between never forgiving and being someone who can

It's also ridiculous to blame her for their actions as grown adults, especially when the vast majority of the time, they don't listen to her. You can blame some things on her for sure. she was, objectively not a good mother, even if there are valid reasons for why she wasn't, especially at the beginning (the same way we should not be blaming alicent for these grown mens decisions, we can't blame everything bad alicent does on the people who harmed her when she was younger too. When she becomes an adult, and can make her own decisions, the responsibility of her actions rests with her) but she didn't raise them like cersei does joffery. She doesn't encourage their violent or sexually abusive behaviors and say they can have and do whatever they want because they're her sons. And even then, aegon and aemond are grown men, and they are choosing to behave that way, which means they are responsible for their actions. Not alicent.

The other argument is that she created this mess and sent them to war so she has no right to suddenly change her mind. which is absurd because 1) she's literally the only one on team green who is actively against a war and tries to make peace, multiple times, while still keeping aegon on the throne initially. It's aemond and daemon who actually kickstart the war. Mainly daemon when he gets jahaerys killed. 2) people are allowed to grow and if you realize you made a mistake that is hurting people, you can and should do your best to stop and fix it. That doesn't make you a hypocrite, it means you're repenting and trying to make things right.

"she's just trying to save herself" sure that might be a part of it, but she's also trying to save her daughter and granddaughter, arguably the most innocent in the entire show.

There are so many other valid things to criticize alicent for, but y'all choose this, the fact that she sold out her sexually abusive and violent sons, in an effort to save her daughter and granddaughter.

I've seen men say some insane things, like being okay with killing a baby and/or her mother, being upset that the mom killed her son because he went after a woman who just gave birth rather than her when she pleaded with him to, or being okay with the person who killed the person protecting the mother of their child because "he didn't know she was protecting them" nevermind the fact that he didn't have to since he had already passed. I've already known that men have this desire to be loved unconditionally, which seems sweet on the surface, but most mean they want that love and care despite bad and even abusive behavior. But they really exposed themselves during this season. There are nuances in the discussion of whether the actions someone did in the games were morally justified or not, but I think it's pretty commonly accepted that killing a mother and her child, or even just a baby, are morally reprehensible regardless of the circumstances. You'd need a damn good reason to even make the argument that it can be justified. When it comes to the mom and son, I think it's always morally wrong to hurt or kill your child, however it can be justified depending on your moral beliefs that she was willing to make the sacrifice of committing a morally wrong action in order to do an objectively good thing (saving a mother and her child). No she didn't need to have the same level of connection to know that letting him kill the mother was wrong, and letting it happen would not only be letting him get away with something vile, but also letting him turn into a person like his father. Keep in mind, he had an opportunity to kill a player before he ran into them. He hesitated either because 1) he was more afraid of the man fighting back, or 2) he felt sympathetic to the man when he mentioned his wife and kids. Aside from the time limit, it's convenient that he chose to hesitate only with the man pleading for his life than with a woman who was already weak from just giving birth. To me, that's being a coward and lacking moral integrity.

333 is interesting to me, because so many men felt like they related to him and felt sympathetic towards him. While I think he's an interesting character, close to how I felt with sang-woo, he's by no means a good man. I've seen men say 222 deserved her outcome because she was "mean" to him. I've seen them justify what he did to the woman protecting 222 by saying he didn't know any better. Here's my counter argument. At no point did 222 owe him anything, not her trust, her love, or kindness. Even if he was perfect (he wasn't, even before the games) she didn't deserve anything bad just because she was less than kind and distrusting in her behavior towards him. He gave her absolutely no reason to trust him either. From ghosting her before the games, all the way to killing 120 in a game he already passed because of his greed. Idc whether he knew it was her or not, killing someone like that just because of greed can't be morally justified.

