I think you should rewatch the show because she's been burning and tortuing people to prove a point time and time again.

I think your heart is set on this being bad writing so you're not remembering everything that Dany has said and done throughout the series. Her character has been all about being impulsive, burning people to prove a point, and being talked down by her advisors.

Maybe you don't think it's necessary to burn women and children, but A she's Targaran, you know fire and blood and flip a coin and all that, and B she's proving a point to the entire Seven Kingdoms. That's everyone watching including Jon Snow and his supporters including the towns people, the northerners, the people she knows do not trust her and want to put Jon on the throne and may be conspiring to do as others close to her already have.

If people see you as such a dire threat that no matter what they do, even just walking on the streets as an unarmed peasant - gets you burned alive - then what you've done is broadcast to your subjects that their survival absolutely depends on them removing you from power and that they have nothing to lose in trying.

They've already tried to overthrow her. Her throne is already under threat from within. Jon Snow is an imminent threat to her and the townspeople love her. Is the daughter of the Mad King, Daenarys Targaryen, the Mother of One remaining Dragon, whom the god flipped a coin about, who has been burning people her whole life, who is constantly being talked down by her advisors, who is betrayed by those advisors, who now has no advisors left, really going to urge caution to herself now after repeatedly urging fire and blood in the past?

You're just nitpicking now in order to continue in the line that D&D fucked everything up.

I mean, saying sure it makes sense she burned the keep and the soldier but not the townspeople? She considers them to have betrayed her too, in Mereen the people rose up against the masters, these people have stuck with the Usurpers her whole life. She doesn't think of them as innocents.