmaneuvering her enemies and allies alike, they felt it was a bit anticlimatic (despite the incredible destruction). Headey’s thoughts when she read that ending? Well, they were mixed.
“I will say I wanted a better death,” she admitted in an interview published Sunday by The Guardian. “Obviously you dream of your death. You could go in any way on that show. So I was kind of gutted. But I just think they couldn’t have pleased everyone. No matter what they did, I think there was going to be some big comedown from the climb.”
This also isn’t the first time that Headey has talked about Cersei’s demise. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly last month, she said she had always hoped that Cersei would have “a big piece or fight with somebody,” but warmed up to what the writers had come up with after talking with “Game of Thrones” co-star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.
“The more we talked about it, the more it seemed like the perfect end for her,” says Headey. “They came into the world together and now they leave together.” In fact, the actress explains, “It’s maybe the first time that Cersei has been at peace.”