As for the end, I think even some men have a hard time defending 333. Rather the arguments I've seen were about 456, choosing to sacrifice himself. (Some were just okay with killing the kid regardless of what stage the game was at. I'd say stay away from people like that) some bring up a valid argument that 456 has his own daughter to take care of, and wonder why he sacrificed himself when he did. My counter argument, though I won't say it's something I'll blame another person for disagreeing with necessarily, is that it's because of his daughter that he feels compelled to do it. The little baby girl probably reminded him of her, and he knew even if he wasn't there, his daughter would be okay. Maybe he thought she'd be better off even, as he knew he was never the best father no matter how much he tried. Maybe he hoped the baby would live a good life despite the horror she was born into. He's not a bad person, he's a hopeful one. He wants to see the best in people (his PTSD takes control for a bit, but his overall character has always felt compelled to help others when he can and do as little harm as possible in the games) even when he's betrayed, he wants to put as much good in the world as he can, because he's already witnessed so much cruelty. It literally would not have made sense for him to kill the baby with how he acted in the games to that point.

But like, think about Dina's family being religious, and her struggle to maintain her faith even after they're gone. Imagine when Seth throws out "in a church" and it reminds her of her mother, how her mother had told her "no, you like boys" when she tried telling her mom how she felt. Wondering if her mom would agree with Seth.

Then her and Joel going on patrol together and potentially talking about what happened at the dance. Her asking how he came around to accepting Ellie, and wanting to know if it was possible her mom would've been able to do the same, and knowing she'll never actually know because she's gone. Her sister too.

And Joel, trying to reassure her that she didn't do anything wrong, because he may not love her the way he does Ellie, but he definitely considers her family. More than anything, Joel wants Ellie to be safe and loved and happy. He knows after their talk the night before that Dina could do that.

Imagine him giving her hope that things will be okay, that she isn't wrong or bad for who she loves, only to have all of that ripped away from her when they run into Abby. How guilty she must feel for not being strong enough to stop them from killing him. (How she maybe thinks of her eight year old self running as fast as she can to save her mom and sister but by the time she made it, it was too late to do anything other than kill the man who took her family from her)

and on top that, there's the guilt of not being honest with Ellie about what she knows probably eating her up inside every time she visits because they told her not to upset Ellie while she recovers.

And they're both probably being distant, and while I know Ellie loves Dina, traumatic events like that can and probably did consume her for a long time and she probably never took time to see how Dina was doing. She went through all of that too, was probably just as terrified and traumatized.

I don't even blame him for what happened with his family. From other Korean content creators, and some of my own research, realistically he probably didn't have a choice once the king requested him to live at the palace as a performer, as refusing the king was dangerous. And from the scene, I think he was unaware his mom and sister wouldn't be allowed to go with him (because why would he bring them with him if he knew they wouldn't be allowed inside? The scene shows them being stopped at the gate, meaning they had to have gone with him, which would be unnecessarily cruel, and I highly doubt he would regret leaving them if he was purposely causing them pain.) even if he didn't actually have a choice, he probably still felt guilty. Similar to survivors guilt, maybe? Or maybe, he would have made the choice to leave them even without the threat of refusing the king because he was that desperate to escape his living situation, and he knows that, so he feels regret about it. Idk. I love that we don't know for sure. Its a complex situation and I think, while selfish, it wasn't inherently an evil decision. Desperate people make bad choices sometimes, and that doesn't make them bad people. It makes them flawed human beings. So yeah, I don't blame him for that.

What I do blame him for is one, participating in stealing people's souls just so he can forget the memories (I understand his reasoning, and it sucks he was going through that, but it doesn't justify killing people) and two, probably the thing that bothers me the most, is that he used what rumi told him in a really vulnerable moment, threw it in her face and exposed her in a really violating way in front of thousands of people, including her demon hunter friends that, for all he knew, would try to kill her when they found out. Which was the plan from the beginning. He felt conflicted as he got to know her, sure, and he had to be tormented into falling back in line, but his plan since he found her patterns was to figure out her shame and use it to destroy her. That's why he tried to talk to her the first time. He wasn't being genuine when he said she could talk to him and that he was the only one who could understand. He was trying to manipulate her. This isn't to say I think he's completely bad. He redeems himself at the end, but I also think a relationship between them would've needed way more time (that they obviously don't get) in order to work through everything and rebuild trust for it to be healthy.

I think his ending was perfect as it was, narratively speaking. Both rumi and jinu get their happy ending. Just not together. After 400 years of being tormented with his shame, jinu finally gets to rest. And he gets to do so after redeeming himself by performing a selfless action to protect rumi, the girl who helped him get his soul back. And rumi learns that she is in fact worthy of love and acceptance.