It's kinda funny how Gaia spent all of Kratos life watching him and getting the perfect scenario to manipulate him and then she screwed it all up last second in the first scene of god of war 3. If she kept her mouth shut or atleast acted like she was trying to save Kratos then she probably wouldn't have died. Honestly I don't know what was the biggest throw. Gaia just suddenly smack talking Kratos for literally no reason or Zeus who literally had to do nothing to stop pandora box from being opened and somehow failed at that.

Gaia: Spends two games and some number of expanded universe media carefully training an attack dog conditioned to respond to betrayal with total destruction of you and everyone you love

Also Gaia: Betrays him

One thing the games don’t really address is that the attack on Olympus is the last time in the series until Ragnarok that Kratos ever commands any troops in batte. So when Gaia tells him in GoW 2 that she wants him to lead them into war against Zeus, she’s appealing to the general he was, and when she betrays him, it’s not only the betrayal of a mother figure, but also of a soldier against their commanding officer. Really, she committed every form of treachery it’s possible to commit against one person.

with how easily she invades his visions in the second game we cant ignore the possibility that Kratos' visions have always come from her, or at least that she constantly put the gas pedal n them.  While i agree that her whole "betrayal" of kratos scene wasn't written the best i do think it encapsulates her character as someone builds long reaching grand plans to allow for a moment of opprutunity but when the moment arises completely fumbles.  She wouldn't have had to overthrow 3 god kings if she ever really had a chance/want to rule herself, she has zero follow through.

I think Gaia betraying Kratos when she was just 1-shot by a lightning bolt was just a heat-of-the-moment kind of deal. She completely lost her composure, got a reality check of her own weakness and probably was grasping at straws how she is actually in control, by pretending to assert her dominance over the next best bystander (Kratos). Odin had a very similar crashout.

It's worth noting, during the beginning of the boss fight against the sisters of fate, one of the sisters tells kratos that gaia had poisoned him with her lies.
That's good foreshadowing

Linda Hunt's portrayal of Gaia is among the all-time greats

It’s most telling that Gaia is one of the first betrayers in the entire Greek mythos, which spiralled into a legacy of betrayal amongst the titans and Olympians

I think the god of war greek trilogy can be explained as "One often meets their destiny on the road they take to avoid it."

Gaia in the beginning of GOW 2: "remember Kratos, dying is gay..."

00:41 The three of them weren't just any three kings of gods. They were her husband, her son and her grandson respectively. Moreover, Kratos is technically her great-grandson. Had he become the next King of Gods, I wouldn't be surprised if Gaia wouldn't be satisfied by his ways of ruling or making decisions that wouldn't be in her favour, so she would try to overthrow him, likely using Kratos' child against him; thus continuing the cycle of generational trauma amongst her descendants.
That was just something that crossed my mind. I'm sure Kratos wouldn't want to become the next King of Gods, let alone let anyone get that title, especially Gaia.
Also, in GoW3 final fight she yells:" Father and son will die together!" However in an ironic turn of events, only grandmother and grandson died that day.

IRL, I do think that Gaia's betrayal was a to clear the way for the manipulative Athena.
In story though, I think Gaia's betrayal of Kratos had a number of origins. First she likely had however many thousands of years to come up with the plot she did, to manipulate one of Zeus' sons to gain the Thread of Fate and bring the Titans back for round two against Olympus. After that she was forced to think on her feet and she just wasn't flexible enough to do that while under pressure. Second, she drastically underestimated the Gods. She thought that time would weaken them, make them easy to defeat, only to realize that the Gods still were legitimately powerful. Third, she did consider Kratos to be nothing but a pawn to obtain the power to travel through time. When she had all the time and energy in the world she could mask herself and play to Kratos ego and tell him everything he wanted to hear, BUT when everything started falling apart and she was put under pressure to try and salvage a failing battle, she just couldn't muster the energy to care about this pathetic little godlings petty revenge anymore.

“Babe wake up, Fatbrett uploaded a new GoW video.”

It never fails to amaze me how many villains in this series end up destroying themselves and other villains, directly and indirectly

I always had a feeling with the third game that the reason she instantly betrays Kratos is she believes herself bigger than she is. She believes that Zeus wielding the Blade of Olympus is why the Titans lost. So now, without the blade on his side, the titans should win. With some of their 'stronger' members still alive, they should win. She is full of ego and it is that hubris that causes her to fail. "If only I can get to him, I can crush him easily." When climbing the mountain, she knows it'll be difficult, which is why she has Kratos on her side. He can help her, he can kill someone. Then he kills Poseidon, and she becomes a little worried, but it's nothing.

So when he cries out for help, she refuses. Her falling would hurt him, as he's riding her. But him falling means delaying her plans, and she can't have that. I suspect she saw some level of the future, and knows she has to climb up the mountain and will do so. So, she doesn't 'need' Kratos anymore, so why keep the pawn if it is to die. After all, he was going to kill himself before, now she no longer needs him, he'll likely do it for her.

Then he doesn't, and he cuts her hand off, and she is betrayed. So, she makes it known to others that she is to be considered dead, so that she can have the element of surprise again. Which, after Kratos has killed all others, leaves Gaia to being there, at the end. Perhaps, a master plan, killing them both to rule what is left after Kratos did her dirty work for her. But, her final plan fails.

13:51 Michael Clarke Duncan was such a great actor, loved his emotional performance in the green mile, had no idea he was Atlas. May he rest in peace.

I think the Ancient Greeks actually did view Gaea in that way, in the sense that she was the nurturing mother of all things, but also the bringer of terrible natural disasters and that’s why she’s so temperamental. (Also, I’ve long believed that Gaea, being essentially the narrator of a lot of the Greek God of War games, since she’s the one telling the story, she’s also the one who’s the most biased into spinning the story of Kratos into something that she wants him to be, a monster who kills indiscriminately and one that can get Gaea everything she wants. And that’s why when we get to the Norse games, especially in Valhalla, it starts showing Kratos in a better light, and more about his perspective than that of someone trying to manipulate him and the audience into feeling a certain way about him.)

I think the reason why Gaia abandoned kratos is that this is a younger version of her who is more arrogant then the older one

Shoutout to Linda Hunt, the voice behind Gaia in the OG God of War series. Can't be God of War without her narrating voice that feels like a grandma telling a tale to her children 🥰

Intrestingly in the orignal mythology it was Gaia who created Uranus, perhaps so he could be her original conduit, and he was the first to defile her will