Daenerys gets captured by another Dothraki hoard, which mirrors the cliff hanger end of her storyline in Dance with Dragons. Here, it picks right up with the Dothraki placing her in bondage and treating her as a slave. Unlike previous seasons where Daenerys becomes more empowered through the aid of her dragons, Khaleesar, advisors and Unsullied, she is completely powerless beyond her wits. This situation provides a great basis for her character growth as she must become independently strong and learn to be self sufficient.
It’s somewhat hinted that Daenerys will fight back against her captivity as she already demonstrates her control over the Dothraki language and expatiates on her prior marriage to Khal Drogo. The Khal she encounters, Khal Moro, does respect tradition and honors her past marriage by mandating that she will remain untouched. However, her sentencing is to live out the remainder of her days in a template in Vaes Dothrak with the other widows of former Khals.
There are some hints that Drogon is still free with him hovering as a huge beast over the villages of the Dothraki. Yet for Daenerys and the storyline in depending upon Drogon as a deux ex machina device cheapens her growth to become a proper ruler. Although now she loses her immediate power, there is a great opportunity for her to become more hands on in gaining respect through charisma, wisdom and intelligence that she has gained over the seasons.
Quite frankly, up until this point, Daenerys has slid down further on my scale as a ruler mostly because she’s played as a demanding, irritable and even somewhat entitled child. She thinks she’s self-aware (certainly far more than her brother and others like Queen Cersei) and has proven to be able to listen. Yet she’s always had some form of negotiating chip. Even in her denigration of her ex-husband, Hizdahr, in Season 5 Episode 9 during the fighting arena, she accuses Hizdahr hypocritically of ever being in combat first hand. Thus far, there has always been someone to champion for her, a representative.
I feel that Daenerys cannot gain the support of the houses and people on her own until she becomes more hands on. Even in Season 5, we see her high above the city, safe and isolated discussing with Ser Barristan Selmy how the city appears peaceful from above. Yet that is the exact issue with management/leadership. Most leaders sit perched high in the clouds, with lofty ideas but little to no concrete plan of implementing them. Yet their decree is delegated to people they think they could trust which leads to utter chaos because the leaders are too far away from the core problem.
Then there are worse problems when leaders surround themselves or are surrounded by ego feeding sycophants who have ulterior motives that usurp the leader’s power base. In Daenerys’ case, she has surrounded herself with both trusted and untrusthworthy people, which has lead to numerous issues. I don’t know if Daenerys will learn in current predicament how to evade this scenario, but it may come up depending on whom she encounters on her journey to Vaes Dothrak.
The other thing is that despite being a prisoner she has to view the Dothraki as a people with their own set of issues. Although the are essentially barbarians, they live in an even harsher setting than Westeros and probably face problems like famine, disease, etc. If she is able to figure out how to handle these issues, she may be able to win the hearts of these people over without the use of force. That’s an aspect of her character that I believe exist but she has not explored because she only thus far has implemented this vague abstract notion of ruling without doing exactly with what people require. For instance, she tries to bribe her way out of captivity through providing thousands of horses to Khal Moro or making vague promises of riches to other people. But it’s all talk at this point. And on top of that, are these the things that these people truly need?
Daenerys wants to break the wheel of vengeance and how society is governed under this hierarchical class system. Yet she doesn’t truly propose many concrete things and has not been pragmatic beyond just paying people off with the wealth she and her troops had pillaged from those she conquered. Being a princess and being a queen/ruler are far different things. She needs to work with concrete ideas, get into the action herself, perhaps even learn to fight rather than just talk or have others do her bidding.
Compare her to at the very least Aragorn from Lord of the Rings. Aragorn may have the birthright, but the key point that I feel earns him a lot of respect in people’s eyes is his hands on approach up to the point where he claims the crown. He managed to lead men to victory and made great personal sacrifice which garnered the respect and inspired those around him. How he rules thereafter is a different scenario but it’s one that I think George RR Martin does want to address, which is something that Daenerys hopefully comes into this season.